Rensselaer Republican, Volume 17, Number 1, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 September 1884 — SHAKING HANDS. [ARTICLE]

SHAKING HANDS.

Some of t he Variotu Modes. The pump-handle shaking is the first which deserves notice. It is executed by taking a friend’s hand and working it up and down through an arc of fifty degrees for about a minute and a half. To have its nature, force, and character this shake should be formed with a fair and steady motion. No attempt should be made to give it grace, and still less variety, as the few instances in which the latter has been tried have uniformly resulted in dislocating the shoulder of the person on whom it has been attempted. On the contrary, persons who are partial to the pumphandle shake should be at some pains to have an equable, tranquil movement to the operation; which should bn no account be continued after perspiration on the part of your friend has commenced*— . —___ The pendulum shake may be mentioned next, as being somewhat"similar in character, but moving, as the name indicates, in a horizontal instead of a perpendicular direction. It is executed by sweeping your hands horizontally toward your friends, and after the junction is effected, rowing with it from' one side to the other according to the pleasure of the parties. The only caution in its use which needs particularly to be given is not to insist on performing it in a place strictly paralell to the horizon. You may observe a person who had been educated to the pumphandle shake, and one who had brought home the pendulum from a foreign -voyage*—They met, joined hands, and attempted to put them in motion. They were neither of them feeble men One attempted to pump, and the other to puddle; their faces reddened, the drops stood upon their ioreheads,-and it—was at last a pleasant illustration of the doctrine of the composition of forces to see their heads slanting into an exact diagonal, in which line they ever after shook; but it was plain to see there was no cordiality in it, and, as is usually the case with such compromises, both parties were discontented. The tourniquet shake is the next in importance. It derives its name from the instrument made use of by surgeons to stop the circulation of the blood in the limbs about to be amputated. It is performed by clasping the hand of your friend as far as you can n your own, and then contracting the muscles of your thumb, fingers, and palm till you have induced any degree of compression you may possess in the hand ofyourfriend? —Particular care ought to be taken, if your hand isias hard and as big as a frying-pan, and that of your friend is as small and soft as a maiden’s, not to make use of the tourniquet shake to a degree that will shake the small bones of the wrist out of their places. It is seldom safe to apply it to a gouty person. A hearty young friend of mine, who had pursued the study of geology, and acquired an unusual hardness and strength of hand and wrist by the use of the hammer, on returning from a scientific excursion, gave his uncle (the gouty one) the tourniquet shake with such severity as had well-nigh reduced the old gentleman’s fingers to powder, for which my friend had the pleasure of being disinherited as soon as his uncle’s fingers got w r ell enough to hold a pen. The cordial grapple is a shake of some interest. It is a hearty, boisterous shake of your friend's hand, accompanied with modern pressure and loud acclamations of welcome. It is an excellent traveling shake, and well adapted to many friends; it is indiscriminately performed. ■ The Peter Grevious is opposed to the cordial grapple. It is a pensive, tranquib'junction, followed by a mild subsultory motion, a cast-down look, and an inarticulate inquiry after your friend’s health. The prude major, and prude minor are nearly monopolized by ladies. They cannot be accurately described, but are constantly to be noticed in practice. They never extend beyond the fingers; and the prude major allows you to touch them only down to the second joint. The prude minor allows you the whole of the finger. Considerable skill may be show in performing them with nice variations, such as extending the left hand instead of tjie right, or stretching a new glossy kid glove over, the finger you extend I might go through along list of the grip royal, and sawmill shake, and the shake with malice prepense, but they are only factitious combinations of the three fundamental forms already described, as the pump-handle,r the pendulum, and the tourniquet. Ishould trouble you with a few remarks in conclusion on the mode of shaking hands as an indication of character, but as I see a friend coming up the avenue who is addicted to the pump-handle I dare not tire my wrist by further writing.— Exchange.