Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-03-06
WHAT'S IN A NAME?
Burdette Thinks There's q Good Deal
if You Spell 1t Right.
THE ANONYMOUS LETTER WRITER.
information as to the Varieties of Gentle
men Out in Arkansas.
PUTTING WORDS TO THE REvEILLE
WRITTEN FOR THE prsrArcH.,

To-day, my son, is the birthday anniver-
sary of great man. 1 refer to the late
NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS. That's the man.
You may not recognize his signature formed
in close column, but I learned to write 1t
that way from a recent article in a magazine
which is an accepted authority on Art with a
big A. get onto these things very readily.
When first saw this distinguished artists
name run in, / supposed. that maybe the
proof-reader was uncertain about the best
place to divide 1t, but soon learned that it
was all right The proof-reader is away up
in all these matters. 80
I knew that his first name-that is, the
part of his name that used to stand out as a
sort of storm door or balcony to the rest
of it, was pronounced Nickel, long ago,
even when I heard artists of good standing
pronounce it My-kel. i knew better than
that when was kid Philistine, because 1
used to 60 to school with boy who spelled
his front name the same way that Angelo
used to write his, and we always called him
Mick. So did bis mother, and she named
him. So the Nickel of it found me on base
when it came along. But this nine-syllable
cast with no leader rather got me at first.
Now can do 1t myself like it.
A0uestion Of Artistic Sense.
Not only does it lend an air of aristocratic
eruditionto the layman who uses it, but it
makes other people envious who are afraid
to try it. 1t makes good long, solid look
ing name, too. I hooked the very last name
onto it myself Takes longer to say it, and
fills up space in print and time in converse
tion. The next time you write compost
tion. you might try sketch of the life and
times of Williamhenryharrison or John
quincyadams, or something on the character
of. Napoleonbonaparte, and see what the
professor will do with it. If he has a soul
that is vibrant with art he will let it go. If
he is feshly, and of the earth, claybound,
he will saw the name up into its original
blocks.
But what a shower of fortune this thin
spacing Of Christian and surname will be
for people whose ancestors went short on
cognomens! Johnjonesesq may now hold
up his head with Tiglath Pileser and laugh
his Assyrian hyphen to scorn. One may
even enlarge the majesty of ones abbrevi-
ated name by adding thereto ones address,
so that when accepting the kind invitation
of Assurbanipul to come over and see the
prisoners get their eyes put out, or declin-
small and early salad down in the stump lot,
Johnsmithofpittsburg can occupy more
space with his signature than is taken up
with the address
An Evidence of Our Greatness.
As soon as we get our new style of writ
ing names projected by International
archaeological copyright. those old heather
who used to glory in making General Spin
ner autographs may take seats in the kim
dergarden. 1t will be great improvement
on the hyphenated center-fire nomenclature
of the G. dew. Edward Estabrooke Buggins
sort OF thing anyhow. We are a great
nation. We may seem to be little slow
for people who learned to read in the
nursery, my son, but give us plenty of
time an1 man of talent to stir us up once
in a while, and if we don't pass the num-
mics on the third quarter and crowd the
ancients pretty hard for second place in q
few generations, you NAV write me down
in three vulgar names, with each a grovel-
ing capital and never hyphen.
proper name is coming into common use
again: it usually does in Presidential years.
1 observed few days since that New
York paper in the course of some personal
remarks concerning Senator Hill spelled his
name with several hyphens As there is no
place where one can divide his name verv
euphoniously, the byphens were aligned
lust in front of it, occupying the space of
say two-em dash, for which they might be
easily mistaken. Especially as the tenor of
the article was not adulatory. Oh, quite
not.
A Bitter Enemy's Mistake.
Speaking of different ways of writing our
names reminds me that I made bitter
enemy last week without intending it. I
don't think it was really my fault, anyhow.
A young man wrote me very savage letter
signing thereto, "a Young Man Who is
Not Ashamed of His YOUTH That was all
right. As I glanced over the letter-that is
to say, as read every word Of tit oc-
curred to me that he might be ashamed of
his spelling; indeed, that he ought to pray
over it. But as to his youth, why had no
quarrel with that. He sailed into me rough
and heavy for something I had printed
without consulting him, and called me one
or two names of his own invention, which
were not at all fattering.
. But the funny part of his letter was not
written by himself at all. In his wrath he
had gone to work as blindly as an angry
man is apt to do, and wrote his savage let
ter on the back of half sheet on the other
side of which was letter written to him.
Behold, two friends of mine! That is, ac-
auaintances. OF course, I sent the letter
back to him without comment, and he was
then ne was mad; he wrote upbraiding me
for my unwarrantable impertinence in look
ing at the other side of the sheet, adding that
enc reptleman''-gentlema being UNDER
lined with scathing and bitter sarcasm three
times-''no gentleman would read line of
what was not intended Tor his eyes, .
was crushed. Some men are abnormally
sensitive on these delicate little questions of
honor.
Two Varieties Of Gentlemen.
One day last winter l was in the Capitol
at Little Rock, Ark, enjoying the Legisla-
tive eloquence By and by:
''The honorable gentleman is thief" ex-
claimed an impassioned orator.
''The honorable gentleman is liar," was
the earnest disclaimer.
Thereupon the honorable gentleman who
was liar hurled a cuspidor-and Little
Rock cuspidor is about the size and weight
of 1O-inch shell-at the honorable gentle
man who was thief. There are so many
different kinds of gentlemen in this world.
And no class of gentlemen are SO delicately
sensitive concerning nice points of etiquette
ana personal honor as gentlemen who are
detected in some mean, vulgar, contempt
ible little bit of rascality that o hat-rack
thief would be ashamed Of
1 do hope, my son, that you will escape
some sins and evils of this wicked world. I
trust that you will not grow up to be q
pirate; there isn't much money in the pirate
L It. a. 80. 81