Laconic Letters.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 3 July 1914, Page 2

Laconic Letters.

Victor Hugo, the great French poet and novelist, could be very lengthy at times, but he knew how to be laconic also. "Les Miserables" had just issued from the press, and Hugo, who was in the Channel Islands, was anxious to learn how it was selling. Being desperately busy, he contented himself with inscribing the note of interrogation on a postcard—".? "—expecting that his publisher would give him a full account of sales. But the publisher gave tit-for-tat, the replj- coming back simply " ! " Disraeli could be brief and bitter, but he could also be brief and diplomatic. A bore who claimed acquaintance with him perpetrated a book, and-straightway sent a copy to the statesman, hoping to get a criticism from him which would boom it with the public. Me was, however, quite unable .to determine whether the reply was a compliment or an insult. It simply said, "I shall waste no time in reading the book which you have so kindly sent me." A model of brief correspondence passed between two well-known members of the aristocracy! The lady—for there was a lady in it — wrote "-.'to the gentleman, "Will you dine with me on Wednesday ?" and the lady was quite satisfied with the reply, although it consisted of but one* word, "Rather !" A certain man considered himself deeply insulted because another man, in reply to a business proposition, had told him to go to a certain individual of whom the poet Milton writes some very fine blank verse. He vowed he would'never do another stroke of business 'with the writer i unless he apologised. t So; being a man of honour, he did so' in these terms, ".near .Jones, —You needn't go-" J