ght.

As for our methods of obtaining it----

Contrast these two excellent beginnings with (and this one is authentic,
too):

In reply to yours of the 6th inst. relative to what part courtesy
plays in business and office management would say that it is very
important.

Routine letters must be standardized--a house must conserve its own time
as well as that of its customers--but a routine letter must never be
used unless it adequately covers the situation. There is no excuse for a
poor routine letter, for there is plenty of time to think it out, and
there is no excuse for sending a routine letter when it does not
thoroughly answer the correspondent's question. The man who is answering
a letter must put himself in the place of the one who wrote it.

This is a fair sample of what happens when a letter is written by a
person who either has no imagination at all, or does not use what he
has.

A woman who had just moved to New York lost the key to her apartment and
wrote to her landlord for another. This answer came:

Replying to your letter, will say am sorry but it is not the
custom of the landlord to furnish more than one key for an
apartment. Should the tenant lose or misplace the key it is up to
them to replace same.

The woman felt a justifiable sense of irritation. She was new to the
city and thought she was taking the most direct method of replacing
"same." Perhaps she should have known better, but she did not. Buying a
key is not so simple as buying a box of matches and to a newcomer it is
a matter of some little difficulty. She was at least entitled to a bit
more information and to more courteous treatment than is shown in the
letter signed by his landlordly hand. She went to see him and found him
most suave and polite (which was his habit face to face with a woman).
He explained the heavy expense of furnishing careless tenants with new
keys (which she understood perfectly to begin with) and was most
apologetic when he discovered that she had intended all the time to pay
for it. It would have been just as easy for him in the beginning to
write:

I am sorry that I cannot send you a key, but we have had so many
similar requests that we have had to discontinue complying with
them.

You will find an excellent locksmith at 45 West 119 St. His
telephone number is Main 3480.

Or:

I am sending you the key herewith. There is a nominal cha