Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1909-02-21
PUBLIC OPINION.
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"Drummer As \ Benedict

w. Hicks Mallory, the well-known cigar salesman, who Is in Pine Bluff calling on his trade, and who is an enthusiastic Arkansas Traveller, con- tributes the following on The Trav- cling Man From Matrimonial View point" which was recently written by him for an Eastern magazine: The time was when the drummer was looked upon az something more than an illusion of love" He was regarded as a ielusion and snare he WAS supposed to train in the same class with the stage door Jonnie-- nay, the masher
 Every mother who bade her daugh- ter an affectionate farewell as she departed for her alma mater used for her parting text, Beware of the drummer, my child!" Every husband who discovered him lurking harmless ly. apparently, around the summer hotel always received a telegram that urgent business was not so urgent, and he remained until the drummer with his merchandise of pink pajamas, shaving mugs and pill boxes saw fit to depart. Even the schoolgirls who spied the drummer passing with his swiftest nag and smile would rush to put their heads together to devise some scheme to withstand his gait. To invite him to your house was to harbor cannibal who eats them raw from fry to old hens.
 Where these primitive ideas were matched the Lord knows
 But your pastor and the janito, declare, gentle reader, that the travel ing man Is necessarily one of mental worth and breeding. No one knows where he earned the sobriquet of airy high flyer It did not originate with MT. and Mrs. Adam. It does not hark back to the Darwinian period or af ter we shed our tails and quit climb ing trees, nor yet does it fit the cave dweller and his coterie.
 All men are not gentlemen, but all gentlemen are real men, and the travelling man is real--his respect for womanhood Is paramount. Mother and sisters are to him sacred posses sions and his wife the one woman. No other calling receives such wide and comprehensive knowledge of men and every branch of business; such constant courtesy. Commerce will al- ways employ the brightest minds money can command The drummer must be Greek in Athens, Hotten- tot in Fjis, good Indian i'll the warm town" and horned frog in Kalamazoo.
 Patient and untiring, he must in- stinctiyely know whether the latest moral horror bright joke, or a life saver in the shape of cherry at the bottom of the glass will pave tue way to an order.
 Charity 10 the tr@eliDS man is q fixed relisjon, Sympathy iu misfor- tune is helpful but there is nathle4l to beat 58e bread in the lardor. fhes Fvbo G849 tasted or the unosteuta- lUc9s and always kindly bounty 9. these af6aa aud bjg hearted men a4a scattered all over this terrestrial globe MI these qualities go to make up the sum total of good husbanj.
 The travelling man has a heart ana likewise d sWeetheart-,t GK and only whom he hopes some day will become his wife His faith in the goodness of womanhood is implicit; therefore he trusts in her. Mutual confidence is the surest bar to ins.ncerity that the gods can invent.
 Perhaps he is married, The wife ! from whom he must be separated for
 weeks, months at a time furnishes the incentive to labor the harder that
 he may quit the road and own his own business and home roost
 Many a Thanksgiving, many 6 Christmas morning the travel ug man gaily wears mask while his heart i is oyerAowing with thoughts of home Many a wedding anniversary must be celebrated far from the dear ones whose happiness is the sum total of earthly endeavor-their love his price less possession Cheerless hotels queer customers, laborious travel by no means comprise all the tribula- tions of the travelling man.