unearths some literary gems.
Dear Reader, small the boon I ask,—
Your gentle smile, to egg my wit on;
Lest people deem my earnest task
Not worth the paper it is writ on.
***
The iceman...had the hard, set jaw of a prize fighter was successfully eating steak, and he welcomed the incoming fried potatoes, as one greets a new instalment of a serial.
***
“Hello,” languidly responded a girl like a long pale lily—a Burne-Jones type, who sometimes carried around a small stained-glass window to rest her head against.
***
She saw gardens like the Tuileries and Tuilerums.
***
"Good work, I'll megaphone."
***
Warble sat down in an easy-going chair—so easy, it slid across the room with her.
***
Goldwin Leathersham was a great Captain of Industry. In fact, he put the dust in industry, or, at least, he took it out of it. He got it, anyway.
***
The French chef looked puzzled. He was an expensive chef and part of his duty was to look puzzled at any plain-named dish.
***
“Why, you see, I am a solist—like a palmist you know—but as to feet. I studied solistry in Asia Minor and I know it from the ground up. Oh, please, Mrs. Petticoat, let me read your sole!”
[...]
“The Solar system,” he began, “is interesting in the extreme. It was invented by Solon, though Platoe also theorized on the immortality of the sole. His ideas, however have been discarded by modern footmen.
“Locke, is [sic] his treatise On the Human Understanding, discusses the subject fully and with many footnotes, and old Samuel Foote himself cast footlights on the subject.”
[...]
“The palmist may claim to read the true character from the lines of the hand, but it is only by solistry that the real sole is laid bare and the character of a subject in any walk of life is exposed. The lines of the sole are greatly indicative of character, for all traits must draw the line somewhere. Now, Mrs. Petticoat, this line extending from the Mount of Trilby to the outer side of the sole is the life line. If that appears to be broken it indicates future death. If more pronounced on one sole than the other, it implies that the subject has one foot in the grave. You haven't, don't be alarmed. Here is the headline, straight and continuous, showing a long and level head.”
[...]
“This line running from the Mount of Cinderella to the heel is the clothes line and denotes love of dress. This line crossing it is the fish line and shows you are incapable of telling the truth.”
[...]
“A thorough, broad understanding and a friendly footing toward all,” declared the solist, “and no danger of misunderstanding.”
[...]
“Mount of Atalanta highly prominent,” said Goodsport, “that means you are a runner, either for office or for pleasure. Here is a line meeting—that indicates a railroad man. H'm. A well-developed football shows you have been to college. You seem to be inclined to solemates—”
But Leathersham had taken to his heels.
[...]
“Ah, the poetic foot!” the soloist exclaimed. “There are two kinds of poetic feet—the Iambic and the Trochaic. You have one of each.
***
They were a stuck-up lot. The fly-paper had intrigued them all.
***
The irrepressible impulse of reform egged her on and it was a perfectly good egg.
***
“I know all about art but I don't know what I like,” she returned, blushing prettily.
[This precurses Thurber's "He knows all about art, but he doesn't know what he likes" cartoon by almost two decades, btw.]
***
“Why, a Color Organ is that marvelous new invention that plays color instead of sound.”
***
"I bet her soul has got its rubbers on!"
***
“Having a walk?” he inquired, casually.
“Yop,” she casualed back.
***
[Un-round numbers dept.]
“How long'll you be gone?”
“It may be four yearth and it may be eleven—”
***
Her position was that of a pickle taster.
At first, only of the little gherkins, then promoted through medium cucumbers, to the glory of full-fledged Dills.
***
