you of that.

A TELEPHONIC CONVERSATION

Consider that a conversation by telephone--when you are simply siting
by and not taking any part in that conversation--is one of the solemnest
curiosities of modern life. Yesterday I was writing a deep article on a
sublime philosophical subject while such a conversation was going on
in the room. I notice that one can always write best when somebody is
talking through a telephone close by. Well, the thing began in this way.
A member of our household came in and asked me to have our house put
into communication with Mr. Bagley's downtown. I have observed, in many
cities, that the sex always shrink from calling up the central office
themselves. I don't know why, but they do. So I touched the bell, and
this talk ensued:

CENTRAL OFFICE. (GRUFFY.) Hello!

I. Is it the Central Office?

C. O. Of course it is. What do you want?

I. Will you switch me on to the Bagleys, please?

C. O. All right. Just keep your ear to the telephone.

Then I heard K-LOOK, K-LOOK, K'LOOK--KLOOK-KLOOK-KLOOK-LOOK-LOOK! then a
horrible "gritting" of teeth, and finally a piping female voice: Y-e-s?
(RISING INFLECTION.) Did you wish to speak to me?

Without answering, I handed the telephone to the applicant, and sat
down. Then followed that queerest of all the queer things in this
world--a conversation with only one end of it. You hear questions asked;
you don't hear the answer. You hear invitations given; you hear no
thanks in return. You have listening pauses of dead silence, followed by
apparently irrelevant and unjustifiable exclamations of glad surprise or
sorrow or dismay. You can't make head or tail of the talk, because you
never hear anything that the person at the other end of the wire says.
Well, I heard the following remarkable series of observations, all from
the one tongue, and all shouted--for you can't ever persuade the sex to
speak gently into a telephone:

Yes? Why, how did THAT happen?

Pause.

What did you say?

Pause.

Oh no, I don't think it was.

Pause.

NO! Oh no, I didn't mean THAT. I meant, put it in while it is still
boiling--or just before it COMES to a boil.

Pause.

WHAT?

Pause.

I turned it over with a backstitch on the selvage edge.

Pause.

Yes, I like that way, too; but I think it's better to baste it on with
Valenciennes or bombazine, or something of that sort. It gives it such
an air--and attracts so much noise.

Pause.

It's fo