ARE YOU A BROMIDE?

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17188, 3 November 1923, Page 9 (Supplement)

ARE YOU A BROMIDE?

Jiv American cousin do*s not come on a visit very often. When she does, j 1 am delighted to see her. not merely i cause i am tojvi <d her, but Ha- ' catise her presence is a tonic. She " breezes in*’ and all one's mental cobThis year she arrived some weeks la t •» “ Better late than never,” 1 gaily ; rned. as she came down the g«r. n .ta,, trom the boat. She turned and fixed me with a hostile eye. “ Don’t say you have grown to ba a bromide,” she implored. I thought she mean a hore until she flung me a brief explanation. “Bromide ? No not exactly a bore; not. far off though. A bromide's the girl who always say* the hackneyed thing when she can. Like you did just now. with your highh original cry of ‘better late than never’ ” •Well." 1 said. •Well,” she jeered, ‘‘suppose you ask me what my crossing was like? If I were a bromide I should reply at . once ‘Oh. the sea was like a mil! , pend!' See?” I did see. A bromide is the person who keeps on saying that sort of thing all day. It must save a lot of trouble. They tell trie that someone is “as light a« a feather.” and that someone else ‘‘smokes like a chimney.” Thev discover it i* ” raining oats and dogs.” or t.hat the night is “as dark* as pi t« h. ” 1 know one most amusing member of the species. One might. 1 suppose, almost term her a ‘bromide de luxe.” She alnavs precedes her most brormdisb saying* with: ‘Well, what 1 And tha-t- of course, give* one the impression *he ha* something really ■new to nay. 1 met her not long ago. when something had annoyed me very much. She listened to my plaint. **Well. what 1 say is every cloud has A silver lining.” *he cried. "Die worst of it is that one might become a bromide without knowing it. TTnw many of these apt little tags and proverbs does one really say in a day? E.D.