The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1889-07-28
INTERsECTIONAL MISTAKES OF JUDGMENT.

INTERSECTIONAL MISTAKES OF JUDGMENT.
AS this is an off year in politics, an in
cident of the recent meeting of the Ma
tional Educational Association at Nash
vile, Tenn, may be canvassed in
spirit Of fairness and candOr by those
who dwell on either side of Mason and
Dixon's line, and with profitable results.
1t is well understood by those who have
given the matter any serious cOnsidera-
ton that the average Southern estimate
of the Northern man and the average
Northern estimate of the Southern man
are as widely different from the real
man of either section as the stage
Yankee or stage Irishman differs from
the real Yankee or real Irishman. The
Northern man is, in the South, popularity
supposed to be a sharp, SNUG, mercenary
fellow, INSCRIPTIONS and overreach-
ing in trade, whose mind and energies
are wholly engrossed in money-making
and the saving of cents, and who has
little or no sense of honor, or a sort of
honor only that has market value, its
hurts being salved with shilling, or
helped, as Tennyson puts it, by the
jingling of the guinea. The Southern
man is. generally regarded in the North
as hot-tempered, reckless sort of be-
ing, bearded like the pard and swear
ing strange, soldierly oaths, without an
+ in his alphabet, staggering about his
"hOnah" and stalking his life upon
fancied affronts TO it, batting negroes
for his pastime, barbarian in his in
stincts and impulses, and survival of
medi9valism in our industrial age.
Even when he reads, which he is sup
posed to do rarely, it is some story of
chivalry by old Sir Walter that receives
his attention instead OF abstruse specu-
latiOns about what nobody knows any
thing, by Herbert Spencer, or the SUBJ
limated 8stheticism of John Ruskin,
which are, of course, infinitely more
modern; and, in the lighter and more in
nocent forms of his play, he betrays a
preference for the joust and tourna-
ment over lawn-tennis and baseball.
A Kansas lady, with all the prepOs-
sessions of her section of the country
about the South and its people, went
over to the teachers meeting at Nash
| vile, and as soon as she had shaken off
and wrote her impressions of it and sent
them to another Kansas lady who had
remained at home. Of course the writer
wrote out the impressions she had
brought with her about Southern ignOr-
ance and barbayism, and these accorded
| 80 perfectly with the impressions of the
| recipient of the letter that she naturally
| considered them very real and life like,
| and kindly gave the letter to Kansas
newspaper, whose readers, having never
| been in the South in the course of their
lives, loudly applauded it's great truth
| fulness as soon as it was presented for
| their perusal. Meanwhile the fair writer
| had been received in numerous Southern
homes, she had tasted their hospitality
and civility, the refinement of feeling
| and the subtle charm and finished grace
| of manner that characterize the social
| intercourse of leisured class in an old
| and somewhat aristOcratic community,
which are a heritage from the ante
bellum days, and are not even surpassed
| in Kansas. In the midst of it all the
Nashville newspapers furnished her with
an evidence of their being in perfect
harmony with the most advanced journ-
alistic methods by copying her letter
| from the Kansas newspaper and scatter
| ing it broadcast over their city with that
"ghoulish glee" which the late Mr.. Cleve-
land declared to be the most truly mod
ern spirit of the press. There were, of
course, tears and penitence, and apollo
gies and regret on the one hand, and
| virtuous indignation on the other;
and good deal of amusement
withal, for those whose withers
were unwrung. But the incident, pain
full as it certainly was to all who were
Immediately concerned in it, is edifying,
and, if rightly considered, might have a
wholesome influence. So long as the
stock notions and traditions which exist
in one part of the country about those
who dwell in another part of it are
lightly accepted as the truth, without
investigation or knowledge of the facts
people are apt to make just such blum
ders. Even when finally confronted
with the facts they are SO blinded with
prejudice as to be unable to scrutinize
them fairly, or, in the phrase of Matthew
Arnold, to see things as they really are
The Western man goes eastward, OIL
the Eastern man comes westward, and, on
the most superficial examination of the
country and people, solemnly prOnOunces
them Just what he expected to find them.
The note of provinciality is discerned
in all his judgments because he is una
BILE to divest himself of the stock notions
and traditions amongst which he has
grown up, and which have effected q
permanent Judgment in his mind and
impaired his faculty for impartial OBJ
servation. Often they produce in him q
sort of hauteur which keeps him alOof
from the sympathies and feelings of a
community, some participation in which
is as helpful to a proper understanding
and lust appreciation of it as any exer-