Masterpieces of American Wit and Humor, 4. köide

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Thomas Lansing Masson
Doubleday, Page, 1903

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Page 148 - I have not found reason to suppose that the English dowager of fifty has actually greater courage, fortitude, and strength of character than our women of similar age, or even a tougher physical endurance than they. Morally, she is strong, I suspect, only in society and in the common routine of social affairs, and would be found powerless and timid in any exceptional strait that might call for energy outside of the conventionalities amid which she has grown up.
Page 99 - ... thy slender voice complain? Thou wailest, when I talk of beauty's light, As if it brought the memory of pain: Thou art a wayward being — well — come near, And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear.
Page 149 - You can meet this figure in the street, and live, and even smile at the recollection. But conceive of her in a ballroom, with the bare, brawny arms that she invariably displays there, and all the other corresponding development, such as is beautiful in the maiden blossom, but a spectacle to howl at in such an overblown cabbage-rose as this.
Page 100 - On well-filled skins, sleek as thy native mud, Fix thy light pump and press thy freckled feet: Go to the men for whom, in ocean's halls, The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls. There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows To fill the swelling veins for thee, and now The ruddy cheek and now the ruddier nose Shall tempt thee, as thou flittest round the brow ; And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings, No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.
Page 119 - If it's a temprance community tell 'em I sined the pledge fifteen minits arter Ise born, but on the contery ef your peple take their tods, say Mister Ward is as Jenial a feller as we ever met, full of conwiviality, & the life an sole of the Soshul Bored. Take. don't you ? If you say anythin abowt my show say my snaiks is as harmliss as the new born Babe.
Page 93 - This made me feel rather bad for a minute or two, and I almost had a mind to give it up ; and then again father's dream came into my mind, and I mustered up courage and declared I'd go. So I tackled up the old horse, and packed in a load of...
Page 103 - Is it well with thee ? is it well with thy husband ? is it well with the child ? And she answered, It is well.
Page 159 - So he crooked old Tom's legs, and got him down agin; and they put the corn-basket over him, and then they both stood and waited. " 'That'll do the thing, Huldy,' said the parson. " 'I don't know about it,
Page 98 - At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway — Ah, there were fairy steps, and white necks kissed By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray Shone through the snowy veils like stars through mist ; And fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin, Bloomed the bright blood through the transparent skin.
Page 158 - And the parson, he sot him down; and old Tom, he sot there solemn enough and held his head down all droopin', lookin' like a rail pious old cock as long as the parson sot by him. "'There; you see how still he sets,' says the parson to Huldy. "Huldy was 'most dyin' for fear she should laugh. 'I'm afraid he'll get up,

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