The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1886-01-30
Josh BILLINGS"
Various Tributes to His Genial
Quaint Worth.

"A more sweet and delightful nature
than Josh Billings Henry Shaw never
lived" says ID. r. Locke, of the Toledo
Blade, in his editorial tribute to the
dead humorist. He was singular
compound of simplicity and shrewdness.
He was more q philosopher than humor-
list. His sayings will outlive those of
Poor Richard, and they ought to. for
his was a pleasant philosophy that had
nothing of meanness in it.
He did not write as profession.
Writing adopted him. He originally
wrote his sayings because he had to.
The public got taste for them and
compelled him to write them. He was
not money-maker. and yet he was in
a small way. When he found goodness
he made the public pay. He was very
shrewd IN his investments, so that he
left his family competency.
HE captivated on the platform be-
cause his manner exactly fitted his mat
ter. His lectures were nothing but a
collection of sayings carefully and
artistically arranged so as to appear
without form. He was always popular
because his talk was like his writings
intended to discourage meanness and
to be helpful to those who needed help.
There was not mean or selfish thing
in him. and his work was merely a re-
flex of himself He was an originator
nd IL,
in taking column and boiling it down
so as to get it into two lines. His work
was converting ashes into potash.
He was all in all delightful man,
and was in private life what he was on
the platform and in print. He never did
a mean thing, and never had an enemy
among good men"
HE was man no one could know
we'll. said Milward Adams, of Central
Music Hall, Toledo. II asked him once
why he did not stand up and talk to his
audience, and he replied: We'll, sir,
old as am, and as long as l have been
before the public, / never go on the
stage but l am so nervous and fright
ened that don't know who I am for
the next twenty minutes Do you
know he used to conduct most all of his
business correspondence by postal card,
with his communication on it mostly
printed; and the characteristic thing
about this was that in the corner of the
card was good picture of Josh in chair
while beside him, with cheek against
his, was donkey around whose neck
Josh had an arm. He announced his
terms in this fashion: i will lecture
for fun and one hundred dollars thrown
in And that's what he got, unless
visiting some small place where they
couldn't pay as much. He picked up
his wisdom as he went He told me
once. when ! asked him where he got
his ideas for all his sayings, that he got
them everywhere. looking at this thing
and at that as he Travelled from place to
place. lie never seemed conscious that
he was humorist."
Some years ago there was published,
for advertising purposes, letter which
Josh Billings wrote to gentleman in
the way Of autobiography. 1t was in
part as follows:
was born in Berkshire County. Mass.
during the nineteenth century, of highly re-
spectacle parents, and owe what little sue.
cess have attained to the wisdom of INV
father.and the piety of my mother. At the
fragrant age of fifteen set nv face west
ward and followed ii until stood upon the
banks of the wide Missouri without anv
plans for life, and but little better in feelings
than cheerful vagrant For twenty-five
years the various wanderings of a border
life made me acquainted with scenes and en-
periences better calculated to cut the char
acter sharp, than to refine it, and IL escaped
without scars, IL was simply because the
susceptibility of my nature looked upon
most things In this life as simply Joke
In common with most Americans who have
TO push early to test their own wings on
gagged in all the usual enterprises of n front
1ersman, having been at times a land -hunter
farmer, drover steamboat captain and ever
pioneer, for partially Organized an enter
prise as early as 1885 to cross the Rocky
Mountains This last-named enternr;sa vvas
q profound failure, but its incention and
preliminary arrangements afforded mo ono
of the choicest relics of my early sdx,en-
lures, and that is three letters. now in INV
possession, written to me personallv nv
Henry Clay, John Quincy Adams and Martin
Van Buren,, recommending me and the
undertaking to the kind care ana patrouace
of all people and all nations.
sf.Lmay De said to ever have commenced
literary career, IL certainly was much
Jator In life than most men commit the folly.
for had passed forty-ive years before
ever wrote q line for the public eve What
little reputation may have made has been
accomplished within the last nine years and
/ consider that owe all Of this little to the
Kindness OF the world at large who while
fh0v have discovered but little wit or even