The Best American Humorous Short Stories

[Dark Saint Alaick]

It was thus it happened. There is an excellent fellow--once a minister--I will call him
Isaacs--who deserves well of the world till he dies, and after--because he once, in a real
exigency, did the right thing, in the right way, at the right time, as no other man could do
it. In the world's great football match, the ball by chance found him loitering on the
outside of the field; he closed with it, "camped" it, charged, it home--yes, right through
the other side--not disturbed, not frightened by his own success--and breathless found
himself a great man--as the Great Delta rang applause. But he did not find himself a rich
man; and the football has never come in his way again. From that moment to this moment
he has been of no use, that one can see, at all. Still, for that great act we speak of Isaacs
gratefully and remember him kindly; and he forges on, hoping to meet the football
somewhere again. In that vague hope, he had arranged a "movement" for a general
organization of the human family into Debating Clubs, County Societies, State Unions,
etc., etc., with a view of inducing all children to take hold of the handles of their knives
and forks, instead of the metal. Children have bad habits in that way. The movement, of
course, was absurd; but we all did our best to forward, not it, but him. It came time for
the annual county-meeting on this subject to be held at Naguadavick. Isaacs came round,
good fellow! to arrange for it--got the townhall, got the Governor to preside (the saint!--
he ought to have triplet doubles provided him by law), and then came to get me to speak.
"No," I said, "I would not speak, if ten Governors presided. I do not believe in the
enterprise. If I spoke, it should be to say children should take hold of the prongs of the
forks and the blades of the knives. I would subscribe ten dollars, but I would not speak a
mill." So poor Isaacs went his way, sadly, to coax Auchmuty to speak, and Delafield. I
went out. Not long after, he came back, and told Polly that they had promised to speak--
the Governor would speak--and he himself would close with the quarterly report, and
some interesting anecdotes regarding. Miss Biffin's way of handling her knife and Mr.
Nellis's way of footing his fork. "Now if Mr. Ingham will only come and sit on the
platform, he need not say one word; but it will show well in the paper--it will show that
the Sandemanians take as much interest in the movement as the Armenians or the
Mesopotamians, and will be a great favor to me." Polly, good soul! was tempted, and she
promised. She knew Mrs. Isaacs was starving, and the babies--she knew Dennis was at
home--and she promised! Night came, and I returned. I heard her story. I was sorry. I
doubted. But Polly had promised to beg me, and I dared all! I told Dennis to hold his
peace, under all circumstances, and sent him down.

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It was not half an hour more before he returned, wild with excitement--in a perfect Irish
fury--which it was long before I understood. But I knew at once that he had undone me!
What happened was this: The audience got together, attracted by Governor Gorges's
name. There were a thousand people. Poor Gorges was late from Augusta. They became
impatient. He came in direct from the train at last, really ignorant of the object of the
meeting. He opened it in the fewest possible words, and said other gentlemen were
present who would entertain them better than he. The audience were disappointed, but
waited. The Governor, prompted by Isaacs, said, "The Honorable Mr. Delafield will
address you." Delafield had forgotten the knives and forks, and was playing the Ruy
Lopez opening at the chess club. "The Rev. Mr. Auchmuty will address you." Auchmuty
had promised to speak late, and was at the school committee. "I see Dr. Stearns in the
hall; perhaps he will say a word." Dr. Stearns said he had come to listen and not to speak.
The Governor and Isaacs whispered. The Governor looked at Dennis, who was
resplendent on the platform; but Isaacs, to give him his due, shook his head. But the look
was enough. A miserable lad, ill-bred, who had once been in Boston, thought it would
sound well to call for me, and peeped out, "Ingham!" A few more wretches cried,
"Ingham! Ingham!" Still Isaacs was firm; but the Governor, anxious, indeed, to prevent a
row, knew I would say something, and said, "Our friend Mr. Ingham is always prepared--
and though we had not relied upon him, he will say a word, perhaps." Applause followed,
which turned Dennis's head. He rose, flattered, and tried No. 3: "There has been so much
said, and, on the whole, so well said, that I will not longer occupy the time!" and sat
down, looking for his hat; for things seemed squally. But the people cried, "Go on! go
on!" and some applauded. Dennis, still confused, but flattered by the applause, to which
neither he nor I are used, rose again, and this time tried No. 2: "I am very glad you liked
it!" in a sonorous, clear delivery. My best friends stared. All the people who did not know
me personally yelled with delight at the aspect of the evening; the Governor was beside
himself, and poor Isaacs thought he was undone! Alas, it was I! A boy in the gallery cried
in a loud tone, "It's all an infernal humbug," just as Dennis, waving his hand, commanded
silence, and tried No. 4: "I agree, in general, with my friend the other side of the room."
The poor Governor doubted his senses, and crossed to stop him--not in time, however.

