"Well," says she, "with all his faults, Dr. Brown has never had a patient die on his hands."
"Get out," says I, "is that so?"
"Yes," says she. "When he sees that they are doomed, he sends them to a specialist.
"Oh, Walter!" says she. "By the way, are we all out of debt?"
"Thank Heaven, we are," I replied.
"Then let's give a swell dinner."
"But that would throw us into debt again."
"Of course it would, but what is the use of having good credit unless you can use it?"
I suppose after that I ought to sing you my latest howling success, entitled "No New Proverbs for Your Willie Boy; or, Some of the Fifty-seven."
They say that if you have too many cooks
You ruin your Sunday joint;
But if you give them nothing to cook
The proverb loses its point.
They say that if you're a rolling stone
You'll pass through the poorhouse door;
But Germany's doing a roaring trade,
And her travelers say they'll do more.
They say that if you go early to bed
You'll prosper, if early you'll rise;
But if you held gas shares, and other folks
Did the same, would that be so wise?
They say that you shouldn't throw stones about
If your house is made of glass;
But if it's insured for more than its worth
The proverb will hardly pass.
The point is just this: that proverbs, though wise,
Are changed by modern inventions;
And to add to this bushel of old-time lies
Would give rise to mighty dissentions.
Say, do you know I'm always afraid to carry that song about with me, for fear that some burglar will follow me home and steal it while I'm asleep.
The truth is I'm somewhat afraid of burglars.
The other night my wife woke me up and said:
"Walter, Walter, there are burglars in the house."
"All right, just take a light and turn them out," says I.
"I'm afraid they might run away with me," says she.
"No fear of that if you take a light," says I. "By the way, dear, do you knew that a Washington man was shot by a burglar and his life was saved by a pajama button, which the bullet struck?"
"Well, what of it?" says she.
"Nothing," says I, "except that the button must have been on."
Well, she wailed and went on so bad, that I had to go down and see what the racket was.
I went into the dining-room and there stood the burglar.
"Hold up your hands," says he.
"I'm darned if I do," says I. "My wife rules me by day, and you're not going to butt in and do it by night."
I grabbed a chair and went at him.
We finally compromised.
He was to take everything of any value if he would only let me – I mean if I would only let him up.
He took all the silverware off the sideboard and began to pack it up.
Just then my little Josephine called from the cradle.
"Say," says my visitor, "I've spotted this house for two weeks and didn't know you had a baby. If you call that sharp-nosed woman, wifie, and that kid yonder, baby, I guess you're blessed enough and in need of sleep. Let's call it a draw. Thank Heaven I ain't married."
"You'll be sorry you didn't get married, if you don't," says I.
"That's all right," says he, "I'd a heap rather that I wasn't, than be married and sorry that I was."
Well, after much mutual congratulation, the midnight visitor finally took his leave.
I was about to go upstairs, when I heard talking down in the basement.
I thought that perhaps there were a few more poor devils down there who would sympathize with me, and went down to make their acquaintance.
I was mistaken.
It was only my servant, Bridget, talking to a policeman stationed on the beat.
I have a friend who had a very wild son about sixteen years of age. He could do absolutely nothing with him.
One day the youngster was offered a job in a big tinware factory.
His father, thinking it might tone him down a bit, consented to let him go.
The first Saturday night the kid lost his week's wages in a crap game and was afraid to go home.
Finally he hit upon a bright scheme. He took his trousers, turned them inside out and had them galvanized.
That night he went home and his father prepared to give him a spanking.
He used his hand first, but the blow almost killed his father.
Then he used a club, but failed to make any impression upon his son.
Then he got out of patience and said to his wife:
"Maria, confound it, get me a can opener."
Now this same Billy got so educated in that factory, that he wanted to go West and shoot millionaires, so he just sloped.
His father telegraphed all over the country, and then, as a last resort, rang up police headquarters.
"Well," says the chief, "it ought to be easy to find him. Has he any marks by which he can be identified?"
"N-o-o!" says the father. "But confound him, just let me get a hold of him and he will have."
They finally located Willie comfortably settled on a farm. There was a job open and he advised his father to come out and take it, and make a few million growing wheat for the food trust.
His father went and they got along swimmingly.
One day a neighbor came across Willie hustling like old Sam Hill to reload a wagon of hay which had overturned.
