Humorous American Short Stories

by Bob Blaisdell

  “ ‘I’m ’gree’ble, Brer Rabbit,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee.

  “ ‘Den I’ll ’pen’ on you,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee.

  “Nex’ day, Mr. Rabbit an’ Miss Rabbit got up soon, ’fo’ day, en raided on a gyarden, like Miss Sally’s out dar, en got some cabbiges, en some roas’n years, en some sparrer-grass, en dey fix up a smashin’ dinner. Bimeby, one er de little Rabbits playin’ out in de back-yard, come runnin’ in, hollerin’, ‘Oh, ma! oh, ma! I seed Mr. Fox a comin’!’ En den Brer Rabbit he tuck de chilluns by der years en make um set down; en den him en Miss Rabbit sorter dally roun’ waitin’ for Brer Fox. En dey keep on waitin’, but no Brer Fox ain’t come. Atter ’while Brer Rabbit goes to de do’, easy like, en peep out, en dar, stickin’ out fum behine de cornder, wuz de tip-een’ er Brer Fox’s tail. Den Brer Rabbit shot de do’ en sot down, en put his paws behime his years en begin fer ter sing:

  “De place wharbouts you spill de grease,

  Right dar youer boun’ ter slide,

  An’ whar you fine a bunch er hay,

  You’ll sholy fine de hide.

  “Nex’ day, Brer Fox sent word by Mr. Mink, en skuze hisse’f, kase he wuz too sick fer ter come, en he ax Brer Rabbit fer ter come en take dinner wid him, en Brer Rabbit say he wuz ’gree’ble.

  “Bimeby, w’en de shadders wuz at der shortes’, Brer Rabbit he sorter brush up en santer down ter Brer Fox’s house, en w’en he got dar, he yer somebody groanin’, en he look in de do’ en dar he see Brer Fox settin’ up in a rockin’-cheer all wrop up wid flannil, en he look mighty weak. Brer Rabbit look all ’roun’, he did, but he ain’t see no dinner. De dish-pan wuz settin’ on de table, en close by wuz a kyarvin’-knife.

  “ ‘Look like you gwinter have chicken fer dinner, Brer Fox,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee.

  “ ‘Yes, Brer Rabbit, deyer nice en fresh en tender,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee.

  “Den Brer Rabbit sorter pull his mustarsh, en say: ‘You ain’t got no calamus root, is you, Brer Fox? I done got so now dat I can’t eat no chicken ’ceptin she’s seasoned up wid calamus root.’ En wid dat, Brer Rabbit lipt out er de do’ and dodge ’mong de bushes, en sot dar watchin’ fer Brer Fox; en he ain’t watch long, nudder, kaze Brer Fox flung off de flannel en crope out er de house en got whar he could close in on Brer Rabbit, en bimeby Brer Rabbit holler out: ‘Oh, Brer Fox! I’ll des put yo’ calamus root out yer on dish yer stump. Better come git it while it’s fresh,’ an’ wid dat Brer Rabbit gallop off home. En Brer Fox ain’t never kotch ’imyit, en w’at’s mo’, honey, he ain’t gwineter.”

  “Didn’t the fox never catch the rabbit, Uncle Remus?” asked the little boy the next evening.

  “He come mighty nigh it, honey, sho’s you bawn—Brer Fox did. One day, alter Brer Rabbit fool ’im wid dat calamus root, Brer Fox went ter wuk en got ’im some tar, en mix it wid some turken-time, en fix up a contrapshun wat he call a Tar-Baby, en he tuck dish yer Tar-Baby en he sot ’er in de big road, en den he lay off in de bushes fer ter see wat de news wuz gwineter be. En he didn’t hatter wait long, nudder, kaze bimeby here come Brer Rabbit pacin’ down de road—lippity-clippity, clippitylippity—dez ez sassy ez a jay-bird. Brer Fox, he lay low. Brer Rabbit come prancin’ long twel he spy de Tar-Baby, en den he fotch up on his behine legs like he was ’stonished. De Tar-Baby, she sot dar, she did, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “ ‘Mawnin’!’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee—‘nice wedder dis mawnin’,’ sezee.

  “Tar-Baby ain’t sayin’ nuthin’, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “ ‘How duz yo’ sym’tums seem ter segashuate?’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee.

  “Brer Fox, he wink his eye slow, en lay low, en de Tar-Baby, she ain’t sayin’ nuthin’.

  “ ‘How you come on, den? Is you deaf ?’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee. ’Kaze if you is, I kin holler louder,’ sezee.

  “Tar-Baby stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “ ‘Youer stuck up, dat’s what you is,’ says Brer Rabbit, sezee, ‘and I’m gwineter kyore you, dat’s w’at I’m a gwineter do,’ sezee.

