Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1903-03-28
CONVE RSATlON,
"Gorson Graham" Pork Packer, to His
Son at Harvard.

son at
From Letters from a Self-Made Mer-
chant to His Son." by George Horace;
Lorimer: Dear P%ierrepont: Yours of the,
fourth has the right ring, and it says
more to the number Of words used than,
any letter that l have ever received from,
you. l remember reading once that some,
fellows use language to conceal thought
but it's been my experience that a good
many more use it instead of thought. .
A business mans conversation should
be regulated by fewer and simpler rules
than any other function of the human ami
NAL. They are:
Have something to say.
Say 1t.
Stop talking.
Beginning before you know what you
want to say and keeping on after you
nave said 1t lands a merchant in a lawsuit,
or the poorhouse, and the first Is a short,
cut to the second. l maintain a legal de-
partment here, and it costs a lot of money,
but it's to keep me from going to law.
It's all right when you are calling on a
girl or talking with friends after dinner
TO run a conversation like a Sunday school
excursion, with stops to pick flowers; but
In the office your sentences should be the
shortest distance possible between pc
RODS. Cut out the Introduction and the
peroration, and stop before you get to
secondly. You've got to preach short SER
mons to catch sinners; and deacons won't
believe they need long ones themselves.
Give fools the first and women the last
word. The meats always In the middle
of the sandwich. OF course. a little but
ter on either side of 1t doesn't do any
harm If it's intended for a man who likes
butter.
Remember, too, that It's easier to look
wise than to talk wisdom. Say less than
the other fellow and listen more than you
talk; for when a mans listening he isn't
telling on himself and he's fattering the
fellow who Is. Give most men a good
listener and most women enough note pa
per and they'll tell all they know.
-
Success.
From Letters from a Self-Made Mer-
chant to His Son. by George Horace
Lorimer: Boys are constantly writing
me for advice about how to succeed,
and when l send them my receipt they
say that l am dealing out commonplace
generalities. OF course / am, but that's
what the receipt calls for, and If a boy
will take these commonplace general
tiles and knead them into his job, the
mixture'll be cake.
Once a fellows got the primary bus
mess virtues cemented into his char
acter. he's safe to build on. But when
a clerk crawls into the office in the
morning like a sick setter pup, and
leaps from his stool at night with the
spring Of a tiger, I'm a little afraid
that IL | sent him to take charge of a
branch house he wouldn't always be
| around when customers were. He's
the sort of a chap who would hold back
the sun an hour every morning and
have 1t gain two every afternoon If the
Lord would give him the same discre-
tionary powers that He gave Joshua.
And / have noticed that he's the fellow
who invariably takes a timekeeper as
an insult. He's pretty numerous in
business offices; in fact, If the glance
of the human eye could affect a clock-
face the same way that a mans coun,
try cousins affect their city welcome, I
should have to buy a new timepiece for
the Office every morning.