Proper Fish Story

Hank Stubbs he set in Stokes’s store

His face a sad expression bore;

It wuz unusual fur Hank

Becuz he warn’t no gloomy crank,

But gen’ly hed a face thet shone

Jest like a polished turkey bone.

Jed Martin says, “What makes you look

So blamed deepressed, an’ off the hook?”

An’ Hank he says, “I’ll tell y’, pard,

I find existunce purty hard.

I try to tell the truth each day

Yit folks won’t b’lieve a thing I say.

Now take, fur instunce, fishin’, Jed,

It is a fact I’m way ahead

Uv anyone in town fur size

An’ numbers; no one here denies.

Yit when I tell uv what I ketch

An’ don’t in any instunce stretch

The truth, but tell it ‘zackly so –

They laff, an’ fill my heart with woe.”

Then Jed, he laffed, an’ says, “I swow,

No wonder they don’t b’lieve ye’ now;

You are too modest, Hank, thet’s all

You put your measurements too small.

When you are tellin’ fishin’ tales

Don’t go by yardsticks nor by scales.

Tack on a foot or two each day

An' they will swaller all you say!”

Jan. 11, 1913