Ever Heard This? Over Three Hundred Good Stories

Chapter 139: THE MARINE AND THE BOTTLE

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About This Book

This collection assembles more than three hundred brief anecdotes, jokes, and epigrams that depend on wordplay, situational irony, and everyday foibles. Each item appears as a short titled vignette, ranging from single-line quips to slightly longer comic sketches touching on family life, clergy, lawyers, regional manners, and social customs. The tone moves between gentle satire and absurdity, using concise setups and swift retorts to highlight human vanity, misunderstanding, and hypocrisy. Entries are grouped for easy dipping and light amusement, offering quick observations and humorous reversals rather than extended narrative development.

THE MARINE AND THE BOTTLE

A story told of William the Fourth, if genuine, shows that king possessed on occasion of a ready tact which is so happy as to be wit. The story runs that when dining with several officers he ordered a waiter to "take away that marine," pointing to an empty bottle. "Your Majesty!" exclaimed one of the officers, "do you compare an empty bottle to a member of our branch of the service?" "Yes," answered the king. "I mean to say that it has done its duty once and is ready to do it again."