Life — December 24, 1896 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

chair, a grizzled man with children climbing all over him—a row of stockings on the chim- ney-piece waiting to be filled! Arcady has no compensation for missing that. The Girl (laughing at him): You'rea sen- timental goose. Look closer and you'll see that the man is dead tired and glad that it is almost over. He has been tramping around for hours collecting things to put in those stockings, and now he is telling awful lies about Santa Claus to those children—trying to quiet them downto sleep. (Pushing aside the rose-bushes at the door.) Go back to your books, old dreamer, and thank the fates for Leing kind to you. (Vanishes.) [The Man opens the book, but the laughter of children keeps floating across the clouds, and tears dim the pages. The fire flickers out, just as the Christmas bells begin to ring. Droch. A CORRECTION. EAR, honest girl, you know that I Could not afford to buy it— The Christmas gift you coveted— And so you write ** Don’t try it.” But you forget, dear heart, that love Ne‘er stops to count a folly : To please you thus I'd live for months In moneyed melancholy. And so accept with Christmas hopes, Sweet one, this little locket. 'Twould break my heart to keep it back— I'd rather break my pocket. Dear Jack (she mistake— I'm feeling quite dejected ; This one cost only half as much As that which I selected. wrote), there's some THE THEIR REWARDS. Optimist and the Pessimist each has his reward: the Optimist in the sense of virtue that engulfs him as he reflects HOW HE FELT. t u $ ‘T SAY, Jones, do you never hun- ger for the good old times you had at college?” “1 frequently Brown.” thirst for them, upon that singular nobility of his mind which makes this hard world seem to him so much better than it really is ; and the Pes- simist, while he wan- ders in the unlighted gloom of his melan- choly, has so much the keener satisfaction in knowing that outside of his professional opinion, life is a round of joy. MERE man can never tell whether two women are friends because they like each other or because they hate each other. E hear that Princeton College offered Dr. Watson (Ian Maclaren) a degree, but as the cautious Scot had never heard of that institute he declined the offer. Learning afterward that Princeton was more of acollege than he at first supposed, he informed the gentlemen in control that he had reconsidered his refusal and would accept the tribute. Where- upon he was told in the most polite terms—and probably not in Scotch dialect —that they must consider as final his previous refusal. While it is mortifying to believe that Princeton lost her head and be- came hysterical, it is correspondingly soothing to learn that she possessed sufficient spine to recover her equilib- rium before she fainted on the doctor's neck. ESTIMATED. INGO: That doctor must have found out how much I am worth, Mrs. Brnco: Why? “T just got his bill.” “—T WAS A COLD, DARK KNIGHT.” comicbooks.com