  “Brer Fox, he sorter chuckle in his stummock, he did, but Tar-Baby aint’ sayin’ nuthin’.

  “ ‘I’m gwineter larn you howter talk ter ’specttubble fokes ef hit’s de las’ ack,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee. ‘Ef you don’t take off dat hat en tell me howdy, I’m gwineter bus’ you wide open,’ sezee.

  “Tar-Baby stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “Brer Rabbit keep on axin’ ’im, en de Tar-Baby, she keep on sayin’ nuthin’, twel present’y Brer Rabbit draw back wid his fis’, he did, en blip he tuck ’er side ’er de head. Right dar’s whar he broke his merlasses jug. His fis’ stuck, en he can’t pull loose. De tar hilt ’im. But Tar-Baby, she stay still, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “ ‘Ef you don’t lemme loose, I’ll knock you agin,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, en wid dat he fotch ’er a wipe wid de udder han’, en dat stuck. Tar-Baby, she ain’t sayin’ nuthin’, en Brer Fox, he lay low.

  “ ‘Tu’n me loose, fo’ I kick de natal stuffin’ outen you,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, but de Tar-Baby, she ain’t sayin’ nuthin’. She des hilt on, en den Brer Rabbit lose de use er his feet in de same way. Brer Fox, he lay low. Den Brer Rabbit squall out dat ef de Tar-Baby don’t tu’n ’im loose he butt ’er cranksided. En den he butted, en his head got stuck. Den Brer Fox, he sa’ntered fort’, lookin’ des ez innercent ez wunner yo’ mammy’s mockin’-birds.

  “ ‘Howdy, Brer Rabbit,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee. ‘You look sorter stuck up dis mawnin’,’ sezee, en den he rolled on de groun’, en laft en laft twel he couldn’t laff no mo’. ‘I speck you’ll take dinner wid me dis time, Brer Rabbit. I done laid in some calamus root, en I ain’t gwineter take no skuse,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee.”

  Here Uncle Remus paused, and drew a two-pound yam out of the ashes.

  “Did the fox eat the rabbit?” asked the little boy to whom the story had been told.

  “Dat’s all de fur de tale goes,” replied the old man. “He mout, en den agin he mountent. Some say Jedge B’ar come ’long en loosed ’im—some say he didn’t. I hear Miss Sally callin’. You better run ’long.”

  “Uncle Remus,” said the little boy one evening, when he had found the old man with little or nothing to do, “did the fox kill and eat the rabbit when he caught him with the Tar-Baby?”

  “Law, honey, ain’t I tell you ’bout dat?” replied the old darkey, chuckling slyly. “I ’clar ter grashus I ought er tole you dat, but ole man Nod wuz ridin’ on my eyeleds ’twel a leetle mo’n I’d a dis’member’d my own name, en den on to dat here come yo’ mammy hollerin’ after you.

  “Wat I tell you w’en I fus’ begin? I tole you Brer Rabbit wuz a monstus soon beas’; leas’ways- dat’s w’at I laid out fer ter tell you. Well, den, honey, don’t you go en make no udder kalkalashuns, kaze in dem days Brer Rabbit en his fambly wuz at de head er de gang w’en enny racket wuz on han’, en dar dey stayed. ’Fo’ you begins fer ter wipe yo’ eyes ’bout Brer Rabbit, you wait en see whar’bouts Brer Rabbit gwineter fetch up at. But dat’s needer yer ner dar.

  “Wen Brer Fox fine Brer Rabbit mixt up wid de Tar-Baby, he feel mighty good, en he roll on de groun’ en laff. Bimeby he up’n say, sezee:

  “ ‘Well, I speck I got you dis time, Brer Rabbit,’ sezee; ‘maybe I ain’t, but I speck I is. You been runnin’ roun’ here sassin’ atter me a mighty long time, but I speck you done come ter de een’ er de row. You bin cuttin’ up yo’ capers en bouncin’ ’roun’ in dis naberhood ontwel you come ter b’leeve yo’se’f de boss er de whole gang. En den youer allers some’rs whar you got no bizness,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee. ‘Who ax you fer ter come en strike up a ’quaintence wid dish yer Tar-Baby? En who stuck you up dar whar you iz? Nobody in de roun’ worril. You des tuck en jam yo’se’f on dat Tar-Baby widout waitin’ fer enny invite,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee, ‘en dar you is, en dar you’ll stay twel I fixes up a bresh-pile and fires her up, kaze I’m gwineter bobbycue you dis day, sho,’ sez Brer Fox, seze
e.

  “Den Brer Rabbit talk mighty ’umble.

  “ ‘I don’t keer w’at you do wid me, Brer Fox,’ sezee, ‘so you don’t fling me in dat brier-patch. Roas’ me, Brer Fox,’ sezee, ‘but don’t fling me in dat brier-patch,’ sezee.

