“No, thanks,” said Fransen.  “I never indulge in experiments.”

“There are no more enterprising young men.  Why, I remember when it was a common thing for a young man to start out as a clerk and in a few years own the business.”

“Yes, but cash-registers have been invented since.”

The junior partner was harried.

“I shall have to get another typist,” he lamented.  “Miss Take is continually interrupting my dictation to ask how to spell a word.”

“Dear, dear!” said the senior partner.  “That seems a great waste of time.”

“It’s not that I mind,” responded the other.  “But it’s so bad for discipline to keep on saying, ’I don’t know’!”

How Business Men Keep Their Spirits Up

“Cancel my order at once,” came the telegram to the factory.  The owner perpetrated the only new joke in the millennium.  His telegram in reply read:  “Your order cannot be cancelled at once.  You must take your turn.”

CUSTOMER—­“Gee, this is a rotten cigar!”

SHOPKEEPER—­“Well, don’t complain.  You’ve only got one of them—­I’ve got ten thousand of the darn things.”—­Life.

EMPLOYEE—­“I don’t like your methods of doing business, Mr. Grafton.  I resign.”

“PRACTICAL” BUSINESS MAN (sneeringly)—­“You’re a holier-than-thou guy, eh?”

EMPLOYEE—­“No; merely a square peg in a crooked hole.”—­Puck.

A New York lawyer tells of a conversation that occurred in his presence between a bank president and his son who was about to leave for the West, there to engage in business on his own account.

“Son,” said the father, “on this, the threshold of your business life, I desire to impress one thought upon your mind:  Honesty, ever and always, is the policy that is best.”

“Yes, father,” said the young man.

“And, by the way,” added the gray-beard, “I would advise you to read up a little on corporation law.  It will amaze you to discover how many things you can do in a business way and still be honest.”

“Dod-burn the luck!” snarled old Gideon Cronk, glaring at the clock.  “That confounded bank is closed!  That’s a thunderin’ pretty howdy-do!”

“Well, you’ve set round the stove here foolin’ with the checkerboard all the afternoon and let the bank close on you,” returned the landlord of the tavern, “What you kickin’ about anyhow?”

“I demand that a public institution shall accommodate its patrons; that’s what!”

“Can’t you cash your check in the mornin’?”

“I ain’t got no check.  But if I had one I’d want to cash it when I wanted to, wouldn’t I?  Well, it’s the principle of the thing I’m talkin’ about!”

BUSINESS WOMEN

Kate’s running a tobacco-shop,
Jane draws a wage from carpentry,
And Amaryllis’ patent mop
Defies domestic anarchy;
Marie’s so capable that she
Keeps foundry laborers from strife;
She heads a motor company—­
But where am I to find a wife?