The Montgomery tribune. (Montgomery City, Mo.) 1892-1910, 1906-07-06
TRUE LOVE

ture, Your wife" or "Your husband"
affection and regard. The shortest
letter brought by the postman and
handed in at the breakfast table is q
hand-clasp that conveys a heart-throb.
Letters of a still more tender sweet
ness, were it possible, are forever fit
ting across the continent in Uncle
Sans mail, letters sent by mothers to
absent sons, to daughters at collage or
to children away on a visit. Some o.
the sweetest letters ever written are
penned by hands that are more accus-
toned to the broom n the rolling
pin than to ink and paper. So many
wise cautions, 70 many gentle remind
ers, SO many loving counsels weave
themselves into homely letters, that GO
from the farmouse or the city fat tn
the distant child, that one fancies the
recording angel smiles as he peeps
over the writer's shoulder.
Every great catastrophe. a tornado
an earthquake, a vast conflagration or
a disaster at sea, Is the occasion of let
tiers that, in their Straightforward and
pithy narrative, surpass much that is
written directly for the press. When
San Francisco was destroyed by earth
quake and flame, and it's thousands
upon thousands of happy people wefe
made homeless in a day, the first mail
bags were burdened with letters of
Homeric simplicity and force. They
rrv4-n -4-N - lsrI.~L
ances, who watched for them eagerly
and snatched at every detail with an
avidity that could not wait. Times
like these test the sincerity of love
and letters written in the ground-sweiI
of homelessness and loss come straight
from the heart. 1t Is curious to tote
in letters of this kind characteristics
Of bravery and faith in an almost uni
versal absence of complaint. People
who lost everything they had in the
world were impressed with the suffer-
ings of others and wrote as If they had
been spectators of a calamity rather
than victims. Instantly, by wire and
post so soon as it was possible, targi-
BILE relief e flying from the east to
the west, not merely in great contr1bu-
tons. but in individual sums that in
every case meant real self-denial and
sacrifice.
Love and letters might be interpret
ed life and letters il cases like this.
Looking over the vast range of liter
ature, we discover, a little to our sur
prise, that the greatest achievements
of genius are surpassed by the same
authors in their letters to kith and
kin. Carlyle, for instance, was mag
nificent as a historian and essayist and
undivalled as a biographer, but no
where does he appeal so directly to the
heart as when he is writing to his Old
mother in the little cottage at home.
in Annandale, or to his sister or bro
Their in the wilds of Canada. IL We
would look for pictures of life in any
period, We must go to the letters of the
time, letters not written in ceremoni-
Gus terms or in full dress, but by the
campfire, on the march, or in the
haste of the last hour before bedtime.
A caution may be addressed to all
writers of love letters, especially before
marriage. Never write that which
woul cause o a blush or a Meeting
embarrassment should it fall into The
wrong hands. Letters sometimes go
astray. 1t is foolish and futile to pour
out upon paper a string of fulsome ad-
j~ectives and superfuous superlatives.
that really near little. Love should
not waste itself in written endearments
that lose force by needless repetition.
Love is a thing that should stand tho
wear and tear of life. that should wash
and not lose color or fiber. that should
endure wind and sun and neither fade
nor tarnish. The best love letter is the
one that the recipient may hold close
to her heart while she would not blush
should 1t by accident fall under the eye
of a stranger.