Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1893-03-03
TRIO KS OF MEMORY.
Speakers and Writers Have Sometime
Difficulties to Face.

Speakers and Writers Have Sometimes
Difficulties to Face.
One OF the queernesses with which
writer's have to contend is an occas-
lonal puzzle-headednes over a per-
fectly well known point of orthogra-
ply or grammar. A word that one
has probably spelled correctly all
ones life suddenly swerves over into
5he doubtful photography column.
Is it "ingulf. '.engulf'' or '.engulph?n
one queries. with pen poised Is il
''aopaf or ''appall?" Fantasy" o.
"phaatasy?" and SO ON, indctiri.
To be sure. there is the d, tiona !,
out who wants to learn his A, B. G."
o. O. again, or TO look up the spe lt.~-
of everyday words?
tits a curious fact that, left to them
selves, the fingers will generally
spell a word correctly. 1t is in the
hesitation that the certainty ia lost.
There can be no doubt that the fin
gers of a writer acquire sort of
automatic education. Even when a
doubt as to the right spelling of a
word has crossed the mind the hand
will usually bring the letters into
form II given its course. 1t is as if
1t consciously reasoned | have al
ways driven the pen so and so, hay
Ing began so. But once hampered
by the spirit of Investigation the res
olute hand inclines toward the una.
bridged.
The matter is worse where ra"ts OF
speech entangle themselves. i,u.es
and regulations fatten themselves
out, and only u helpless founderinp
around pronouns, antecedents and
,orrelatives seem for the time pos
;ible. In one of Wilkie Collins pub
lshed letters he writes: For the
asst week. while | was finishing the
ltory, | galloped along without feel.
Ing it, like the old post-horses. Do
you remember how the fore legs of
these post-horses quivered and how
their heads dropped when they came
to the journeys end9" That's me, my
dear. that's mo. Coed God! Is me-
grammar? On, sht it to be 'I?' My
poor father paid 200 year for my
education, and | give you my sacred
word of honor | am not sure whether
it is me- or Il.
Probably Wilkie Collins could have
made pretty straight guess on this
point, but these little alterations
come upon us sometimes, when we
should be slow to stake anything upon
our correctness, though another per-
son laundering in the same way would
be instantly arraigned before the bar
of our correct and scandalized judg-
ment. just as we serve merited CON
demnation upon fellow mortals who
display the Identical faults OF which
we are ourselves guilty.
Noluble speakers and vuluminous
writer's probably experience little of
this trouble. The spouting geyser of
words never fails them, ana for lis
they are to be congratulated; vet it is
consolation to those of less o,atori-
cal ability to know that great writer's
and speakers learn to ru ID their
flowing speech rather than give vent
TO it. Professor Shedd states TIA in
the last half of Mr.. Web5ter's public
life he learned to reject the vague
words that came thick and till'f 4gins
when the mind is aronsei. He grew
more select and precise. ard present.
ly, as one said, "every word weighed
pound" This style of speaking or
writing cannot be driven through
with the velocity enjoyed when one
is more careless of results. The
word fifty chosen is the word to be
striven for, and such is the pervers-
ity of inanimate things, it is The
word that sometimes fails to come.