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Show WO-VIEN ARE WISE Uncle Henry Shows What Chance a Poor Man Has. Any man who thinks. a woman hat no sense of humor," said Uncle Henry, unlimbering about four dollars' worth, of complicated gestures, "deserves ta be say, any man who is so bald-head ed on the inside as to suppose thai women don't know a joke when they see it deserves to be well, son, my gracious, he deserves to be married. And that's all there is to it. "Did you see this? Did you read this in the papers? By gum, it's a corker. Listen here. "A young idiot goes and enlists ia the navy. They give him some blue clothes and a black eye, a slop bucket and a light breakfast, and set him to work improving the complexion of the. starboard watch ahoy. Say, he va sore all over. "Had a girl ashore, too. Fact is, she, put him up to it. Well, sir, he was in and he couldn't get out. So be man cured the brass work, learned to say 'Yessir' and Nosir,' and click his heelf and salute every time any gold brabj came along, and after awhile his tirns was up. "Then listen 'No.more discipline,' he says. 'No more bowing and scraping,' he says. 'No more being afraid to catj your soul your own,' he says. 'Not with the girl on shore ready to marry me,' he says. 'I'm through with discipline dis-cipline and backing water for life,' h says. And he skiddoed right out ot the navy like he was almost human. "Then, by gracious, what does ha do? Well, sir, by gum, he goes right off and marries the girl. Think it over, son; take it easy and get the meat out of it. That's right; go ahead and laugh. Honest, can you beat it? "Goes right home, he does, right oat of the navy, and marries the girl. Never waited to get the crick out ot his back, even. Tried of discipline, he was. And he goes right off and gets married! Wanted a chance to call his soul his own, he did. And as soon as he gets a living show he beats right out and becomes a husband. Regular husband, by gracious, and before that he was only a sailor. "But the girl, son; the girl! Wasn't she the goods? Can you see it? Does it get to you, the whole business? "There she was, just an ordinary sort of a female woman girl person-Nothing person-Nothing extra, understand, like as though she was bigger than he was, on could throw straight, or anything. No, sir, regular straight, average girl. "And there he was. High and mighty sort of a male man. Used to go out with the boys and come back with the katzenjammer. Stood up straight and looked 'em over. Regular unmarried sort of a guy. Wouldn't take nothing from nobody. "Now, see. Pipe the foxy fiossie. She was over seven. What chance would she stand with him? Nix. So what does she do? She pumps him full of salt-water literature. She hands liim over to the myrmidons of the quarterdeck and lets them beat the j fear that cometh with understanding Into him with a 16-inch gun. Say, son. It was grand. "Then she waits for him to come out. Grins as he plunges over to her. 'ittle cottage door. And when he saya: Will you?' she gets red in the face '.rying to frame up 'You betcher life!" In some more modest and retiring sort of language. "Would she? Would she be his? Would she? Holy hopping hoopskirls, what in the name of senses had she been training him for? Would she bo his? In a minute if she had not already al-ready decided that he was going to be hers. And, say, son, what chance has a man got against a gaYne like that? "By gracious, you got to give her credit. You got to give 'em all credit They're wise, son; they're wise. They go out to tea fights and bargain matt-sees matt-sees of an afternoon and sit there like butter wouldn't melt in their months. 41ong comes one of us mere men with a pair of squeaky patent leathers and a. week's pay in his kick, and he looks in at 'em and he says to himself; 'There's a nice, quiet, tame, innocent looking bunch. For two cents I'd go in and give 'em a look.' "And all the time the girl nearest the window is saying to the petit lamb alongside: 'There's a big hulkol nothing with a face like a pan of stale fudge piping us through the window Shall we make him come in and tie s few knots in him?' 'No,' says mother's moth-er's ownest lainb, putting on a sick duck-in-a-thunderstorm expression. 'Let's wait until the caramels are gone, and then we'll go out and throw the hooks into a couple of live ones.' "Honest, son, what chance in Ibis wide, wide world has a poor, undo-tenseless undo-tenseless critter like a man is until somebody wakes him up from his dream, got with a frame-up like that? Say, he hasn't get any more show than I have when my wife gets going. Only I know enough to beat it before it begins to thunder. That's experi-once, experi-once, that's what that is, and experience experi-ence doesn't come in a box like crackers. crack-ers. "And that's why I say any man who thinks a woman has no sense ot humor is liable to have some girl coma along any day and marry him up, and I hen where is he? He knows more, but it doesn't do him any good. "Yes, indeed, son, there's no doubt about it, a woman knows a joke when she sees it. Of course you tell her a joke and she won't laugh nor nothing. But that's because she don't it." |