XXI. HOW TO WRITE A LETTER.

I suppose everybody who is in the way of receiving many letters has often noticed how many of them are, in one way or another, very unsatisfactory letters, and wondered why they need be so.

Of course, this comment must most often arise in the minds of literary persons, especially of those whose business it is to consider and decide upon the products of other people’s pens; and as my experience lies in these latter lines I am only too often led to wonder why persons who can write well for the press, or, as one may say, for the public, write so very poorly for their friends or for an individual reader.

Perhaps the greatest wonder of all, in my mind, is that I don’t write better letters myself, for I assure you, dear friends, that I understand my own shortcomings quite as well as you do; but remember, if you please, that there is a large class who “know the right and yet the wrong pursue,” and so far as letter-writing goes, rank me among them.

After this bit of salutary meekness, let me proceed to rehabilitate myself by pointing out some of the most common faults in the letters I peruse, some of which faults I confess as my own, and some others of which I indignantly deny, and please don’t anybody intimate that I

In the first place let us consider letters of friendship, especially those occurring in a correspondence. How many persons begin these with apologies for long silence, “I don’t know what you have been thinking or saying about me all this while,” or, more artlessly, “I suppose you are provoked at me for not writing,” or some other form of deprecation of wrath, and then follows a string of apologies and minute explanation of the reasons why the letter has not been written sooner, and promises of doing better in the future.

Now all this is very conceited and vain, since it takes for granted that one’s letters are of great value, and have been watched and waited for, whereas, in point of fact, your correspondent has very likely been just as busy and just as preoccupied as you have been, and has not had time to notice that your letter did not come, or even has been glad that it did not, because it has not demanded an answer. One of the sad lessons of life is that we are not of as much consequence to anybody else as we are to ourselves, and that very many of our friends do not much care whether they receive a letter from us to-day or this day week. My own dearest and oldest woman friend and I correspond very seldom, and never accuse each other or excuse ourselves concerning the gaps between our letters, and yet we love each other more and more deeply as the silent years go on.

The next most common fault in friendly letters is filling them with discussion of the person to whom they are written, advice and suggestions about that person’s movements or affairs, and questions as to his or her health, opinions and domestic circle. Of course, between intimate and familiar friends all this has its place, and there are plenty of occasions when the very object of writing is to advise or question, or in some fashion express one’s mind about the person to whom one writes, but in the ordinary friendly letter this is not advisable. When one takes up a letter in a familiar handwriting one says to one’s self: “Ah! here’s a letter from A. Now I shall hear all the Washington gossip;” or, “Now I shall get a little rest from all this worry and bother of business.”

But lo and behold, the friendly letter is simply a raking over of all the things which fret and weary you the most. How are you getting along with your lawsuit, or is there any chance that those bonds or stocks will recoup themselves? And how is your neuralgia, and did you ever hear of this or that remedy—generally remedies that you have thrown aside long ago; or how you must miss your dear little dog, and can’t you trace the thief? Or perhaps the letter is filled with advice upon some matter whose “true inwardness” nobody understands but yourself, or some course upon which you have deliberately made up your mind and fixed your resolution, although you have not announced it to the world, or even to your correspondent.

No! In a friendly letter don’t try to avoid egotism, but rather cultivate it. Your friend knows all about herself and her own affairs and surroundings; what she wants now is to know something about yours; some brief, bright little account of something you have done, some person you have met, some amusement whereat you have assisted, and where you have met acquaintances mutual to you and your correspondent.

Perhaps you live so quiet a life that you have no social anecdotes to relate; perhaps it is so uneventful that you have done nothing and seen nothing worth repeating. Well, then, fall back upon the things not worth repeating so long as they are vividly in your mind. One of the very most amusing letters I ever read in my life was from a young girl living a very, very quiet life, and making no pretension to literary ability. It was all about the adventures of a piece of sticky fly paper on a windy day, ending with her father setting his silk hat down upon it, and then, while nobody could speak for laughter, snatching up the hat, clapping it upon his head and rushing out of the house in masculine contempt of the senseless hilarity of his family.

A very trifling occurrence, you will say, and a very silly letter, but all the same it gave me a good laugh and a merry mood, and I have had a pleasant thought for that girl through all the years that have rolled between that day and this.

If you have nothing whatever to tell about yourself, find some little bit of news about other people; not the affairs of nations, which are generally stupid, or of public characters, which every one may read in the newspapers, but of the people around you. As, for instance, “We have a new Biddy, and when I told her in making coffee to put in an egg ‘and the shells,’ she actually used an unbroken egg, and at least half a pound of cocoa shells.” Or tell of Miss Brown’s appearance at the polls, or Miss Smith’s astounding new gown, or in fact any little incident that could make one smile, or give one a new view of humanity.

Perhaps somebody remarks, in a town full of “Prunes, Prisms and Propriety,” “That thing is gossip, and I never gossip!”

