antries dependent on them to one country, no
great loss perhaps, though the greater part of German humour is thus
rendered obscure. "Remember," writes Lord Chesterfield, "that the wit,
humour, and jokes of most companies are local. They thrive in that
particular soil, but will not often bear transplanting. Every company is
differently circumstanced, has its peculiar cant and jargon, which may
give occasion to wit and mirth within the circle, but would seem flat
and insipid in any other, and therefore will not bear repeating. Nothing
makes a man look sillier than a pleasantry not relished, or not
understood, and if he meets with a profound silence when he expected a
general applause, or what is worse if he is desired to explain the _bon
mot_, his awkward and embarrassed situation is easier imagined than
described." But ignorance of the meaning of words, while it destroys one
kind of amusement sometimes creates another. The mistakes of the deaf
and of foreigners are often ludicrous. A French gentleman told me that
on the morning after his arrival in Italy he rang his bell and called
"_De l'eau chaude_." As he did not seem to be understood he made signs
to his face, and the waiter nodded and withdrew. It was a long time
before he reappeared, but when he entered the delay was accounted for,
as he had been out to purchase a pot of _rouge_!

But mistakes with regard to the meanings of words are not so common as
with regard to their references. We are often ignorant of the state of
society, or the manners and customs to which allusion is made. This is
the reason why so much of the humour of bygone ages escapes us. In
ancient Greece to call a man a frequenter of baths was an insult, not a
commendation as it would be at present. With them the class who are "so
very clean and so very silly" was large, and the golden youth of the
period, under the pretence of ablution, spent their time in idleness and
luxury in these "baths"--which corresponded in some respects to our
clubs. To give an example in modern literature--when Charles Lamb in his
Life of Liston records that his hero was descended from a Johan
d'Elistone, who came over with the Conqueror, and was rewarded for his
prowess with a grant of land at Lupton Magna, many people had so little
knowledge or insight as to take this humorous invention to be an
historical fact.

Laughter for want of knowledge is especially manifested among savages,
when they first come into contact wi