"
* * * * *
I told this tale to MacShaughnassy. He agreed with me that it was
instructive, and said he should remember it. He said he should remember
it so as to tell it to some fellows that he knew, to whom he thought the
lesson should prove useful.
CHAPTER II
I can't honestly say that we made much progress at our first meeting. It
was Brown's fault. He would begin by telling us a story about a dog. It
was the old, old story of the dog who had been in the habit of going
every morning to a certain baker's shop with a penny in his mouth, in
exchange for which he always received a penny bun. One day, the baker,
thinking he would not know the difference, tried to palm off upon the
poor animal a ha'penny bun, whereupon the dog walked straight outside and
fetched in a policeman. Brown had heard this chestnut for the first time
that afternoon, and was full of it. It is always a mystery to me where
Brown has been for the last hundred years. He stops you in the street
with, "Oh, I must tell you!--such a capital story!" And he thereupon
proceeds to relate to you, with much spirit and gusto, one of Noah's best
known jokes, or some story that Romulus must have originally told to
Remus. One of these days somebody will tell him the history of Adam and
Eve, and he will think he has got hold of a new plot, and will work it up
into a novel.
Pages:
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51