“Them was nice folk you waited on, Mamie, ain’t they?” “No, no, dear!  Appearances is deceitful.  They didn’t have no charge-account.  Paid cash for everything.”—­Judge.

Mr. Butterworth, the grocer, was looking over the credit sales-slips one day.  Suddenly he called to the new clerk: 

“Did you give George Callahan credit?”

“Sure,” said the clerk.  “I—­”

“Didn’t I tell you to get a report on any and every man asking for credit?”

“Why, I did,” retorted the clerk, who was an earnest young fellow.  “I did get a report.  The agency said he owed money to every grocer in town, and, of course, if his credit was that good I knew that you would like to have him open an account here!”

A well-known wholesale merchant, who has a wide patronage throughout the Piedmont region of the South, received the following letter from one of his customers a few weeks ago: 

“I receive your letter about what I owes you.  Now be pachent.  I ain’t forgot you and soon as folks pay me I’ll pay you, but if this was judgment day and you were no more prepared to meet your Maker than I am to meet your account then you sho going to hell.”

The credit, it may be noted, was extended.

“Rufus, aren’t you feeling well?”

“No, sah; I’se not feelin’ well, sah.”

“Have you consulted your doctor, Rufus?”

“No, sah; I ain’t don’ dat, sah.”

“Why?  Aren’t you willing to trust your doctor, Rufus?”

“Oh, yes, sah; but de trubble is he’s not so alt’gether willin’ to trus’ me, sah.”

  “My son,” said old man Reddit,
    “Take this advice from me: 
  The less you use your credit
    The better it will be.”

CRIME

  Lives of master crooks remind us
  We may do a bit of time,
  And, departing, leave behind us
  Thumb-prints in the charts of crime.—­Life.

Fear follows crime, and is its punishment.—­Voltaire.

Responsibility prevents crimes.—­Burke.

If poverty is the mother of crimes, want of sense is the father.—­La
Bruyere.

  But many a crime deemed innocent on earth
  Is registered in heaven; and these no doubt
  Have each their record, with a curse annex’d.

  —­Cowper.

CRITICISM

  A man must serve his time at ev’ry trade,
  Save censure; critics all are ready-made.

  —­Byron.

  Damn with faint praise, assent with evil leer,
  And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer: 
  Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
  Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike.

  —­Pope.

THE ARTIST—­“Dubbins, the art critic, has slated my pictures unmercifully.”

HIS FRIEND—­“Oh, don’t take any notice of that fellow; he has no ideas of his own—­he only repeats like a parrot what everybody else is saying.”