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Army Rations

The colonel of a volunteer regiment camping in Virginia came across a private on the outskirts of the camp, painfully munching on something. His face was wry and his lips seemed to move only with the greatest effort. "What are you eating?" demanded the colonel. "Persimmons, sir." "Good Heavens! Haven't you got any more sense than to eat persimmons at this time of the year? They'll pucker the very stomach out of you!" "I know, sir. That's why I'm eatin' 'em. I'm tryin' to shrink me stomach to fit me rations."

On the occasion of the annual encampment of a western militia, one of the soldiers, a clerk who lived well at home, was experiencing much difficulty in disposing of his rations. A fellow-sufferer nearby was watching with no little amusement the first soldier's attempts to Fletcherize a piece of meat. "Any trouble, Tom?" asked the second soldier sarcastically. "None in particular," was the response. Then, after a sullen survey of the bit of beef he held in his hand, the amateur fighter observed: "Bill, I now fully realize what people mean when they speak of the sinews of war." - Howard Morse.

ART There was an old sculptor named Phidias, Whose knowledge of Art was invidious.

He carved Aphrodite Without any nightie- Which startled the purely fastidious. -Gilbert K. Chesterton.

The friend had dropped in to see D'Auber, the great animal painter, put the finishing touches on his latest painting. He was mystified, however, when D'Auber took some raw meat and rubbed it vigorously over the painted rabbit in the foreground. "Why on earth did you do that?" he asked. "Why you see," explained D'Auber, "Mrs. Millions is coming to see this picture today. When she sees her pet poodle smell that rabbit, and get excited over it, she'll buy it on the spot."

A young artist once persuaded Whistler to come and view his latest effort.. The two stood before the canvas for some moments in silence. Finally the young man asked timidly, "Don't you think, sir, that this painting of mine is well-ertolerable?" Whistler's eyes twinkled dangerously. "What is your opinion of a tolerable egg?" he asked. The amateur artist was painting-sunset, red with blue streaks and green dots.

The old rustic, at a respectul distance, was watching. "Ah," said the artist looking up suddenly, "perhaps to you, too, Nature has opened her sky picture page by page! Have you seen the lambent flame of dawn leaping across the livid east; the red-stained, sulphurous islets floating in the lake of fire in the west; the ragged clouds at midnight, black as a raven's wing, blotting out the shuddering moon?" "No," replied the rustic, "not since I give up drink." Art is indeed not the bread but the wine of life. - Jean Paul Richter.

Now nature is not at variance with art, nor art with nature; they being both the servants of His providence. Art is the perfection of nature. Were the world now as it was the sixth day, there were yet a chaos. Nature hath made one world, and art another. In brief, all things are artificial; for nature is the art of God. - Sir Thomas Browne.