The Washington herald., 1912-01-04
SILENCE is GOLDEN
In HOME CIRCLE
Conversation Taking Place
Is Below Par.
by DOROTHY DIX.

Il was reading in the paper yesterday,
said the woman in blue, that learned
lady near Boston. who speaks fffty-four
languages, has just become engaged 10
marry a man who is reported to be the
greatest Hnguist in the world, and who
understands even more tongues than she
does
And Ill wager my new hat" com
mented the woman in white, that when
they are spooning they don't use any of
the fifty foreign LIMOGES they have ac-
quired with such pains, but he says,
'oo's ducky Is oo? and she says, Use
GO duclIy daddle, and then there's long
sibilant sound that listens like a horse
drawing a foot out of sticky mud. and
she says. What makes you such a sinful
pity boy? and he says, 'Oo's the booful-
est thing in the world with oo's pun
jowl hair and there's another curious
noise that sounds like a smack and
nl-m-m-m-m-m.
'Ah, that's Cupid's volapuk," smiled
the woman in pink. you don't have 20
learn fifty languages to understand that.
You just speak II naturally"
My goodness" said the woman in
blue, Just think of the things that
woman with fifty tongues can say TO
her husband when he comes home at .
a. m! 1t makes me envious"
''Oh. I don't know" replied the woman
in white. Il find that ! can get quite
some action out Of one language under
the circumstances"
Have Little to Say.
And think said the woman in pink.
sympatheticaIly. "of the sorrows OF the
poor man who has lost his grip on all
languages, trying to explain in fifty about
meeting an old college friend, or having
IN NnE a mt
lecture, or having a sunstroke or some
thing else that unavoidably kept him
away from his pre-pre-cious iii wife
his-and his sweet home where he-hic
-h'c-wonted to be all the time"
We'll. at any rate" said the woman in
blue, in a family where a husband and
wife each hold a language record there
certainly can't be the conversational
deadlock that you see in most homes
To my mind the most pitious thing in
the world is that husbands and wives
appear to have nothing to say to each
other unless they pick a quarrel You
can spot married couple as far as you
can see them by the frozen silence that
relgns between them.
''If az the theater you see a man sit
ting up reading the advertisements in
the programme and the woman looking
around hstlessly al the other womeIfs
clothes, by that token you know they
are husband and wife. II at a restaurant
you see couple gobbling down their
food without a word to each other, you
don't have to look at the woman's we'd
ding ring to know they are married. II
you see a couple travelling together, yet
apparently not on speaking terms, it's a
married couple of on a pleasure trip.
Upon my word, believe that converse
tion would become a lost art II husbands
and wives were segregated from the bal
snce of humanity"
Too Much Small Talk.
That's right" exclaimed the woman
in white. and did you ever notice not
only the paucity OF conversation in the
family circle. but its pifiinE character?
Ninety-nine times out of a hundred it's
confined to the children, or household
expenses, or the most trifinE gossip
about the neighbors.
Yet these people are intelligent and
entertaining, and regular chatter boxes
out in society. / wonder why? Do mar
Tied people talk themselves out during the
honeymoon, so that they've got nothing
TO say the balance Of their lives? Or do
they cease to be interesting to each other
because neither one is willing TO make an
effort to entertain the other?"
7 don't know why other women don't
talk at home" said the woman in blue,
but I don't because I've nobody to lis
ten to me. The minute we've had dinner
my husband subsidies into his evening
paper, and talking to him is like talking
TO a wooden Indian, so far as getting a