The Canton mail. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 18??-1882, 1875-04-03
The Art of Conversation.

The secret of great talker is in his
courage and presence of mind. The
god of gable helps those who help
themselves to our ears and time. o
tongue-tied friend what fool you are,
with your stammering and your rush OF
blood to the cheeks, your mistimed
modesty and miserable struggles to be
accurate! Shall we tell you little an
ecdote? The scene is a library. The
subject is an edition of the Greek tes-
lament just put out. The interlocutors
are two gentlemen who have written
for newspapers until they have forgot
ten all their Greek, and another gentle
man just from Oxford and dreadfulIy
fresh in his Alpha Beta Gamma. He
at once points out an error in the text
"A wrong particle and not of the least
consequence, SO far as the salvation of
the world is concerned. He WAKES in
dignant at the criminal carelessness of
proof-readers. The two also wax indig-
nant. "Good heavens |" they cry,
"what are we coming to?" So the Ok
ford man goes away, with great re-
spect for their exegetical powers, and
then-they look into each others faces
and laugh. lawful carelessness, they
say as they smoke over it-"Basker-
vile would never have rlade a typo
Like that" and then they smoke and
laugh again. There is nothiSg like
assuming erudition, thousT you have
it not. Besides. it is usually safe,
especially in r. country, to take the
Ignorance Of the other party for
granted, unless you happen to know
your man too well to try it on. If You
are a fool, you will sometimes get
caught; but, being a fool, you will not
feel it. Accurate knowledge of any
Thing is the rarest acquisition of this
superficial time. Don't be scared
When we are exceedingly dignified
and moral, we express q great contempt
for mere praters, ami speak as if gen.
eral massacre of the whole crowd of
them would shove us several thousand
leagues toward the millennium. Can
be more embarrassing than
the awful silence which sometimes falls
down like an enormous wet blanket
upon q company, left to look idiotically
in each others face, and horribly to
hem and haw? Your part of the work
is but small-only "Ye-e-es" dropped
here and there to keep things bobbing.
Sweet then is the sounding BRASS
sweet the tinkling cymbol! Is it at
dinner? Is not any noise better than
a clatter of knives and forks? Or, if
it be at tea, jingle-jangle of the spoon2
Or in the evening circle, better by far
than the thrums of the piano and the
chirp of the family soprano? So
that when we are sometimes forewarned
that 6 Miss Multiglott is coming" and
that she will talk us to death. we are
not in the least frightened, but rather |
consoled. We like her simple, honest |
hat. She will tell MS about our neigh
bors. And we like dearly to know all |
about our neighbors. She will make
matters lively. She will sprinkle Wor-
,estershire sauce upon the funeral
baked meats, and put little taste into
he cold tea of young lady lisping. 1t
s so pleasant to loll back in ones chair
md be all receptivity! And the best of
t is that We shall really be told some
hing which we did not know before
or it is astonishing what queer, odd
Kings these petticoAted fetchers and
arriers pick up in their constant trots.