The Birmingham age-herald., 1924-07-11

cnIt,re or tba 1acL 62sorssx DE of it.
 Every one knows this, and yet
 with the whole dictionary free for
 the taking, most of us are so pow
 erty-stricken that we have only two
 or three hundred words, which we
 use over, and over again without
 any reference whatever to their
 suitability. Which is as absurd as
 if we went to market in a point
 lace evening gown or used hun
 dred horsepower engine to do one
 flea power work.
 We never have enough words to go around and so we overwork the few we have and say Sure" to everything with which we agree, and that a gown is dinner, and that So-and-So had a Swell" and we went to swell" Swell" funeral, and we sure had 'swelr' time in Europe last summer. And that the Himalaya mountains are wonderful" and that they make a Swonderful" nut sundae at the corner drug store. And that the baby has "cute" little ways, and that Niagara Falls is just too "cute" for anything.
 And that the men and women
 who haven't enough words in their
 tongues to cover the ordinary de-
 cencies of conversation are not in
 the least ashamed of it and do not
 try to supply their deficiences, yet
 they would be mortified to death
 if they didn't have a change of
 shirts, or enough spoons to set the
 table, or if they had to wear their
 working clothes to a ball.
 Yet, obtuse as we are to the nature and quality of the words we use our selves, we are keenly sensitive to the value of the words that others use in speaking to us, and there is no surer passport to our good graces than to have just the right things said to us in just the right words.
 To call a fat woman fiat" for in stance, is to make a deadly enemy for life, but she purrs stately" Similarly a living skeleton resents being describ- ed under your hand if you speak of her as 'scrawny," but she beams upon the one who knows enough to say she is "willowy."
 10 tell an author that the SGos
 or play upon which he has law
 ished his soul is sweet" makes him q want to murder you on the spot,
 but he thrills with qualification if
 you call it strong" or tragic"
 or realistic" or a little master
 piece" No girl wants to be called
 'pretty" when she considers herself
 "spirituelle," or ''vampish," or
 'dashing," and no young man would
 ever forgive the one who called
 him nice" for there is invariably
 some adjective for which our vanity
 pants as the heart pants for the
 water brook and which flatters us
 to death, and-just as invariably
 there is another adjective that we
 feel is a premeditated insult when
 it is applied to us.
 Furthermore, the possession of a large and flexible vocabulary helps to enable us to maintain cordial relations with our fellow creatures. The word less are reduced to the extremity of blurting out impolite truths because they have no smokescreen of phrases behind which to conceal their thoughts. Not so the man who is rich in words. He can always fall back upon some happy term that will not bellttle his judgment or offend his auditor. When confronted with an ugly child by a proud parent he can say, as diplomatic old doctor used to do under such cir cumstances. "Well, well, well, this is a baby 1" which was undeniable, and that sent the mother away beaming with qualification. He can call temper" 1'nerves", and lack of common sense '4temperament." He can tell any amateur artist that his work is full of promise or interesting and he can call it "composition" instead of pie ture." And he can cling as to the rock of ages to really" which deals with glittering generalities and is always translated according to the listeners pleasure.
 A plentiful supply of words is
 letter of credit in both business
 and social circles. The man who is
 halting in speech, who shutters
 and stumbles, and who cannot pre-
 sent any sort of business proposi-
 tion in a clear, concise and con
 vincing way, seldom gets very far
 in the commercial world. 1t is the
 good talker who sells himself and
 is a go-getter.
 And it is the interesting eOnversa- sationalists, the people whose words are like slaves spreading carpet of glory before us," as Kipling puts it., Mcdonnell, Mir. Clyde Guthrie, with Miss Virginia Odum and party, Mir. and Mrs. J. Phil Mcguire and party and Mir. and Mrs. Hal Davis and party.
 The dinner-dances will be continued every Wednesday evening until cold weather.
 The date for the general membership meatinp has been set for SatutdaY. July