AUTOMOBILING
"Sorry, gentlemen," said the new constable, "but I'll hev to run ye in.
We been keepin' tabs on ye sence ye left Huckleberry Corners."
"Why, that's nonsense!" said Dubbleigh. "It's taken us four hours to
come twenty miles, thanks to a flabby tire. That's only five miles an
hour."
"Sure!" said the new constable, "but the speed law round these here
parts is ten mile an hour, and by Jehosophat
'm goin' to make you
ottermobile fellers live up to it."
Two street pedlers in Bradford, England, bought a horse for $11.25. It
was killed by a motor-car one day and the owner of the car paid them
$115 for the loss. Thereupon a new industry sprang up on the roads of
England.
"It was very romantic," says the friend. "He proposed to her in the
automobile."
"Yes?" we murmur, encouragingly.
"And she accepted him in the hospital."
"What you want to do is to have that mudhole in the road fixed," said
the visitor.
"That goes to show," replied Farmer Corntassel, "how little you
reformers understand local conditions. I've purty nigh paid off a
mortgage with the money I made haulm' automobiles out o' that mud-hole."
The old lady from the country and her small son were driving to town
when a huge automobile bore down upon them. The horse was badly
frightened and began to prance, whereupon the old lady leaped down and
waved wildly to the chauffeur, screaming at the top of her voice.
The chauffeur stopped the car and offered to help get the horse past.
"That's all right," said the boy, who remained composedly in the
carriage, "I can manage the horse. You just lead Mother past."
"What makes you carry that horrible shriek machine for an automobile
signal?"
"For humane reasons." replied Mr. Chugging. "If I can paralyze a person
with fear he will keep still and I can run to one side of him."
In certain sections of West Virginia there is no liking for
automobilists, as was evidenced in the case of a Washingtonian who was
motoring in a sparsely settled region of the State.
This gentleman was haled before a local magistrate upon the complaint of
a constable. The magistrate, a good-natured man, was not, however,
absolutely certain that the Washingtonian's car had been driven too
fast; and the owner stoutly insisted that he had been progressing at the
rate of only six miles an hour.
"Why, your Honor," he said, "my engine was out of order, and I was going
very slowly because I was afraid it would break down completely. I give
you my word, sir, you could have walked as fast as I was running."
"Well," said the magistrate, after due reflection, "you don't appear to
have been exceeding the speed limit, but at the same time you must have
been guilty of something, or you wouldn't be here. I fine you ten
dollars for loitering."--_Fenimore Martin_.