drawn, as sound as the other.  “What’s to pay?” she inquired.  “A shilling,” said the surgeon.  “Very well,” rejoined the hostess, with a chuckle; “you left a shilling due in my house the other night, and now we are quits.”  “Certainly we are,” responded the perplexed tooth-drawer, and the delighted old woman returned to her hostelry, to acquaint all her gossips of how cleverly she had outwitted the doctors.

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Ferrier says, in his Illustrations of Sterne, that the facetious tales of the Sieur Gaulard laid the foundation of some of the jests in our old English collections.  A few of them found their way somehow into Taylor’s Wit and Mirth, and this is one:  A monsieur chanced to meet a lady of his acquaintance, and asked her how she did and how her good husband fared, at which she wept, saying that her husband was in heaven.  “In heaven!” quoth he.  “It is the first time that I heard of it, and I am sorry for it with all my heart.”

Similar in its point is a story in Archie Armstrong’s Banquet of Jests:[8] Sitting over a cup of ale in a winter night, two widows entered into discourse of their dead husbands, and after ripping up their good and bad qualities, saith one of them to the maid, “I prithee, wench, reach us another light, for my husband (God rest his soul!) above all things loved to see good lights about the house.  God grant him light everlasting!” “And I pray you, neighbour,” said the other, “let the maid lay on some more coals or stir up the fire, for my husband in his lifetime ever loved to see a good fire.  God grant him fire everlasting!”

This seems cousin-german to the Arabian story of two men, one of whom hailed from the town of Hama (ancient Hamath), the other from Hums (ancient Emessa).  Those towns are not far apart, but the people of the former have the reputation of being very clever, while those of the latter are proverbially as stupid. (And for the proper understanding of the jest it should perhaps be explained that the Arabic verb hama means to “protect” or “defend,” the verb hamasa to “roast” or “toast.”) These men had some business of importance with the nearest magistrate, and set out together on their journey.  The man of Hums, conscious of his own ignorance, begged his companion to speak first in the audience, in order that he might get a hint as to how such a formal matter should be conducted.  Accordingly, when they came into the pasha’s presence, the man of Hama went forward, and the pasha asked him, “Where are you from?” “Your servant is from Hama,” said he.  “May Allah PROTECT (hama) your excellency!” The pasha then turned to the other man, and asked, “And where are you from?” to which he answered, “Your servant is from Hums.  May Allah ROAST (hamasa) your excellency!”

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Not a few of the Bizarrures of the Sieur Gaulard are the prototypes of bulls and foolish sayings of the typical Irishman, which go their ceaseless round in popular periodicals, and are even audaciously reproduced as original in our “comic” journals—­save the mark!  To cite some examples: