* * * * *

A jealous general was abusing Wolfe to the King.

“The man is mad,” he declared bitterly.

George sighed.  “I wish,” he said, “that I could persuade him to bite all my generals."_

* * * * *

A rich man, formerly a cheesemonger, was discussing the Poor Law with Lamb, and boasted that he had got rid of all the sentimental stuff called the milk of human kindness.

“Yes,” said Lamb sadly, “you turned it into cheese long ago_.”

* * * * *

Jerrold said of some one who sent his wife effusive letters but not a farthing of money, that he was full of “unremitting kindness.”

* * * * *

A Turkish proverb says, “The devil tempts the busy man, but the idle man tempts the devil.”

* * * * *

Gladstone once asked, “In what country except ours would (as I know to have happened) a Parish Ball have been got up in order to supply funds for a Parish Hearse?”

* * * * *

“They’re rising in Connaught,” shouted a scaremonger, dashing into Chesterfield’s room.  Quietly he drew out his watch.  “Nine o’clock,” he said gently.  “They ought to be.”

* * * * *

“He is one of those people,” said Jerrold of a mistaken philanthropist, “who would vote for a supply of tooth-picks in a time of famine”; and of another—­“He would hold an umbrella over a duck while it was raining.”

* * * * *

“Hark at Boswell,” muttered Wilkes, “telling every one how he has had his handkerchief picked from his pocket—­it’s merely brag, to show us he had one.”

* * * * *

“Do you approve of clergymen riding?” Sydney Smith was asked.  “Well, it depends,” he replied thoughtfully; “yes, if they turn their toes out.”

* * * * *

“The testator meant to keep a life interest in the estate himself,” remarked the judge, who was trying a will case.

“Surely, my lord,” said the barrister, “you are taking the will for the deed.”

* * * * *

Sydney Smith said of an obstinate man, “You might as well try to poultice the humps off a camel’s back.”

A MASTER WITH BRAINS
[Sidenote:  Memorials of Edward Burne-Jones]