; and our babbler, longing to know the end of this adventure,
exclaimed, "And the third!" "Oh, the third!" answered the other; "he
shot me dead."

ABSENT MAN
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]

A celebrated living poet, occasionally a little absent in mind, was
invited by a friend, whom he met in the street, to dine with him the
next Sunday at a country lodging, which he had taken for the summer
months. The address was, "near the _Green Man_ at _Dulwich_"; which, not
to put his inviter to the trouble of pencilling down, the _absent_ man
promised faithfully to remember. But when Sunday came, he, fully late
enough, made his way to Greenwich, and began inquiring for the sign of
the _Dull Man_! No such sign was to be found; and, after losing an hour,
a person guessed that though there was no _Dull Man_ at Greenwich, there
was a _Green Man_ at Dulwich, which the _absent_ man might _possibly_
mean! This remark connected the broken chain, and the poet was under the
necessity of taking his chop by himself.

PRIDE
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]

A Spaniard rising from a fall, whereby his nose had suffered
considerably, exclaimed, "Voto, a tal, esto es caminar por la turru!"
(This comes of walking upon earth!)

WITTY COWARD
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]

A French marquis having received several blows with a stick, which he
never thought of resenting, a friend asked him, "How he could reconcile
it with his honour to suffer them to pass without notice?" "Poh!"
replied the marquis, "I never trouble my head with anything that passes
behind my back."

VALUING BEAUTY
[Sidenote: _Percy Anecdotes_]

The Persian Ambassador, Mirza Aboul Hassan, while he resided in Paris
was an object of so much curiosity that he could not go out without
being surrounded by a multitude of gazers, and the ladies even ventured
so far as to penetrate his hotel.

On returning one day from a ride, he found his apartments crowded with
ladies, all elegantly dressed, but not all equally beautiful. Astonished
at this unexpected assemblage, he inquired what these European
odalisques could possibly want with him. The interpreter replied that
they had come to look at his Excellency. The Ambassador was surprised to
find himself an object of curiosity among a people who boast of having
attained the acme of civilisation; and was not a little offended at
conduct which, in Asia, would have been considered an unwarrantable
breach of good-breeding; he accordi