"Well, Willie, I see you are in trouble."
"Yes," says Willie, working for dear life.
"Suppose you come to the house and have dinner with me," says the neighbor.
Willie wouldn't hear of it. The man finally persuaded him to go.
All the way to the house and at dinner Willie kept saying:
"I shouldn't have come. I know dad won't like it."
"Why," says the neighbor, "your father will never know unless you tell him."
"I know, I know," says Willie, "but I'm sure father won't like my going to dinner with you."
"Darnation," says the neighbor, now thoroughly worked up. "Why won't he?"
"Well, you see," says Willie, "dad's under the load of hay on the road."
Speaking of Willie puts me in mind of another boy I know.
He's the brightest chap for his years to be found in a day's walk.
Why, when the boy was six months old, he howled all night and slept all day.
They fooled him though, by putting an electric light in front of his parent's door, while he slept one day.
When he woke up to give his usual nightly concert, he found the room as bright as day.
He just turned over and went to sleep again.
That boy is a genius though, in his way.
Why, do you know that they have had thirty-four examinations since he's been going to school, and he's managed to dodge every one of them.
I went down to one of the big department stores the other day and met my old friend Matt Wheeler looking over some furniture.
"Hello, Matt," says I, "how's Mamie?" Mamie is his sweetheart, you know.
"Oh!" says Matt, "I've thrown her over."
"Well, that was a foolish thing to do," says I. "Mamie was a good and beautiful girl."
"I know it," says he, "but her father offered to give us enough money to furnish a home, if we got married. I'm going with another girl now."
"What sort of a girl is she," says I, and that started him off.
Have you ever noticed how easy it is to start a fellow extolling the virtues and graces of his chosen before he is married?
If you ask him how his wife is after the ceremony, all you get out of him is something resembling a grunt.
Well, this fellow rambled.
"She's an angel. She isn't like other girls. She's got the loveliest complexion. The handsomest face, the finest figure, the sweetest nature that ever woman had."
"Good," says I, "but how about her feet?"
"Feet, man," says he, "what are you talking about? Are you demented?"
"No," says I, "but you ought to have looked at her feet."
"What has her feet got to do with it?" says he, "I'm marrying the girl, not her feet."
"That's right," says I, "but you'll get her feet thrown into the bargain. Never marry a club-footed girl, because she's always got something to hit you with in case of an argument."
Even that didn't shut him up.
"Let me tell you how I got engaged to her," says he.
"Go ahead," says I.
"I was down to her house one night and stayed until almost one o'clock.
"Finally her old man hollered downstairs and asked the girl if I didn't think it was about time to go to bed.
"I hollered up that it was all right, I'd excuse him if he wanted to go.
"Then we got talking about birds, birdlets and birdies.
"I said I loved birdies of all kinds.
"She tore over to the piano and began to play: 'I Wish I Were a Birdie.' Yes, we're looking for a nest now."
Now I'm going to sing you a song about this foolish couple.
Just sit back and hold tight.
It's entitled "What a Difference When the Preacher Says You're Wed; or, I Wonder Why Mary Jones Married a Man Twice Her Age."
He has ceased to call her "darling,"
She has ceased to call him "dear";
He has ceased composing sonnets
To her "shell-like little ear."
She has ceased to hurry madly
To the mirror when he calls;
He has ceased to buy her chocolates
And ice cream at high-toned balls.
This is not because these lovers
Have been mixed up in a row —
No, the plain truth is that they
Are a married couple now.
That song always makes me sad.
It's founded upon one of my actual experiences.
I was a married man, once, though I may not look it.
One night I came home late and knocked at the door.
My wife shoved her head out of the window, and says:
"Is that you, Billy, dear?"
My name's not Billy. I got divorced.
Talking of graveyards, I took a trip to Philly last week.
Say, I never had such fun since I sold my automobile.
The circus began at Hoboken and continued all the way down.
When I got to the station I noticed an Irishman sitting out of harm's way, holding his jaw.
"What's the matter, old man?" says I; "toothache?"
"Yes, bedad," says he, "but I'm going to get rid of it."
He got a strong piece of twine, tied one end to the offending molar, and the other to the rail of the last car of the Washington express.
Soon the train started.
The twine held and so did the tooth.
