The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 1850-1873, 1873-07-11
The Power of Sulkiness.
TFrom the Pail Mall Gazette.l


so thorough as to be injurious to th
general welfare of humanity. But in
less and more ignoble form it is not un
common, and the deadweight and cho
king pressure which mankind endure il
consequences go to make up an almos
intOlerable grievance. There are peo
pie who have the gift of being sulk,
for an indefinite length of time, and as
sert that they act thus on principle
but it is almost invariably found tina
the principle harmonizes with the ma
ture, for to tendper5 that are short ant
sweet, hot, inconsistent' or quickly pla
cable, and any of these are liable to bt
suddenly vexed for an hour or two i
is always difficulty to sulk. It is bita
of acting and not reality, even wheI
carried out, and the assumption of i
is felt to be burden too heavy to bt
b0Tn6
The capacity for steady solid concen
trated sulkiness is a mighty power tC
him who possesses it it implies many
curious and varied accomplishments anc
| gifts, among others that of the com
plete mastery of the five senses. It is
for man to be blind when it is desired
that he should open his eyes, dumt
whenever words would be acceptable
deaf to all allurements or submission,
insensible to every effort at Cancellation
1t can create gloom, and, having crea
ted it, it can perpetuate and deepen il
until it becomes a clinging atmosphere
as unwholesOme as a malaria. 1t COM
prehends an absolute control over the
facial muscles, so that no softness
or sign of yielding, not ripple of a
smile or an expression of pleasure, may
replace even for moment the sullen
apathy or illumine the habitual scrowl
of the confirmed sulker. In word, it
is the faculty of stimulation to such a
degree that person shall appear to be
blind, deaf, dumb, stupid, paralysed, i'll
or dead whenever and for as long as he
chooses. Mr.. Helps has truly said,
"Unreason always governs. Nothing
prevents you having your own way SO
much as being at all amenable to
reason" And sulkiness neither gives
reasons nor listens to them. The sulky
being sometimes wears a depressed,
spiritless, and utterly detected appear
ance, as though crushed and heart
broken by long g-continued oppression !;
sometimes a heavy, displeased, drag
ging step, and black and lowering
brow, are the chief signs which indicate
the disturbance within, and the form of
the vengeance which is to be taken in
respect of it. The latter is the mascu-
line type; the former is, properly
speaking, feminine. Mr. N. P. Willis,
in one of his earlier volumes, has a
clever little tale describing the power
of en- injured look" By virtue of it
a young American lady contrived to
persuade whole house full of boarders
to regard her as a martyr, and to speak
the worst and think the worst they
could of her husband and all this,
without uttering one word herself, was
produced solely by the injured look. ;"
And if there is an "iniured look
there is also such thing as "dumb
devil - if the power of theone is great,
the provocation induced by the latter
is unuterable. It is a curious, and to
some will appear an unaccountable, cir
cumstance that in sulkiness woman is
more often possessed with dumb devil
than is man.
Sulkiness is visible even in the nurse
ry, where it exists, so to speak, in the
form of bud; but it is merely an out
break of bad temper, for at that age a
child has not learned the method of
using it as an instrument with which to
punish his play And the wisest
way is to leave it entirely unnoticed,
"efface" the offender, as the French
say, until there is an obvious return to
a more amiable disposition. But boys
and girls soon learn to estimate the
power of sulkiness either by practice
or endurance, and large school is
the best check on despotism of this
kind. Sulkiness is not tyranny which
can be safely exercised in society at
large, and it is commonly reserved for
private or home exhibition. The small
er the circle the more concentrated its
force in family, in house, in one
room, the power of suIkiness oppresses,
searches, and pervades every corner of
it. In love-making sulkiness is a de-
plorable blunder. Smile or strike, or
smile and strike too if that seems more
advisable but no good ever follows
sullen enmity, which ehills, disconcerts,
and often actually destroys love. Even
that simulated sulkiness, that toothless
vengeance, which consists in pouting
cOldness is an experiment full of dan
ger, and in the worst possible taste.
But if between lovers it is blunder,
in married life it is simply the greatest
madness of which human being can
be guilty. There they are man and
women yoked together like goats, and
as the eountryman justly observed,
"that's been trouble to more than
goats" and if either of them is en-
dowed with the faculty of persistent
sulkiness, one shudders to think of the
life the other one may be made to lead.
It might be reasonably urged as cause
for judicial separation, possibly even
for divorce, since the practice of quiet
ly pressing the spirit and life out of
human being, no matter how many
years the operation spreads over, is not
one that ought to be permitted in
Christian country: "V8 victis p the
weak go to the wall, and too often the
weak are the pleasantest and most Iowa
bic of earth's creatures.
Sometimes a person is seen to exhibit
something which resembles and yet is
not sulks. It is silent moodiness of
manner arising from a sense of failure,
modification, or secret discouragement,
and vexation which he cannot get over
all at once. It is often seen in youth,
but in reality the man is struggling
Will LIS anu % h111O WO4o VI
friendly overture will almost always
float him over the difficulty. But gen
uine sulkinessi is essentially premeditated
and of aforethought it is also vindic-
tive, sometimes even malignant, in it's
nature, and, if much indulged in,
causes the manners to become habitual-
Iy morose, and the face and person ac-
quire heavy sodden appearance as of
a substance too long stepped in I'M
wholesome juices. Dragging the feet
along the floor and slamming the doors
of the house for weeks and months to-
gether are vulgar and ignoble, but
neither uncommon nor inexpensive
modes of sulking. We all know of
other ways more refined but not less
disagreeab1e, and remember them too
we'll. The fashion in which the very
few words which custom and conven-
ience render absolutely necessary are
dropped from the lips as if they were
so many leaden bullets the steadfast
surprised stare that you or any one
else should venture to ask such ques-
tions as shall require reply of any kind,
the pertinacious coldness, the carefully
averted glance, the steady gloom, the
hand withheld the smile unreturned,
and the hardly muttered acknowledge