Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 9, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 November 1874 — Blabs. [ARTICLE]

Blabs.

The blab belongs to the very worst class of talkative people. He can neither guard his own secrets nor other people’s. When he goes abroad he keeps his eyes open and his mouth in the same condition. It would simply be a waste of time to endeavor to convince him that a still tongue - showeth something more than a wise head, to-wit: a considerate nature. As a rule he is one of those stolid, unimpressionable people whose self-consciousness is such that they can never be induced to depart even from an evil course. Fond of a joke, he is utterly careless at whose expense he gets it. Proud to be the retailer of news which at once gains him an attentive hearing, he is by no means particular who suffers so long as his vanity is gratified by his being regarded as an interesting person. Go abroad with a party of which he forms one and his eye will not cease to follow, detecting your movements in the most remote and gloomiest of corners. In the event of your speaking civilly to Brown’s wife he will gleefully dance about, declaring that if he were Brown he would look after her, and you too. Have the smallest bit of a “tiff” with your better-half and he will rejoice at being afforded some slight ground for saying that you and she had a terrible cat-and-dog life, and that it would not surprise him if there were an application for a judicial separation

before long. Let young Smith hand Miss Robbins a plate of bread and butter or a cup of tea and he is on the qui mve at once; While, if that gallant gentleman goes so far as to inquire of the lady, in a seemingly confidential manner, whether she is warm, or cool, or what not, his state immediately becomes one of not a little excitement, and he is afterward acutely on the alert to detect the further acts of enormity into which those who are the objects of his disinterested scrutiny may be led. If they will but slightly detach themselves from the main body of the company they may happen to be in, and appear as if they are a trifle interested in each other, his raptures and Jocosity rise to an indescribable pitch. Right willing he squares the circle of his acquaintances, and inquires of them, after he has gayly poked their ribs, whether they have noticed this, that and the other, his queries being accompanied by a series of suggestive winks, significant gestures and entertaining gnmaces. He seems to deem it his duty to report all that he sees to people whom he meets long after the occurrences related have grown old, and it is a curious thing that the oftener his reports are retailed the more florid they become, until, at last, one might be excused for thinking that they had no connection, remote or otherwise, with the affair they related. "When matters have reached this amusing state, blab number two, in the form of one of those goodnatured friends of whom the world is so Tull, steps in and does his best to make matters worse. The unhappy young niran is informed of a great deal that has been said by blab number one and other people ; also, of a great deal that has not been said. He is told in a roundabout fashion that he is thought to be a fool or a villain, as the case may be; further, that the impression is that he is making an ass of himself or being made an ass of —he being kindly left at liberty to choose which view of the case he deems most flattering to himself. All this is confided to the hapless being’s ear as if it were a profound secret, but it is a very great mistake to suppose that the blab will do otherwise than bis best to make it common property. It appears to be his aim to make people thoroughly uncomfortable by confiding to them what he declares, confidentially, other people say, and there is good reason for believing that he does not always content himself with mere humdrum reporting, but frequently makes his powerful imagination do good service. If you are on bad terms with any individual he will take care to let you know that this individual is ih the habit of avowing the greatest contempt for you; if you have written a book, painted a picture, or made a speech, he will kindly lead you to understand that many persons are laughing at you on the score of what you have done. —Saturday Review.

There is such a thing as being “ too smart.” A Detroit thief went to the door of a house, rang the bell and asked the servant to call her mistress, as he had particular business with her. The lady came, when the strangler informed her that Mr. , naming the name on the door-plate, had sent him to the house to get twenty dollars which was due him. But for one thing he might have got the money. The lady’s husband had been dead seven years. .