  “ ‘Hit’s so much trouble fer ter kindle a fier,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee, ‘dat I speck I’ll hatter hang you,’ sezee.

  “ ‘Hang me des ez high as you please, Brer Fox,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, ‘but do fer de Lord’s sake don’t fling me in dat brier-patch,’ sezee.

  “ ‘I ain’t got no string,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee, ‘en now I speck I’ll hatter drown you,’ sezee.

  “ ‘Drown me des ez deep ez you please, Brer Fox,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, ‘but do don’t fling me in dat brierpatch,’ sezee.

  “ ‘Dey ain’t no water nigh,’ sez Brer Fox, sezee, ‘en now I speck I’ll hatter skin you,’ sezee.

  “ ‘Skin me, Brer Fox,’ sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, ‘snatch out my eyeballs, far out my years by de roots, en cut off my legs,’ sezee, ‘but do please, Brer Fox, don’t fling me in dat brier-patch,’ sezee.

  “Co’se Brer Fox wanter hurt Brer Rabbit bad ez he kin, so he cotch ’im by de bchime legs en slung ’im right in de middle er de brier-patch. Dar wuz a considerbul flutter whar Brer Rabbit struck de bushes, en Brer Fox sorter hang ’roun’ fer ter see w’at wuz gwineter happen. Bimeby he hear somebody call ’im, en way up de hill he see Brer Rabbit settin’ cross-legged on a chinkapin log koamin’ de pitch outen his har wid a chip. Den Brer Fox know dat he bin swop off mighty bad. Brer Rabbit wuz bleedzed fer ter fling back some er his sass, en he holler out:

  “ ‘Bred en bawn in a brier-patch, Brer Fox—bred en bawn in a brier-patch!’ en wid dat he skip out des ez lively ez a cricket in de embers.”

  SOURCE: Joel Chandler Harris. Uncle Remus: His Songs and His Sayings; the Folk-lore of the Old Plantation. New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1881.

  HIS PA GETS MAD! (1883)

  George W. Peck

  Peck (1840–1916) was born in New York State but grew up in Wisconsin. A long-time professional editor, he became the governor of Wisconsin in 1890. His “bad boy,” featured below, was the starring character of several books.

  “I WAS DOWN to the drug store this morning and saw your Ma buying a lot of court-plaster, enough to make a shirt I should think. What’s she doing with so much court-plaster?” asked the grocery man of the bad boy, as he came in and pulled off his boots by the stove and emptied out a lot of snow that had collected as he walked through a drift, which melted and made a bad smell.

  “O, I guess she was going to patch Pa up so he will hold water. Pa’s temper got him into the worst muss you ever see, last night. If that museum was here now they would hire Pa and exhibit him as the tattooed man. I tell you, I have got too old to be mauled as though I was a kid, and any man who attacks me from this out, wants to have his peace made with the insurance companies, and know that his calling and election is sure, because I am a bad man and don’t you forget it.” And the boy pulled on his boots and looked so cross and desperate that the grocer-man asked him if he wouldn’t try a little new cider.

  “Good heavens!” said the grocery man, as the boy swallowed the cider, and his face resumed its natural look, and the piratical frown disappeared with the cider. “You have not stabbed your father have you? I have feared that one thing would bring on another, with you, and that you would yet be hung.”

  “Naw, I haven’t stabbed him. It was another cat that stabbed him. You see, Pa wants me to do all the work around the house. The other day he bought a load of kindling wood, and told me to carry it into the basement. I had not been educated up to kindling wood, and I didn’t do it. When supper time came, and Pa found that I had not carried in the kindling wood, he had a hot box, and told me if that wood was not in when he came back from the lodge, that he would warm my jacket. Well, I tried to hire someone to carry it in, and got a man to promise to come in the morning and carry it in and take his pay in groceries, and I was going to buy the groceries here and have them charged to Pa. But that wouldn’t help me out that night. I knew when Pa came home he would search for me. So I slept in the back hall on a cot. But I didn’t want Pa to have all his trouble for nothing, so I borrowed an old torn cat that my chum’s old maid aunt owns, and put the cat in my bed. I thought if Pa came into my room after me, and found that by his unkindness I had changed to a torn cat, he would be sorry. That is the biggest cat you ever see, and the worst fighter in our ward. It isn’t afraid of anything, and can whip a New Foundland dog quicker than you could put sand in a barrel of sugar.

