Banta was a carpenter on a building site, he rushed up to the site engineer. "Sir, Sir!" he cried, "Someone just dropped a knife from the top of the scaffold and sliced my ear off!"

The site engineer immediately organized a search party to find the ear in the hope that micro-surgeon would be able to sew it on again, if it was well-preserved in ice and taken immediately to the hospital in a thermos flask.

"Here it is!" cried one of the searchers, waving an ear.

"No, that s not it," said the injured Banta, "mine had a pencil behind it!"