The San Francisco call. [volume], January 08, 1910, Page 8, Image 8

About The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913

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THE SAN FRANCISCO CALTJ, SATURDAY, JANUARY 8, IPIO.— THE JUNIOR CALT
8
A SPENCERIAN
ROMANCE
CHARLES CRISTADORO
ITURN back, the annual hand of the , '
clock of life nearly 50 years and I
sec myself a boy at'a desk, and in'
front of me is a ne / glass Ink well,
carefully filled, lest It .overflow, with an
acrid smelling blue black liquid, ink.
1 finger over half a dozen_ little elon- •
gated crescents of polished steel,
pointed and ingeniously split, my pens,
with "Gillott" stamped upon their sur
face. In. those days, in the pen line,
it was Gillotfs pens or a quill, you
took your, choice. : ... \u25a0\u25a0 ;
The penholder was a masterpiece of
polished, turning, smelling of tho cedar
chest in which the furs. were stored at
home in 'the attic. Into this holder we
were shown how. to insert, the pen, not
too far, but just far enough to avoid
dipping too deeply Jn the Ink and soil
ing our fingers, a' precautionary meas
ure futile in Its outcome, as .a rule. .
The portfolio wasa.parallelogram of
pasteboards held together, to form a
pocket,' concealing crimson colored
sheets of .very thin blotting paper, that
only top often '.'blotted". instead of ab-'
sorbing, the outer surface of the port-;
folio being covered with a thin glazed,
fabric, of some, kind. You rarely ever •
see one nowadays in \usc In this conn- -
itry, although common on the desks of
French officials, and very likely even
now present in. their schools. I im
agine they were imported, from France.
> And' now came the orthographic
taskmaster, the copy book/ Spencerlan,
filled with up and .down strokes, fine
and shaded, pot hooks. and V's and W's,
that were the despair of the tyro's
life. And the impossible narrow, space
between lines to which we must re
strict ourselves. That book was, *in a
penmanship sense, truly a pons asln
orum.
Those hair- line -up strokes. .How.
could we even ;do those without the
pen spluttering and maybe breaking
and making an. inky constellation upon
the page? Troubles real and burden
some may,, and do, come in after life
v plenty, but what be they to the
trials and sorrows and tribulations of
the school boy? The frowning, mas
ter, the unlearned lesson, the dunce's
conical headgear and the high stool
in the corner, and the bunch of.birch
en twigs or. leather, strap or ruler, long,
flat and weather. beaten. .-.'.
"No blots" was the slogan that wo
heard when writing lesson was , an
nounced, but how did we know that we.
must first moisten . the ; nib .with our,
lips before dipping It into the ink well?
And in this we had to have our expe- 5
rlence by blotting our nicely engraved
page and making the most calamitous
of all "steps, a bad beginning.
. And so we struggled on, first. through
the angular, ups and. downs, then the
curves and the shading, untir passing
through , the. individual, letters we were
actually writing, as they say In. "Hani
let." "words, words, words," "Virtue is
Its own reward,'.' "To be good. is to ".be "
happy," "Daretodo right." And so we
were maximed and taught, to < write at.
oik' and tho same time.' But, tho fear
ful blots! And the borrowlng.of. pen
knives and the' Incessant -'.scratching'
that but too often left openings clean
through the paper. The boy who really
could show a blotless, unscratched and
neat copybook deserved the head place
in the class and no envy followed him.
And so the, days went on until" wo
arose to the dignity of writing home
in a more or less perfect simulation of
the true Spencerlan style.
Months, or perhaps a year or two
after, a writing teacher, a specialist,
came along. A fine, well set-up French*
man of 60 or more, bearded and as ma
jestic looking as Michael Angelo'a '
MudPH, He hud tho accent, but whllo
noticeable it did not interfere with his
making things 'very clear to us, al
though he would unguardedly exclaim
at times, "Viola! Attendez. Comme ca!
Tres facile," etc. • . . f
And what did this old gentleman
from the sunny, vine clad lit 11s of la
belle France do but go to the black
board, which he nicely cleaned and
with a fresh long piece of chalk, tho
same identically as that in use today,
make circles, circles, and more circles.
