Jones Has An Off Day

Mr. Jones, although he ís oí a verv sanguine temperament, has days when the world is all hollow and his dolí stuñed with sawdust. One of these occured to him recently when ho put on his winter overooat for the first time and started out to ontch the next car. lie caught the car; also caught his foot in the door, and was shut up bv the driver. who. when ho saw his mistake, released him so suddenly that he was shot into the lap of an old lady who only had breath enough left to scream: "Mercy sakes ulive, man! Take nae money, but spare me life!" Jones apologized, and then smiled at one or two whoru he kne-v, but there seemed a coldness andconstrainton the part of the passengers and a determination to avoid him. The ladies buried their noses in their handkerchie and the gentlemen threw open the car window and glared at Jones as if they intendcd to throw him out, while "the old lady aforesaid was heard to mutte somethingthalsoundedlike"pestilenee ' "Board of Health ought to bo informed of this," said a red-faced man angrily; "U's a criruinal oft'ence, that's what it is, for a.fumigated patiënt to leave the hospital and go about in public!" Two ladies said they feit ill and left the car; then the red-faced man addressed Jones: 'Can you reeoncile it with your conscienoe, he askedseverly, "to go about like a walking nuisance aruongyourfellow men? Have you no regard for the health of the community?" and he covered his face with a polka dot spread. "GoodHeavens! what do you mean?" dcmanded the ularmed Jones. "I mean, sir. to protest against your presence in this public place, carrying an odor of camphor and of.her disinfectants,.which show that you are an escaped fevor patiënt. It is absolutely outrageous, sir!" ' Ha-ha-ha!" laughed Jones hysterically. "He-he-he!- fever patiënt - escaped! Ho-ho! Because I forgot to take some lumps of gum camphor out of the jockets of my coat - disinfectants - haia-a-a!" The disgusted passengers left the car and Mr. Jones put his feet up on the cushions and laughed softly to think what a joke he had to teil Maria when he got home. But who knows what a day will bring forth! Jones was goins: down to the postofïtce a few hourilater and as he walked airily down Griswold street, thinking uf tïie rise in dried applrs, he tvvirled a m.tty cañe hecarriedanilsang with a voice up to concert pitch a lino frora one of his farorite war songs "Let me like t. Soldier fa-a-all I" ' Some ladies were passing, and they looked at Mm with that admiraiion he alwavs excites in the feinale breast, and he raised himself on tip-toes, swelled out like the impressario of an opera troupe, and in a voice several octaves higher, warbled: ¦ "Le-het me like a e-o ho-ldier fa-all." Then he stubbed his toe on a stepladder, on which a smallboy was wasung windows, and it climbed all over üm, and th soap and water extinguishd all his martial valor, aad when the hook and ladder company rescued him he only uttered one word which seerned to be a W elsh combinatiou of m's and n's. Mrs. Jones was sitting at the parlor window, knitting a pair of plaid silk ear mutts for a Christmas present to Jeptha, when the ambulance drove up with his remains; she counted fourteen "thread under, thread over" - then she went to the door and identifica him. "And you promised me you wonldn't touch a drop of anythin to-dav," she said in a four-volume voice, as she looked up and down the street. '-Tako him round to the coal shed, driver, and leave him thero till he sobers off," Poor Jones!