Silly Syclopedia — 06 - R and S

[Illustration: "R--The Rolling Stone at the Bottom of the Hill."

] Remember--you can fool some of the people all the time if you care to spend your money that way.

Reasons may be found for everything except why does a woman get off a street car backwards.

Race suicide doesn't appeal to poor people.

Rolling stones gather no moss but look at the excitement they have.

* * * * * ### R: The eighteenth letter of the alphabet, used principally to began a college yell; thus, Rah!

Rah!

Rah!

### * * * * * [Illustration] RAG.

A material invented for chewing purposes.

RAKE.

A man-about-town after he gets shop worn.

RARE.

The way you get roast beef when you order it well done.

REFORM.

A bird which is always flying towards us but which never gets here.

RETRIBUTION.

A man who marries for money and finds it is all in Confederate bills.

[Illustration] RICHES.

Something which is said to have wings, but I can't prove it, because they never flew my way.

ROYSTERER.

A man who sowed so much wild oats in his youth that he has to eat cracked oats in his age.

[Illustration] RACE-SUICIDE.

A disease which was cured by T. Roosevelt, Esquire, when he invented an idea for the purpose of giving nursemaids steady employment.

For instance: Rondeau.

There was a nice old lady and She lived within her shoe;

She had so many children that She didn't know what to do.

She wrote the President and said "I have twenty kids or more!"

The President replied to her "Encore, old girl, encore!"

She answered, "I've no room at home For more, so I am through!"

And he replied, "Why don't you go And get another shoe?"

--Sir Walter Scott, page 96. RIDDLE.

A question-mark gone mad.

A foolish member of the Interrogation family whose most fiendish offspring is "How old is Ann?"

Some examples: * * * * * Ann's father sends his pitcher to the well; Mary's father sends his pitcher to the saloon; how much money has Ann's father saved?

Ann's mother has just finished reading a very beautiful story.

Mary's mother sent over and borrowed the book.

How old will Ann's mother be when the book gets back?

Ann's little brother is entertaining Ann's sweetheart in the parlor.

Ann's little brother has just told Ann's sweetheart how old Ann is.

How long did Ann's sweetheart remain after he learned the bitter truth?

Ann has a brother by the name of James.

James wrote two letters, one to his wife and one to his lady typewriter.

Ten minutes after mailing them he discovered that the right letter was in the wrong envelope.

Which train did James take and when does Ann expect him back?

Ann took a dollar bill and went to a department store.

She saved twenty cents for car fare and spent eighty cents for lunch.

What were the clerks swearing at after Ann went out?

Ann had dark hair but she put peroxide on it to frighten it lighter.

Ann's hair became angry at the peroxide and got up and left her head.

Why does Ann converse with callers through the speaking tube?

Ann's friend Mary has seven brothers.

One of them paints sawdust in a delicatessen factory at twelve dollars per.

The other six play the races.

What time does the dinner bell ring and who squares it with the grocer?

Ann has another friend by the name of Ellen.

Ellen's father has one sitting room and four daughters.

The four daughters are engaged to four nice young gentlemen.

At what time in the evening does papa and mamma crawl out of the dumb waiter and how much is the gas bill?

Ann rode home in the Elevated Rough House at the twilight hour.

Eighty-seven gentlemen were there hiding behind eighty-seven newspapers.

Ann joined a strap and swung to and fro.

How old was Ann when she received a seat?

[Illustration: "S--The black Sheep."

] Some people's talk is too cheap at any price.

Some men are just like a mule, because they kick at the wrong time.

Some people save up their money for a rainy day and finally decide that a foggy day is a good enough excuse to spend it.

Scandal is the black sheep in the family of Love.

* * * * * ### S: The nineteenth letter of the alphabet, which is called a sibilant, because it makes a hissing sound like a goose.

### [Illustration] * * * * * SALOON.

Something which can be opened on credit, but it takes cash to start a church.

SARCASM.

A thirty-dollar Panama hat on a thirty-cent man.

SATAN.

An accommodating chap who picks out cosey-corners in his hot-house for the men that brag about being such devils among the women.

SCEPTIC.

A man who will stop to see if there is a microbe in a kiss.

SEASHORE.

A violent disease which breaks out all over people when the weather gets warm.

The cure costs anywhere from to per day, according to the mood the landlord is in.

SINCERITY.

What our friends think about us when our backs are turned.

SPECULATION.

Paying a nickle for a seat in a street-car and then waiting till you get it.

STUBBORNNESS.

A man who knows he is wrong but believes he is right for personal reasons.

SUCKERS.

The bait used by those who go fishing for compliments.

[Illustration] SUCCESS.

Failure kicked to pieces by hard work.

A man who can make enough noise when he wins out to drown the voices of the knockers.