First from left to right with the shad
ing on the down stroke at the right,
and then from right to left, with tho
heavy down stroke on the left. •
We were a .little amused at first.
Some of us, boylike, tittered at the
novelty, queerness of the actions of
the old writing master, but there was
method in his madness. He never made
a straight line; nor a pothook on that
board, but circles, or perhaps better
and more correct, ovals, ovals, ovals,
for many lessons. And we were told
'to practice, practice, practice. It was
quite some fun and tho freedom over
the former way that held us down to
narrow spaces was most agreeable.
We could swing and swing our whole
hand and forearm, and then the arm
from the shoulder "to the finger tips. It
was real fun when we got the hang and
. full swing of It.
•-'. But for a long time It was nothing
but ovals, and we wondered and won
vdered'What was coming next. It turned
out to be capitals. From A to Z- the
writing master went down the Hue,
clearly illustrating th* fact that the
oval came into play and importance in
•every letter. "Volla!" he would Bay as
with a swing of his chalk ho formed
the letter A and the B and tho C, "You
zee, ze oval is ze important, ze in-dis
pen-sablo movement. It Is ne-ces-salre
zat you must first make zo oval. It
ecs tres Important." •
: So from "c ovals" wo made capitals
and they certainly did come easy, and
did fit Into the ovals whether the shad
INSTINCT AND REASON
An- illustration showing the \u25a0 differ*
enco between instinct and reason in
monkeys came under the observation
of David Starr Jordan, the famous
educator. At one time he had two
lively Macacus monkeys called; Bob
and Jocko. These were nut and fruit
eating monkeys and Instinctively knew
just how to crack nuts and peel fruits.
At the same time ho had a baby mon
key, Mono, of a kind that had the offer
eating Instinct, , But Mono had never
yet seen an egg.
.To each of the three monkeys Dr.
Jordan gave an egg, the first that any
of them had ever seen. Baby Mono,
descended from egg eating ancestors,
handled his egg with all the inherited
nxpertness of a long developed in
stinct. He cracked It with his upper
teeth, making a hole in it, and sucked
out all it* uubstance. Then, holding
the eggshell up to the light and see.
ing there was no longer anything in
it, he threw it away. All this he did
ing was right or left. And from capitals
we ascended or descended to the small
letters, and there was a swing to our
writing that had with it a freedom of
movement that was pleasant. We
crabbed the pen in our fingers no
more. Held well between the thumb
and two fingers, using the tip .of the
small fingers \u25a0 to swing upon, .we did
wonders.,
"And in- after years when my writ
" ing helped me along in my position I
claimed I had learned all, l knew about
writing from making ovals, ovals,
ovals.
So one day a. little Savoyard, a blos
som from sunny Italy, with sJioc
blacklng equipment, blew into my of
fice about closing timo, and asked,
"Shine?" "Yes, go ahead." And I
asked questions. He was working all
the day, but went to night school. Yes,
he could write, and when ho had
\u25a0earned his nickel I gave him pen and
paper and told him to write. And,
grabbing his pen .with, his fingers
bunched up close, almost to the touch
ing of the Ink, stained pen point itself, ,
ho wrote, a crabbed, scrawly lot of let
tering. . *
I took the pen from him, and, tak
ing a letter head, made ovals, right
and left, as the old French relncar
mechanically, automatically and just
as well with the first egg as with any
other he afterward had. And all eggs
since given him he has treated in the
same way.
The monkey Bob took his egg for
some kind; of nut. He broke it with
his teeth and tried to pull off the Bhell.
When the, lnside ran out and fell on
the ground ho' looked at:, it for a mo
ment In bewilderment, then with both
hands scooped up the yolk and the
Band mixed with it and swallowed it.
Then he .stuffed the shell into his
mouth. This act was not instinct; it
was reason. He was not familiar by
Inherited Instinct with eggs. He would
handle one better next time, however.
Reason very often makes mistakes at
first, but when it is tra.ined it becomes
a means far more valuable and power
ful than instinct.
The third monkey, Jocko, tried to
eat his egg in much the uarne way that
Bob did; but, not liking the taste, he
threw it away. — St. Nicholas.
nation of Moses did for us when we
were school children. Here, I- said,
after carefully blotting It, is your copy.
