OCR Text |
Show Bores. What constitutes a bore? What combination of qualities goes to make up that scourge of civilization? A total lack of humor, we should say, and of that sympathetic power which enables a person to see, as if by instinct, in-stinct, whether ho or his conversation be agreeable to the listener, joined sometimes to intenso egotism; though this last is not a necessary ingredient in the bore's character, except in so far as it is connected with want of sympathy. The essence of the bore is tho absence of tbo sympathetic power. This by no means implies tho absence f the sympathizing power. Tho two are quite distinct. A person may bore one to death with sympathy, by offering offer-ing it at tho wrong time. A bore has no tact. This is why tho masculine boro so largely predominates over the feminine. Women, as a rule, have more tact than men. They are more sympathetic too; their finer sensibilities enabling them to leel the pulse, as it wore, of tho individual with whom they aro conversing or the society in which they are mixing. But though the feminine type is rarer than the masculine it is infinitely the worte of tho two. The rarity is moro than compensated com-pensated for bythcintdusity. Tintleys Magazine. |