Ambrose Bierce - Fantastic Fables

“That is just it, your Honour,” replied the counsel for the plaintiff; “the defendant by making a correct forecast fooled my client in the only way that he could do so. He has lied so much and so notoriously that he has neither the legal nor moral right to tell the truth.”

Judgment for the plaintiff.

An Insurance Agent was trying to induce a Hard Man to Deal With to take out a policy on his house. After listening to him for an hour, while he painted in vivid colours the extreme danger of fire consuming the house, the Hard Man to Deal With said:

“Do you really think it likely that my house will burn down inside the time that policy will run?”

“Certainly,” replied the Insurance Agent; “have I not been trying all this time to convince you that I do?”

“Then,” said the Hard Man to Deal With, “why are you so anxious to have your Company bet me money that it will not?”

The Agent was silent and thoughtful for a moment; then he drew the other apart into an unfrequented place and whispered in his ear:

“My friend, I will impart to you a dark secret. Years ago the Company betrayed my sweetheart by promise of marriage. Under an assumed name I have wormed myself into its service for revenge; and as there is a heaven above us, I will have its heart’s blood!”

Two Frogs in the belly of a snake were considering their altered circumstances.

“This is pretty hard luck,” said one.

“Don’t jump to conclusions,” the other said; “we are out of the wet and provided with board and lodging.”

“With lodging, certainly,” said the First Frog; “but I don’t see the board.”

“You are a croaker,” the other explained. “We are ourselves the board.”

A Big Nation having a quarrel with a Little Nation, resolved to terrify its antagonist by a grand naval demonstration in the latter’s principal port. So the Big Nation assembled all its ships of war from all over the world, and was about to send them three hundred and fifty thousand miles to the place of rendezvous, when the President of the Big Nation received the following note from the President of the Little Nation:

“My great and good friend, I hear that you are going to show us your navy, in order to impress us with a sense of your power. How needless the expense! To prove to you that we already know all about it, I inclose herewith a list and description of all the ships you have.”

The great and good friend was so struck by the hard sense of the letter that he kept his navy at home, and saved one thousand million dollars. This economy enabled him to buy a satisfactory decision when the cause of the quarrel was submitted to arbitration.

Two Footpads sat at their grog in a roadside resort, comparing the evening’s adventures.

“I stood up the Chief of Police,” said the First Footpad, “and I got away with what he had.”

“And I,” said the Second Footpad, “stood up the United States District Attorney, and got away with—”

“Good Lord!” interrupted the other in astonishment and admiration—“you got away with what that fellow had?”

“No,” the unfortunate narrator explained—“with a small part of what I had.”

During the Civil War a Patriot was passing through the State of Maryland with a pass from the President to join Grant’s army and see the fighting. Stopping a day at Annapolis, he visited the shop of a well-known optician and ordered seven powerful telescopes, one for every day in the week. In recognition of this munificent patronage of the State’s languishing industries, the Governor commissioned him a colonel.

A Negro in a boat, gathering driftwood, saw a sleeping Alligator, and, thinking it was a log, fell to estimating the number of shingles it would make for his new cabin. Having satisfied his mind on that point, he stuck his boat-hook into the beast’s back to harvest his good fortune. Thereupon the saurian emerged from his dream and took to the water, greatly to the surprise of the man-and-brother.

“I never befo’ seen such a cyclone as dat,” he exclaimed as soon as he had recovered his breath. “It done carry away de ruf of my house!”

After a great expenditure of life and treasure a Daring Explorer had succeeded in reaching the North Pole, when he was approached by a Native Galeut who lived there.

“Good morning,” said the Native Galeut. “I‘m very glad to see you, but why did you come here?”

“Glory,” said the Daring Explorer, curtly.

“Yes, yes, I know,” the other persisted; “but of what benefit to man is your discovery? To what truths does it give access which were inaccessible before?—facts, I mean, having a scientific value?”

“I‘ll be Tom scatted if I know,” the great man replied, frankly; “you will have to ask the Scientist of the Expedition.”

But the Scientist of the Expedition explained that he had been so engrossed with the care of his instruments and the study of his tables that he had found no time to think of it.

A Man who had experienced the favours of fortune and was an Optimist, met a man who had experienced an optimist and was a Cynic. So the Cynic turned out of the road to let the Optimist roll by in his gold carriage.

“My son,” said the Optimist, stopping the gold carriage, “you look as if you had not a friend in the world.”

“I don’t know if I have or not,” replied the Cynic, “for you have the world.”

“My dear sir,” said the editor to the man, who had called to see about his poem, “I regret to say that owing to an unfortunate altercation in this office the greater part of your manuscript is illegible; a bottle of ink was upset upon it, blotting out all but the first line—that is to say—”

“‘The autumn leaves were falling, falling.’

“Unluckily, not having read the poem, I was unable to supply the incidents that followed; otherwise we could have given them in our own words. If the news is not stale, and has not already appeared in the other papers, perhaps you will kindly relate what occurred, while I make notes of it.

“‘The autumn leaves were falling, falling,’

“Go on.”

“What!” said the poet, “do you expect me to reproduce the entire poem from memory?”

“Only the substance of it—just the leading facts. We will add whatever is necessary in the way of amplification and embellishment. It will detain you but a moment.

“‘The autumn leaves were falling, falling—’

“Now, then.”

There was a sound of a slow getting up and going away. The chronicler of passing events sat through it, motionless, with suspended pen; and when the movement was complete Poesy was represented in that place by nothing but a warm spot on the wooden chair.

A Successful Man of Business, having occasion to write to a Thief, expressed a wish to see him and shake hands.

“No,” replied the Thief, “there are some things which I will not take—among them your hand.”

“You must use a little strategy,” said a Philosopher to whom the Successful Man of Business had reported the Thief’s haughty reply. “Leave your hand out some night, and he will take it.”

So one night the Successful Man of Business left his hand out of his neighbour’s pocket, and the Thief took it with avidity.