Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1872-05-24

II is customary to cOnsign the art of letter
writing TO place among the lost arts, and the
only question held 10 be open is the cause of its
disappearance. One is expected, without re-
lection, to accept the explanation which makes
steel pens accountable, but that is too much like
Goodwin Sands and Tenterden Steeple. Leisure
may have disappeared just when quill pens rave
place to metal points; but some revolution in
our uneasy world disposed of both, if they real
" have disappeared. We are skeptical upon
tne ueeIne OF letter writing. Composition of
every KIND has become so much more a matter
Oh TACT, that exceptional skill in the writinp OF
letters IS not so much observed and MANY a
lady, travelling abroad writes letters home which
mouiu NC puohshed with notes to them if they
had been her grandmothers. ny
Perhaps an explanation of the apparent de-
cline 10 letter writing is to be found in the mart
winch newspapers play in modern society
Ihey make the exchange in our busy life. We
READ the same daily that our friend reads, and
to our stock of knowledge and sentiment the
same addition has been made so that il becomes
unnecessary for us TO send each other heavy lei.
tiers IN our commerce Of thought-the news
paper becomes our clearance-hOuse Accord.
ingly, modern life is relieved of great deal Of
cnmDrous letter writing. The newspaper par
GELS out the labor to few intelligent reporters
and news collectors, and gives another ilustra.
ton Of organization in daily life
Inc newspaper ITSELF as an eptome of human
life, has also its correspondence. Who il is that
writes we 40 not Know; the letter, nominally
written to the newspaper, is divided by that inn
personal medium into thousand lights for the
thousand readers. Each who reads is aware of
a more or less direct communication with the
writer, and the newspaper seems to him scarce.
~ more than the air between them. But the
finest quality of professional correspondence is
not always appreheDded by those who under
take il. Letter writing is an art, and the grace
which endears il 10 us in domestic uses, should
never he absent from the newspaper letter. The
letter writer who addresses newspaper has his
own place, and no one else in the paper can fiji
il; he is not an editor, passing judgment and
trying causes, nor reporter, giving a clear, un.
cOlOred account Of incident or circumstance,
nor strnmarizer, placing in convenient form
for reference related but scattered facts he is
not all these in one. lie is IN balloon, so far
as the world is concerned, when he makes his
observations; he skins over the surface, lust
enough above it TO be brightly independent of
il, Just near enough to see clearly from the top
70 look downward; he gathers the several OBJ
1ects about him into one coup d'0U and gives
Just sufficient newness 10 his observations TO
make them deceive the reader for a moment.
A. Is the momentary deception in common things
.hat cnarms, the slight iostling Of familiar OBJ
Jccls ny which they are unfamiliar for O second
Or TWO. Tue correspondent gives us no new
iaetsi put ne puts Just so much of his isolated
personality into each as shall make them seem
10 us Ike confidential disclosure. He writes
about DOORS, saying nothing which the books
could not more satisfactorily say, but when Won
read what he says, IL seems for a moment as
though no one else had a chance at seeing those
books. He tells Of new pictures aud becomes
tin opera glass to you, that childlike instru-