Why
Do you know why the rabbits are caught
in the snare
Or the tabby cat’s shot on the tiles?
Why the tigers and lions creep out of their lair?
Why an ostrich will travel for miles?
Do you know why a sane man will whimper and cry
And weep o’er a ribbon or glove?
Why a cook will put sugar for salt in a pie?
Do you know? Well, I’ll tell you—it’s
Love.
—H.P. Stevens.
PAPA—“Why, hang it, girl, that fellow only earns nine dollars a week!”
PLEADING DAUGHTER—“Yes; but, daddy, dear, a week passes so quickly when you’re fond of one another.”—Judge.
“Love makes the world go ’round,” quoted the Parlor Philosopher.
“Yes, but it has to be cranked,” replied the Mere Man. “It isn’t a self-starter.”
Cupid
Why was Cupid a boy,
And why a boy was he?
He should have been a girl,
For aught that I can see.
For he shoots with his bow,
And a girl shoots with her eye;
And they both are merry and glad,
And laugh when we do cry.
Then to make Cupid a boy
Was surely a woman’s
plan,
For a boy never learns so much
Till he has become a man.
And then he’s so pierced with cares,
And wounded with arrowy smarts,
That the whole business of his life
Is to pick out the heads of
the darts.
—William Blake.
Partake of love as a temperate man partakes of wine: do not become intoxicated.—A. de Musset.
LUCK
VICAR—“Nothing to be thankful for! Why, think of poor old Hodge losing his wife through the flu!”
GILES—“Well, that don’t do me no good. I ain’t Hodge.”
Good luck is the gayest of all gay girls;
Long in one place she will
not stay:
Back from your brow she strokes the curls,
Kisses you quick and flies
away.
But Madame Bad Luck soberly comes
And stays—no fancy
has she for flitting;
Snatches of true-love songs she hums,
And sits by your bed, and
brings her knitting.
—John Hay.
YOUNG SON—“What is luck, father?”
FATHER—“Luck, my son, is something that enables another fellow to succeed where we have failed.”
MAGAZINES
History of the Magazine Story
July 27, 1914—Author finishes it.
Aug. 3, 1914—Rewrites, giving incidental war slant.
May 9, 1915—Rewrites; hero rescues heroine from torpedoed liner.
Apr. 7, 1917—Rewrites; hero enlists; villain, German spy.
Nov. 13, 1918—Rewrites; denouement, allied entrance into Berlin; heroine, Red Cross nurse.
Nov. 13, 1918—Rewrites; climax, homecoming from overseas.
Aug. 15, 1919—War fiction going stale; goes back to original story, retaining only German villain.