SPARE HALF-HOURS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1601, 29 July 1882, Page 26

SPARE HALF-HOURS.

By Henry Lapham.

FOBOE OP HABIT.

In that most pleasant and humorous little story of ' Cranford '—the pleasantest, I sometimes, tbink, of all Mrs Gaskill's books— the authoress has told us, in her own charming fashion, of poor Miss Matty's ' pet meanness ' in the matter of saving all the half-burnt candles, and further acknowledges that sho herself cherishes a favourite weakness, and very few people can, I think, declare themselves clear altogether from such an imputation. We all of us have our ' pet meanness '— our particular something which we are vexed to see destroyed or wasted. With one person it may be a passion for picking up pins (please excuse the alliteration ; it was quite uninten tional). Another has an intense passion for string, and will become quite nervous if he sees you attempt to cut a piece ; will fumble and grope over difficult knots, quite satisfied if after half an hour's endeavour he can get off the cord intact ; then folds it up neatly, and pats it safe away in his pocket., With many good housewives this simple mania takes the form of a desire to see no scraps of butter left upon one's plate. They will beg, nay, insist almost upon your taking just another bit of 1 bread, and as a rule you do ; but, rather than the butter should go to waste, ,they will call in boy Johnny, the omnivorous child wtiijh belongs to every family, and oblige him to finish the morsel, though as a rule Master Johnny has already overeaten himself, and this ' last straw' will certainly induce a fit of indigestion. Never mind— their ' pet meanness ' is satisfied. My own peculiar failing is an utter inability to destroy a piece of paper that has been written upon. I confess to having treasured up tha most absurd scraps of paper of no earthly value to myself or anyone else, but other documents much more' intrinsically important I have destroyed without the least misgiving. I might have saved — well, never mind bow much, could I but have produced a, certain receipt a short time ago, but not a trace of it was forthcoming ; but I have possessed for the last ten years a copy of the Lord's Prayer written in Maori, which I never have been able to read, and never expect to. However, the best and wisest men have had their failings. You recollect that Dr Samuel Johnson could not walk down Fleet street without • placing his hand upon every post in the way. And I fancy that Oliver Goldsmith's habit of , 'drawing .the long bow' was just merely a habit which had taken too great a hold upon him to be Bhaken off. If you will but consider > the matter, what a wonderful and terrible thing is the force of habit ! A little pebble will turn the course of a brook, a small ,lump of earth make the seedling' grow' awry, and a habit unwittingly acquired in childhood may alter the whole course of a man's life. For this reason it would be a true kindness in parents to watch their children , closely, . and endeavour to uproot such.habits as may prove dangerous, and instil others that shall be useful and strengthening; for, if we will ' but look at it in a proper way, we are all sufferers or gainers from our habits, bad or good. You recollect Southey's story of the man who always put on his spectacles before he ate his cherries, that they might appear twice their natural size. It would be well for each of us if we were to view our pleasures through magnifying glasses, and so make the most of them. ' It would be easy, if one only made a habit of ; it, to derive at least three times the usual amount of enjoyment— first, by a prospective view ; second, by the actual pleasure ; and, thirdly, by a retrospective glance. Very few people, however, think such a plan wprtnwhile, because to some few fortunate persona pleasures and amusements are so easily to be obtained that they are taken as a matter of course ; to the majority of mankind, however,, because play and mirth seem to be somehow forbidden things, only to be partaken of sub rosa, and not too much said about it. Such exceptions cannot apply to the habit of cultivating a cheerful spirit. All philosophers, from Solomon to Addison — all the poets, from Horace to Longfellow — have borne testimony to the value of that buoyant spirit which, in spite of cares and sorrow, can keep

A light heart stiil breaking into song. It is years since I have read ' The Old Curiosity Shop ' (more shame for me !), but is it not the Marchioness who contrives, by ' making believe very much,' to fancy that the toastwater is wine ? At any rate, we all have some nauseous draughts, and it would be well if we exerted our powers of ' make believe ' to sweeten them. Not all of us can hope to rival Mark Tapley as philosophers ; but when troubles press and cares assail, we may all endeavour to imitate that immortal hero, and exclaim, ' Floored, but jolly ! ' Then, too, what a much more pleasant person to live with is the happy, cheerful woman or man, and how enviable' is that temperament which can see the silver lining to every cloud, and turn even adversity into a fresh cause of joy ? Closely allied to this habit of cheerfulness is the habit of content— of making the best of things, of looking back only to compare the disadvantages of the past with the solid advantages of the present. Unfortunately this excellent system is usually reversed by those to whom it would be most beneficial — viz., to those who are compelled, by poverty or other uncontrollable circumstances, to seek new homes far from their fatherland. I dislike much the expression ' New chum,' when used as a term of contempt. New chums can teach us Colonials many useful lessons, such as thrift, sobriety, carefulness of machines, improved methods of labour, neatness and thoroughness in work, and for all such lessons there is ample room and too many who ought to be willing learners. At the same time, new chums, as a rule, are discontented. The labouring classes, at any rate, are infinitely better off here than ever they were in the Old Country. They have easier work, kinder and more considerate employers, are far better paid and with shorter hours, are better clothed, better lodged, better fed, but not better taught. Even in the midst of this Land of Canaan — a land, at any rate, in which any man who is sober, persevering, and economical may in a few years hope to sit beneath his own vine and fig-tree, an ambition utterly beyond his reach in the overstocked Home Countryeven here the immigrant will sigli for the fleshpots of Egypt, and be ready even to regret the making of bricks without straw. Of course there are disadvantages inseparable from an new countries, and one could pardon a person who has been accustomed to the refinements and luxuries so easily procured in the Untisft Islands, but which are comparatively hard to obtain here, feeling the want of them, and repining a little when obliged to bear the roughness and disadvantages of Colonial society. But the labouring classes have no such hardships to undergo. Not only have they a higher status given them, but there is literally no height to which their children or grandchildren may not hope to climb. The best society may bo entered by anyone who is fairly well edu-

