The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1871-06-15
LIVING WITH WINDOWssoPEN.
From scribncr's Monthly for June.

have homes do they regard their homes
as sacradly private Every family knows
it's neighbof's affairs; and nothingatrans
pires concerning the most private rela
tions that is not immediately noised
abroad discussed and judged, by med
ding and & gossiping communities.
Homes that should be guarded with the
most jealous care are of easy ,acces to
strangers, who come with fimsiest Gre
dentials, or with none at all; and every
year produces its crop of personal and
social disasters which this upwise expo
sure Of the soil gives to reckless or vii
famous sowing. If man should wish
to see how Americans differ in this thing
from other nations. let him try to Get.
into q German Or an English family, or
even into French family abroad. He
will at once discover that he has under.
taken to do "a very difficult thing. No
man can obtain an inside view of the
economies and habits of foreign home,
I and share in its communion, who does
not enter it with a record or an introduc
| ton and inddfseihent which will place
him above suspicion. Students who go
to continental Europe to study language,
with the natural expectation to accom-.
plish their purpose by enteringa French
or German family, find, to their surprise,
that nothing but necessity will induce
any family to open it's sanctities to them.
It will naturally be said that old or
mature communities are conservative in
this, as in other matters; but we do not
see that, as America grows older, it mends
in this respect. Indeed, it is certainly
and swiftly growing worse. The greed
for personalities the taste for every
thing relating to the life of individuals
and the base desire to be talked about.
were never more prevalent than now.
We have only to take up a fashionable
paper to learn who has had parties, who
Were the bellies Of the parties, and how
they were drGssed and we know while
we read that the ladies who gave the
parties gave also the information con-
corning them, and were GLAD to see the
reports in print. Weddings, which
should be sacred to kindred and closest
friends, are turned into public shows and
EtrOusseaus are inventoried by the daily
j prints and spread before the country
1t is not enough that ones marriage be
published when it takes place, but the
engagement must be bruited in Jenkins
Journal, jenkins having previously been
| assured that the announcement would
not be offensive, aud subsequently, re
paid by an order for extra papers. The
inanities Of the Court Journal, over which
Americans were in the habit Of laughing
a dozen years ago, are more than matched
by the daily report of the movements of
every man Of title, or place, or notorietv.
When woman lectures, the reporters
understand that the first thing peoDle
wish to learn obOut her relates to her
face, figure and dress; and that is the
first thing they write about. The wo-
men OF the platform-being all very sen
slble women and too wise to be vain
are OF course offended by this treatment /;
but it somehow happens that the reports
are generally Of t1attering character
1t would be possible to get along with
all this A man may become used TO
smothering his sense of humiliation and
disgust when reading the public record
of private life, SO long as that record "a
made with the consent, or at the wish, IF
those t, whom it relates but it happens
that we have in America now prowIino
prying, tar-seeing, vivacious, oquaciouS,
Voraclous being known as the Local Ed.
itor, who must get living, and who
lives only upon items If a man sneezas
twice in his presence, the local column of
the moIAlpg paper will contain the
announcement that "our esteemed fellow
citizen" is suffering from severe cold.
Ii a man lose his hat in high wind, il
excites the mirth of the local editor to
the extent Of dozen lines. He amplifies
an accident that kills, or a scandal that
runs, with marvellous minuteness of de
tail. His eye is at every mans back
door, to see and report who and what 90
and come There is nothing safe from
his pen. All the private affairs of the
community for which he writes are pub
l'shed to the community every Gay. If a
man shoots dog, or catches string of
trout, or rides out for his health or is
seen mysteriously leaving town on an
evening train, or sells horse, or BUYS q
COW, or give dinner party, or looks
sailoW, or grows fat, or smiles upon a
widow, or renews the wall paper of his
house, he gives the local editor an item,
The local editor turns the houses of the
community inside out every day, and
keeps the windows open by which the
secrets and sanctites of every home are
exposed to public view.
The local editor is, we regret to say,
not without excuse: Occasionally some
indignant victim of his prying and pub
fishing propensities scourges or scolds
him; but it must be confessed, with sor
row and shame, that his local column
finds greedy market Instead of frown-
ing upon the liberty he takes with per.
sons and homes, and the details of ind1-
vldual private life, the multitude read
his column first of all. That it's results
are mischievous and demoralizlng in
their ministry to neighborhood gossip