To such an one I say, then you’d better learn, my dear, for I contend that gossip—that is to say, good-natured, truthful, charitable gossip—is a very useful element of social success either in conversation or letter-writing. It takes one’s thoughts off of oneself, and off of that perpetual question as to life being worth the living, and off of those darker problems concerning the sin and misery and needs of those around us in a great city, which, like the Sphinx, are always threatening to devour us if we do not guess their riddle.

Yes, it is a great thing to some of us brain workers to have a bit of amusing gossip presented as an attraction to our overburdened lives, and I for one am always thankful to a correspondent who presents it to me.

Another very frequent fault in friendly letters is the want of proportion between value and space; that is to say, three-fourths of the sheet will be covered with either those excuses for not having written sooner, or some lamentation over a mistake already corrected, as, for instance, “I was so sorry, I thought you said three instead of two, but as I told you when we did finally meet I was thinking of the last time you called for me, and you remember that was three,” etc., a couple of pages utterly useless and uninteresting, since the friends had already come to an explanation by word of mouth. And then on the fourth page comes, “Oh, I must tell you I have at last made an arrangement to sell my house and go abroad, but I have no time to tell you about it now, as the bell has rung for dinner.”

How many such letters we all receive; yes, and unhappily so many of us write! Letters filled with what might just as well be left out, and omitting or minimizing the most important subject at our command. It is always better before one puts pen to paper to cast a little comprehensive glance over what one has to say, and select the one thing that must be said to begin upon; give the best time and attention to that in the very first place, and then if there is still room and the dinner bell doesn’t ring, fill up your letter with as many “frills” as you like.

Another very provoking kind of friendly (?) letter is one I too often receive. It is a very brief and scrawly kind of note, written merely to say that the writer has no time for a letter, although she has a thousand things to say, and loves me very dearly. To such an one I have sometimes replied, “If you have no time for a letter, wait for a few hours until you have, and if you love me show your affection by making a little time.”

Yet another irritating sort of letter is a half-confidential one: “I had such a strange interview with—you know who! If I should tell you about it you would—well, I don’t know how you’d feel nor what you’d say, but I ought not to tell you nor anybody else, so I won’t. It wouldn’t be right to let you see how far—well, there, we won’t say any more about it. Have you heard Patti this season?”

Now if one’s intimate friend undertakes to talk in that fashion face to face, one can soon shake the whole story out of her, or if she is too exasperating can say, “Pray don’t tell me it unless you want to; I really don’t take any interest in the subject.” But when the friend is miles, or even oceans away, it is not worth while to slap at her in this fashion, and, of course, one wouldn’t choose to urge for a confidence, even if quite sure it would come in the end.

So much for friendly letters. As for business letters, their merit, like that of wit, lies mostly in their brevity. A person who has a business proposition to present, or a business question or a business reply to make, should have a mathematical capacity for extracting the “square root” of the matter, and giving that to his correspondent, pure and simple. I always distrust a business correspondent who indulges in fine language or graceful verbiage; the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth should be the criterion of business letters as well as of legal testimony. You have something definite to say—a proposal, a petition, a question, a reply, or whatever it may be—well, turn it over in your own mind for a few moments, get at the pith of it, the “true inwardness,” and then clothe it in simple, straightforward language, and sign your name to it. Of course, there are some little forms of courtesy to be observed, but don’t garnish your plain roast beef with paper frills or carrot flowers; it will go down better without them.

There is one kind of business, or semi-business letter which every editor receives only too often, and is more or less grieved threat, although it seldom effects its object. It is written by some poor soul who has been left a widow with little children, or has a sick mother to support, or is struggling to get the means for a collegiate education, or from some other highly respectable cause is in need of money, and has persuaded him or herself that it may be wrung from the hand of a sympathetic editor in exchange for a manuscript, accompanying the letter. Of course, if the manuscript proves available, the hope is fulfilled, and all goes upon velvet; but, unfortunately, it generally isn’t available, for few persons who have the gift of authorship find it out for the first time when misfortune comes upon them. One must have learned to use one’s weapon before the hour of combat arrives.

Now, editors are but men and women, and are often moved by these appeals to a very considerable extent, but if they are honest editors and good business men and women, the sympathy leads to no results. The editor is the servant of the public, and is bound to furnish his employer with the best wares that are in the market, so far as he can obtain them. The editor who prints a trashy story or poem because the writer is unfortunate and needs money, fails to carry out his contract with the public, and the public will very soon show its resentment by withdrawing its patronage. No, the plaintive appeal only frets and annoys the editor, and very, very seldom produces any other result.

Once, to be sure, I was so betrayed by my weaker nature as to pay for a MS. story immediately thrown into the waste basket, but I was thoroughly punished for my folly by an inundation of worthless matter from the same writer, who was grievously offended and rather abusive because none of it was accepted.

There is one more class of letters, namely, love letters, of which I might speak, but—“the dinner bell rings, so good-by!”