234

IDENTIFYING ONE'S SELF

The American Aversion of Uniforms Is Unwittingly Disregarded in Many Cases.

Mrs. Peattie Writes of Unions and Art- The Musical Union of Omaha and the Albert Concert.

Are you glad that you are what you are? Richard Harding Davis, in his charming series of letters entitled "Our English Cousins," says: "In America, we hate uniforms because they have been twisted into meaning badges of servitude; we will our coachmen shave their mustaches. This tends to make every class of citizens look more or less alike. But in London, you can always tell a bus driver from the driver of a four-wheeler, whether he is on his box or not. The Englishman recognizes that, if he is in a certain social grade, he is likely to remain there, and so, instead of trying to dress like someone else, in a class to which he will never reach, he 'makes up' for the part in life he is meant to play, and the 'bus driver buys a high white hat, and the barmaid is content to wear a turn-down collar man would as soon think of wearing a false nose as a mustache. He accepts his position and is proud of it, and the butcher's boy sits up in his cart just as smartly, and squares his elbows, and straightens his legs and balances his whip with as much pride as any driver of the mall cart in the park.

"All this helps to give any man you meet individually. The Hanson cab driver is not ashamed of being an abandon cab driver, not is he thinking of the day when he will be a boss contractor and tear up the streets over which he crawls, looking for a fare, and so he buys artificial flowers for himself and his horse, and soaps his rubber mat, and sits up straight and business-like, and if you put him into livery, you would not have to teach him how to look well in it. He does not, [word] our drivers, hang one leg over the edge of the seat, or drive with one leg across the other, and leaning forward with his whip. The fact that you are just as good as the next man, as the constitution says you are, does not absolve you from performing the very humble work your chance to be doing, in spite of the constitution, in a slovenly spirit."

This presents a problem that all of us must have considered at one time. The constitution has, indeed, assured us equal rights, but it could not, nor could any human agency make us equals. What folly to suppose that you are equal of Emerson, or that I am the equal of Edison! How thoughtless and egotistical must the person be who will for a moment presume to say we are all on a plane! And, when one comes to think of it, would it not be very dull if we were all on a plane? It is not a pleasure to indulge in hero worship? Are you not proud and glad to look up to a great man or woman, and to feel his or her life acting as an inspiration to youth? Of course, a lady or gentleman never looks down on anyone. That remains for those to do who are uncertain of their position. The person of generous nature and of good breeding feels pity, admiration, appreciation, or regret those beneath him, but never, by any chance "looks down" upon him. It is, for one thing, not worthwhile. And secondly, the student of human nature learns how all humans have their use, no matter of what curious species they may be.

I have always thought that work in America would be dose a great deal better if each of us would identify ourselves with some form of work, and be proud of it, instead of feeling a constant uncertainty and discontent, and as if we might be seustore or millionaires tomorrow.

I believe in the religion of discontent, when content is out of keeping with human liberty. But there is really nothing inconsistent with perfect liberty in any honest occupation for which there is a demand, and which one does with pride and pleasure. It goes without saying that every man who performs his work unwillingly is a slave. For him, there is no liberty. But the man who possesses his unconquerable soul is just as happy at a clerk's desk as he would be if he were the proprietor of the concern for which he works.

A milliner said to me the other day: "I have always been ashamed of the fact that I was a milliner. I would so much rather have been something else."

She need never have looked at things that way. To begin with, she makes exquisite hats. She is an artist in her way. And when you come to think of it, what art is more truly feminine and graceful than that of making dainty headgear for women-crowning with beauty the most beautiful thing in the world a woman's head. What if some milliners do bear a reputation not without reproach? Is that anything against the milliners whose lives are good and pure?

It is ridiculously [word] to say that anything that is worth doing at all worth doing well. But Americans seem almost to have overlooked that. They are content to do small things poorly, while they dream of the opportunity for doing large things well. ANd to most that large opportunity does not come. Truth to tell would not one be much better fitted to occupy an important and conspicuous position, if he had lived up to the very best opportunities of an obscure an unimportant one?

