The reading room
Jolly Adventures #1
This issue contains two stories. "Horace Hardbutt" follows a man who spots a lost gent with a post cigar and, after a series of misadventures, loses his chance to keep it when he gives away his only pin. "Sammy Smart Gets the Best of a Deal" depicts Sammy outwitting Mr. Skinflint through arithmetic, proving that six and eight do not equal fourteen and escaping by only paying three pence. The second half features a dramatic prison story in which Kern, an innocent man, receives a package with instructions from a prison library and attempts an escape, but is ultimately captured and forced to confess after being caught by police. "Wee Willie Winkle" shows Willie creating chaos by spilling ink throughout a room, ultimately causing his mother to discover hidden money in the coal cellar that his father had been secretly saving.