The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1902-01-21
Children'S Column.
THE GENTLEMAN.

ton whether boys are as gentle
manly nov as they used to be in
''the good old times" AS 1 was
coming up the street, the other day,
l saw two nicely dressed young fell
lows, of perhaps fourteen or fifteen.
standing on the corner. A gentle
man passed them who had a slight
limp in his gait. He was neatly but
rather poorly dressed, and had the
air OF a man whom life had used
hardly, but who was bravely breast
ing the wave and making the best of
adverse conditions. He was not a
jaunty, sleek, self Satisfied, we'll
conditioned man, but refined of face
and unobtrusive in manner. The
well-dressed boys eyed him closely
as he passed, aud when he was a few
rods away che of them threw the
pore of the apple he had been eating
so that it struck the gentleman in
the back then he unoonoernedly re
sumed his conversation with his
companion.
That little incident made my blood
boil. Yes, l am not ashamed to con
fess it, boys, it made me downright
mGd-to use a term that we employ
when we care more about being
positive than about being COR
rect or elegant. l would have thor,
oughly enjoyed stepping up to that
insolent vOungster and giving him q
forcible lesson in good manners. But,
unfortunately, the time of life had
passed with me when I could do this
without being considered a maniac,
or being arrested for assault and
battery.
The trouble with the average boy
of to-day, who u 80 be a gen.
tleman, is just this-that his gentle
manliness is apt 80 be only a super
hoial gentility, whose roots are in
the clothes rather than in the heart.
Ii is a kind of tit-fOr tat g~entlemanli
ACKNOWLEDGMENT politeness TO the
w~ell-dressed, Difference TO the able
bodied and fine appearing, courtesy
80 the sleek. Instead of respecting
weakness, it respects only strength.
There IL something meanly agrees
i've about it, that reminds me of the
disposition of q our, holding in his
bark while a man goes along the
street with a firm, steady step, but
bursting out s~pitefully and taunt-
iDgIy, if the man happens TO slip or
trip or stumble. l think 1t was that
gentleman's limp, chiefly, that
brought the apple core flying after
him. The limp was an evidence of
weakness, of misfortune, of inability
80 re~taliate. Is placed the man out
side the boys GLASS of "gentilhoOd, -
as old Chaucer calls it, and therefore
subjected him ID the contempt and
insOlence of the specifically polite.
hope there are not many boys of
the sort I have described and yet l
am afraid that the shallow, preten
tious kind of gentlemanliness is in
creasing, in these modern days, at
the expense of the good, old fash-
toned, sincere, chivalrio kind, that
went clear down into the heart, and
was pitiful and sympathetic and
helpful as we'll as courteous, and
gentle as we'll as graceful. l would
a thousand times rather see a boy
awkward in his manners and noble
in his instincts and feelings, than
polished in manner and selfish and
insolent IN heart. 1 love to see a boy
d~efeTential 80 weakness of any kind,
but l don't care a straw how Obse
uuious he may be in the presence of
strength and superiority. Even
wolves are polite TO lions. That sort
of poIiteness does not count for
much. Be a gentleman at heart, !
say, if you claim TO be a gentleman
at all. Respect the burden, respect
weakness, respect ave inferiority-
respect anything you a help. That
is the Christian notion of a gentle
man and he who conforms to it is
the only one who ought to bear such
a beautiful and suggestive name
James Buckham, in The American
Boy.
HOW he FELT.
A certain chief justice of the Su
-- N,-.G 4, ono tho WaSterY