The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-10-19 00:00:00

The "GENTILITY" of MODERN TIMES!

(From Weduesday's Daily News.)
Thst "Gentility' to which Lord Sahalulu casually alluded
in his admirable speech at Manchester the other day, works
far more mischief in English Society than any combination
of strikes or rise of (omit to famine prices These thlnes are
accidental end intermit`eut. and are eventually modified by
she ct.mpetitiou of the markets of the world ; but the" Gen-
tility " we aways have with us, inflicting incalculable Mjury
on all classes of our pope' Won. This pheitomenon of our social
life is doubtless very of teu ludicrous in the extreme ;aid has
furnished abuntimt material for our comedies and farces.
We can all laugh at Monsieur Jourdaln insisting on walking
out with two lackeys following closely at his heels, to stow
that they belong to him. We are familiar with the hypo- ,
crisies of the parvenu whose whole ambition it is to conceal
his origin, and gain admittance into circles considerably
above him in that odd invention of modern life which is
called the Social Seale. hilt there are other and graver
novels of this prostrating weak msa, to which mast
lie
attrionted much 4.1 the actual paisi and suffering which is
borne with more or less of meekness by thoueands
arneug us. Take, for example, the case of the
sou of a small country tradesman, who, rebelling
against the notion of selling raisins across a counter,
must needs come to London and become a clerk in
a mercantile office. lie gets eighty, or a hundred, or & hun-
dred and twenty pounds a year. Men can live wel and
comfortably on the least of these incomes; but oily, to
quote ii homely proverb, by "cutting their coat according to
their cloth." The clerk, however, must ft Mow, at a distance,
the example of bin superiors; must have his cheap cigars,
Ms cheap jewellery, his cheap wines, anti what not
Fie must dress in as go el an imitation as is poesible of
the materna of the Prince of Wales in the last-pub-
lished photo graph of the Royal Family. Lie must enter-
tain his bachelor friends ; and then he aims at a sort of
entitrtainnient which might be possible to men with six times
his salary. Finally, he marries. Lotus say that he has now
a hundred and fifty a year. There is no earthly reason why
men in this country should not marry and live comfortable
on three pounds a week, or on less then that; only, they
must eschew pretence It in the misfortune of English Society
that they will not. The clerk Sr warehousemon with three
pounds a week must have himself and his wife drowsed ou; in
gaudy attire on a holiday must have a mild-servant to
wheel out his children in a preambuiator ; and must en-
deavour to adorn his house in a style wholly incompatible
with his means, lie lives, indeed, at the outside limit of his
income, and it is mily by the most continuous and painful
struggle that he can succeed in maintaining what are called
" appttarames." Ile does succeed for a time. lits wife
assumes the airs of a woman of fashion, and could not think
of helping the aolitary "Loewy " in her deity drudgery.
Money is spent on aimless frippery, or on al excursion in a
dog-cart, which ought to have gone into a savings bank and
the father of the family considers that he is somebody in the
eyes of his neighbours. But suddenly an Sc ident occurs.
tither himself or one of his family becomes ill Per-
haps a sudden rise in prices comes to test an income
which is already strained t i the utmost limit P 3 opie
who have their thousand or fifteen hundred a year may
view with a comparatively light heart the gradual Incrense
In the price of semis or butcher's meat ; nut to those small
households which have been "keeping Op appearances" by
trading on their uttermost farthing, such an additional call
means ruin, recklessness, and misery. If we could get any
trustworthy statistics on such a subject, we should learn how
massy thousands of Lonnie. there are in London who are en-
deavouring to keep up a state altogether out of proportion to
their means, and who are from time to time plunged into
the deepest distress by some unexpected call on their con-
fined resources.
This disastrous pretentiousnese does not stop here. It pre-
le other regions. The tradesman who has made a
foftune, and who gives dleners which a duke would think
extravagant, never dreams for a moment of allowing his son
to go into business. Ile most either be a "gentleman," in
the sense in which gentleman means idler, or enter one of the
professions. The occupation of being, in this sense, a " gentle-
man" is an easy one. The candidate for the honour has only
to be well fitted out by a tailor, a jeweller, and a cigar
merchant, 11111 he becomes eligible as one of those placid
beings who may be seen, in the Seaeon, loungidg
iii
Rotten-row. lie must somehow get into a club ; and
pit up lessons in deportment from half-pay officers, who
will play pool with him as a sort of fee for the tuition they
afford the novice. If he enter OW) of the professions, his
c ire3r becomes a trifle more digoificd, but none the less
useless. There is no demand made upon his brain arid
energy, if he happens to have either. Ilia professional status
Is merely desired to give him some kind of passport into
Society. With this stet of creature the world cannot be ex-
pected to find much fault ; because he is, in a sense, sole
supporting. But the " genteel" notions which aro held by
the rich slop-keepers are an example to others who C.lll.
riot give each of their sous a fortune. Nevertheleset,
these sons must be " gentlemen. ' It is not to 'he
thought of that they should go into trade, lion.
year overstocked the profeseions may lie—how-seer improba-
ble it is that the impecunious candidate for honours may
earn an holiest Pispaitee for pars to guise—into a profe3sion
he must go. If he marries, woe to him ! lie must marry a
"lady "—that is, some young woman who can play a few
pieces of music indifferently, anti who can cook nothil,g
ot
all. With povi rty at the prow, and preteece at the helm, it
is easy to predict what course the vessel will steer. But does
any one point the moral of the shipwreck, and attribute it to
a weak and pitiful hypocrisy l No: sonic accident of illness
occurred, or soms unforeseen rise in prices made living diffi-
cult, and so the household succumbed. The parable may be re-
peated in a thousand different ways. meson of the workman
must be a shopkeeper ; the son of the shopkeeper must be a
insects:oda; clerk ; the son of tee merchant's clerk must be
educatsd for the law, or medicine, or the Church ; awl they
must in the meantime swersate the social position and ex
penditure necessary to the character, and incur the most
severe privations for the sake of a weak and foolish pre-
tence.
- - -- • •• • •

No one, of course, can desire to check the ambition of
ardent youth. If the son of a journeyman carpenter have
the brains to become a gooe law' er, by all means let him
study and take his chance. We should be sorry to discourale
tire mute, inglorious Nliitous and village Ilampelens who
may be dreaming of great things. Put this natural ned
proper ambition is a very different thing from the sham
pretentiousness which IkIUIS at impressing one's neigh-
bours. There is something noble in the aspiration of
the youth, who has te.en brought op in lowly circum-
stances, to become a Rembrandt, a Newton, Cr a (Welles ;
and if, in aiming at the moon, he hits the highest trees, hie
good fortune ought to be a matter of congratulation. But
the Minnie:l wh e..h drives people into elicits to distingWeh
themselves, or better their circumstances, Is vastly different
from that petty hypocrisy which loves to "keep up ap-
pearances' and ape a style of living altogether beyond
Ps means. That is one of the great curses of our than, and
it is bard to see how it is to be remedied except by a grow-
ing spirit of good elise itod honesty on the part of Our
population generally. The exarmde of noblemen send-
ing their sons into commere, is all very good Pa its
way ; but it cannot be expected to affect the c nuluct of
men who consid,T a clerkship and eighty pounds a year as
more "genteel" than a carp,nter's trench and three pounds
a week ;or of women wh mbninistering au income otter,,
hundred a year, would think thenuelvm degraded if they
assisted in the cooking and eta lied the small economies of
the kitchen. If we had a little less "gentility" and a trifle
111,Te thrifty. prudent, and plain ordering of limited means,
our social life in England would boa good deal more com-
fatable and praiseworthy than it is.