You never saw any one run to beat that fool Irishman. He had Duffy beaten to death.
Finally after he had run a two-mile straight-away, the cord snapped, but the tooth stayed in. Pat came back.
"Be jabbers," says he, "the dum thing fooled me that time, but I'll get even. I'll go to a dentist."
I got on my train and took a seat in the forward car.
Just opposite, a very stylish, rather beautiful lady sat next to a clerical-looking chap.
When the conductor came around for her ticket, she fumbled for her purse, then grew pale and gasped:
"I've been robbed. There is nothing in my pocket but a piece of orange peel, some cloves, and a bottle of whiskey."
Then she began to throw the articles on the floor.
"Madam," said the deep bass voice of the clerical-looking chap, "I'll thank you to take your hands out of my pocket and leave its contents alone."
Then I began to look around for some other diversion, and got it.
In front of me sat an old gentleman with a man-servant in attendance.
He was greatly bothered by a fly, which used to go in one ear and out the other.
You know how they do, sometimes.
The fly had made ten laps, and was comfortably along on its eleventh, when the old fellow called his servant.
"John," says he, quietly, "catch the little creature as gently as possible and put it out of the window. Don't hurt it, though, or I shall be angry."
John, who evidently knew his master's weakness, caught the bothersome fly and carried it to an open window.
"Ah, master," pleaded he, "just look, it is beginning to rain. Shall I not give the poor little fly a mackintosh and an umbrella?"
Just then the train stopped at a way station and I got off to get a bite to eat. As usual, I got left.
While waiting, my attention was attracted to an elderly couple, who had approached the ticket agent as he came out of his coop.
"Say, boss," says the old man, "can you tell me if the three-fifteen has left?"
"Oh, yes," says the agent, "it went by ten minutes ago."
"And when will the four-thirty be along, do you think?"
"Not for some time, of course," was the answer.
"Are there any expresses before then?"
"Not one."
"Any freight trains?"
"No."
"Nothing at all?"
"Nothing whatsoever."
"Are you quite sure?"
"Of course I am, or I wouldn't have said so," yelled the agent.
"Then, Maria," says the old man, "if we're quite careful, I guess we can cross the tracks."
My train arrived a minute before it was scheduled to leave. A kid stepped up to the conductor.
"Say, mister, there are two men on this train who came all the way from New York, and didn't pay any fare."
The conductor thought that some fellows were beating the company and went through the whole train, but couldn't find any one who didn't have his proper ticket.
So, seeing the kid, he says:
"Hey, where are the two men?"
"On the engine. The engineer and fireman," shrieked the kid.
After the train got in motion, I suddenly espied my old friend Joe Dempsey, who is an insurance agent.
"Hello, Joe," says I, "why so glum?"
"Well, you see, Walter," says he, "I proposed to old Billion's daughter and she refused to have me."
"Well," says I, "that's nothing. There are other girls."
"Yes, of course," says he, "but I can't help feeling sorry for the poor girl."
I looked around for something to throw.
"Yes," he continued, "especially after the beautiful dream I had about her the other night. I dreamt that I had married her and that she had settled $14,000,000 on me."
"Yes, and then you woke up," says I.
"No," says he, "that's the funny part of it. I put that money in the bank."
"Well, that's all right," says I, "but you'll have a dickens of a time in getting it out again."
"That's easy," says he, "I'll just go to sleep again. I guess I'll do that now and draw some of the interest."
We got to the city of the dead and, having nothing else to do, I went with Joe on a scout for business.
While we were out in the suburbs, he struck a man putting up some kind of a building, for he had a large pile of bricks.
"Good-morning, neighbor," says Joe. "I'd like to insure this new cottage you are putting up."
"It isn't a cottage at all," began the man.
"Ah, well, my good man," says Joe, "if it's only a dog-house, you'd better have it insured."
"Confound you," says the suburbanite, now in a rage, "get out of this. I'm rebuilding my well."
Joe, soon after this, decided to stay in the carpetbaggers' city and take the agency of a large insurance company.
One day there was a very destructive fire at Cohen & Wosislosmitdewhiskey's clothing store.
Joe took the company's adjuster and went down to investigate.
A good deal of discussion resulted, in which the cause of the fire figured principally.
Cohen said it was due to the electric wiring, and his partner claimed it was the gas-light.