The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1893-02-01
PUNCTUATION AS A HIGH ART.
Brown and His New Method OF Learns
Ing the Rules.


ing the Rules.
Brown, my boy, there's nothing like
1t. It's better than French in six
weeks because you can work it into
yourself in n month, so that you can
hardly say or think anything without
following the rule. Take this beautiful
section, which recalls our %schoolboy
days: the boy stood on the burning
deck, comma, whence all but he had fed,
semicolon the flames that lit the battles
wreck, comma, shone round him DER the
dead, period That's grand; that's in
spring. You have all the beauty and al
the sentiment, and besides you punctu-
ate as you 60 along, and SO mingle the
artistic and the useful"
Brown was quite taken with this new
plan for l~e'rning how to punctuate
properly. He had often felt like a brother
TO the fellow who wrote a book without
any punctuation whatever, simply ado
ing in an appendix n complete list OF
punctuation mark, from which Thereafter
could select and punctuate as much or a.
little as he pleased.
The first lesson went of swimmingly.
Brown so fell into the spirit OF it that a
he walked up the street afterwayd he
found himself ~soliloquizing: al wonder,
comma, IL / had better get that paregoric,
comma, for the ba by, comma, before | go
home, period. Perhaps, comma
Then he slipped up on a piece of banana
skin and yer down fat with two excla-
nation points and enough stars to equip
several issues of a " blanket sheet"
For the first time in his life he felt like
using the "dash and also making c
dash for the miscreant who threw that
murderous peel there. He lay on the
pavement long enough to denote several
paragraphs, then got up with difficulty
and iimped down the street. But the
magic power OF that first lesson was still
upon him, and meeting a newsboy he be-
gan: "Well, comma, my boy, have you
the Starr? Interrogation point" The
sharp-eyed little rascal stared at him
cur!ously and then replied: "Com-ah?
Come of. When did yer 'scape from tn
'sylum?"
After punctuating the town generally
during the next two hours and getting a
crowd Of small boys at his heels, whom
he escaped by seeking refuge in an empty
school building-a place the average boy
never enters IL he can help it-he took
home to his dear family a somewhat bat
tered but still large supply of punctua-
ton.
AT 2 n. m. his wife nudged him.
"John, John, there are burglars in the
housed"
"What-ah? Burglars, burglars"
Now wide awake he sprang TO the floor,
exclaiming: dearest, comma, ! will
defend you, comma, ever with my hearts
blood, comma, IL necessary, exclamation
point"
He then threw open the chamber door
right in the face OF two masked burglars,
who held pistols TO his breast and de-
manded:
"Iour money or your liic!'
With one whirl of his strong right arm
he dashed the pistols aside, " bullets
perforating the bail window instead OF
his head, a. was intended. With two
more whirls OF that trusty arm he sent
the burglars, as surely and swiftly as one
sentence follows another IN the mouth OF
a 2O0-a-minute speaker, out through the
window after the bullets, rcmarking
"Thore, comma, now comma, you can
hunt your bullets AZ your le sure, period.
Call again. CONNIE. and III show yop bow