Polished brass will pass upon more people than rough gold. —­Chesterfield.

In all professions every one affects a particular look and exterior, in order to appear what he wishes to be thought; so that it may be said the world’s made up of appearances.—­La Rochefoucauld.

APPETITE

“Josh,” said Farmer Corntossel to his son, “I wish, if you don’t mind, you’d eat off to yourself instead of with the summer boarders.”

“Isn’t my society good enough for them?”

“Your society is fine.  But your appetite sets a terrible example.”

TEACHER—­“You remember the story of Daniel in the lion’s den, Robbie?”

ROBBIE—­“Yes, ma’am.”

TEACHER—­“What lesson do we learn from it?”

ROBBIE—­“That we shouldn’t eat everything we see.”

APPLAUSE

“You don’t attach much importance to the applause an orator receives.”

“Not much,” admitted Senator Sorghum.  “There is bound to be applause.  You can’t expect an audience to sit still all evening and do absolutely nothing.”

“The train pulled out before you had finished your speech.”

“Yes,” replied Senator Sorghum.  “As I heard the shouts of the crowd fading in the distance I couldn’t be sure whether they were applauding me or the engineer.”

A slowness to applaud betrays a cold temper or an envious spirit.—­Hannah More.

The silence that accepts merit as the most natural thing in the world, is the highest applause.—­Emerson.

ARITHMETIC

“Waiter,” he suggested mildly, “I want three eggs, and boil them four minutes.”

But the cook, having only one in the place, boiled it twelve minutes.

Which proves the value of higher mathematics.

SCHOOL-TEACHER (to little boy)—­“If a farmer raises 3,700 bushels of wheat and sells it for $2.50 per bushel, what will he get?”

LITTLE BOY—­“An automobile.”

“Now, then, Johnny,” said his teacher, “if your father gave you seven cents and your mother gave you six and your uncle gave you four more, what would you have?”

Johnny wrinkled up his forehead and went into silence for the space of several minutes.

“Come, come,” said the teacher impatiently.  “Surely you can solve a simple little problem like that.”

“It ain’t a simple problem at all,” replied the boy.  “I can’t make up my mind whether I’d have an ice-cream soda or go to the movies.”

In Missouri, where they raise more mules and children than in any other place in the world, a certain resident died possessed of seventeen mules and three sons.  In his will he disposed of the mules as follows:  One-half to the eldest son, one-third to the next, and one-ninth to the youngest.