  “Well, about eleven o’clock I heard Pa tumble over the kindling wood, and I knew by the remark he made as the wood slid around under him, that there was going to be a cat fight real quick. He came up to Ma’s room, and sounded Ma as to whether Hennery had retired to his virtuous couch. Pa is awful sarcastic when he tries to be. I could hear him take off his clothes, and hear him say, as he picked up a trunk strap, ‘I guess I will go up to his room and watch the smile on his face, as he dreams of angels. I yearn to press him to my aching bosom.’ I thought to myself, mebbe you won’t yearn so much directly. He come up stairs, and I could hear him breathing hard. I looked around the corner and could see he just had on his shirt and pants, and his suspenders were hanging down, and his bald head shown like a calcium light just before it explodes.

  Pa went into my room, and up to the bed, and I could hear him say, ‘Come out here and bring in that kindling wood or I will start a fire on your base burner with this strap.’ And then there was a yowling such as I never heard before, and Pa said, ‘Helen Blazes,’ and the furniture in my room began to fall around and break. O, my! I think Pa took the torn cat right by the neck, the way he does me, and that left the cat’s feet free to get in their work. By the way the cat squawled as though it was being choked I know Pa had him by the neck. I suppose the cat thought Pa was a whole flock of New Foundland dogs, and the cat had a record on dogs, and it kicked awful. Pa’s shirt was no protection at all in a cat fight, and the cat just walked all around Pa’s stomach, and Pa yelled ‘police,’ and ‘fire,’ and ‘turn on the hose,’ and he called Ma, and the cat yowled. If Pa had had presence of mind enough to have dropped the cat, or rolled it up in the mattrass, it would have been all right, but a man always gets rattled in time of danger, and he held on to the cat and started down stairs yelling murder, and he met Ma coming up.

  “I guess Ma’s night cap or something frightened the cat more, cause he stabbed Ma on the night-shirt with one hind foot, and Ma said ‘mercy on us,’ and she went back, and Pa stumbled on a handsled that was on the stairs, and they all fell down, and the cat got away and went down in the coal bin and yowled all night. Pa and Ma went into their room, and I guess they annointed themselves with vasaline, and Pond’s extract, and I went and got into my bed, cause it was cold out in the hall, and the cat had warmed my bed as well as it had warmed Pa. It was all I could do to go to sleep, with Pa and Ma talking all night, and this morning I came down the back stairs, and haven’t been to breakfast, cause I don’t want to see Pa when he is vexed. You let the man that carries in the kindling wood have six shillings worth of groceries, and charge them to Pa. I have passed the kindling wood period in a boy’s life, and have arrived at the coal period. I will carry in coal, but I draw the line at kindling wood.”

  “Well, you are a cruel, bad boy,” said the grocery man, as he went to the book and charged the six shillings.

  “O, I don’t know. I think Pa is cruel. A man who will take a poor kitty by the neck, that hasn’t done any harm, and tries to chastise the poor thing with a trunk strap, ought to be looked after by the humane society. And if it is cruel to take a cat by the neck, how much more cruel is it to take a boy by the neck, that had diphtheria only a few years ago, and whose throat is tender? Say, I guess I will accept your invitation to take breakfast with you,” and the boy cut off a piece of bologna and helped himself to the crackers
, and while the grocery man was out shoveling off the snow from the sidewalk, the boy filled his pockets with raisins and loaf sugar, and then went out to watch the man carry in his kindling wood.

  SOURCE: George W. Peck. Peck’s Bad Boy and His Pa. Chicago: Belford, Clarke and Company, 1883.

  JOHN ADAMS’ DIARY (1887)

  Bill Nye

  Edgar Wilson “Bill” Nye (1850–1896) wrote in his introduction to Remarks, his book that collected this piece, “It is my greatest and best book. It is the one that will live for weeks after other books have passed away. Even to those who cannot read, it will come like a benison when there is no benison in the house. To the ignorant, the pictures will be pleasing. The wise will revel in its wisdom, and the housekeeper will find that with it she may easily emphasize a statement or kill a cockroach.” Nye made his name as a journalist and humorist in Laramie, Wyoming, in the 1880s.

  DECEMBER 3, 1764.—I am determined to keep a diary, if possible, the rest of my life. I fully realize how difficult it will be to do so. Many others of my acquaintance have endeavored to maintain a diary, but have only advanced so far as the second week in January. It is my purpose to write down each evening the events of the day as they occur to my mind, in order that in a few years they may be read and enjoyed by my family. I shall try to deal truthfully with all matters that I may refer to in these pages, whether they be of national or personal interest, and I shall seek to avoid anything bitter or vituperative, trying rather to cool my temper before I shall submit my thoughts to paper.

  December 4.—This morning we have had trouble with the hired girl. It occurred in this wise: We had fully two-thirds of a pumpkin pie that had been baked in a square tin. This major portion of the pie was left over from our dinner yesterday, and last night, before retiring to rest, I desired my wife to suggest something in the cold pie line, which she did. I lit a candle and explored the pantry in vain.