It is possible to decorate life and make it beautiful anywhere, under all honest circumstances.

I once knew a beautiful young woman, the wife of a dry goods merchant, who, finding that her husband was not succeeding very well in business, owing to innate qualities which made him unpopular, left her home through the day and went into his store as chief clerk. Her training had been most careful. She belonged to an aristocratic eastern family. She had traveled much, was well educated, and had elegant and modest manners. The result was what she imagined it would be. [word] simple, cordial, fine loaners, her taste, he interest in all sorts and conditions, her bright, indefinable charm, made the little store a sort of salon. And to go to it was one of the features of the town. I am proud to say that the beautiful young woman did not lose the place in society which she had previously occupied, and that, if anything, it became more secure. In short, she made a success. And success in anything wins a sort of respect. I read somewhere the other day of a woman who loved celebrities and would have gone to dinner on the arm of the best crossing sweeper in London if she could not have found any other celebrity at hand. Success does pay, and it depends largely on being thoroughly enamored with the work in which one is engaged and identifying one's self with it, instead of being ashamed of it.

It is noticeable too, that if one is ashamed of his occupation that others also will apologize for it, and one is liable to overhear one's dearest friend saying;

"She's a little dressmaker, you know, but she's real nice for all that."

I don't know what form of the out direct would be best calculated to punish a friend who would apologize for one's mode of earning a living. But then, if one were tremendously proud of making dresses, and succeeded in making the most artistic gowns in town, and impressing an individuality on all of them, it would be very different-very different, indeed!

Even in democratic western life a dressmaker could not, of course hope to get into "society," But then, that would be as much society's loss, perhaps, as the dressmaker's and, fortunately, the dressmaker, or the milliner, or the clerk, knows where to find charming friends, and no end of happiness just as much as if she stood around among swarms of excited and weary women the folly that brought her there and the inhospitality that took away all the chairs.

One of the advantages of being a milliner or a dressmaker would be. I should think, that one would not be likely to go anywhere that there were not chairs in which to sit.

There is just one thing about which if quarrel with some milliners and dressmakers, and that is that they do not permit themselves a place in which to luxuriate in the atmosphere of a home, entirely apart from their work. The dressmaker's front room is apt to be her "trying-on-room," and at night still shows signs of labors that have gone on there during the day; or the milliner sleeps back of her shop, and has no place which stands for rest and forgetfulness of work, it seems to me that whatever my labor. I would try to have at least one room which should bear no trace of it, and where one could sit in the evenings, and be purely a comfortable human being, reading by the fire and study lamp, in a gown that did not in any way suggest labor, and with such refinements at band as one could command. Almost anyone can do this who can do anything independent at all. And it is a part of the decoration of life of which divorcement from all thought of toll one can return to one's muttons-or bonnet frames- in the morning, without a sing of regret.

Really, let us not be ashamed of what we are. On the contrary, let us make much of it. Let us not be afraid to be spoken of as working women. Let us only dread to be thought of as idle women. And let us put the best of our brains, and personalities, and hopes into our work, whatever it may be. And when we have succeeded we will be respected, no doubt about that.

Various little episodes have, of late, brought into prominence the existence in this city of a musical union-that is to say, a union of players on musical instruments. Of course, everyone has long known of the existence of such an organization. But recent occurrences which have shown the union in the light of an organized discourager of good music has once more called attention to this anomaly. I say anomaly because I feel that any leveling organization in the art cannot but be utterly out of keeping with the spirit of art.

A union, I take it, is an organization formed for the purpose of keeping up a standard of wages, and of securing for all members equal opportunities and equal pay. Even in the trades it is doubtful if such an arrangement is ever perfectly just,a nd those who have belonged longest to the trades unions, and has the most experience with them, will be the first to uphold me in this.

