' `No!' was his simple,
straightforward, quite unanswerable answer. But I have never heard a
man assert that he had no sense of humour. And I take it that no such
assertion ever was made. Moreover, were it made, it would be a lie.
Every man laughs. Frequently or infrequently, the corners of his mouth
are drawn up into his cheeks, and through his parted lips comes his
own particular variety, soft or loud, of that noise which is called
laughter. Frequently or infrequently, every man is amused by
something. Every man has a sense of humour, but not every man the same
sense. A may be incapable of smiling at what has convulsed B, and B
may stare blankly when he hears what has rolled A off his chair. Jokes
are so diverse that no one man can see them all. The very fact that he
can see one kind is proof positive that certain other kinds will be
invisible to him. And so egoistic in his judgment is the average man
that he is apt to suspect of being humourless any one whose sense of
humour squares not with his own. But the suspicion is always false,
incomparably useful though it is in the form of an accusation.
Having no love for the public, I have often accused that body of
having no sense of humour. Conscience pricks me to atonement. Let me
withdraw my oft-made imputation, and show its hollowness by examining
with you, reader (who are, of course, no more a member of the public
than I am), what are the main features of that sense of humour which
the public does undoubtedly possess.
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