TOO POOR TO TAKE A PAPER.
MOORE, of the Rural New Yorker, was sitting in his office one afternoon when a farmer friend of his came in. "Mr. Moore, I like your paper, but the times are so hard I cannot pay for it." "Is that so, friend Jones? I'm very sorry to learn that you are so poor. If you are so hard run, I will give you my paper." "Oh no! I can't take it as a gift." "Well, then, let me see how we can fix it. You raise chickens, I believe?" "Yes, a few; but they don't bring anything hardly." "Don't they? Neither does my paper cost anything hardly. Now, I have a proposition to make to you. I will continue your paper, and when you go home you may select from your lot one chicken and call her mine. Take good care of her and bring me the proceeds, whether in eggs or in chickens, and I will call it all square." "All right, Brother Moore," and the fellow chuckled as he went out, at what he thought a clever bargain. He kept the contract strictly, and at the end of the year found that he had paid about four prices for his paper. He often tells the joke on himself, and says that he has never had the cheek to say that he was too poor to take a paper since.