Something which can be caught if a man only runs long enough.

SWIFTNESS.

The manner in which a fool and his rich wife's money are parted.

SYNONYM.

A lazy man trying to win success and a hen trying to lay a corner-stone.

SEAT.

A mythical place in a street car where many are called but few are chosen.

For instance: Little Jack Horner Sat in a corner Riding down town on the "L." He jumped to his feet Gave a lady his seat-- I'm a liar, but don't it sound well.

--Oliver Goldsmith, page 34. SARDINE-CAR.

A term of endearment given to crowded street cars.

* * * * * Marcus Aurelius thus describes the sardine-car in his "Meditations"--see page 946--as follows: The sardine-cars consist of fifty people trying to squeeze into a space that was built only for a Pajama hat and two newspapers.

The seats in the sardine-cars run sideways; the passengers run edgeways, and the life insurance agents run any old way when they see these cars coming.

[Illustration] The sardine-car is the best genteel imitation of a rough-house that has ever been invented.

The are called "Sardine Cars" because the conductor has to let the passengers out with a can-opener.

Brave and strong men climb into a street car and they are full of health and life and vigor, but a few blocks up the road they fall out backwards and inquire feebly for a sanitarium.

To ride on the street cars in a big city of an evening brings out all that is in a man, including a lot of loud words he didn't know he had.

The last census shows us that the street cars in the city of New York have more ways of producing nervous prostration and palpitation of the brain to the square inch than the combined population of Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Tinkersdam and Gotterdammerung.

To get in some of the street cars about six o'clock is a problem, and to get out again is an assassination.

One evening I rode from Forty-second Street to Fifty-ninth without once touching the floor with my feet.

Part of the time I used the outposts of a stout gentleman to come between me and the ground, and during the rest of the occasion I hung on to a strap and swung out wild and free, like the Japanese flag on a windy day.

Some of our street cars lead a double life, because they are used all winter to act the part of a refrigerator.

It is a cold day when we cannot find it colder in the street cars.

In Germany we find Germans in the cars, but in America we find germs.

That is because this country is young and impulsive.

The germs in the street cars are extremely sociable and will often follow a stranger all the way home.

Often while riding in the street cars I have felt a germ rubbing against my ankle like a kitten, but being a gentleman, I did not reach down and kick it away because the law says we must not be disrespectful to the dumb brutes of the field.

Many of our street cars are made out of the same idea as a can of condensed milk.

The only difference is that the street cars have a sour taste like a lemon squeezer.

When you get out you cannot get in and when you get in you cannot get out because you hate to disturb the strange gentleman that is using your knee to lean over.

[Illustration] Between the seats there is a space of two feet, but in that space you will always find four feet and their owners, unless one of them happens to have a wooden leg.

Under ordinary circumstances four into two won't go, but the sardine-cars defy the laws of gravitation.

A sardine-car conductor can put twenty-six into nine and still have four to carry.

The idea of expansion which is now used by our Congress was suggested by one of these sardine-cars.

The ladies of America have started a rebellion against the sardine-cars, but every time they start it the conductor pulls the bell and leaves the rebellious standing on the corner.

We are a very nervous and careless people in America.

To prove how careless we are I will cite the fact that Manhattan Island is called after a cocktail.

This nervousness is our undoing because we are always in such a hurry to get somewhere that we would rather take the first car and get squeezed into breathlessness than wait for the next which would likely squeeze us into insensibility.

Breathlessness can be cured, but insensibility is dangerous without an alarm clock.

For a man with a small dining-room the sardine-car has its advantages, but when a stout man rides in them he finds himself supporting a lot of strangers he never met before.

One morning I jumped on one of those sardine-cars feeling just like a two-year-old, full of health and happiness.

During the first seven blocks three men fresh from a distillery grew up in front of me and removed the scenery.

One of them had to get out in a hurry so he kicked me on the shins to show how sorry he was to leave me.

One of the other two must have been in the distillery a long time because pretty soon he neglected to use his memory and sat down in my lap.

When I remonstrated with him he replied that this is a free country and if he wished to sit down I had no business to stop him.

Then his friend pulled us apart and I resumed the use of my lap.

During the next twenty blocks I had one of the worst daylight nightmares I ever rode behind.

The party which had been studying the exhibits in the distillery got the idea in his head that my foot was the loud pedal on a piano and he started to play the overture from _William Tell_ until I yelled "W'at'ell!"

That man was such a hard drinker that he gave me the gout just from standing on my feet.

Then I jumped off and swore off and swore at and walked home.

If the man who invented the idea of standing up between the seats in a sardine-car is alive he should have a monument.

My idea would be to catch him alive and place the monument on him and have the conductor come around every ten minutes for his fare.