The Charm of the Inexact. 



\VHEN a child of two or three is asked if it 

 will have a cake, it naturally answers "Yes," 

 but the cake is withheld until there is added to 

 the original reply " Thank you, ma'am ;" all of 

 which may be very polite, but is an infliction 

 that the child should be spared. It is not what 

 is said, but how it is said, that determines the 

 mental status of the speaker. A simple "yes" 

 or "no," as the case may be, spoken in a 

 proper tone and with a meaning look, is better 

 a thousand times over than, in reply to a simple 

 question, to have a small vocabulary impatiently 

 flung at you. We have but to listen to an 

 ordinary conversation between a half-dozen 

 couples in a room, and with our eyes shut we 

 can imagine a battle royal between Webster, 

 Worcester, and the several new dictionaries. We 

 use too many words ; the trouble begins in 

 infancy, and while then it is mere tautology and 

 208 