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The same gallery-boy shouted, "How's your mother?"--and Dennis, now completely lost,
tried, as his last shot, No. 1, vainly: "Very well, thank you; and you?"
I think I must have been undone already. But Dennis, like another Lockhard chose "to
make sicker." The audience rose in a whirl of amazement, rage, and sorrow. Some other
impertinence, aimed at Dennis, broke all restraint, and, in pure Irish, he delivered himself
of an address to the gallery, inviting any person who wished to fight to come down and
do so--stating, that they were all dogs and cowards--that he would take any five of them
single-handed, "Shure, I have said all his Riverence and the Misthress bade me say,"
cried he, in defiance; and, seizing the Governor's cane from his hand, brandished it,
quarter-staff fashion, above his head. He was, indeed, got from the hall only with the
greatest difficulty by the Governor, the City Marshal, who had been called in, and the
Superintendent of my Sunday School.
The universal impression, of course, was, that the Rev. Frederic Ingham had lost all
command of himself in some of those haunts of intoxication which for fifteen years I
have been laboring to destroy. Till this moment, indeed, that is the impression in
Naguadavick. This number of The Atlantic will relieve from it a hundred friends of mine
who have been sadly wounded by that notion now for years--but I shall not be likely ever
to show my head there again.
No! My double has undone me.
We left town at seven the next morning. I came to No. 9, in the Third Range, and settled
on the Minister's Lot, In the new towns in Maine, the first settled minister has a gift of a
hundred acres of land. I am the first settled minister in No. 9. My wife and little Paulina
are my parish. We raise corn enough to live on in summer. We kill bear's meat enough to
carbonize it in winter. I work on steadily on my Traces of Sandemanianism in the Sixth
and Seventh Centuries, which I hope to persuade Phillips, Sampson & Co. to publish next
year. We are very happy, but the world thinks we are undone.

[Dark Saint Alaick]

A Visit To The Asylum For Aged
And Decayed Punsters


By Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-1894)


[From The Atlantic Monthly, January, 1861. Republished in Soundings from the Atlantic (1864), by Oliver Wendell Holmes, whose authorized publishers are the Houghton Mifflin Company]

[Dark Saint Alaick]

Having just returned from a visit to this admirable Institution in company with a friend
who is one of the Directors, we propose giving a short account of what we saw and heard.
The great success of the Asylum for Idiots and Feeble-minded Youth, several of the
scholars from which have reached considerable distinction, one of them being connected
with a leading Daily Paper in this city, and others having served in the State and National
Legislatures, was the motive which led to the foundation of this excellent charity. Our
late distinguished townsman, Noah Dow, Esquire, as is well known, bequeathed a large
portion of his fortune to this establishment-- "being thereto moved," as his will expressed
it, "by the desire of N. Dowing some public Institution for the benefit of Mankind." Being
consulted as to the Rules of the Institution and the selection of a Superintendent, he
replied, that "all Boards must construct their own Platforms of operation. Let them select
anyhow and he should be pleased." N.E. Howe, Esq., was chosen in compliance with this
delicate suggestion.
The Charter provides for the support of "One hundred aged and decayed Gentlemen-
Punsters." On inquiry if there way no provision for females, my friend called my
attention to this remarkable psychological fact, namely:
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A FEMALE PUNSTER.
This remark struck me forcibly, and on reflection I found that I never knew nor heard of
one, though I have once or twice heard a woman make a single detached pun, as I have
known a hen to crow.
On arriving at the south gate of the Asylum grounds, I was about to ring, but my friend
held my arm and begged me to rap with my stick, which I did. An old man with a very
comical face presently opened the gate and put out his head.
"So you prefer Cane to A bell, do you?" he said--and began chuckling and coughing at a
great rate.

