The Japanese Spirit

ATLANTIC SHOP-TALK

THIS Talker of Shop cannot help feeling a certain kinship with the ‘colyume conductor’ of a daily newspaper. He envies that discursive purveyor of fancy, comment, and opinion the freedom of scope unlimited by any single Shop. He observes, however, that his favorite ‘colyumists,’ from B. L. T. of blessed memory to F. P. A. of diurnal ebullition, are frequently at a loss to avail of their ‘terminal facilities’ to their own complete satisfaction. To attain this object they bring their daily productions to an end with a variety of verbal and typographical quips of which only a newspaper is capable.

the difficulty here is rather with beginnings than with endings. This month — the unhappy journalist would be writing this afternoon —we are taking recourse to the office letter-files, and copying the following sentence from a letter written by a Japanese in California, at the conclusion of a brief correspondence regarding a manuscript: ‘I take this opportunity to tell you that your refined and respectful ways with authors has been a spiritual service to me.’ This passage, be it said in all sincerity, is not quoted for its fervor and quaintness of expression so much as for the attitude of mind which it bespeaks. Whatever may be said about disarmament in general, the individual Japanese is certainly disarming.