The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-09-01
ENeL1sHmAN,s STAG DINNER
The Butler Was AS Immovable As a
Piece of Adamant.

washington POst)
"WhiIe / was in Melbourne" said
WashingtOnian who recently visited
Australia on a business mission Tor
Philadelphia manufacturing concern
Il was present at a stag dinner given
BY an Englishman who had only
short time before struck 1t rich IN ths
gold fields. He was middle-aged ah9
a cockney of the cockneys. he hau
been pOking around the auriferous nlIls
of Australia with IA pick for more Ihah
twenty years before he struck the iedse
that made him millionaire many
times over,
He was a bachelor, and when got
10 Melbourne he had only recently
got his magnificent domicile in running
order. He had about two dozen ser
wants. the top man. of course, beIhs d
Enthusiastically grave ana lnper-
turbable English butler, a telio" as
stiff as a lamp post and with ABOUT as
much humor in his carcass as a nine
pin. IN
THE stag dinner was a pretty jolly
affair. IL was attended by apouI
twenty well known men about town OF
Melbourne, and some performers from
the Melbourne vaudeville theatres were
engaged TO entertain the guests.
The English butler presided over
the feast with the solemn manner De
fitting his kind. The fun ran around
the table Ike a breeze after the wine
began 10 operate but nary a grin
crossed the features of the naughty
butler. He stood at the sideboard as
straight as a persimmon tree, with
his arms folded, and his eountenahce
was like a mask of tragedy when the
host and all OF the guests were all but
rolling out OF their chairs with laugh
ter
I was sitting on the left of the host.
and ! observed that the preternatural
gravity of the butler was getting on
the hosts nerves. Whenever the
laughter was at its height the eockney
millionaire would glance up from De
meath his bushY eyebrows at the Dut-
Ter, only 20 perceive that not so much
as "A muscle of that dignitary's face
was twisting.
'Blime me- l heard the host NUT
ter savagely to himself two or three
times. ivy don't that blOOmink cove
larf. y'knaw?'
Even when the vaudeville people
began to execute their cut-up stunts
the butler never gave the slightest in
dication that he saw anything funny
in the proceedings. Finally a mon
Ologue chap, whose line OF talk really
was screamingly funny, got the floor.
and il wasn't long before he had every
man at the table just a-rocking and
holding his sides. The butler stood like
rock To all intents and purposes he
might Just as well have had paralysis
of the facial nerves.
THE cockney host couldn't stand it
any longer. He jumped out Of his
chair-showiug that he was just bit
unsteady on his legs. which was nat
ural enough. considering the way the
corks had been popping-and rushing
upon the butler and catching him
around the waist, he threw the imper-
turbable serVitOr on to the floor. threw
open the buffers coat, dug the fingers
of both of his strong. pudgy hands into
the buffers ribs to tickle him, and
bawled as he leaned over the man:
Larf, y bloody StOughton bottle.
larf! That's right. larf! Larf till y
bust. y bloomink cove"
THE butler. conVulsed with uncon-
trollable shrieks of laughter under the
tremendous tickling which he was un-
dergoing, yelled TO be let up before he
went off into ''isterics. but his en-
ployer went right on tickling his ribs
with all his might. until the butler was
exhausted. Then he let him up.
Hi knowed HID make y larf, y
bloOmer, an now that we've larfed. III
give y a rise in y'r wages. said the
host, gleefully, resuming his chair. The
butler got up and the feast west on"