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My friend winked at me.
"You're here still, Old Joe, I see," he said to the old man.
"Yes, yes--and it's very odd, considering how often I've bolted, nights."
He then threw open the double gates for us to ride through.
"Now," said the old man, as he pulled the gates after us, "you've had a long journey."
"Why, how is that, Old Joe?" said my friend.
"Don't you see?" he answered; "there's the East hinges on the one side of the gate, and
there's the West hinges on t'other side--haw! haw! haw!"
We had no sooner got into the yard than a feeble little gentleman, with a remarkably
bright eye, came up to us, looking very serious, as if something had happened.
"The town has entered a complaint against the Asylum as a gambling establishment," he
said to my friend, the Director.
"What do you mean?" said my friend.
"Why, they complain that there's a lot o' rye on the premises," he answered, pointing to a
field of that grain--and hobbled away, his shoulders shaking with laughter, as he went.
On entering the main building, we saw the Rules and Regulations for the Asylum
conspicuously posted up. I made a few extracts which may be interesting:

SECT. I. OF VERBAL EXERCISES.

5. Each Inmate shall be permitted to make Puns freely from eight in the morning until ten
at night, except during Service in the Chapel and Grace before Meals.
6. At ten o'clock the gas will be turned off, and no further Puns, Conundrums, or other
play on words will be allowed to be uttered, or to be uttered aloud.
9. Inmates who have lost their faculties and cannot any longer make Puns shall be
permitted to repeat such as may be selected for them by the Chaplain out of the work of
Mr. Joseph Miller.

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10. Violent and unmanageable Punsters, who interrupt others when engaged in
conversation, with Puns or attempts at the same, shall be deprived of their Joseph Millers,
and, if necessary, placed in solitary confinement.

SECT. III. OF DEPORTMENT AT MEALS.

4. No Inmate shall make any Pun, or attempt at the same, until the Blessing has been
asked and the company are decently seated.
7. Certain Puns having been placed on the Index Expurgatorius of the Institution, no
Inmate shall be allowed to utter them, on pain of being debarred the perusal of Punch and
Vanity Fair, and, if repeated, deprived of his Joseph Miller.
Among these are the following:
Allusions to Attic salt, when asked to pass the salt-cellar.
Remarks on the Inmates being mustered, etc., etc.
Associating baked beans with the bene-factors of the Institution.
Saying that beef-eating is befitting, etc., etc.
The following are also prohibited, excepting to such Inmates as may have lost their
faculties and cannot any longer make Puns of their own:
"----your own hair or a wig"; "it will be long enough," etc., etc.; "little of its age," etc.,
etc.; also, playing upon the following words: hospital; mayor; pun; pitied; bread; sauce,
etc., etc., etc. See INDEX EXPURGATORIUS, printed for use of Inmates.
The subjoined Conundrum is not allowed: Why is Hasty Pudding like the Prince?
Because it comes attended by its sweet; nor this variation to it, to wit: Because the 'lasses
runs after it.

