WHISTLING.

North Otago Times, 5 December 1908, Page 4 (Supplement)

WHISTLING.

ITS MOTIVE,

Whistling is understood everywhere to signify coolness, confidence, carelessness. These may be virtues in their proper place, but that place is not in the' society' of one's fellow creatures, whether one be acquainted with- them or not.. A boy reprimanded, a servant dismissed, goes away whistling, if he .dare. He [wishes to express contempt, and he j succeeds at Jeast in enraging his master generally. A hobbledehoy who commits some breach of the proprieties commonly bursts into a whistle. This is to save his face, meaning no harm ; but it signifies "I don't care!"-which is just the reverse of the apology needed. At best it shows indifference; at worst, as the dullest feel, insult and.provoI cation. .

Bosw'ell tells a little story' illustrating the former significance. Johnson and ho were dining with the Duke of Argyll, who asked a gentleman present to fetch curiosity from another room. He Jjrought the wrong article and the Duke sent him back-the position of this gentleman towards his host is undisclosed. However, Boswell says "he could not refuse; but to avoid any appearance oi servility he whistled as he went out of the room, On my mentioning this afterwards to Dr. Johnson he said it was a nice trait of tharacter. 1 The gentleman desired to show, his independency.' " That is always the motive of whistling, when it has any. You very often see a young barbarian in this country survey his fel-. low-passengers and then fall to whistling deliberately. But cultured persons here, and quite common folk abroad, are trained to regard poiteness towards strangers as a duty. Therefore the condemnation v of whistling is quite intelligible. Many icoples outside Europe share ■ it. Savages think it hateful to the gods; iko the Tongan Islanders in Mariicr's day, or the Australians still, t may be suspected, in this as in jther cases, that they suppress _ a practice offensive to their human instinct by laying it under the ban of Heaven.

All Moslems hate whistling; the inhabitants of the province of Mak'ian in Persia arc said to furnish the necessary exception, and they ■ are abhorred in consequence'. Arabs hold that a whistler's mouth ennnot bo purified under forty toys of penance—many think that a demon has entered it to corrupt ithe Faithful. It is: on. record that Buckhardt fell into the ' most serious peril of'his. expedition l through whistling inadvertently.

In India there is no name for an abomination of'which a right-mind-ed individual could not lie guilty. Chinese think' with Arabs that whistling contaminates not only Urn agent, hut the hearers.—Frederick Boylo, in the "Pall Mall CUizettc."