UNKNOWN

Evening Post, Volume LXIII, Issue 153, 28 June 1902, Page 3 (Supplement)

UNKNOWN

"To kiio»v wai.it to hvivo owl" — iiiiiein, we an* Inld, lu -i (lie nail of su m in iii'iion. it h.ij .ilw.ij ■. '■ov nu'd t(i inu that the srmo mlo ii'il.N „ ". l 'd ior it > .i(iiu<r . u«j\fl .ih .vi v, nli!" one. Tlio wise lc.itltr is di*>lniijiisiit'd i..nii .'ho i'um'usc by Ihe nini.ssKiiio ho m.iKos ; m other words, he is a judicious skipper. Yet, for sumi. 1 lo.i^-oii not ea.'-j to iiihloi-I.ukl, the art oi' ho I.i r fiom bi'iin' ciiLoui.i^od ,uid i-iillivati-d, is re^cidod ;is .ilmo^l iinuioi.il by pi imiiis of quilu <r»cra;;c iniclli^ciiio. You l.ik» up .t nook that has just come fiom tlio liln uy, and at the end of an hour or ho you ivm.uk that yon have finished it. Thereupon, your I'iiend .iKstimes .in air of grave icproach. "Vfou've been skipping!" he exclainisi, in a tono which would bo appiopiiato wero ho taxing you with soma dreadful crime. Ihe weakness ot human nature impels you to deny the charge, or to extenuate your deed by saying that you'vo missed only a sentence here and there. But how much better in every way it would be to admit that your friend is right, that \ou have skipped indeed, and that his remark, so far from being an accusation, is in tiuth a Untiluumal 'to your wisdom! . . When I meet a paragraph which begins "It is now necessary to retrace- our steps somewhat to explain. . . ." Or, 'me crimson sun by this time nearcd tho horizon. Far over the hills stretched a vault of heavy cloud, its strange purple tints fading and dissolving into ." Or, "But tho contents of this room — his 'sanctus sanctorum' — deserve moro detailed description " Or, "O, strange, unfathomablo mystery of existence, compelling our purblind iaco ." when, 1 say, 1 meet a "passage in a novel which begins thus, I skip like anything. If the book is commonplace, all I need to care for is the stoiy, upon which the«o puragrnphs are mere exciescences. If it is worth reading twice, the second perusal will Lave additional charm, in that there aie portions ot the book with which I have .'..till to make acquaintance. For example, I can conceive an admirer of tho late Mr. William nhck\s romances reading a novel of Ihh three time';, and eicli iimc with a duTt rent pleasure. Once he will read it for the stoty, o'neo for the sunsets and scenery, and once for tho salmon JMiing. Why, then, is the practice of "skipping" so wantonly coiulcminjd? The veiy i>anff* pomchov. has :\ leproacMul ling about it, aud % \m< it i"- lcnlh no'hing else than tho art of judicious selection — in a word, of cli-c.imiiution. Tbo "diserimi Kiting icadci" cams fenei.tl praifo because, forsooth, ho dUciimiihiie.H between volumo and volume, choouin; the j»ood, rejeiting tho bad. Why should he who cririvn tho proretii further, <iisvriminotin'C botv. c:n pige and p. 1 ye, be counted voilhy of blunu? h\ an n?« when binks wli'o few nnd co r lly, one can undorstnnd that the skijipor wns opt to be rc^aidod ps extravagant. But tluujs , n'.'c very dillcivut nov. adayr, when the, libraries will nipplv you with au uulimit- j td number of publications. No (loubl | mauy of them, i» the common phracc, ;iro not "worth reading." — Anthonr Deane in Tho Pilot.