But to have a union in art is absurd as it would be for a company of disembodied souls, seeking judgement before the throne of God, to band together for an equal giving out of rewards and punishments in spite of their individual deserts. To chain art down to a standard of common work and wage may be looked upon as the veritable raps of the Heavingly Maid, and I marvel that any person calling himself a musician could for a moment consent to such a thing.

Art is the most intense medium of individualism. An artist is nothing if not distinctive, singular, isolated and peculiar. He is an eagle, and flies alone, and cannot in the nature of things, "flock" like a common blackbird. All advancement in art is discouraged by the conditions of a union. A dull mediocrity must be the inevitable result of working in such a manner, and no artist could expect to be developed under such restrictions, or, if he were, he would have no chance to do anything, save by severing his connection with the union.

It is the same in any form of art.

How absurd, for example, to have a union of painters! Why the man who could draw a dog's head would be placed on equal footing with the man whose pictures were the result of the subtlest genius and years of sacrificial work!

At one time there was some talk in this city among the newspaper reporters of joining the 'Lypographicial union-or at least a branch of it devoted to practical journalists. It was to set a scale of wages, to lay down rules as to what one should or should not do, and to form an organization by which editors might be held in check if they showed a disposition to discharge a man they did not want, or exercised any other prerogative of a free citizen. The idea that the callow youth who came on the paper yesterday, and who would serve but the briefest apprenticeship, and who did not know news from turnips, nor literary style from a sewing machine, who was unconscious that journalism contained moral responsibilities, or that it had its magnificent task to perform daily-the idea that he was too preposterous! So was the idea preposterous that we were all to strike if the proprietor concluded that he did not want one of our numbers and id not choose to tell the reason why? It was also preposterous that we were to insist upon a working number of hours. The newspaper man's work is done only when there is no more work to do, and every newspaperman who is worth anything knows it. We all felt that the profession would be degraded by putting it among the list of mechanical occupations. I believe, incidentally, that the Typographical union voted not to admit us anyway, but that was what was to be expected. A compositor always looks with fixed pity and smothered contempt upon a man who merely writes. He is regarded as a slave to provide the compositor with copy-and so perhaps he is. But then one ought to be willing to stop a hole to keep the wind away.

I should think wages would be a secondary consideration to a musician. And it is difficult to understand how one would have the impertinences to ask a man of fine talent to live down to the restrictions set for commoner musicians, or how one would be willing to play on equal conditions with a very poor musician.

I should say that the wings of art had been deliberately clipped and that fetters had been put on her feet. A union may be a good place for a man with the bones between his fingers, but one who has any ambition in his soul, or genius in his cranium, I should think the union would have much the same effect that a brick would if bound on the head of a baby.

Is seems to me that art will reach its limitations soon enough without any assistance from man. ELLA W. PEATTIE.

MARCHIONESS OF ZETLAND,

The Beautiful Wife of a Former Viceroy of Ireland.

The marchioness of Zetland belongs to the noble house of Lumley, a family noted for handsome men and beautiful women. Her husband is the head of the illustrious Scotch house of Dundas, whose members have played such a conspicuous part in English and scotch history. He received his title of marquis as a reward for the services which he rendered as viceroy of Ireland during the last Salisbury administration, having been appointed lord lieutenant on the resignation of Lord Londonderry. His predecessor in the Zetland peerage was famous as the grandmaster of English Freemasons an office which is now held by the Prince of Wales. Lady Zetland has several grown-up children, one of her daughters, Lady Hilda, having married Lord Southampton during her father's viceroyalty at Dublin, Lady Zetland is a later of the present earl of Scarborough, who is able to trace his ancestry in an unbroken line back to the days of Edward the Confessor-that is to say, prior to the Norman conquest. Lord and Lady Zetland are very rich and hospitable, and consequently popular, and there are few more charming hostesses than the marelioness.

