The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1893-04-21

One woman whom am SO miserable
as to meet sometimes received, at the
age of eighteen, a valentine in which
her laugh was said to embrace every
note in the gamut. The possessed
| girl, passably rational in other re-
poets, set herself forthwith to work to
practise the suggested exercise. The
result is unique. Now, at forty-five,
she does the octave with every
cachinnation, and her examinations
are many. People turn to stare and
smile in drawing-room, upon the
street, and upon car and ferry boat,
as the shrill peal of unsyllabled ''do,
re, mi, ia, sol, la, 81, do ~ smites the
startled air. Nobody, be it friend, or
| the husband who married her before
the accomplishment was perfected, or
the children who color sensitively at
the amused looks directed toward her
in public places, can alter her behav-
ior in this regard. She is more we'd
ded to her laugh than to her legal
| lord, and sincerely reckons it as a
rare ard subtle means of fascination.
| Other daughters have been converted
into nuisances by the belief that their
| laughs were musical, but she, it is to
| be hoped, excels them all.
A serious aspect of the giggling hab-
| it is that it is so nearly incorrigible.
Mannerisms of all kinds strike their
roots deeply, but she he ~ ''ha ha ~
| become part and parcel of the offend
| ers against reason and taste. That
| which makes the listener nervous to
| irritability, fretting the amiable into
| a desire to smother the meaningless
cackle in the throat that gives it birth
| if he cannot escape beyond hearing of
| it, is practised involuntarily by the
habitual Laughter. Like the famous
button on the learned advocates
coat, with which he fumbled inces-
sanity while pleading, the giggle
! would, if suddenly taken away, de-
prive its slave of the power of speech.
To command gravely temperate arti-
culation would be to strike dumb.
The origin of the obnoxious trick is,
of course, in youth and inexperience,
and almost always in native difffdence
or temporary embarrassment. When
the girl has no fitting words at call, she
giggles. When the lad is oppressed
by a weight of bashfulness, and would
swagger it off, he outlaws. In the
tyro's opinion laugh outdoes charity
as cloak for every defect, and extri-
ton. Affectation is an active ally in
the evil work, and the ambition to be
agreeable brings up the rear-guard.
The interjectional damsel is usually
a giggler as we'll. Surprise that both
faults are not cured by educators
before they are confirmed passes before
the recollection of the fact that
education nowadays is accomplished
by means OF textbooks. And text
books do not teach the noble art of
conversation. Forgetful of the edu-
cere which is the genius of their mis-
sion, the makers of manuals, and
those who apply them to growing
minds, drill and cram and 'tamp,n as
If blasting, and not permeation and
growth, were the business in hand
Our girls and boys come out from the
schools with vocabularies narrowed
rather than enlarged by the curric-
uium. The girl who took the Latin
prize last year at Wellesley giggles
and makes giggle with the first-honor
man from Yale as effusively as Robin
and Jenny guffaw and litter over the
music-books at the village choirmeet-
ing. Sedately cheerful or animated
consecutive discussion of any topic
appears alike impracticable to each
and all. The ''ohs'' and 'ahs'' of
round rosy mouths are separated by
hyphens of giggIes, and fractured
sentences are bracketed by little
shrieks, oftener sharp than soft.
So used are we to the cachinnatory
accompaniment of ordinary converse
ton that we hardly appreciate how
grotesque is the effect until by some
unhappy chance we are SO far remoy-
80 H. al, A.
words are unintelligible, and the muir
muir of sustained talk is nearly if not
quite inaudible. Laughter, pitched
on higher notes, having better carry
ing qualities, reaches our ears. The
effect is at first ludicrous, then pain
full, finally unbearable. We wonder
wildly at the rhythmic regularity of
the base ''haw! haw.n elected from the
lungs of the young fellow whose bow
and smile and athletic grace of carriage
we admired yesterday, and how it
happens that the mother of a pretty
girl, whose voice i'll speaking is not
discordant, could have allowed her to
cultivate the staccato screech that
pierces the tympanum like hot
knitting-needle. The frequency OF
outbursts that, disconnected from the
words they emphasize, sound like the
jerly babbie of idiocy is in itself anna
Zing. knowing as we do that
congress of the worlds wits could not
in the same time give legitimate oc-
casiOn for such extravaganza of mirth,
we are forced to the conclusion that
the major part of the demonstrations
is absolutely and offencively sense
less. Such riot of bleat and bray
among what we class as the mindless
brute creation would excite the aston
ishment and alarm of shepherd and
donkey-driycr.
Where is the satirist who will show
up for the correction of u gross evil
''la fen me qui ritz" That giggie and
lance may be explained by the mex
perience and bashfulness hypothesis
given just now. There are other evil
dences of crude judgment and Grass
ignorance that win indulgence when
youth and beauty are put in as re-
concentrations to mercy. When
fewness OF years and the lightness of
an unwrunS heart are no LONGER tena-
BILE pleas the giggling woman should
be an unknown phenomenon. Good
taste would dictate grades and degrees
of laughter for advancing age, as SEN
sible women discard round hats when
the pure curves of youth desert their
cheeks and chins, and incline to sober
tints in gowns and ribbons. Is it in
partial appreciation of this natural
law of propriety that the spinster
who ''fends off, the oncoming years
in blind desperation outgiggles the
brainless chit of fifteen?
AN agreeable woman, if she would
not laugh somuch - is the death knell
to many aspirations after social
triumphs. He who laughs before the
point of his story is reached discounts
the wittiest of witty anecdotes. A
giggle that breaks Il repartee into
fragments makes it depressing instead
of amusing. When the anecdote is
not worth the telling to begin with,
ana the retort an inane commonplace,
the speakers unshared mirth accen-
tuates inanity into asirinity. The
giggle causeless and continual is at
best but the sputter of damp matches.
The caviller at my sweeping strict
ures who will initiate Lucy Fontaine
in making sly reports olive will say
-one-third of the society talk that
goes on about him will forgive the de-
parture from the dignified essay-writ-
ing.
The laughing philosopher neither
filters nor outlaws, and his ready
smile and genial laugh are evoked by
good and sufficient cause. The hear
ty outburst that helps digestion and
unliftS tho aupyaS pf InuSoIaS that ,ra