The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1890-05-18

mothers. Thank the Lord, when the men are
scarce, there are always the babies to make love
to, and don't know but what after all they are
the more deserving.
WHAT SHOULD JOURNALISTS READ?
Did you ever make speech? And If you did,
were you ever struck with the terror known as
stage fright? Ithas funny way of making your
voice shake, and you have a wild desire to cry.
However, after the reassuring sound of your
own voice comes to you you gain courage and go
on expressing your convictions. The other night
tiny little speech was made in answer to the
question, what should journalist read 2" and
as it answers q number of letters that have been
sent to me put it in here.
Read your own paper-all of it, if necessary
even the ads. and the political edttorials-the
counting-house and the "infiooence" often have
a great deal to do with the style of work best
Read the book of the moment; if possible be
ahead of time and by reading the new books dis
cover it.
Read with a view to clipping-thatis. read with
q blue pencil. You may not keep scrap-books,
but the value of the scrap is great.
Read all that is written, il you can, in your own
line of work, slowly. carefully, and with
thought as to how it differs from yours, why it is
better, and why it interests people.
Do not lose your individuality by making an
effort to, write like the people, whose work you
you" and which gives the subtle leaven that
makes good the whole.
Read to remember. Read to rest and amuse,
work; you will neither remember nor profit
by it.
For myself, l read all sorts and conditions of
books; what their influence may have been do
not know, but they have given me more pleasure
than anything else in the world. AS for reading
for the sake of gaining good English, would
commend Viscount Amberlys "Analysls of Re-
ligious Beliefs" and Cardinal Newman's "Apol-
from absolutely different points of view, but each
man is master of English as she should be writ
ten. Viscount Amberly dedicates his work to
his wife, who helped him with it, and who died
before it was published another master of good
English, John Stuart Mill, did the same in his
book on Liberty" his wife and co-laborer also
dying. Both dedications are marvels not only of
good English but of loving tenderness. / do not
believe write worse English, however, for choos-
ing to learn it from Becky Sharp" or Henry
Esmond," rather than from Macaulay.
No Journalist gains in any way by reading Toll
stoi or his followers for it cannot be desirable
for anybody to get into that dark house of pes
simsm and look out on the world through win
dow of dull-gray, glass that means hopelessness
and never lets the good Gods sunshine enter.
Better read Mother Goose" Better wander
with Alice in Wonderland" Best of all, read
what other women write, and then--try to do
better.
Read your own work with blue pencil, and
cross out every unnecessary adverb or adjec-
tive This method will make good work; but as
long as editors pay by the word, or by space
rates, rather than for ideas and work, the best
Saxon, which is the simplest, will not be gotten.
is written to-day, read tomorrow, and buried the
day after. do not believe it.. The work that
has lived for many years. to which we all turn
with the greatest admiration, was written for a
tiny little newspaper that would be scorned in
these days of enormous pages written for the
Spectator, and by that king of journalists-Mr.
Joseph Addison. And these are the opinions of
BAB.