IDENTIFYING ONE'S SELF

The American Aversion of Uniforms Is Unwittingly Disregarded in Many Cases.

Mrs. Peattie Writes of Unions and Art- The Musical Union of Omaha and the Albert Concert.

Are you glad that you are what you are? Richard Harding Davis, in his charming series of letters entitled "Our English Cousins," says: "In America, we hate uniforms because they have been twisted into meaning badges of servitude; we will our coachmen shave their mustaches. This tends to make every class of citizens look more or less alike. But in London, you can always tell a bus driver from the driver of a four-wheeler, whether he is on his box or not. The Englishman recognizes that, if he is in a certain social grade, he is likely to remain there, and so, instead of trying to dress like someone else, in a class to which he will never reach, he 'makes up' for the part in life he is meant to play, and the 'bus driver buys a high white hat, and the barmaid is content to wear a turn-down collar man would as soon think of wearing a false nose as a mustache. He accepts his position and is proud of it, and the butcher's boy sits up in his cart just as smartly, and squares his elbows, and straightens his legs and balances his whip with as much pride as any driver of the mall cart in the park.

"All this helps to give any man you meet individually. The Hanson cab driver is not ashamed of being an abandon cab driver, not is he thinking of the day when he will be a boss contractor and tear up the streets over which he crawls, looking for a fare, and so he buys artificial flowers for himself and his horse, and soaps his rubber mat, and sits up straight and business-like, and if you put him into livery, you would not have to teach him how to look well in it. He does not, [word] our drivers, hang one leg over the edge of the seat, or drive with one leg across the other, and leaning forward with his whip. The fact that you are just as good as the next man, as the constitution says you are, does not absolve you from performing the very humble work your chance to be doing, in spite of the constitution, in a slovenly spirit."

This presents a problem that all of us must have considered at one time. The constitution has, indeed, assured us equal rights, but it could not, nor could any human agency make us equals. What folly to suppose that you are equal of Emerson, or that I am the equal of Edison! How thoughtless and egotistical must the person be who will for a moment presume to say we are all on a plane! And, when one comes to think of it, would it not be very dull if we were all on a plane? It is not a pleasure to indulge in hero worship? Are you not proud and glad to look up to a great man or woman, and to feel his or her life acting as an inspiration to youth? Of course, a lady or gentleman never looks down on anyone. That remains for those to do who are uncertain of their position. The person of generous nature and of good breeding feels pity, admiration, appreciation, or regret those beneath him, but never, by any chance "looks down" upon him. It is, for one thing, not worthwhile. And secondly, the student of human nature learns how all humans have their use, no matter of what curious species they may be.

I have always thought that work in America would be dose a great deal better if each of us would identify ourselves with some form of work, and be proud of it, instead of feeling a constant uncertainty and discontent, and as if we might be seustore or millionaires tomorrow.

I believe in the religion of discontent, when content is out of keeping with human liberty. But there is really nothing inconsistent with perfect liberty in any honest occupation for which there is a demand, and which one does with pride and pleasure. It goes without saying that every man who performs his work unwillingly is a slave. For him, there is no liberty. But the man who possesses his unconquerable soul is just as happy at a clerk's desk as he would be if he were the proprietor of the concern for which he works.

A milliner said to me the other day: "I have always been ashamed of the fact that I was a milliner. I would so much rather have been something else."

She need never have looked at things that way. To begin with, she makes exquisite hats. She is an artist in her way. And when you come to think of it, what art is more truly feminine and graceful than that of making dainty headgear for women-crowning with beauty the most beautiful thing in the world a woman's head. What if some milliners do bear a reputation not without reproach? Is that anything against the milliners whose lives are good and pure?

It is ridiculously [word] to say that anything that is worth doing at all worth doing well. But Americans seem almost to have overlooked that. They are content to do small things poorly, while they dream of the opportunity for doing large things well. ANd to most that large opportunity does not come. Truth to tell would not one be much better fitted to occupy an important and conspicuous position, if he had lived up to the very best opportunities of an obscure an unimportant one?