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The Superintendent, who went round with us, had been a noted punster in his time, and
well known in the business world, but lost his customers by making too free with their
names--as in the famous story he set afloat in '29 of four Jerries attaching to the names of
a noted Judge, an eminent Lawyer, the Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions, and
the well-known Landlord at Springfield. One of the four Jerries, he added, was of
gigantic magnitude. The play on words was brought out by an accidental remark of
Solomons, the well-known Banker. "Capital punishment!" the Jew was overheard saying,
with reference to the guilty parties. He was understood, as saying, A capital pun is meant,
which led to an investigation and the relief of the greatly excited public mind.
The Superintendent showed some of his old tendencies, as he went round with us.
"Do you know"--he broke out all at once--"why they don't take steppes in Tartary for
establishing Insane Hospitals?"
We both confessed ignorance.
"Because there are nomad people to be found there," he said, with a dignified smile.
He proceeded to introduce us to different Inmates. The first was a middle-aged, scholarly
man, who was seated at a table with a Webster's Dictionary and a sheet of paper before
him.
"Well, what luck to-day, Mr. Mowzer?" said the Superintendent.
"Three or four only," said Mr. Mowzer. "Will you hear 'em now--now I'm here?"
We all nodded.
"Don't you see Webster ers in the words center and theater?
"If he spells leather lether, and feather fether, isn't there danger that he'll give us a bad
spell of weather?

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"Besides, Webster is a resurrectionist; he does not allow u to rest quietly in the mould.
"And again, because Mr. Worcester inserts an illustration in his text, is that any reason
why Mr. Webster's publishers should hitch one on in their appendix? It's what I call a
Connect-a-cut trick.
"Why is his way of spelling like the floor of an oven? Because it is under bread."
"Mowzer!" said the Superintendent, "that word is on the Index!"
"I forgot," said Mr. Mowzer; "please don't deprive me of Vanity Fair this one time, sir."
"These are all, this morning. Good day, gentlemen." Then to the Superintendent: "Add
you, sir!"
The next Inmate was a semi-idiotic-looking old man. He had a heap of block-letters
before him, and, as we came up, he pointed, without saying a word, to the arrangements
he had made with them on the table. They were evidently anagrams, and had the merit of
transposing the letters of the words employed without addition or subtraction. Here are a
few of them:
TIMES. SMITE!
POST. STOP!
TRIBUNE. TRUE NIB.
WORLD. DR. OWL.
ADVERTISER. { RES VERI DAT.
{ IS TRUE. READ!
ALLOPATHY. ALL O' TH' PAY.
HOMOEOPATHY. O, THE ----! O! O, MY! PAH!
The mention of several New York papers led to two or three questions. Thus: Whether
the Editor of The Tribune was H.G. really? If the complexion of his politics were not
accounted for by his being an eager person himself? Whether Wendell Fillips were not a
reduced copy of John Knocks? Whether a New York Feuilletoniste is not the same thing
as a Fellow down East?

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At this time a plausible-looking, bald-headed man joined us, evidently waiting to take a
part in the conversation.
"Good morning, Mr. Riggles," said the Superintendent, "Anything fresh this morning?
Any Conundrum?"
"I haven't looked at the cattle," he answered, dryly.
"Cattle? Why cattle?"
"Why, to see if there's any corn under 'em!" he said; and immediately asked, "Why is
Douglas like the earth?"
We tried, but couldn't guess.
"Because he was flattened out at the polls!" said Mr. Riggles.
"A famous politician, formerly," said the Superintendent. "His grandfather was a seize-
Hessian-ist in the Revolutionary War. By the way, I hear the freeze-oil doctrines don't go
down at New Bedford."
The next Inmate looked as if he might have been a sailor formerly.
"Ask him what his calling was," said the Superintendent.
"Followed the sea," he replied to the question put by one of us. "Went as mate in a
fishing-schooner."
"Why did you give it up?"
"Because I didn't like working for two mast-ers," he replied.
Presently we came upon a group of elderly persons, gathered about a venerable
gentleman with flowing locks, who was propounding questions to a row of Inmates.
"Can any Inmate give me a motto for M. Berger?" he said.
Nobody responded for two or three minutes. At last one old man, whom I at once
recognized as a Graduate of our University (Anno 1800) held up his hand.
"Rem a cue tetigit."
"Go to the head of the class, Josselyn," said the venerable patriarch.