Cross Questions and Crooked Answers

An Irish recruit about to be inspected by Frederick the Great, was told he would be asked these questions: (I) How old are you? (2) How long have you been in the service? (3) Are you content with your pay and rations? So he prepared his answers accordingly. But it so happened that the king began with the second question: "How long have you been in the service?"
Paddy glibly replied,"Twenty years."
"Why," said the king, "how old are you?"
"Six months."
"Six months!" rejoined the king; "surely either you or I must be mad!"
"Yes, both, your majesty."

¶Some Highlanders, coming to England for employ, conceived they would be asked (1) Who are you? (2) Why do you come here? and that the questioner might then say, "No, I don't want your service." Scarcely had they crossed the border than they came to the body of a man who had been murdered. They stopped to look at it, when a constable came up and said, "Who did this?"
"We three Highlanders," was the prepared answer.
"Why did you do it?" said the constable.
"For the money and the silver," was the answer they had prepared.
"You scoundrels!" said the constable, "I shall hang you for this."
"If you don't, another will," said the men, and were preparing to go away, when they were marched off to jail.

¶Another story of the same kind is told of three Sclavonians who went to Hungary, and "were taught the language in three days." Their répertoire was, however, limited to, "We three," "Cheese," and "That's the truth." Coming to a dead body lying on the road, the forestkeeper asked them, "Who has murdered the man"
"We three," was the ready answer.
"What for?" was the next question, and
"Cheese" was the reply.
"Then," said the keeper, "you will all be hanged;"
"That's the truth," responded the strangers, and were about to be handcuffed when the supposed dead man jumped up with a "Ho, ho, ho!" overjoyed at his practical joke.