CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY REMARKS
"Kind messages, that pass from land to land; Kind letters, that display the heart's deep history, In which we feel the pressure of a hand-- One touch of fire--all the rest is mystery." --_H. W. Longfellow._
"Every day brings a ship, Every ship brings a word; Well for those who have no fear, Looking seaward well assured That the word the vessel brings Is the word they wish to hear." --_R. W. Emerson._
The nineteenth century is the grandest of all the centuries of time. It has done more for the education, the culture and the comfort of the world than all the ages that have gone before. Schools, seminaries and colleges have increased to an almost fabulous extent. With the increase in numbers there has been also an increase in efficiency and influence to such an extent that our institutions of education have become the glory of our land. In the eventful years of this century science has marched on with majestic strides, revealing to the earnest student the long-kept secrets of nature; while the spirit of invention has been busy through all the years making the path of life easier to walk, and redeeming our common life from much of its hardship and drudgery. The railway, the steamship, the telegraph and the telephone are hard at work bridging over space, and making minutes sufficient for tasks that not long ago required months to perform. The printing press is regarded by common consent as one of the greatest inventions the world has ever seen. It has been described not inaptly as the miracle of the fifteenth century. But within the last few years the typewriter has come to claim a share in its honors, and to take its place among the most wonderful contrivances of the age.
It would seem as though letter-writing, which half a century ago was a luxury and a delight, is about to become a lost art, a mere memory of days of happy leisure. Before the advent of Sir Rowland Hill, and the establishment of that wonder of our civilization, the modernized post office, men and women of education occupied their leisure hours in writing long, delightful letters to their friends.
It is interesting to note that much of the most admirable literature of the eighteenth century took the form of letters. The best critics and essayists of that time, such men as Addison, and Steele, and Pope were aptly described as "men of letters." The severest and most caustic political strictures ever written were "The Letters of Junius," though who "Junius" was remains a secret, and will probably remain so to the end of time.
But the world moves on! The days of leisure are passed, and a busier age demands quicker methods. In answer to this demand the writing-machines have appeared. These marvelous labor-saving inventions have already wrought a revolution in our commercial life, and they bid fair to put an end to letter-writing in all branches of commerce and in clerical professions generally. Yet, as long as the world lasts letter writing will hold an important place; indeed, it will always be a part of our best life. Business even will sometimes assume such importance, and involve so many intricate details, that it will seem that nothing short of a long and carefully written letter, in which the individuality of the writer appears in the character of his hand-writing, will fully serve the purpose of the occasion.
There is something formal and official inseparable from a type-written letter. Type-written letters are more or less all alike, they have no individuality, are marked by no personal characteristics; while, on the other hand, no two letters from the pens of different writers are ever alike. A firm may send a dozen type-written letters on some important subject, with little or no result. But if the head of some department, or better still, the head of the firm himself, with his own hand, write a letter, then the matter is sure to receive prompt attention. Indeed, any matter of more than ordinary importance is surely well worth the trouble of a written letter.
In more intimate intercourse, the hand-written letter still reigns supreme. The mother does not want a machine-written letter from her son. Type-written letters might be from some other son to some other mother. She wants to see her son's hand-writing, for to her loving eyes, his angular, awkward, and even misspelt, letters are a thousand times more beautiful and symmetrical than any letter any typewriter ever produced. What ardent lover would care to receive a type-written letter? Do not lovers fondly linger, and dote, and dream over the very characters wrought by the hand they love so well? A letter from a lover's hand is a revelation that no machine-written letter can ever be. Besides all this, are there not dottings of i's and crossings of t's, and countless twists, and turns, and underlinings, all full to the brim of mystic meanings that no typewriter on earth could convey?
There are other things, moreover, that it would show very poor taste to commit to the typewriter. Such, for example, as letters of condolence or congratulation. No thoughtful, cultured person would send a letter of condolence to a mother who had lost a child, or a letter of congratulation on a wedding anniversary, written on a machine! It would be as far from good taste as though sent from a printing office in printed form.
Who would have cared to have received type-written letters from the brave boys who were fighting the battles of freedom thirty years ago? What treasures those letters were! Written from the battle-fields, on scraps of paper, with the drum head for a desk. Written in haste while "the foe was suddenly firing"; crumpled, blotted, and sometimes stained with blood. How the mothers and sweethearts kissed the precious missives, and even sturdy fathers were not ashamed of tears! The straggling, imperfect penmanship was beautiful, seen by the eyes of love. While love and tenderness endure, love letters and letters sent home must be written by the hand, for there is often as much impressiveness in the form of a letter as in the accents of the voice. In short, good and careful letter-writing will always form an important element in a liberal education. A gentleman is nowhere so much a gentleman as in his letters.
It would be a good thing for Young America to take to heart the thought that the debts of personal correspondence are very sacred obligations. It is a cheap and easy thing to say that the friendship that cannot last without periodical letters had better die; but if friendship is worth having, if friendship is more than a name, it is surely worth keeping and guarding, when all that is asked to keep the fires upon its altars aflame is an occasional kindly letter. Thoughtlessness in this direction is unkindness, and especially in the matter of letters for the home circle. The "exile from home," in far-away lands, finds a letter from home as cheering and refreshing as a fountain in a dry desert land. And in like manner, the home-circle, and especially the mother's heart, is made strong and glad, and goes comforted for many a day by a kindly letter, however brief, from the absent and the loved.
"Write soon!" Oh, sweet request of truth, How tenderly its accents come! We heard it first in early youth, When mothers watched us leaving home.
And still, amid the trumpet joys, That weary us with pomp and show, We turn from all this brassy noise To hear this minor cadence flow.
We part, but carry on our way Some loved one's plaintive spirit-tune, That as we wander, seems to say-- Affection lives on faith--"Write soon!"