Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1892-11-18
CONSCIOUSNESS IN WAITING.


beh-Consciousness Makes You a poav
Writer and a Bad Speaker.
Richard Grant White writes: Al
both writing and speaking are the
expression of thought through Ian.
Euage, the capacity for the one,
ioined to the incapacity for the
other, Is naturally the occasion of
remark, and has, l believe, never
been accounted for. | think It Wilt
be found that consciousness. which
generally causes more or less embari
rassment Of one kind or other, is AT
the bottom of this apparent inconl
gruity.
The man who writes In a clear and
fluent style, but who, when he under
takes to speak, more than to say yes
or no or what he would like for dim
ner, hesitates and utters confusion.
does so because he Is made self-conl
scious by the presence of Others when
he speaks, but gives himself uncon.
sciously to the expression Of his
thought when he looks only upon
the words which he Is writing. He
who speaks with ease and grace, but
writes In a grabbed, involved style.
forgets himself when he looks at
Others, and is occupied by himself
when he is alone. His consciousness
and the effort that he makes on the
one hand to throw it off, and on the
other to meet Its demand upon him.
confuse his thoughts, which throng,
and jostle, and crash, instead Of NOV
ing onward with one consent togeth-
err
Mere consciousness has had much
to do with the charming style Of
many women's letters. Women's
style, when they write books, Is gen.
orally bad, with all the varieties Of
badness; but their epistolary style is
as generally excellent in all ways Of
excellence. A letter written by a
bright, cultivated woman-and she
need not be highly educated or
much instructed women, but
merely one whose intercourse is with
cultivated people-and written mere
ly to tell you something that inter-
ests her and that she wishes you to
know, with much care about what
she says, and no care as to how she
says 1t, will, in twelve cases out of .,
bakers dozen, be not only irreproacl
ably correct in expression but We
charming. a
Some literary women, though feino
are able to carry this clear fluef H
idiomatio English style into tn II
books. Mrs. Jameson, Charlotte
Bronte, and perhaps George Eliot lss
prominent instances in point. n
Trollope's book, "The Domestic Mr.
ners Of the American" which N
her name known and caused it te
detested, unjustly in this countrJe 30
written In this delightful style-ei-
flowing and clear, like beaut
stream, rejecting from It's pie
surface wherever 1T passes, by addr
In the reflection a charm to theD
age which Is not In the object,
distorting only when it is dimpledTb
gayety or crisped by flow Of SCI II
or a ripple Of humor. 1t is We u
reading only for It's style. 1t matGe
studied to advantage and emul; Q
but not initiated, for all abou 4
that is worthy of emulation is iT -
liable. Mr.. Anthony TrollCerns
mastery of our language was in
tied, but he did not come into
session of quite all the materna 4
tate. 4
say that Mrs. Trollope's book e
been unjustly censured becauseTYl
her descriptions were true to eerN
and were evidently taken from J
She described, however, only G
which struck her as peculiar,
Iaassa Gasasintancs with the" coult
was among the most uncuiVl'a
people.