CONFESSIONS OF A COLONIAL

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLVI, Issue 14223, 20 November 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

CONFESSIONS OF A COLONIAL

ENGLAND AND THE ENGLISH.

■■ No. III..;; \\,-/. BIT GUT H. SCHOLEFIELD. Once upon a time, discussing the negro question, a worldly-wise man , remarked: "It never does to be polite to niggers or Englishmen." That he understood niggers I knew, but I am convinced now that his knowledge of the English was just that modicum which is so often a dangerous thing. Perhaps he knew the English man in the street. Perhaps he had approached the English from colonial standards. Probably, living in hotels as a visitor, he had some experience of Englishmen in menial positions; domestics, hotel-waiters, and so on, towards whom politeness is a treasure not be squandered or too freely used. In the colonies politeness even to menials is the oil which lubricates the wheels of' life. It is expected of everybody, and the servant and porter and waiter—who are paid irrespective of tips—are much more likely to be attentive and civil if they are spoken to with consideration. In England it is quite the reverse. The stranger who speaks politely to servants is at once rewarded with diffidence and inattention. Politeness is essentially a menial quality, meet to be requited with incivility. But there' is more in it than that. The person who, staying only a short time in England, does not come into contact with much more than the man in the street, and the hotel servants, might feel disposed to agree that politeness is a dangerous qualitv to dispense, and only leads to snubs. And he will find plenty of corroboration for this opinion. For surely there never was a people who so habitually mistook spontaneous courtesy . for weakness and acted accordingly. Hundreds of outlanders have complained of the manners of the English. And, candidly, the less said about the surface manners of the people the better. If I possessed more than the due reverence of a colonial my appreciation of the cordial hospitality of the English would forbid me to say many things about the London streets, the architecture, and the ideals that do not exist. But it is an Imperial duty to discuss British manners to the length, at all events, of a chapter. I have often thought that the Englishman takes a pride .in being, rude to strangers, and that is why so many casual visitors write down the English people, in rude letters, as a nation of boors. There is still to me a lively recollection of the shock I received on this score when I 'first made the acquaintance of the English in their own country. I have mixed a good deal in my time with backwoodsmen— to whom the grey shirt, the stockwhip, and riding-breeches are much more apt than dress suit or even a white shirt. And in my first few weeks in England my mind often reverted from many jarring instances of impoliteness and boorishness in the street and the railway car, and the restaurant on the part of well-dressed and apparently well-educated persons, to the rough chivalry and the tender-hearted courtesy of the back blocks. There is no display about the chivalry of the back blocker, just as there is none about the manners of the English gentleman, but the British sense of discipline and order seems to protect the man who remains seated in the ■ tube railway, while elderly ladies stand, and him who walks straight at a woman on the footpath and compels her to ; step off into the roadway. V c 7. The railway carriage is the most fruitful hotbed of British discourtesy to strangers. And it is a silent discourtesy. Nothing is said. It is all done with a look of suspicion, a gesture, a stare. And it is quite cosmopolitan, no respector of persons. Yet. on the other hand, the Englishman is much less militantly rude to his own sex than the colonial. He does not shoulder, elbow, and bump others on the footpath. If he ever bumps it is because he is dreaming, absorbed in thought, and he is always the first to apologise, whether he is to blame or not. The colonial is more exacting. He waits to apportion the blame, and only begs pardon if he decides that it is his place to do so. The Englishman will never thank you for a courtesy, but then the English speak to strangers much more rarely than colonials do. As a matter of fact, the heart and soul of the Englishman's rudeness lies in the fact that he confines it to strangers, to persons who, being unknown, are ipso facto suspect. In the colonies it is rather the reverse— man is considered to be entitled to courtesy until he proves himself otherwise. Nothing, however, could exceed the kindness and consideration of the Englishman for the per son to whom he has been duly introduced. It is so cordial. that a man once enjoying it would feel himself forbidden to refer to the primal rudeness ,of the nation if there were not something far greater than 'mere personal gratification at stake. But how much Little Englandism and separatism within the Empire has been the direct result of boorishness on first acquaintance ! There are thousands of colonials who never get beyond the first acquaintance with their English' cousins. Over and over again one hears Englishmen in the colonies referred to as "stand-offish," overbearing, bad-mannered, and insolent. Perhaps ninety per cent, of those who speak thus never get the better opportunity of judging of the Englishman in his other aspect as a kind, generous, hospitable man, and a gentleman and a sport to boot. It is no use mincing matters where there is something larger than a personal interest at stake. English manners were a, real and concrete factor in, the separation of the American colonies. They were again a real and concrete factor in that unsympathetic feeling between the colonies and the Mother Country which the Boer war happily arrested and turned to good account. .* In the matter of chivalry to the opposite sex and to elders I do not think the English boys can compare with their colonial cousins. . They are too introspective and unobservant to be polite, and they often end in acting with habitual selfishness.

The relations between the sexes in England make an interesting study for the de--mocratic colonial. The whole thing is so entirely different from what he has been accustomed to. In the colonies the part that women have played in the actual pioneering work entitles them to a measure of consideration which may be equally, though riot apparently, their due here. There it was recognised, almost before the women themselves asked for it, by the extension of the franchise, which has placed the sexes on a political equality.

In England the position is not nearly so frankly recognised,' quite apart from the political aspect. One too often sees men keeping the footpath while ladies step off into the street to make way for them; men and boys enjoying seats in the tubes railway cars and while ladies of all ages hang on by the straps. In Australia and New Zealand the lot of the working girl—the barmaid, the typist, the shop-assistant, the waitress, and the domesticis made bright for her by the respect in which she is held by the opposite sex. It is quite a common practice for men in the colonies to raise their hats to the barmaid on leaving. In fact, if she is a superior girl, as many are, her bar has frequently the air of a mild humble salon. The lives of many working girls are made bright by the courtesies and little attentions of the opposite sex. How different in England ! Scarcely a ray of light is thus imported into the life of the English working girl. There is; no consideration and courtesy from the opposite sex to make the grinding" hardness of their life; more pleasant. Girls of the classes I have referred to are regarded simply as pariahs. and sometimes worse. In ordinary affairs of life there does not seem to be nearly such a frank understanding between .the sexes as in the colonie*