e continued in a state of suppressed
laughter after passing on. Meeting a brother professor, who asked him
what was amusing him so much, he told the story with a slightly varied
reading. "I asked that fellow why he had so short a gown, and he
answered, _it will be a long time before I get another_."--"Well,
there's nothing very funny in that."--"Neither there is," said the
professor, "I don't understand how it amused me so much. It must have
been something in _the way he said it_."

MDCCX.--FOOTE'S LAST JOKE.

WHEN Foote was on his way to France, for change of air, he went into the
kitchen at the inn at Dover, to order a particular dish for dinner. The
true English cook boasted that she had never set foot out of her
country. On this, the invalid gravely observed, "Why, cookey, that's
very extraordinary, as they tell me up stairs that you have been several
times _all over grease_!"--"They may tell you what they please above or
below stairs," replied the cook, "but I was never ten miles from Dover
in my life!"--"Nay, now, that must be a _fib_," says Foote, "for I have
myself seen you at _Spithead_!" The next day (October 21, 1777) the
exhausted wit "shuffled off this mortal coil."

MDCCXI.--_L'Envoy_.

THERE is so much genuine humor in the following jocular DINNER CODE,
that we cannot do better than close our little volume with it.

DINNER CODE.

_Of the Amphitryon.--His Rights._

Art. 1.--The Amphitryon is the king of the table: his empire lasts as
long as the meal, and ends with it.

Art. 2.--It is lawful for his glass to exceed in capacity those of his
guests.

Art. 3.--He may be lively with his male guests, and gallant towards the
females; to such of them as are pretty he may risk a compliment or two,
which is sure to be received from him with an approving smile.

_His Duties._

Art. 1.--Fulfilling to the utmost the laws of hospitality, he watches
with paternal solicitude over the welfare of the stomachs committed to
his care; reassures the timid, encourages the modest, and incites the
vigorous appetite.

Art. 2.--He must abstain from praising either his dishes or his wines.

Art. 3.--He is not to take advantage of his situation to utter stale
jests or vulgar puns. A careful perusal of "The Jest Book" will be his
best security against a violation of this _article_.

Art. 4.--The police of the table belongs of right to him; he should
never permit a plate or a glass to be