It is possible to decorate life and make it beautiful anywhere, under all honest circumstances.

I once knew a beautiful young woman, the wife of a dry goods merchant, who, finding that her husband was not succeeding very well in business, owing to innate qualities which made him unpopular, left her home through the day and went into his store as chief clerk. Her training had been most careful. She belonged to an aristocratic eastern family. She had traveled much, was well educated, and had elegant and modest manners. The result was what she imagined it would be. [word] simple, cordial, fine loaners, her taste, he interest in all sorts and conditions, her bright, indefinable charm, made the little store a sort of salon. And to go to it was one of the features of the town. I am proud to say that the beautiful young woman did not lose the place in society which she had previously occupied, and that, if anything, it became more secure. In short, she made a success. And success in anything wins a sort of respect. I read somewhere the other day of a woman who loved celebrities and would have gone to dinner on the arm of the best crossing sweeper in London if she could not have found any other celebrity at hand. Success does pay, and it depends largely on being thoroughly enamored with the work in which one is engaged and identifying one's self with it, instead of being ashamed of it.

It is noticeable too, that if one is ashamed of his occupation that others also will apologize for it, and one is liable to overhear one's dearest friend saying;

"She's a little dressmaker, you know, but she's real nice for all that."

I don't know what form of the out direct would be best calculated to punish a friend who would apologize for one's mode of earning a living. But then, if one were tremendously proud of making dresses, and succeeded in making the most artistic gowns in town, and impressing an individuality on all of them, it would be very different-very different, indeed!

Even in democratic western life a dressmaker could not, of course hope to get into "society," But then, that would be as much society's loss, perhaps, as the dressmaker's and, fortunately, the dressmaker, or the milliner, or the clerk, knows where to find charming friends, and no end of happiness just as much as if she stood around among swarms of excited and weary women the folly that brought her there and the inhospitality that took away all the chairs.

One of the advantages of being a milliner or a dressmaker would be. I should think, that one would not be likely to go anywhere that there were not chairs in which to sit.

There is just one thing about which if quarrel with some milliners and dressmakers, and that is that they do not permit themselves a place in which to luxuriate in the atmosphere of a home, entirely apart from their work. The dressmaker's front room is apt to be her "trying-on-room," and at night still shows signs of labors that have gone on there during the day; or the milliner sleeps back of her shop, and has no place which stands for rest and forgetfulness of work, it seems to me that whatever my labor. I would try to have at least one room which should bear no trace of it, and where one could sit in the evenings, and be purely a comfortable human being, reading by the fire and study lamp, in a gown that did not in any way suggest labor, and with such refinements at band as one could command. Almost anyone can do this who can do anything independent at all. And it is a part of the decoration of life of which divorcement from all thought of toll one can return to one's muttons-or bonnet frames- in the morning, without a sing of regret.

Really, let us not be ashamed of what we are. On the contrary, let us make much of it. Let us not be afraid to be spoken of as working women. Let us only dread to be thought of as idle women. And let us put the best of our brains, and personalities, and hopes into our work, whatever it may be. And when we have succeeded we will be respected, no doubt about that.

Various little episodes have, of late, brought into prominence the existence in this city of a musical union-that is to say, a union of players on musical instruments. Of course, everyone has long known of the existence of such an organization. But recent occurrences which have shown the union in the light of an organized discourager of good music has once more called attention to this anomaly. I say anomaly because I feel that any leveling organization in the art cannot but be utterly out of keeping with the spirit of art.

A union, I take it, is an organization formed for the purpose of keeping up a standard of wages, and of securing for all members equal opportunities and equal pay. Even in the trades it is doubtful if such an arrangement is ever perfectly just,a nd those who have belonged longest to the trades unions, and has the most experience with them, will be the first to uphold me in this.

