Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-11-12
THE TOPICAL TALKER.
A Quaint Local Story Tnken to Point a
Sunday School Moral-A Wall From
AIIaRhanH md nm An.runr In II

Sunday School Moral-A Wall From
Allegheny and an Answer TO It.
Perhaps you have heard, and perhaps you
have not the story that Pittsburger tells Of
the immense solace half dozen common pins
brought him while he was confined in the
Western Penitentiary. The man who tells the
story has won very creditable position for
himself in the business world. At the risk Of
retailing a chestnut, I viii tell the tale again.
The prisoner found after he had in prison
some time, that the lack of employment-for
his sentence did not carry hard labor with it
was sapping the strength of his mind. He
looked about him for something to employ his
faculties and consume the weary hours and
his hand happened to light upon some pins in
the lapel of his coat. Then the idea struck
him that if he were to throw the pins upon the
floor of his cell, he might achieve the object
he aimed at by searching for them.
From that day on he was forever throwing the
pins on the floor and looking for them again. 1t
answered his purpose completely, and the lat
ter part of his imprisonment was less terrible
and few infinitely faster than the time before
he invoked the aid of the pins. When he was re-
leased he took the pins to a jeweler and had
them made into a scarf pin, and If mistake
not his wife treasures the quaint little emblem
Of her husbands unhsppiest days to this very
day.
What brought the story to my mind was
little Sunday school leatlet which little Alle-
gheny girl showed me the other day. In it was
the true story, substantially as have given it
above, of the prisoners pins. The only change
of moment is that the Sunday school story
makes the prisoner the victim of tyrannical
king. 1t points a moral nicely for little
lecture on the pleasure of industry.
-
An Allegheny lady writes:
what vulgar self-satisfed kind OF people,
we North Americans are after all! how little
we have improved in true poliTeness, or good
manners, since Dickens wrote his American
notes or sligt tly caricatured us in Martin
Chuzzlewit"- what Senior Pulvano, Of
the All-American delegation, said to the re-
porter at the Exposition on Thursday evening:
Now, please, don't ask me what think of
the country or what think of Pittsburg? I
have been asked my opinion Of the country in
every city, town. borough, village and hamlet
since we left Washington, etc.
'Now. what do people expect the answer to
be in all cases? Would they not be dsap-
pointed, offended, should the polite gentle
man dare to criticise or utter his honest
thoughtH and what exceedingly bad manners
to be always seeking for expressions of praise,
admiration wonder of our greatness with a
big G. These gentlemen must laugh in their
sleeves at us, if they are not disguised, at the
foolish vanity of the people in all the spread
eagle display-all this only look at me-; how
big, how smart, and, by comparison, how slow
the rest of the worldl
olwad some power the giftie gle us,
To see oursel's as ithers see u.s.
I'm spite of our great material progress we
are crude and uncultivated in many things. It
will require years of culture to give US the
alF 0F
the older nations and what we are apt to con-
slider effete civilizations"
PLUMPLY 1 may say that this gentle wall
from Allegheny seems to be pitched in too
piteous a key. Senior Pulvano's reply to the
reporter was natural enough because he had
met so many reporters before that the sched-
uled questions were becoming trife tiresome
to answer. don't blame the noble Senior at
all. Had we been travelling in South America,
and the Teportoreddor of our esteemed cotem1
porary, EE BEddderioso Mericdno had asked
US what we thought of Mexico, we should have
said about what Senior Pulvano said.
By the way, Americans are not the only peo-
pie who are eager to get the views of visiting
strangers as to their land, its people, its
scenery, its resources and its institutions. Not
by large majority. You will find Englishmen
eager, and more SO English women, to extract
your impressions Of the tight little island. The
continental nations are curious to make COM
parisons with you about your several countries
as soon as you are on familiar terms with them
and when you know their language.
That Americans are more eager than the
children of the Old World for criticism may be
true. 1t ought to be true, for a country which
is so new and original has right, and does
well to seek criticism. The experiments of
government, of civilization, of scientific devel-
opment are so vast in this land that we may be
pardoned if we exhibit an anxiety to know
what our neighbors think of them. There is
such thing as not knowing when you have
good thing, and there is another of not letting
the world know when you have it. These are
mistakes to be avoided.