cated and decently well off. Blue blood goes £ or 1 little in the Colonies, but politeness, integrity, and worldly success will enable anyone to take rank as a' gentleman or lady, though his or her grandsire perchance could not sign his own name ; while in the Old Country not twice the money, twice the uprightness, will suffice to 'lift a son of the soil, and one who has no claims to a family tree, into the exclusive ranks of the ' Upper Ten.' English society has its root in the dusty graves of antiquity ; Colonial society is but in its infancy. Then let the labouring man every day bless that happy fate which has transported him to so kindly a region, and let him only look back to oounfc all that he had to endure and suffer, and at least to be content.

The late Mrs Margaret Caudle, wife of Mr Job Caudle, toy merchant, is an excellent representative of the peculiarly feminine habit of ' nagging ' — of being continually discontented, chronically unhappy, always dissatisfied.' ' Unhappy women, however, are of many different' species, and it may be well to examine each kind a little in detail. First, and perhaps the' most common, is the nagging woman. She need not necessarily be a wife, but it is better that she should be> for then she will always have one lawful object upon whom to- spend* her wrath. The nagging woman is never happy. Let her have riches, she will sigh for more ; or let her be poor, she will covet all tha'tis not' to be had. She finds fault with everything and everybody — with her husband, with her'children ; to please her is hopeless, and would be useless, for then she would nag because nothing was left to find fault with. Sho is often charitable, but accompanies her gifts with so much spiteful good advice that the reoipient would rather be without both. If.'her- nusband or children fall ill, she will nurse them, faithfully, but will nag at them for being; sick all the same., As a rule she is a successful woman, for her tongue will secure her everything she desires, but she will not the less 1 .'be discontented. Solomon bad a pretty large experience of wives, and he knew well what nagging meant else he never had written — ' A continual dropping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike. Whosoever hideth her hideth the wind and the ointnient of his right hand which bewrayeth itself.' And.sb, ; too, did the Frenchman who wrote— ' La langue dcs femmes est leur epee et elles ne la laissient pas rouiller.' Truly it is a swOrd such' as the bravest man cannot withstand. ■■ It' wounds deep, " striking the heart sometimes ; ' ! but the' tongue of a nagging woman worries and frets, as do- the pricks of pins, slightly but so persistently, that the victim often' goes mad. The son of toil, when tortured thus 1 , often silences the woman by kicking, her to death, and then he has peace ; the' educated man usually finds refuga in suicide, and he has peace aldo. •Then there is the 1 lachrymose female, one whom' the slightest misfortunewill melt into tears.' r She .will weep if her husband comes home hungry and demands' dinner hurriedly, a's 'hupgry husbands are apt to do. She will weep that his appetite is gone when he'sees Her weeping. : She will- weep at a birth, is a very shower at a, wedding; and is perfectly irresistible -at «r death. If the baby chokes with a crumb the wrong way in its throat, she weeps with alarm ; and when the dear little innocent has been thumped on the back till it is breathless and black in the fatfe, she weeps anew.' ' Nothing is too bad to cry over — nothing 'too good for tears. If her husband speak 'sharply, he is a brute, and then tears are natural ; if he pets her and is kind, then' very Joy requires that she should weep f afresh. She is a very Niobe, but With a small cause for weeping. ' This world is 'to her truly ' a vale of 'tears,' and- she will not care much for any other which is likely to prove so happy as to leave no c&us'e for grief. A peculiar form of the lachrymose woman is the intensely religious female— the' woman who is religious in season and out- of season, but' whose piety seems to take the form of counting all the motes in her neighbours' eyes,- magnifying -all their failings into vices, and who is destitute alike of charity, pity, or womanly tenderness. Mr Jerry Cruncher, in "' The Tale of Two Cities,' is not an attractive character,but one can almost, pardon his ' brutality to Mrs C, who would ' flop ' in defiance of him. ' And what do you suppose, you conceited female, that the worth of your prayers may be ? ■ Name the price that you put on your prayers,' said Mr Cruncher. ' They only come from the heart, Jerry ; they are worth no more than that,' ' Worth no more than that, ain't they ? ' repeated Mr Cruncher. 'They ain't worth much, then. Whether or no, I won't be prayed agin, I tell you. I can't afford it. If you must go flopping yourself down, flop in favour of your husband and child, and not agin 'em. Bu-u-ust me ! if I ain't, what with piety and one blowed thing and another, been choused into as bad luck as ever a poor devil of an honest tradesman met with. I tell you I won't be gone agin in this manner. lam as rickety as a hackney-coach, I'm as sleepy as laudanum, my lines is strained to that degree that I shouldn't know, if it wasn't for the pain in 'em, (which was me and which was somebody else,* yet I'm none the better for it in pocket; and, it's my suspicion that you've been at it from morning till night to prevent me from being the better in ■ pocket, and I won't put up wi' it, Aggerawayter ! ' . • ' Flopping ,' in moderation and in secret is a good thing,, but to make a habit of it will ruffle a gentler heart than that of Mr Jerry Cruncher. • , (To l*e Continued.)