Year: 1868

bOreS may De QlvlueQ into TWO classes


the active and Fassive-those who


bore you by active stupidity or su e.


pernatural intelligence, and those who
produces an equally exasperating effect


by idiocy, and merely constitute


themselves your echoes. 1t is difficult


to say which carries off the palm, which


bores you most; for, although acting in


widely different ways, they produce


precisely similar results. The active


bore Is o terrible person. He goes about


seeking whom he may devour, and he is
capable of clinging to a person till CON-


plete, mental prostration snperyenes.


may either be q man of fair intelligence,
or he may be an ass. If he has any


brains they are probably devoted to
some hobby, about which nobody else


in the world can be expected to manifest
the slightest interest. 1t may be scien-


tiic, it may be religious; he may be
lneditatiug an attack upon your soul,
or only desirous of Involving you in a
chaos of chemical formule. Or he
may have. travelled a good deal; and the
bore who has travelled is like the Scotch
snob, "than which," as the great his
torian of snobs says, "the world con-
tains no more offensive creature" The
travelled bore will give you page after
page of the guide-books, interspersed


with his own reflections, till you are
ready to execrate the abominable ac


tivity which caused him to leave his
ancestral halls. 1t is given to but few
people who travel to have any thing
worth hearing to say about the places
they have visited; for the faculty of
judging foreign nations fairly is very
rare; how rare We can see from the
French representations of English
women. The active bore may also be
facetious, and it is impossible to con-
ceiye any infiiction greater than, that
of the society of q man who is
what jest-boOks call "a wag," or
a witty fellow" Jokes are very
we'll in their way, but perpetual
Joker is an unutterable bore. 1t makes
no difference whether he be what is
affects verbal contortions, and puns bor
rowed from the last burlesque. He is
uncomfortable in any case, and 1t is the
duty of any man or women to put him
down and extinguish him with all pos
sible speed. Even good joke may be
heard too often, but the repetition of a
bad one, such as the Thoroughbred
facetious bore delights in, is almost too
much for human nature to endure. He
will repeat it, too, with gustO that, at
the outset, nearly persuades you that
you are going to hear something new.
You are politely attentive. You encOur-
h., aff
sSmes the stale, old stupid story that
you have heard heard Il hundred times
before, and the exclamation that you
mutter under your breath is certainly
not blessing. The political bore, who,
perhaps, ought to have come first, is an
other very oxasperating member of the
fraternity. His opinions are of the ha-
ziest description, but they are support
ed by 4 quantity of voluble declama-
ton, and what he tlatters himself is ar
gument. He deals solely in magnificent
generality, in sweeping assertions. No
body's views but his own can possibly
be right, and it therefore behOoves him
to air that view whenever an oppor-
tunity occurs. His phrases are
picked out of elocution books and
vivacions leaders in the penny pa
pers. II, is ordinarily a Radical,
with all Intense desire to reform
every body and everything but himself.
That reform he is very slow to accom-
plish; and be will most likely end as he
began. a spouter of stale and generally
incoherent sedition. He is great at
clubs, where quiet men avoid him, and
wish they could keep all the newSpa-
pers out of his way. And in these days,
unfortunately, this species of bore is
somewhat on the increase, and has more
opportunities of asserting himself and
Of boring people than heretofore. He
is dangerous specimen of the active
bore, and as such to be carefully snub-
bed whenever such snubbing is possible.