Beverly banner. [volume] (Beverly, N.J.) 1877-1964, 1883-07-07
THE MAN WHO INTERRUPTS

| do not as rule, thirst for the blood
of my fellow man. | am willing that
the law should in all ordinary cases
take its course, but when we begin to
discuss the man who breaks into con
versation and ruins it with his own ir-
relevant ideas, regardless of the feelings
of humanity, | am not law and order
man. The spirit of the cred Vigi-
lanter" is reused in my breast and L
hunger for the blood of that man.
Interrupters are of two classes First
the common plug who thinks aloud
and whose conversation wanders with
his so-called mind. He breaks into
the saddest and sweetest of sentiment,
and the choicest and most fearful Of
pathos, with the remorsless ignorance
that marks stump-tail COW in a dab
liza bed. He is the bull in my china
shop, the wormwood in my wine, and
the kerosene in my maple syrup.
am shy in conversation, and my unfet-
tered flights of poesy and sentiment are
rare, but this man is almost always
near to mar it all with remark, or
marginal note, or story or bit of
politics, ready to burst my beautiful
dream and make me wish that his
name might be carved on beautiful
slab in some quiet cemetery, far away.
| do not care to talk more than my
share of the time, but | would be glad
to arrive at conclusion just to see how
it would seem. / would be so pleased
and so Joyous to follow Up an anecdote
till had reached the ''nub," as it were,
to chase argument home to conviction
and to clinch assertion with authority
and evidence.
The second class of interrupters is
even worse. 1t consists of the man
and, | am panied to state, his wife
also-who see the drift of your remarks
and finish out your story, your gem OF
thought or your argument. 1t is very
seldom that they do this as you would
do it yourself, but they are kind and
thoughtful and their services are al
ways at hand. No matter how busy
they may be, they will leave thier work
and fly to your aid. With the light of
sympathy in their eyes, they rush into
the conversation and, partaking of your
mouth, and cheerfully suck the juice
out of your joke, handing back the
rind and hoping for reward. That is
where they get left so far as | am con-
cerned | am almost always ready to re-
pay rudeness with rudeness, and cold
preserved gall with such acrid sarcasm
as | may be able to secure at the mo-
ment. No one will ever know how [
yearn for the blood Of the interrupter.
At night | camp on his trail, and all
the day | thirst for his warm life's cur
rent. In my dreams | am cutting his
scalp loose with a case-knife, while my
fingers are twined in his clustering
hair. | walk over him and promenade
across his abdomen as | slumber. |
hear his ribs crack. and see his
tongue hang over his shoulder as he
smiles deaths mirthful smile.
do not interrupt a man no more
than | would tell him he lied. give
him a chance to win applause or de-
composed eggs from the audience &C
cording to what he has to say, and ac-
cording to the profundity of his profund.
All [ want is a similar chance and
room according to my strength. Com
mon decency ought to govern CONVEX
sation without its being necessary to
hire an umpire armed with a four foot
club, to announce who is at the bat and
who is on deck.
1t is only once in week or two that
the angel troubles the waters and stirs
up the depths of my conversational
powers, and then the chances are that
some leprous old nasty toad who has
been hanging on the brink Of decent
society for two weeks, slides in with a
low kerplunk and my fair blossom of
thought, that has been trying for weeks
to bloom, withers and goes to seed,
while the man with chilled steel and
copper-riveted brow and wad Of self
esteem on his intellectual balcony as
big as an ink-stand, walks slowly away
to think of some other dazzling gem,
and thus be ready to burst my beauti-
full phantom and tear out my high-priced
bulbs of fancy the next time | open
my mouth.-BiU Nye.