The Berlin income tax

“Mr. Coroner, your income is estimated at 10,000 thaler.”
“God help me! That is far too much!”
“Please, Mr. Coroner! In the spring you had chicken pox and the real smallpox, in the summer you had nervous fever, and now you’ve already had cholera for eight weeks. So it’s all brilliant dealings!”
(Kladderadatsch, Germany, 1850)