The San Francisco call., 1910-12-11
By Charles Cristadoro

1t, said 1t was his letter and his signature,
but 1T must be something Stanton knew about
and sent the warden to the secretary, who
saw through the and forgery of the
prisoner, who 1t seems had already hired a
lawyer and started habeas corpus proceedin gs.
Stanton gave the clever forger an option of
going back to prison or to the Dry Tortugas,
and he went back to prison. But Mr.. Lincoln
admitted the genuineness of his letter and
signature. There is no association, ac-
count of illegibility, between Mr.. Greeley s
and Mr.. Lincolns handwriting
Napoleon wrote an execrable, nonunder-
standable hand. He kept secretaries, several
or them, like Caesar, busy at one and the
same time, he, Napoleon, performing a sort
OF peripatetic dictation act. Had Napoleon
transmitted his orders in his own handwriting
half OF his army would have marched one way
and half marched the other, and the artillery
instead of being massed at the front would
have very likely been parked in the rear.
His written orders would have been mpos-
sible to decipher and each general would
have guessed he chose. So there would
have been no Arc de Triomphe no Column
Vendome, no Waterloo-he would never have
gotten that far-no Invalides and no porphyry
sarcophagus insidei
The great cardinal, Richelieu kept many
SECRETARIES busy and the nature of his hand
writing whether good. bad or Indifferent, I
never knew
But nowadays what does handwriting and
even style in letter writing amount to? For
who writes" letter nowadays? It is dicta-
tfon and cold type. even personal correspond
ence being filtered through second hands be-
fore it teaches the receiver
You may yet hear of steamer day" in
the offices with foreign correspondents
abroad. but it certainly is not the bugbear
or years ago. The stenographer and type
writer has changed all that. We had book
keeper in New York once-it was nearly forty
years ago-who had friends and relatives in
England, who presumably would have either
fallen dead or had conniption and many
of them did the regular weekly letter from
New York fail. IL the closing of the mails
was at an early hour Saturday then Friday
AFTERNOON or evening became steamer day
Tor writing; II, on the other hand, the tide
enabled the steamer to sail at noon or early
afternoon, then Saturday mogning was
steamer day.
To approach that DID, bearded gray haired
book keeper under stress of letter writing
was as safe as to poke grizzly out his den.
collector to call and approach his desk
and ask for his account to invite trouble
and quick and curt growl of dismissal, Of
tentimes profanely expressed.
The old man wrote with deliberation using
a good pen and writing a fine legible hand.
always deliberate, and he knew to minute
when the supplementary mail closed at the
main postoffice While he was writing moth
ing seemed to hurry him, but the moment his
letter was sealed and addressed some one
had to hustle to get that letter in the mail,
usually myself, and falling to find the boy
when he wanted him, the old book keeper, in
linen duster, ink spotted and showing years
of service, his old straw Office hat we'll back
on his head, made tracks for the postof1ce,
then at Liberty and Nassau streets
Steamer day" then an institution and
Friday night saw the clerks late at their
desks always, struggling with the foreign
mail that was to go out the next day.
OF all the men who suffer most the railway
clerk undoubtedly heads the list. He must
be quick and yet must be accurate. Biunders
carry marks with them and marks count
when promotion Is in order. so the man who
CLUES his feet to the mail car going SO miles