The true northerner. [volume] (Paw Paw, Mich.) 1855-1920, 1871-07-28
LfctmS rtth Jy.fmdows Open.

dows open. Less than any people who
have homes do they regard their homes
as sacredly private. Every family knows
his neighbours affairs; and nothing trans
pires concerning the most private rela-
tons that is not Immediately noised
abroad, discussed, and judged by med
ding communities. Homes that should
be guarded with the most jealous care
are of easy access to strangers, who
come with the fimsiest credentials, or
with none at all and every year pro.
duces its crop of personal and social dis
asters which this unwise exposure of the
soil gives to reckless or villainous sow.
ing. If man should wish to see how
Americans differ in this thing from other
nations, let him try to get into Ger.
man or an English family, or even into
a French family, abroad. He will at
once discover that he has undertaken to
do very difficult thing. No man can
obtain an inside view Of the economies
and habits of foreign home, and share
il its communion, who does not enter it
with record or an introduction and
Endorsement which place him above sus
picion. Students who 60 to continental
Europe to study language, with the nat
ural expectation to accomplish their
purpose by entering French or Ger
man family, find, to their surprise, that
nothing but necessity will induce any
family to open its sanctities to them.
1t 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 everything relating to the life of in
dividuals-and the base desire to be
talked about, were never more prevalent
than now. We have only to take up
fashionable paper to learn who has had
parties, who attended the parties, who
were the bellies of the parties, and how
they were dressed; 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 trousseaus are inventoried by the
daily prints and spread before the coun-
try. 1t is not enough that ones mar
riage be published when it takes place,
but the engagement must be bruitcd in
.]enhn'S Journal, jenkins having pre-
viously been assured that the announce
ment would not be offensive, and subse
quently repaid by an order for extra
papers. The inanities of the Court
Journal. over which Americans were in
the habit of laughing dozen years ago,
are more than matched by the daily re.
port of the movements of every man of
title, or place, or notoriety. When
woman lectures, the reporters understand
that the first thing people wish to learn
about her relates to her face, figure, and
dress; and that is the first thing they
write about. The women of the plat.
form-being all very sensible women,
and too wise t. be vain-are Of course
offended by this treatment; but it some
how happens that the reports are gener
ally of Aattering 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 is
made with the consent, or at the wish,
of those to whom it relates but it hap
pens that we have in America now a
prowling, :prying, far-seeing, vivacious,
loquacious, voracious being known as the
Local Editor, who must get living,
and who lives only upon these Items
If man sneeze twice in his presence,
the local column of the morning paper
will contain the announcement that "our
esteemed fellow.citizen" is suffering from
severe cold. If man lose his hat in
high wind, it excites the mirth of th,
local editor to the extent of dozer
lines. He amplifes an accident thai
kills, or scandal that ruins, with mar