Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1869-03-26

gone out both in factand fiction, on the stage
and off it. To be sure, we have few trav
oilers, of slightly apocryphal courage and
more than doubtful accuracy, whose DOCKS
of perious adventure and breathless dangers
are to us what Bombastes and Bobadil were
to our fathers; and we have Major Yelling
ton de Boots with his military swagger and
and his hares heart. But he is a very weak
imitation of the old fre-eater; and, on the
whole, this special family of the pumpkins
has dwindled into significance, and their
place knows them no more.
Very often the pumpkin has wife whose
fibre is as close as his is loose, and whose
nature is as tough as his is soft; hard
ened, thin Tipped, tenacious woman, who
speaks little and boasts not at all, but who
does all she wishes to do, and whose iron will
pins her pumpkin to the wall as the spear of
the Bushman pins the elephant or the rhi-
noceros. 1t is very curious to see how a
blatant, clustering man, who is so loud and
confident abroad. knocks under at home
and how the high-crested department which
carries things with such a lofty bearing out
of doors droops into the meek submission of
the henpecked husband as soon as the house
door closes on him, and he is subjected to the
ton of flourish then and if by chance the
ambitious crest should try to display itself,
the wife knows how to lower it by a few
decisive words ola keen edged kind, and her
pumpkin is made to feel sharply enough the
difference existing between fibre and pulp.
Yet it is almost melancholy to see ono of
these fine furnishing fellows so subdued.
/ Pumkin as he may be, it is not pleasant to
see him so cut down in his pride; and inyol
unfairly ones sympathies go with him rath-
/ er than with that tenacious, hard-mouthed
wife of his, who would be none the worse
perhaps for a little of her husbands softness,
and with less than her own hardness. How
often, too, these big fellows have no physical
stamina, as well as but very shaky moral
fibre. A small, wiry lightweight will do
! twice as much as they; not. OF course, where
muscle only is wanted, but there the question
is of endurance Large heavy men knock
up far sooner than the light-weights; and
though size and weight count for something
at certain times and on occasions, fibre and
tenacity 90 for more in the long run. In the
Crimea, the men who first dropped off from
exposure and privatiOn were the magnificent
ly, built Guardsmen-men apparently bred
and fed to the highest point of physical per-
lection while the understood little liners,
who had nothing to be admired in them,
stood the strain gamely, and were brisk and
serviceable when the others were either dead
or in hospital. So far as we have gone yet,
we have not solved the problem of how TO
combine toughness and bigness, solidity and
size, but for the most part fail in the one in
proportion as we succeed in the other
Many of the dark-skined races are pumpkins
in way. Their flashing black eyes and
swarthy skins seem To be instinct with passion
they look like living furnaces filled with
flames and molten metal, terrible fellows,
dangerous to NEEDLE with, and almost impOs-
sible to subdue But nine times out of ten
we fEd them to be marvelously meek per
sons, timid, amenable to law, unable 10 give |
offence, and incapable Of taking it-lambs |
masquerading in tiger-skins. \ iair-faced 1
Anglo-Saxon. with his sensitive blush, good |
humoured smile, and light blue eyes, has |
more pluck and pirh IN him than brigade |
OF certain of these dark-skined men He /
has less fcrocity perhaps than they when |
they are thoroughly reused, though our good
humored Ango-SlxOn Is by no means des-
titute Of ierocity on occasions when his blood
is up but it is ferocity Of the brutal and
bludgeon stand-up fight klnd-the ferocity
Of strength fairly put out against an adyer-
sary, not the tigersh cruelty which is al
most always found when moral weakness
and physical submission have mOmentary
triumph and reaction Cowardly men are
like women in their revenge when once they
get the upper hand and their revenge Is
more cruel than that of the habitually brave
man who, after fair fight, overthrows bis
opponent Some Of the dark-skined races
look the very ideal of the melodramatic
ruiHan-operatic brigandsIpainted with broad
black lines, and up to any amount Of deeds
of daring and of crime; but they are only
pumpkins at :he core. We need not 20 so far
as Calcutta to find them we get examples
nearer home, both in Hondsditch and in
Rome: for both jews and Italians are soft
cored men IN spite of their passionate out
sides. and both would be better for an extra
twist and toughness in their fbres.
Intellectual pumpkins are as common as
those of the more specially physical kind.
on meet with philosophers and '' thinkers !
perhaps they are poets, perhaps politicians
who flourish out a vague big defamation c
which. when YOU reduce it to its essence. {
gou find to be a platitude worth nothing;
whipped cream, without any foundation Of
ohd pudding. If they are Of the philosoph
C sort. they quote You Fichte and legel, to I
he bewiderment Of your brains, unless YOU ]
nave gone into the metaphysical maze on l
our own account but they might have d
,ut all they said into half dozen words of b
hree letters. like chid's first reading lesson. d
The flourish imposes, a,d people who can C
ot analyze take the whipped cream for sol o
! pudding, and think that platitudes dress
d ia the garb Of FIchte and Illegal are utter ?
noes worthy of deep respect and admiring :.
-0nder. II