The New Orleans daily Democrat. [volume] (New Orleans, La.) 1877-1880, 1878-07-14
THE MAN OF THF SOUTHWEST.
Edward King In the Boston Journal

Edward King In the Boston Iournall
When he is q real American, with no
adulterated blood in his veins-with no
tinge OF Latin ancestry-he is wonder.
Something Of the vastness OF the prai-
ries, and the richness Of the Southern
vegetation seems to have crept into his
nature. He is energetic, earnest, and
convinced that civilization is q good
thing, but he allows himself to be tram
meled less than any other being in the
wide world. Even facts are too hard
and unyielding for him; he prefers now
and then to go around them, rather than
to jostle against them. Witness the
charming pride with which he will point
out to a stranger some rising town.
and the frank and winning manner in
which he will announce, "Well, we
have from $4,000 to 10000 people here"
The real figure Is probably 10000, but
our Southwesterner Is impatient Of
restraint He prefers to take the
future rather than the present, by the
forelock. That which is to be seems to
him already accomplished. The earn
ings OF new railway for a month are
computed by him ON the basis which
they will have assumed when there are
fiourishing villages all along the line.
He adores his State, and is firmly con-
Vinced that she will become the leading
community in the Southwest. He pos
sesses in his vocabulary strange and
uncouth collection Of nicknames, which
he delights to bestow upon the inhabi
tants of neighboring States not in a
malicious spirit, but in humorous vein,
gently rallying them on their marked
inferiority to him and his fellows. For
one who takes so much interest in the
growth Of great enterprises, he is singu-
larly attached to locality. He thinks
the village or city In which he has fixed
his destiny the most desirable place in
the world to live, and will give you an
hundred reasons for his belief. Nowhere
is the water sweeter, the air more whole
.some-nowhere Is there such scenery.
Besides, most Southwesterners are con-
WINGED that the especial towns in which
thew live-even il those towns have
scarcely struggled out of the forest
are certain to become commercial CEN
tres. They live for years upon hopes
doomed never to be fulfilled, and some
times their disappointment is so bitter
that they feel inclined to criticise the
general government for their own lack
OF judgment. In fact, they are never
happier than when criticising the gov
eminent for anything whatsoever.
They have in their secret souls a mild
disdain for the cautious East, which, to
their thinking, bows too much before
the frigid conservatism OF Europe.
They fail to see why they should be
bound by all the small regulations Of
the commercial world, when it comes
to matters of State and national tinan-
cial legislation. The same man who
is scrupulously and uniformly honest in
his dealings with his neighbors, seems
to lose his sense Of fairness when credi-
tors who are thousands of miles away
across great oceans are concerned. He
groans under burdens which they i'm
pose. He INDUCES in long speeches, he
writes and prints pamphlets, he floods
the newspapers Of his locality with his
views on the subject.
The Southwestern man is usually
large In stature, sinewy yet spare Of
frame, and nature has favored him with
manly and graceful bearing. There is
freedom in his walk and picturesque
ness In his speech which make him
marked man the moment he ventures
out of his own section. Perhaps only
generation ago he migrated from New
England or Northern New York to
Texas, or Arkansas, or Missouri, but
the ichor in his blood seems to have
been changed in that time; he is new
man. Even his methods Of thought are
different. The transformation has been
SO gradual that he does not know of it
himself until he perchance comes back
among the people in whose midst he
was born. Then he discovers, to his
establishment, that he has few things in
common with them. Thot which chief
ly surprises him is that, for them, the
country seems to stop at the boundary
of their little commonwealth he finds
this small, "picayunish. He does not
remember that he is guilty Of exactly
the same fault-if fault it be-himself.
For him, the country stops at his Ar
kansas or Missouri border, and be rare
ly thinks of the sky to which the Sierras
Lift their peaks, or the valleys through
which the Oregon rolls its flood.
The man Of the Southwest possessed
many Of the good and few Of the bad
traits OF the Southern character. The
energy OF the West is always at hand to
correct his nature when it seems liable
to suceumb to the Incidence of the
South. He abhors the listlessness
which allows property to go to decay,
fences to rot, and lands to become ex-
hausted simply because the owner is
too lazy to arrest the downward pro-
gress. After the war had passed he
sprang into an abnormal activity, for
the purpose of repairing the ravages
which had occurred in the disastrous
years.
The Southwest is always receiving
strong and vigorous current of energy
Hom the Northwest. This is one Of the