The Portland daily press., 1888-08-16
READY WIT.
Some Famous Repartees from Men
famous and Obscure.
Chambers Journal.l

sion Of ready wit does not seem desirable, for
nothing Is of more use in an emergency than
the ability to return"a Roland for an Oliver"
in such way as to extinguish an opponent.
But the art Of retaliating skillfully is by no
means universal. Perhaps this is as well,
considering the proneness of rapartee to de-
generate into maliciousness; and it is not
difficult to imagine how much more disagree
able the world would be if every one in 1t
were Douglas Jerrold or Horne Tooke.
None Of the professions seem more devot-
ed to ready wit than that Of the law; and,
Judging from the following story, this devo-
tion is of no recent origin. 1t is related that
on one occasion Sir Nicholas Bacon was
about to pass Judgement upon man who
ishable by death: but the culprit pleaded for
the Judge. aHow is thatP" he was asked.
my lord. " was the reply, your name is Ba-
con, and mine is Hog, and hog and bacon have
trre,5 answered Sir Nicholas; "but as hog is
not bacon until 1t has hung, until you are
hanged you are no relation of mine"
Still more to the point is an anecdote told
regarding two. opposing barristers. The law
yer for the defence was so severe upon the
prosecutor that the latter rose and asked:
"Does the learned counsel think me a fool? ?"
The retort was prompt "My friend wishes
to know Ii consider him q fool and in re-
ply to his question / can only say that am
not prepared to deny it,
There are many instances of passages Of
arms between bench and bar, but this one
may be new to most of our readers. At the
close Of heightened wrangle between a
judge and prominent council, the former
said; swell. sir, If you do not know how to
conduct yourself as gentleman, am sure
can't teach vou To- which the harrister
mildly replied 9That is SO, my lord
Occasionally, however, the yotaries of the
law have the tables turned upon them, as In
the case OF the lawyer who. driving along a
country road, asked woman who was go
ing In the same direction the way to his des-
tination. She told him, and added that, as
she was going part Of the journey, she would
point out the way. "An right, my good
Woman said the lawyer, lump up-better
miles, the woman thanked him for the drive
descended, and he asked how much further
he.had to 60. "Oh,"e she answered, you
passed the place you want two or three
miles back but as thought bad company
legal gentleman certainly deserved the les
son, and it is to be hoped that he profited by
Parliamentary elections usually afford a
good field for the exercise Of wit. While q
nSSis met Sny S xss who decsred @ srsey that he
would sooner vote for the devil than for
him." I've not the slightest doubt of it, my
friend, said the the candidate quietly; but
in the event of your friend not coming for
another Of the same kind At an open polit-
ical meeting man cried, "Hurrah for Jack
son = to which . bystander retorted, "Hur:.,
rah for q jackassw "All right, my mar" )"
exclaimed the first speaker; you can hurrah
for your favorite candidate, and I'll dc the
same for nina >,
An enviable quickness of rapartee was
shown by a French actor when the head Of a
goose was thrown upon the stage. Advanc-
to the fo0tlights, he said Gentlemen, If
be glad to restore it at the conclusion Of the
piece" Deseryedly severe also was the re-
ply Of Descartes to a nobleman, who, seein z
that he enjoyed the pleasures of the table re-
marked Il see, sir, that philosophers can
asEsd dn6aSgs T. good c1ss
agine that Providence intended the good
things Of this earth only for the foolish and
OF wit bordering on the malicious there are
many examples, and some of the rapartees
are. fully deserved, while others are only cal
culated to give pain. Among the latter is
one told at the expense of an elderly French
widow who had fallen in love with young
n0bleman, whom she was never tired of
praising to her friends as handsome as one
q lady who heard her and who was possibly
jealous: he Is mnskateer, and you are Tscen-
Much more merited than the above, prob
ably, was the answer given by Foote to a dis
sipated Duke who asked him In what new
''Ge soberl" imam about town" said to
young lady: "No, am not exactly en-
gagged, but have the refusal Of two or three
girls. He undoubtedly deserved the crush
have ssRee them ara you mean yo
The tourist, also, who said to an idle Skye
man, why do you lie there all day with
your hands In your p0ckets?" must have
been taken aback by the cool reply: "Cause
sne nasna thsn, been far enouth south to learn to
Ready wit cannot be said to be natural to
youth, Tor the answers given by precocious
schoolboys are not witty, being usually the
outcome either Of misunderstanding or of
.,cneek. afsl There are exceptions, however,
was meant by divers diseases" and was
rather surprised when one of the boys ans
wered, Water in the head" A little dot Of
girl inquired Of her mother the meaning OF
Atlantic "Does trans always mean cross.
mammal" she then asked. "Yes," replied
her mother; "but don't bother me any more. 7
Then guess transparent, means a cross
parent, was the conclusion the unconscious
little humorist came to as she relapsed into
The Lord Provost of certain well-known
city in the North had daughter married to
gentleman Of the name of Baird; and
speaking OF names to several friends, he hap
pened to remark: my grandmother was a
husband and my mother Man." these hav-
Ing been the maiden names Of the ladies'.
cMby, In that case" said the celebrated DR..
Gregory, who was present, 1--WE may the less
yiul, wonder at your daughter having got a
Turning from expressed repartees. we
ind that there can be no less wit in the man
ner In which writers subscribe themselves.
For instance, we have it upon record that,
when Glengarry claimed the chieftainship
of the Macdonald clan, the general acknowi-
edged chief wrote to him as follows:
My Dear Glengarry: As soon as you can
prove yourself my chief, 1 shall be ready to
acknowledge you. In the meantime | am
Yours, MACDONALD.
TnIs letter may have suggested to Benja-
min franklin the note he wrote to friend
In England when the American colonies de-
clared their Independence, and which closed
thus.
You and were long friends. You are now
my enemy, and am
Yours, b. FRANKLIN.
During the last half of the eighteenth CEN
tury the governments Of the day frequently
kept themselves in power by bribing and
corruptlng members of Parliament; and
this was the case during the debates on the
india bill, when the opposition, led by Fox,
found its majorities steadily decreasing.
This, 1t was known. was the work Of the
Secretary to the Treasury, John Robinson,
who used both places and money to carry
out the ministerial policy. One evening
Sheridan, speaking of the decrease said |:
'This Is not to be wondered at, Mr.. Speaker,
when member is employed to corrupt every
body to obtain votes. "'Who is it? Name him
or witbdawi" rose fiercely from all parts of
the House. Sheridan saw that he was In a
predicament. but he was equal to the emer-
gency. "Sir," he said. .sit would be an uE-
pleasant and an invidious thing to name the
person, and therefore shall not do 1t. But
don suppose, sir, that l refrain because
there Is any difficulty in naming him II could
90 that, sir, as soon as you could say Jack
Robinson"
Sheridan's ready wit was eoualled some
years ago by another prominent politician on
the occasion of the Derby being won by a
French horse. The Frenchmen present. as
was natural, cheered vociferously, and not
content with that, one of them shouted,
"Waterloo avengedw ''Yes," said the
statesman, who happened to hear the re-
mark, 'syou ran well in both casesl''
c(MaMS: :SsEEN1E