Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-01-03
NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS.

! NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS.
Excuses Two Men Offered for Not Keeping
Theirs-People Who Enjoy the Old
| Jokes-A Clowns Experience = An
| EDglishman Laughing in Hades.
| WRITTEN FOR THE DIspArcH.l
] This being the season of the year for
making great resolutions, I've gone into the
business myself to my usual extent-that is,
I've re-adopted all those of the past few
| years and finished by a firm resolve to keep
| them. Individual resolutions are like those
| OF Congress and other legislat tive bodies
| they're not worth the talk it takes to tell
| them, unless they're boosted along by
good strong enacting clause. In this respect
! they also resemble n donkey-any mention
| of Congress always brings donkeys to my
| mind.
| knew fellow who once resoluted so hard
on New Years Day that his wife stopped
him; she was so afraid that if he kept on
| there wouldn't be anything left for the
Bible to do, After supper he went out, just
for a minute, to tell friend a message he
| had forgotten. When he reached home, at
O'Clock in the morning, the whole police
force of the village was helping him along,
while there was O smell in the air as if a big
distillery had exploded
"Oh, john" moaned his wife. as he spread
himself all over the stair carpet, and she
held the camphor bottle under his nose,
"what's become OF all those good resolu-
tions?"
"I've got em (hic) all, m DEAR" was the
reply, "but (hic) they're so Young yet that 1
didn't (hic) like to put em (hic) to work"
Another chap who was loaded to the muz-
zle with good resolutions and bad rum, was
doing the figure 8 act all over the sidewalk
one New Years night when yirtuous
neis shbor met him and remarked:
"My poor friend! On this day of all days,
too!n
"Thash all right" said he of the load, ex-
tracting a flask from his pocket. "Take
drink?''
"No, will not; but If you have started this
morning with some good resolutions
"Oh, thash what you want. ish it? All
right, take 'em all. Don't be modest about
it, f'r I'll be darned if can do a blame thing
with EN-"
Things aren't as bad that way, though. as
they used to be when it was the fashion for
a fellow to hurry all day long from one
friends house to another and make believe
he was making New Years calls. In those
good old times fellow generally put off his
resolution until next day, when he was sure
to have a whacking headache to help him.
l.
said that there was nothing like heada che
to help man swear off, and nothing like
swearing Off to help man tie another big
headaches; the longer it was put off the big
ger it got.
The Appreciation of Old Jokes.
1t takes an awful lot to make some peo-
ple's faces break up. 1t would take keg of
dynamite to get u joke into the heads of
some people and even then you have to
clinch them on the inside to keep them from
getting away before they had got down to
business. To many people jokes are like
wines-the older they grow, the better they
are. l find that jokes are q good deal like
tuneS-most people enjoy best those they
are best acquainted with. II went over
to the Good Samaritan Home the
other day to try and make the old
folks laugh, and 1 succeeded gloriously
Il never had a more app reciat1ve audience
All the inmates have passed IS years or
more, so thought they would enjoy listen
ing to some old acquaintances, and l found
/ was right. One of the yarns l told them
was the one about the man who used a wart
on the back of his neck for a collar button;
twas the joke that Noah came on one of his
sons when the family were leaving the ark,
and the young man had been unable to find
the collar button which he had dropped in
his state room, the flood having lasted so
long that the vessels supply of candles had
run out Well, the old folks laughed until
the tears rolled down their cheeks, but
one old gentleman interrupted me by inno-
Gently inquiring; Wasn't the wart too
large to be used that way, Mr.. Wilder?"
Old people aren't the only ones who like
OLD jokes best, especially if the listeners live
in the country. A circus manager once
hired new clown, and as the fellow had
been out of employment for a long while,
and wanted to show his gratitude to his new
employer, he laid himself ont to get up a
brand new lot of jokes. They were first rate
them q
audience, the people were as solemn if
they were taking pills. The manager got up
a bowling rage and went for the clown, eX-
claiming:
BLANK blank you, what do you mean by
getting up all that stuff?"
: "Stuff?" echoes the clown. "I'd like you
to understand, sir, that those are all new
jokes"
New jokes be hangedr' roared the man.
ager. 'Get right out there and give them all
the old cheStnutS, or the reputation of this
show will be gone forever"
Tho clown obeyed orders, and within five
minutes that show was so full of laugh that
the manager was afraid he'd have to put an
extension on the tent to hold it all. The old
folks saw what was coming each time the
clown began, so they had time to let q reef
or two out of their faces so as to be ready to
young people who had been at circuses be-
fore looked as expectant as young girl or
fellow at the gate under twilight, waiting for
the other to come.
One of Dan Rfce's Jokes.
Speaking Of circuses and old jokes re-
minds me of an old story which was told
twice q day in the ring by that superb
clown, Dan Rice, so long ago that it ought to
be entirely new to this day and generation
1t was first told one Saturday night when
the show had reached town so late that the
performance was running into Sunday
morning, and the manager thought he could
pav some respect to the character of the day
by getting off q moral reflection or two. So,
when the clown swore at the trick mule, the
manager, who was also ringmaster, re-
marked:
"Stop-stop, sir! Don't curse that mule.
Don't you know that God made him?"
"What?' drawled the clown, who was none |
other than the great and only Dan himself |
and to whom the manager whispered what |
he was up to. and that Dan must find some |
gag to wind up with. as that so?"
Certainly, sir. God made that mule, and |
he made the earth and everything in it."
"What? Made all the people, too?"
"Yes, sir. Made man first, and then |
woman?"
"You don't tell me! Well, making man |
must have been a big job, but to make |
woman-that must have been an awful puz-
zler."
"Puzzler, sir? Why should it have been
'Why, because"
because what, sir?"
decide whether to make her blonde or |
brunette"
The Appreciation of Humor
They say that Scotchman is the hard |
est l eing on earth to get into, but the Scotch |
award the thick-hcad championship to the |
English. One of them tells the story of man