You make those . with pen. or pencil,
plenty of them, on any kind of paper —
wrapping paper, newspaper, any kind.
It was not many days after before
the shipping clerk, taking, a "shine"
to the bright, cheerful little olive com- .
plexioned shaver, had him "between ,
shines" running messages for him.'tip
ping him so that he did as well as a \u25a0
messenger, pecuniarily, as a shoe
shiner.
Ho was always around at closing
time and Invariably came into the of
fice and handed me a packet of ovals,
done on backs of torn bills of lading,
shipping receipts, brown paper, and
what not. Dirty, very dirty at first,
and ink smeared, but always an Im
provement, marked as the days went
O*ll. ' \u25a0 :
In time the ovals were not only, very
creditable 1 and all done in; ink, no
more lead pencil, but the blots had dis
appeared and his work was done on
clean white paper, letter heads fur
nished him by the shipping clerk. 1 v
And then I stepped Into a Stationery
store and bought a Spencerlan copy
book. My! the l'ecollections brought
up by that book! The playgrounds
and study halls, , the class rooms and
""call bell, that sent -us to sleep, to work,
toldinner and to play^-I can "hear: its
Old familiar ding dong, ding dong. now
echoing in my ears— and the faces of
the boys of my childhood days, van
ished now like a pleasant dream, with
•all their disinterested and friendly,as
sociations! How familiar those ups
and downs and those Vs and W's and
the old' (but how- disregarded in these
days of high finance) adage of /'Hon
esty is the : . best policy" and, all "Wall
street to the contrary, it-is the pollcy
that wins out in the finals of the great
game of life.
So when the little fellow, now neater
In his dress and cleaner as to his hands
and nails (he had the run of the ship
ping clerk's wash basin) than of yore,
'stopped in to leave his daily stint of
ovals, nothing but ovals (I wonder
whether he. ever dreamed of." ovals < at
night), I 'showed him the Spencerlan
copy book. "Now," I;: said, "you have
niade ovals enough. Here Is a copy
book, : pens, and pen holder,' all new,
fresh and clean. Here, too," taking a
fresh, clean dollar bill from my pocket,
silk threaded, geometrically engraved,
vignetted and signed, "'is a fresh, clean
dollar bill. I am going to put it in
this envelope and save it for you. It
is your dollar bill, when,: without a
blot or. a smutch of any kind, you re
turn this copy book filled from cover to
cover. I want no more ovals. "•'.<
. And tho first thing that Jurio eyed
boy did was to find a clean piece of
wrapping. paper and wr"ap the book.up.
, If .elasticity of step imlicated anything,
as the boy shouldered his blacking-box
and went hurrying toward his Baxter
street home, ho certainly was walking
on air, for I had also given him a* shiny,
ticking Ingersoll watch.
\u25a0 It is many years ago and hard to re
' memben just how . quickly that book
came back, but it did come back clean,
yes, as "spotless town." No .blot,
scratch or blemish marred the surface
of the pages. .The ups and downs were
a little shaky but good', and the V.'a'
and the W'« . were open to criticism,
and his "learn to do good. X. Y. G.
•Wlx." might have been bettered,' but
the effort' and purpose of the boy
showed In every line. Tho last pages
of the book were simply excellent and
beyond criticism, ull tho circumstances
considered. I certainly was proud »of
my pupil and, the boy was not far off,
as to his showing, So I watched his
face wreath itself in smiles, his lips
twitch and extend, the fresh young
. blood in the cheeks coursing under the
thin, olive hued epidermis, his great
blue eyes all but .suffused In tears of
joy, as were Juno'» (sufTusis oculis)
when I reached Into my drawer, opened.
; the envelope and handed him the much
dreampt of and coveted'dolhir promise
of. Uncle Ham. And ho wanted the
envelope to protect it as he tucked it
away in his pocket.. There was great
rejoicings, I know, in that little back
room tenement up three or four flights
of stairs in BOMit- "double decker" la
Baxter street that night.
Changes came. 1 was away months,
years, from New York. I returned and
ran across the old shipping clerk. "And
I whatever became of little Angelln'o?"
• "Shipping clerk with a big plate glasa
house, married and living comfortably.
,Writes with copper plate, and always
asks ufter you and says you got him
the Job all right."