Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1879-08-01
Perfect Your Manuscript.

Ooiiiuie''ihS upon the subject of
newspaper correspondence, an ex,
change says: Perfect your mau,E
script. There are few mistakes
which are SO common, even amor.
educated writer's and speakers, that
they deserve special notice. If yop
DO not know Wheeler a certain le. .er
ought to be c..oi +: ed or not mako
1t either one OF the other; never
make a sclawlins hybrid that Won
THINK might answer equally we'll for
a capital or small letter" Thus the
article goes on to some length, re.
veallnS many of the brain-rackinr
trials to which editors and comnosi.
tors are too often subjected. T.
would not be difficult matter to in.
stance probable case where tho
issues of life and death might rest
upon the lesibility of piece Of
manuscript. All persons cannot
write an elegant hand, nor is it sun.
posed or required that they should
DO so, but there is no reasonable ex.
cuse why everybody should not write
IN his mother tongue so there wonld
be no question as to the interpreta.
ton of the characters.
We have sometimes thought there
ought to be a rigid law making il o.
CRIME TO write business letter ORA
legal instrument, in careless ans
illesible' manner. But faulty pen.
manship is not the only difficulty
with which printers have TO contend
The world his agreed that certain
words should represent definite ideas
just as letters represent sounds. So
II through want of cure, a term Of
widely different or opposite meaning
from what was intended, is commit.
ted to the paper, there is no tel!ino
where the mischief will end. But
there arc other signs and symbols
that convey, in a "still small voice"
most important significant meanings.
A comma may be SO placed as to
yum subllmity into inanity or make
OF sacred things mockery. Be-
SIDE the errors incident to bad pen.
manship and faulty punctuation,
there are many other and still more
important points to be taken into
in order to write fit
for publication" Ambiguity and
equivocation are rhetorical errors,
nearly allied though not identical,
and the habitual indulgence of either
is fatal to perspicui,y, to say notSs
ing OF their great detraction frorH
energy and force.
Publishers have too much to attend
TO without being obliged to re-write
the long and tedious articles of those
correspondents who are either too
lazy or ignorant to give correct ex-
preston to their own confused ideas.
BETWEEN the good and the bad,
there is, properly considered, no
neutral ground. 1t is a fact to be
regretted that VIC have men and wo-
men Ill our midst who, on hearing
of q new movement in the temper
ance reform, will curl their lips in
derision and maintain that the sub
ject is exhausted, and consequently
that it is no longer popular to specu-
late upon or discuss so hackneyed
topic. Nor do they altogether array
themselves in hostility against the
cause. In point of fact, they be-
long to that isnoble class of individ-
lduals known in all ages of the world
as neutrals. Now it is a principal
in war and politics that to be neutral
is to be inimical to tho one side as
we'll as to the other. Then deliver
US from all such pretended helps as
these. Give us the true soldier,
every time, though n declared foe
man, rather than the neutral mana
who is, in reality, no man ut all.
WE have heard of engagements in
the court room and within the dingy