LETTER-WRITING.

Press, Volume LIX, Issue 17701, 1 March 1923, Page 11

LETTER-WRITING.

REPLYING. v-flrt roan, and a still inle of letters * 6X6 i iovo ng on ration g out. e not wroW notes hear: pen;' 0 bogoiimg; 'wiLd postal le lota was penny Evan st for .laborry. As people in any ut Sir raduly .ifiable profits time s not jnce," prove,e letmy in 1 raisiee, in l the spondpular. letter i few, imous. epartiat of >wper, rpresßoth er them, Ireary n wowrite 1 and nfortmight d'^vol- ■ kept aeath;acies. some i very ivour. [n the were urnel, rpte a ssomc imroon

tniy letters do not contain any of that sort of tosh. Historically and politically the latter lias been, ah important factor. The Lotlera of Junius" and Sydney •Smith 8 Letters of Peter Plymley" had a marked effect on national affaire, .brasmus mado deadly übo of the letter against his enemies. Cicero, known as {lie lather of letters, has given us in his. a vivid picture of contemporary social life. Religious letters are in a class by themselves, but everyone knows that Die Isew Testament contains a laige proportion of letters that we consiuer it more proper to call "Epistles." 'lhe Old Testament includes some memorable letters, a few of them written for no very creditable purpose. When King David wanted Uriah stuck in the front of the battle ho arranged it by means of a letterJezebel employed a letter to instigate Naboth'a murdor. Oh, yes, their letters furnish very disconcerting evidence against, some of these distinguished ancients. The archasologists are busy producing evideiico more ancient still. They have beon digging amid the ruins of Babylon for half a century, and some rears ago Dr. Budge, of tho British Museum staff, discovered a collection of small tablets which proved ,to be letters ivritteii 2300 8.0., a period contemporaneous with Abraham. Babylon was then tho educational centre of tho Oriental world, and those tablet lettors reveal a regular system of correspondence between rulers and their subordinates. They are now housed in the British Museum. If ever you take a trip to England you are free to go in and have a look at them. An exploratory expedition, organised by the University of Chicago, had similar good luck recently. Thoy unearthed some 2000 clay tablets; on these were drawn the rough pictures by means of which - ideas were then expressed. The tablet when fully inscribed was placed in the sun to dry. At a later stage the tablet was covered with a coating of thinner clay in order to protect the writing from the eyes of tho curious. There you have the first envelope. When the tablet had been pierced and a string passed through tho hole, the letter was ready for delivery. These latest letters, are the sort that might have been written by any ordinary middle-class inhabitant of Babylon or his wife. For evidently the Babylonian lady was as busy with heir stylus as is the modern lady with her fountain pen. ( The letters deal with the usual round of matters likely to be interesting to people in an Oriental country. Some of the writers seem to have been travelling from home occasionally, and they write upbraiding their faithless correspondents for not writing. And 'the faithless ones reply on tho clay tablets that really they "have not had time to rtrite"; just the same hoary lie that probably scores of people have written in letters throughout Melbourne this very day. It is a fair cry from clay tablets to typewriters, but these old Babylonian letters reveal the eternal sameness of human nature. And if, 4000 years hence, posterity digs up some of our letters, they will probably. feel impelled to repeat the same trite remark. There is evidently in all humanity Bome constitutional weakness which makes us regard correspondence as a hateful drudgery. Sydney Smith, in his own quaint way, observes that "correspondences are like small clothes before the invention of suspenders; it is impossible to keep them up." Iri these busy days it is more impossible than ever,'but no generation has been able to plead so many extenuating circumstances. The existence of telegrams and telephones, the increased facilities of locomotion, with the increased chances of meeting, all these tempt us and entitle us to keep for., our conversations what our ancestors poured into their lettersAnd, after all, perhaps our degeneracy ia not so great as might be imagined. Doubtless you regard all sorts of prime With abhorrence, but haven't' "you ever fancied you wcmld like to steal'some morning the'bag of letters intended for delivery throughout yo.tir district. If you could 'take them' into your' room ana scan them leisurely, what an interesting, peeji it would be into tho lives of your, neighbours. Not that you want any such peep; you are not one of those vulgarly curious persons. But, as the children say, ' just suppose." . Contrary to what vou had expected, you would probably be surprised at the proofs of the goodness i'ahd honesty of the Uvea of the people round about you, and, to your still greater: surprise, you might find that their correspondence was marked by quite a high literary (juattty<—Melbourne "Age." <