Democratic Sentinel, Volume 15, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 July 1891 — An Oriental Joke. [ARTICLE]

An Oriental Joke.

The Oriental races are not -without a sense of humor, which ia often of a very grim sort. A European traveler, who was visiting the court of the Imam of Muscat not long ago, relates the following : I had heard that no ruler of Muscat for the last hundred years had died a natural death, and was interested when, in our conversation, the Imam himself introduced the matter of this extraordinary fatality among the sovereigns of his country. “Is it true,” I ventured to ask, “that no Imam for a hundred years has died in his bed ?" “Certainly not,” said he, w ith a perfectly grave face. “Let me see—four of them have diod in bed.” “And they were not assassinated, then V" “Well,” he said, “it is true that they were found under the mattress instead of on top of it, but they unquestionably died in bed." They had been smothered by their heirs apparent. Five boys were arrested by the police in Boston the other day on the charge of breaking into a carpenter shop and stealing $1.50 in ooppers. They used the carpenter’s tools in the shop to try to break open the safe. When the police made an examination of the premises they found a book entitled, “How to Break Safes,” which had been left in the shop by the boyburglars. ' The man who has neither money nor the inclination to travel become the cashier of a bank, and perhaps ha would soon have both. Alabama now comes to the front .with ■> story,,,about t£e death of a oolored woman who wat one hundred and fifty-six years old.