A Gentleman

The first difficulty the unpractised writer has to overcome is a lack of the right words. Words are repeated, and other words that are wanted to express some nice distinction of...

We often forget that criticism does not mean fault-finding. It means rather the art of finding virtues; and after any private entertainment, at which each performer has done his...

Begin, in addressing a stranger, with “Madam” or “Sir.” “Miss” by itself is never used. After a second letter has been received, “Dear Madam” or “Dear Sir” may be used. Conclude...

Similarly, most of us have been induced, by the Puritanism in the air around us, to take our opinions of the great English classics from text-books compiled by sciolists, who ha...

Let us imagine that you have been sent to Washington on business. I take Washington because it is the capital of the United States, and, if you do the right thing according to s...

In offering this little book to that public for which it is intended—a public made up of young men from fifteen to twenty years of age—the author fears that he may seem presumpt...

Slang is in bad taste; and the slang we borrow from the English is the worst of all—the repetition of “don’t you know?” for instance. “I’m going to town, don’t you know, and if...

Nevertheless, the boy who rushes through Oliver Optic’s stories, and Henty’s and Bolderwood’s, is not likely to be injured. They are not ideal books, from our point of view. He...

Before we condemn the proverbial artificiality of the French, let us contrast it with the brutality of the average carper at this artificiality. “A Frenchman,” he will say, “wil...