The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1903-07-11
oLD-TIME WIT AND oRAroRY.

OAu-lliuSI WHO uSteneQ not long
agoto mark Twain at club dimes
In this city and who laughed at ST.
meoh Ford's wit, was talking after
ward b one of the Committee on En-
tertainfent, and among other things
he said
You people have so much of this
sort OF feast that I question whether
you appreciate it. Ali you have to
do when you want to get together is
to press tht button.
You get tired and you fill up
your rooms or homes with clever peo.
pie, unique entertainments, and the
cares which infest the day-you know
the rest. 1t is not strange, perhaps,
when you think of it, that we were
not quite so frequently entertained or
amused forty, five years ago. We
were fewer, we were scattered, and
maybe We were easier pleased because
we did not have our entertainment
on tap.
'Why do you know, we used to
rely on the almanacs for our Jokes +?
We used to keep almanacs on the
centre tables for Our guests. When
the conversation Jagged and the COM
pany began to look at the clock on
the shelf some one would pass the al
manac and we would have some fun.
The home newspaper had no de-
partment of humor. If a Joke crept
into the columns it was credited to
the almanac. Some of the editors
used to get advance copies of the al
manac and play scurvy trick on the
druggists by printing the jokes be-
fore the druggists got their consign-
ments.
Occasionally home genius un-
loaded home grown fun on the editor.
But there was not so much of the
homegrown article then as now. I
do remember one, but he did it for
pure fun.
"He was banker, too-Col. A.
M. Saxton, president of the first bank
of my town ! He was the living
image of Mr.. Pickwick. He wrote
occasionally funny pieces for the old
"For long time the people thought
the editor wrote the pieces, and he
was always asked to step up and have
something when he was in sight. I
don't remember how it came about,
but it was finally learned that Col.
Saxton wrote the pieces that gave the
paper its boom.
"Then the people got to going to
the bank, hoping to hear Saxton
talk, but he was as silent and as far
away in his looks as the Sphinx.
Then he quit writing for the paper,
because he said it hurt his business to
be known as funny man.
Occasionally the paper printed
the articles of Philander Doesticks,
and after him, Artemus Ward. Josh
Billings puzzled the public for a
while. We didn't know whether he
was funny or ignorant.
"But he struck St. Joe with lee
ture. The editor of the Gazette re-
ported the lecture straight away, spell
ing correctly, and the public decided
that Josh Billings was no wit. His
reputation was frostbitten in Our
town.
"Once year we had a one-ring
circus come to town. The Gazette
editor always had seat down by the
ringside, and whenever the clown
said anything the editor jotted it
down on paper he held on top of his
stovepipe hat, and we had circus
Jokes for several weeks after.
"a little later young lawyer came
to town who afterward attained ma.
tional reputation as a politician, wit
and after-dinner speaker. That was
Gen. Jim Craig.
''He was a member of the lower
house of Congress afterward presi-
dent of the Hannibal and St. Joe Rail-
road, and he became a close friend
and adviser of Lincoln. But before
Craig got to be so generally known
he became famous in his town as a
wit.
"Whenever he sat in front of the
old tavern in the afternoon of sum-
mer day the crowd assembled to hear
him tell stories. I've seen the street
congested with teamsters and dray-
men listening to him, and the busi-
ness men in the vicinity would will
ingly lose a customer in order to 60
over and hear Gen. Jim Craig jokes.
"But funny men began to be more
numerous newspaper wits began to
increase, and Gen. Craig began tc
grow old. Notwithstanding his abil-
ity as a lawyer and railroad manager,
his reputation rested on his inimitable
wit. Although wit and humor are
abundant today, and in demand,
verify believe that if Gen. Craig
should return to earth he would have
batch of stories of the undiscovered
country that would cause him to tak'
first place in the list.
'The after-dinner speaker of th'
time of which I speak was unknown
There were banquets and public oc
casions, but the speakers were either
ponderous, or of the spread-eagl
make. The popular speaker was per
, mitted to tell an anecdote, but he wa
expected to raise his hearers to th
skies, and funny stories do not hav
, that effect.
81 do not think you have any BET
ter orators today than we had then
but you have a soberer lot. Yo
, don't often see a speaker in thes
days who is under the influence whe
he is on his feet. But there used to b
an idea that a speaker couldn't swa
i his audience until he was about thre
Al 4