A WORD FITLY SPOKEN

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 2, Issue 363, 26 October 1932, Page 4

A WORD FITLY SPOKEN

It is a newspaper axlom that when a dog bites a man it is not news, but that that if a.man was • so misguided as to bite a dog, it would be a front page story. In other words, it is the unusual element which distinguishes news from a commonplace. A recent message from Christchurch must have been framed with this axiom in mind. It records the un- ; doubtedly noteworthy fact that two of the shortest speeches on record were made at a complimentary dinner to Canon Wilford-, of College House. After dinner, the principal proposed the health of the college in the words, "Gentlemen, College House" and a second speaker proposed the health of the guest I of the evening, "Gentlemen, Canon Wilford." Nothing more was said. It is perhaps a reflection upon our modern standards of after-dinner loquacity that it was this unusual brevity which gave this little story its'news value. There is no doubt that I brevity at this class of function, : as well as at a great many more, | is unusual. Verbosity, like any- ; thing else, unless it is checked j in its early exuberance has a j tendency to lead to anything. ' Our Parliamentary debates are an example of the extent to ! which free speech may become ; pure license but our politicians ! are not alone in their wordiness. 1 If a tiddly winks club is to be ! opened, someone must speak, i someone else must reply and an j audience must be bored ; if a | tiddly winks club is to be closed ; someone must commemorate the j fact in torrents of eloquence and t someone else must reply. in kind. Conferences, conventions, congresses, ordinary common garden meetings, are all contributing their quota to the growing flood of speech-making that is j inundating and bewildering audii ences the world over. And yet, j as much can be said in proposing j a toast after the simple formula | already recorded as in an hour | of tedious repetitio^n. There is a j time honoured formula in projposing the health of the King. | The toast-master does not em- , bark upon a lengthy panegyric extolling his Majesty's virtues; I that toast is a simple gesture of l loyalty and goodwill. "Gentlemen, the King" is considered sufj ficient for the pnrposes of r the occasion and so, undoubtedly, it is. The same remark applies with equal force to very many other toasts and speeches. The clerical gentlemen who paid their compliments with such commendable brevity are to be congratulated upon a very useful example. When a number of men gather together to do honour to one of their number it may be taken for granted that they are aware of the purpose for which they are gathered and of the virtues which they propose to commemorate. They come, in the majority of cases, knowing their own opinions in the inexpressive fashion of the tongue-tied Briton but resigned to submit to a varying period. of boredom while these opinions are elaborated and developed ad lib. and ad infinitum. There is, however, as sincere, and certainly as dignified a tribute in the simple formula of the toast as in a torrent of laudatory eloquence. "A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver" say Proverbs and it is much more simple to speak one word fitly than a very large number. The same prineiple could equally well be applied to the opening of clubs, meetings, conferences,' and all the thousand and one other excuses for eloquence. If a club, or a meeting or a congress is to be opened, its members are usually anxious to get on with the business, but instead they are often eompelled to listen to an ■ exhaustive examination of the reasons for their gathering, with which- they are already thoroughly acquainted and of which many of them would possTbly prefer iiot to be reminded. It has been said that everything has al-

ready been said and written that is likely to be said and written but that is cold comfort when it is realised that it will go on being said and written just the same. The clerical gentlemen in Christchurch have given an excellentdead toward a curtailment of unnecessary verbosity. If it is not; a breach of privilege or an assault upon the tender susceptibilities of Parliament to make the suggestion, it might almost he possible to set up a national economy in words commission ; there is no doubt that this, at least, is an economy which would be welcome.