The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-12-14 00:00:00

"TRADESMEN' AND "GENTLEMEN."

this writes to the Daily News

I have a bright, intelligent, well-brought-up little
fellow nine years old,
i for whom I want a good prepara-
tory school. I live n a large city with many such
schools, where my boy might be well prepared for the
public school to which in due time I hope to send him.
What, then, is my difficulty? Just this. I sin a
tradesman—ergo, not a gentleman—ergo, my son can't
go to their schools. My cage is not an isolated one.
In all our provincial towns may be found many men
of considerable intellectual ability, of culture and
refined minds, whose aid and counsel are sought and
readily aciepted in all public matters, but who,
happening to be engaged in retail trade, in fact to keep
shops find this great difficulty in the education of their
children. If the town be fortunate enough to possess
good Grammar School, the difficulty is removed as far
as their boys are concerned, but remains with un-
diminished force as totheir girls. I fear the time has not
yet come when we can expect much from an appeal to
the good !sense or good feelings of those whose exquisite
gentility shrinks from the least possible association
with trade. But there is an appeal which, if they were
wise enough to understand it, would come home to them
with some force, and it is this. 'Me throng of young
men entering the profession and the Government
offices, &v., is exceeeive ; it becomes year by year more
difficult to make way in England, and few are the fami-
lies some of whose boys are not fr reed to seek for that sun.
cesa in India or the colonies denied to them nearer home.
This crowding into " genteel " occupations does not
arise from aversion to other employment so much as
from the absurd stigma attaching to trade, and to the
desire of most successful tradesmen to save their sons
the annoyance and indignities to which they have them-
selves been subjected. In proof of this I would men-
tion that in my own town, six tradesmen of my acquain-
tance will bring up twenty boys to professional life,
and only two or three to the very respectable and pro-
fitable business they have themselves conducted. Now,
character and ability are by no means confined to the
"eons of gentlemen." In the jostling of the world's
strife, the best man and the strongest men generally
wins, and weighted as the s ms of tradesmen often are
by the necessary imperfections of their education, they
often inherit a force of character which helps them to
push aside their more favoured competitors. I would
therefore urge upon those, and there are many, who
stipulate that any school, drawing class, or dancing
academy which is to be privileged to receive their
children should shut their doors to the sons and
daughters of a tradesman, however objectionable jper sr,
to remember that the fact I have pointed out is the
inevitable imult, is the peaalty their children will pay
for their pride. I would farther ask them whether
it would not be wiser to allow education and re-
finement to give dignity and content to trade,
which might even in time find many a snug
berth for boys of theirs who would never earn
their salt in a profession at home, or do more than
wreck their health and chance of happiness, and sink
into a premature grave abroad. tffir great public
schools know no such paltry class distinctions, but how
comparatively few are able to avail themselves of this
aid, whilst in every town how many are there
who feel the evil I have pointed out. There is, lam
glad to know, a largely increasing class who value edu-
cation and refinement of mind and manners, not for
what they may buy, nor with the hope that by their
aid they or their children may be raised out of the
social station to which they belong, Lot for the intrin-
sic value they confer and for the elevation of tone they
give alike to the individual and to the class. The evil
of which I complain has much increased of late years,
and I would crave the aid of all true friends of enlight-
enment and social progress to arrest it,

Another correspondent also writes :
I was very glad to see the article in the Daily
News of yesterday, advising gentlemen to send
the:r sons into business. As I am one of the
very few of the so-called "Upper Ten" who have
taken up manufacturing, perhaps you will allow
me to give my experiences. I left school at 17, and,
intending to go into the diplomatic service, went
abroad for three years. After this I returned to
England, and finding that I should have to wait
for some time for a nomination, gave tip all idea of
that service. With 80Mil difficulty I got leave to enter
a factory on the same footing as a common appren.
tice. I worked steadily, taking almost no holidays—
that is, only a week in the year—from six to six.
Alter two and a-half years of this, I was offered, and
accepted, the managership of a factory. My salary
is 1:400 per annum, with a prospect of increasing. I
mean to keep this for four years or so, and then to
take a factory for myself with the few thousands (for!
am a fourth son) that I can command. Now, in what
profession could I get 1:100 a year at 23 years
of age? I know of none. I should strongly re-
commend young men in my position, who are not afraid
of hard work, to do the same thing. At first, it is
true, it will be an uphill fight to persuade the business
men that the swell is serious, and has not taken up the
thing for a freak, but it is possible to do it. T enclose
my card, but not for publication, and remain your
obsdient servant, OLD ETONIAN.

December 5.
P.S.—I may mention that I have no relation, and
had not even friends in trade.