But to have a union in art is absurd as it would be for a company of disembodied souls, seeking judgement before the throne of God, to band together for an equal giving out of rewards and punishments in spite of their individual deserts. To chain art down to a standard of common work and wage may be looked upon as the veritable raps of the Heavingly Maid, and I marvel that any person calling himself a musician could for a moment consent to such a thing.

Art is the most intense medium of individualism. An artist is nothing if not distinctive, singular, isolated and peculiar. He is an eagle, and flies alone, and cannot in the nature of things, "flock" like a common blackbird. All advancement in art is discouraged by the conditions of a union. A dull mediocrity must be the inevitable result of working in such a manner, and no artist could expect to be developed under such restrictions, or, if he were, he would have no chance to do anything, save by severing his connection with the union.

It is the same in any form of art.

How absurd, for example, to have a union of painters! Why the man who could draw a dog's head would be placed on equal footing with the man whose pictures were the result of the subtlest genius and years of sacrificial work!

At one time there was some talk in this city among the newspaper reporters of joining the 'Lypographicial union-or at least a branch of it devoted to practical journalists. It was to set a scale of wages, to lay down rules as to what one should or should not do, and to form an organization by which editors might be held in check if they showed a disposition to discharge a man they did not want, or exercised any other prerogative of a free citizen. The idea that the callow youth who came on the paper yesterday, and who would serve but the briefest apprenticeship, and who did not know news from turnips, nor literary style from a sewing machine, who was unconscious that journalism contained moral responsibilities, or that it had its magnificent task to perform daily-the idea that he was too preposterous! So was the idea preposterous that we were all to strike if the proprietor concluded that he did not want one of our numbers and id not choose to tell the reason why? It was also preposterous that we were to insist upon a working number of hours. The newspaper man's work is done only when there is no more work to do, and every newspaperman who is worth anything knows it. We all felt that the profession would be degraded by putting it among the list of mechanical occupations. I believe, incidentally, that the Typographical union voted not to admit us anyway, but that was what was to be expected. A compositor always looks with fixed pity and smothered contempt upon a man who merely writes. He is regarded as a slave to provide the compositor with copy-and so perhaps he is. But then one ought to be willing to stop a hole to keep the wind away.

I should think wages would be a secondary consideration to a musician. And it is difficult to understand how one would have the impertinences to ask a man of fine talent to live down to the restrictions set for commoner musicians, or how one would be willing to play on equal conditions with a very poor musician.

I should say that the wings of art had been deliberately clipped and that fetters had been put on her feet. A union may be a good place for a man with the bones between his fingers, but one who has any ambition in his soul, or genius in his cranium, I should think the union would have much the same effect that a brick would if bound on the head of a baby.

Is seems to me that art will reach its limitations soon enough without any assistance from man. ELLA W. PEATTIE.

MARCHIONESS OF ZETLAND,

The Beautiful Wife of a Former Viceroy of Ireland.

The marchioness of Zetland belongs to the noble house of Lumley, a family noted for handsome men and beautiful women. Her husband is the head of the illustrious Scotch house of Dundas, whose members have played such a conspicuous part in English and scotch history. He received his title of marquis as a reward for the services which he rendered as viceroy of Ireland during the last Salisbury administration, having been appointed lord lieutenant on the resignation of Lord Londonderry. His predecessor in the Zetland peerage was famous as the grandmaster of English Freemasons an office which is now held by the Prince of Wales. Lady Zetland has several grown-up children, one of her daughters, Lady Hilda, having married Lord Southampton during her father's viceroyalty at Dublin, Lady Zetland is a later of the present earl of Scarborough, who is able to trace his ancestry in an unbroken line back to the days of Edward the Confessor-that is to say, prior to the Norman conquest. Lord and Lady Zetland are very rich and hospitable, and consequently popular, and there are few more charming hostesses than the marelioness.