The Best American Humorous Short Stories

CONTENTS

Introduction   v
Alexander Jessup
The Little Frenchman and His Water Lots (1839) 1
George Pope Morris
The Angel of the Odd (1844) 7
Edgar Allan Poe
The Schoolmaster’s Progress (1844) 18
Caroline M.S. Kirkland
The Watkinson Evening (1846) 34
Eliza Leslie
Titbottom’s Spectacles (1854) 52
George William Curtis
My Double; and How He Undid Me (1859) 75
Edward Everett Hale
A Visit to the Asylum for Aged and Decayed Punsters (1861) 94
Oliver Wendell Holmes
The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County (1865) 102
Mark Twain
Elder Brown’s Backslide (1885) 109
Harry Stillwell Edwards
The Hotel Experience of Mr. Pink Fluker (1886) 128
Richard Malcolm Johnston
The Nice People (1890) 141
Henry Cuyler Bunner
The Buller-Podington Compact (1897) 151
Frank Richard Stockton
Colonel Starbottle for the Plaintiff (1901) 170
Bret Harte
The Duplicity of Hargraves (1902) 199
O. Henry
Bargain Day at Tutt House (1905) 213
George Randolph Chester
A Call (1906) 237
Grace MacGowan Cooke
How the Widow Won the Deacon (1911) 252
William James Lampton
Gideon (1914) 260
Wells Hastings