"Go away. I don't believe that."
"Honest he did—I'll show you the cancellation."
BUSINESS ENTERPRISE
The story of the rival boot-makers, which appeared recently, is matched by a correspondent of an English paper with another story, equally old but equally worth repeating. It concerns two rival sausage-makers. Again, they lived on opposite sides of a certain street, and, one day, one of them placed over his shop the legend:
"We sell sausages to the gentry and nobility of the country."
The next day, over the way, appeared the sign:
"We sell sausages to the gentry and nobility of the whole country."
Not to be outdone, the rival put up what he evidently regarded as a final statement, namely:
"We sell sausages to the King."
Next day there appeared over the door of the first sausage-maker the simple expression of loyalty:
"God save the King."
"Biddy," remarked the newly wed Irishman, "go down and feed the pigs."
"Faith and I will not," replied the bride.
"Don't be after contradicting me, Biddy," retorted the husband. "Haven't I just endowed you with all my worldly goods, and if you can not feed your own property, then it's ashamed of you I am."
This was a new point of view, so off Biddy went.
Presently she returned.
"Have you fed the pigs, Biddy?" demanded her husband, sternly.
"Faith, and I have not," she answered. "I have done a great deal better. As they were my property I have sold them, and shall not be bothered with them again."
A business man advertised for an office boy. The next morning there were some fifty boys in line. He was about to begin examining the applicants when his stenographer handed him a card on which was scribbled:
"Don't do anything until you see me. I'm the last kid in line, but I'm telling you I'm there with the goods."
In one of the back streets in Philadelphia is a little jewelry store which is making progress—witness this incident:
"What's the price of nickel alarm clocks?"
"Dwenty-fife cends."
"What! Why, how's that? Last week you told my son they were a dollar."
"Yaw, dat is so. Listen: You are a good frien', so I tol' you. Ven I hat some I sells him for von tollar. Now I ain'd got none I sells him for dwendy-fife cents. Dot makes me a rebutation for cheabness, und I don't lose noddings!"
Commercialomania
PROFITEER—"One million is the price of a gram of radium!"
HIS PARTNER—"And we never thought of trying to sell any!"
An enterprising young florist, in order to increase his trade, displayed this sign in his window:
"We give a packet of flower seeds with every plant."
His competitor across the street promptly sought to meet the competition by placing in his window the following announcement:
"We give the earth with every plant."
A very small but live boy applied to a great merchant for a job.
The great man sized him up with twinkling eyes, for the one situation open needed a bigger parcel of human experience, and asked what position he wanted.
"A chance to grow up in the business, Mister."
"Well, we are more or less being depopulated by the drafts. What is your motto, my son?"
"The same as yours," was the ready answer.
"What do you mean?" asked the puzzled merchant.
"Why, on the door there—'Push.'"
He got the job of keeper of that very door.
The proprietors of two rival livery-stables, situated alongside each other in a busy street, have been having a lively advertising duel lately.
The other week one of them stuck up on his office window a long strip of paper, bearing the words:
"Our horses need no whip to make them go."
This bit of sarcasm naturally caused some amusement at the expense of the rival proprietor, but in less than an hour he neatly turned the tables by pasting the following retort on his own window:
"True. The wind blows them along!"
A group of farmers were complaining of the potato bugs' ravages.
"The pests ate my whole potato crop in two weeks," said one farmer.
"They ate my crop in two days," said a second farmer, "and then they roosted on the trees to see if I'd plant more."
A drummer for a seed house cleared his throat.
"Gents," he said, "all that's very remarkable. Let me tell you, though, what I saw in our own store. I saw a couple of potato bugs examining the books about a week before planting time to see who had bought seed."
UNFORTUNATE PEDESTRIAN (who has been knocked down and dazed)—"Where am I? Where am I?"
ENTERPRISING HAWKER—"'Ere y'are, sir—map of London, one penny."—Punch.
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