Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1914-03-17
Stories of Irish Wit and Humor
BY sEUMAs MAC MANUs

| Editors Notion ST. Patrick's
Day, last year, there appeared on
| this page six Irish Stories,' erro-
neously attributed to the Irish poet,
novelist and lecturer, Seumas Mac
Manus. Mr.. MacManus has protest.
ed against this attribution, as he has
long kept up a vigorous fight against
this type of irish humor." His
writings in the leading magazines, in
| books and in his lectures are a prac-
| teal Illustration of the genuine type
of Irish wit, humor and storytelling.
| We are glad to publish on this st.
Patrick's Day the following article on
this subject by Mr.. MacManus with
! typical stories of Irish humor Sc
lected by him. We believe that the
! false impression made by the previ-
GUS error as to authorship can be
| best shown by this article from Mr..
| MacManus's penn
| There's a type of American joke
smith (more correctly jackass) who
will perpetrate Irish humor" for his
! fellows to heehaw at--and who as
sumes that the people who are adj
mittedly the keenest and brightest on
| the worlds ridge are one-half butts
and one-half blunderers-that an
| Irishman cannot open his mouth
without putting both his feet in it
that, with the face of baboon, he
talks in baboonish jargon and that
the real recipe for producing Irish
dialect is to make hash of the En-
| glsh language, salt the dish with a
su cheney of "shure ans" and pep
per-dust it with a plentiful sprink-
ling of "Oi," "yez," "bhoy," 'praste'
and BE jabers."
| Under my name q year ago, such
a gentleman set down here "SiX best
Irish stories that were particularly
vile To take the bad taste off the
mouth of those who swallowed last
years, ] offer the following genuine
and average samples of true Irish
wit and humor:
A fair specimen of sardonic Irish
humor was that quoted by Mr.. Taft
while he was still displacing sixty
cubic feet of White House atmos-
phere Some one asked him what
was his favorite joke, and he said
that no joke tickled him like the old
one-the bit of dialogue passing be-
tween the bar-man i'm the bar and
his boss in the back room:
rs Murphy good for a drink"
HAS he got it?"
HE has"
HE is
And the dryest of the dry Irish wit
was we'll exemplified in a story told
to me recently by William White
who put the sass in Kansas. When
in Ireland some years ago recklessly
searching out ancestral records, he
strolling one afternoon through the
beautiful Phoenix Park in Dublin
both amused and amazed at sight
of three great big burly Dublin pc.
licemen striving to run down q
spindly, sickly, ragged little urchiI
who were putting his putting pursuers
out of breath Mr.. White, turning
to a seedy, serious-looking old fellow
buried in newspaper on one of thu
park benches, asked: what has
the poor little fellow done that these
big policemen are chasing him?"
The old fellow, taking his eyes ou
of the newspaper. looked for a few
moments over his bone-rimmet
glasses at the ridiculous race, snorteC
and replied: "The little vagabont
pulled up a tree back here and man
slaughtered what policemen aren'
afther him." Then, snorting again
he buried himself in his paper.
III.
There is not in Ireland any char
acter more joking. nor yet more be
joked, than the jaunting car driver
the jarvey. And with an eye tipping
time, he Is the most polite of mel
also. Riding on the long car that raj
!, around the coast from Sligo to bon
ny Bundoran, l had the fortune one
to be entertained by a wonderful ar
gument upon whiskey, it's celestia
, and it's internal qualities-carried oil
between a publican (saloonkeeper
who sat on the storm side of the ca
and preacher who sat on the milan,
side. Some one at length appealel
to the jarvey for his opinion on tn,
: question. Leaning down toward tn
publican who sat under him to tn
t left, the jarvey said: "Whiskey i
all right" Then looking ahead an
Ticking fly from the off-horse's ca
continued to the company generally
"In its right place" And finally
: leaning down toward the preacher o.
: his right. concluded, And helfs tn
| place for it"
| w.
| Profanity was the next subjeo
/ I