Daily Yellowstone journal., 1890-01-31
PITAl
Decline of tho Old Fashioned Virtue.
Reasons for the Change.

There is something more than the
talk Of the traditional grumbler in the
charge thai the old fashioned virtue
of hospitality is on the decline. Where
in the days of our fathers or grand.
fathers IL was not unusual for people
To have their houses literally over,
flowing with guests, it is o hard TO
find anybody who ever thinks Of en-.
tertaining more than n Or at the
most two ut a time, and it has become
the exception rather than the rule
that il used TO he for anybody outside
Of a country house in summer TO have
guests at all. The succession of coun.
try cousins who were once almost as
regular visitors to all well regulated
city dwellings as the tax collector and
the gas man, are seen no more forever,
and the modern housewife would as
soon think of opening a boarding
house at once as Of having her home
no overrun as it was in the days of her
grandmother.
The reasons for this change are nu.
merous. In the first place, the in
creased facilities for travelling Of mod
ern times has made it so easy for visit.
ors to come to town that il the doors
swung as Hospitality open as of old it
is feared that the rightful owners of
any given domicile would be in serious
danger Of being crowded out of their
own premises. There is, moreover,
the increased expense of living and
the complex requirements of modern
society, which renders it impossible to
keep up the old fashioned customs,
with imminent danger of finding any
ordinary income and any ordinary
strength h~opelessly overtaxed. Mod
ern housekeeping, it is TO be added. is
SO much more elaborate than that
which obtained in the olden days that
it cannot allow the interruptions and
upsettings which formerly made no
great difference. The housckecper of
today is at the head of too intricate a
machine To see with any patience the
arrival Of guests which throw out Of
gear the whole mechanism. We are
more selfish than Of old, and we are
forced To be If we hope to keep up at
all to the requirements OF society. We
are asked 10 be able to do 50 much that
the country cousins, the poor rela-
tives, the strangers Of all sorts, must
be attended To in some other way than
that Of having the house doors opened
TO them.
The sense of individuality which
has been developed SO greatly within
the last century has undoubtedly
much TO do with the present state of
things. II is recognized that a mans
house must be his castle mentally as
as well rs physically if he is 10 pre-
serve his individuality from the im.
portunities of the unsympathetic, the
vexing, the vulgar and the idle. II
may be a sublimated form of selfish.
ness, but it is one Of the things which
the age demands, and to what the age
demands it is pretty hard not To accede.
Nor is the result wholly without its
good side. People arc certainly more
interesting who do defend their indi.
viduality, and develop their personal
ity, and in the stress of our over ner-
vous time and climate it would be
practically impossible TO meet the re-
quirements which stand ready to meet
men and women the moment they
step over their own threshold. did they
not make that threshold a bar TO the
claims of the outside world as far as
possible.
The danger perhaps lies in the d.
rection Of the home life's becoming
stagnant, and the sanctuary's becom-
ing a mere resting place. There is,
too. in the exercise Of personal hospi-
tality a fine broadening Of the char
acter which is to be come at in no
other way SO surely. The chance of
entertaining angels unawarcs is SO
much diminished by modern fashions
that there is room for fearing that we
shall all too soon forget how it might
seem TO entertain the heavenly visi-
tants at all. OF course each must
in this as i'm other matters draw the
line for himself, but out Of regard for
himself and for his own character it
will be well if he draw it a great deal
nearer the old fashioned idea than is
generally done in these days. Boston
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