NEWCOMERS.
IT cannot often happen, we hope, that the stranger within our gates finds himself in such an evil case as a correspondent who has recently unburdened his soul to the Surrey Advertiser. His subject is "The Manners of Guild- ford," he signs himself "Americus," and his complaint is Litter indeed. He and his wife, he tells us, have only lived in Guildford a few months, but, " since,we are London people and follow London fashions and wear London clothes, have been continually subject to the disgusting manners cf people
in the streets of your town." In a town which contains "quantities of churches," he thinks, this ought not to happen, and we may certainly agree with him. Has he in mind, perhaps,
the old couplet which belongs to Guildford—" Proud Guild- ford, poor people; three churches, no steeple " ? The "peer people," it seems, are the offenders ; the "London clothes" are objected to, we gather, and we get vague allusions to colours and materials. If things go on in this way "Americus" threatens "to take on the wholesale thrashing of your males and the wholesale summoning of your females," which is certainly a stormy future to look forward to, especially in a town which has long had the reputation of being one of the quietest and best-behaved in the country. It would be difficult, probably, to light on a better instance of constitutional incapacity on the part of a newcomer to adapt himself to his surroundings.
Newcomers to a quiet country town, you would think, would have the easiest prospects in the world. The pitfalls which lie before all strangers and sojourners would gape for them, you would suppose, with the narrowest mouths possible. In a country town there is almost the same opportunity of attracting no observation, and consequently no hostility, as there is in the suburbs of London, and in the suburbs you may be anybody or nobody ; there is only one rule, which is pretty common, also, in other places, that you must not injure your neighbour. Otherwise the newcomer from the first has the simplest task possible. He can keep to himself as much or as little as he pleases ; he has so many neighbours that instead of being stared at he escapes notice as individuals escape notice in a crowd. He may have a large house and garden or a villa, with a small garden, but in neither case will he find his possessions an inconvenience or a difficulty as the townsman living in the country sometimes finds them; his gardener, if he employs one, will not think the less of him for knowing nothing about flowers and fruit, or if he does his own garden- ing and makes his own mistakes there will be plenty of other people round him who do the same. He can see as much or as little as he likes of the society of the neighbourhood; his wife, when she has returned any calls which have been paid on her, can accept or discourage whatever friendships she pleases. The newcomer in the suburbs or the country town, indeed, can escape the observation or the attentions of his neighbours to almost any extent so long as he pays his bills ; he has merely to avoid, in all his dealings, any appear- ance of eccentricity. If he chooses to be eccentric in dress, of course, he will not escape personal remarks, even though he should be the most amiable and retiring of men. The town atmosphere in that case will make itself felt, it will demand its own standards. It may merely be good-humoured but persistent, as were the small boys who once so puzzled Francis Newman, the brother of Cardinal Newman, by asking who was his hatter. "For the life of me," he explained to a friend, "at the time I could not remember." But mere eccentricity in dress would be forgiven in time ; what would perhaps be unforgiven would be the absurdities of fashion carried to extravagance. Those cannot pass unnoticed ; they are meant, indeed, to be noticed, and those who adopt them are presumably prepared to receive, if not to welcome, the attentive comments of interested passers-by.
The newcomer in the country, on the other hand, is in a different position. He cannot lose himself in a crowd. By his choice of country rather than town to live in he proclaims himself anxious to share in country pursuits and to meet country people; and since he makes his profession of tastes he will be judged by those who share them. He may very likely find it easier to drop into place among persons of equal standing with his own than to find the precise position he ought to occupy with the villagers and poorer country people, unless, of course, he has merely come from one part of the country to another, and knows how country people "like to be spoken to." There are many who take a long time to make that discovery, especially, perhaps, among those who have employed labour in other industries besides those of the countryside. One such newcomer to a country district, who had built a new house and was laying out a garden round it, revealed himself sufficiently by ordering the men at work not to come the next morning, as he would be going to town and could not look after them. They were to come the day after, when he would be at home and could be sure that they did a full day's work. "I know what you country labourers are," he remarked. "Just what he don't know," was the terse comment. The Sussex labourer's motto is said to be, "I wunt be druv," and that possibly is the general attitude of the countryman towards the townsman who expects too much or too quick work, as he considers it, out of him. But even less than being bullied will he allow himself to be patronized. If there is one thing which the newcomer to the country will find himself unable to do it is to "come the great gentleman" over villagers who are not used to him. He will be allowed to give no more than he will be allowed to take. He will not be welcomed or accepted as patron simply because he has the money or the will to bead subscription lists and provide entertainments. That is a privilege which he will have to earn, and he will earn it quickest by offering himself latest; he will be asked if he is worth asking. Of one thing he may be sure enough, that he will never succeed in pretending to be what he is not. He may just as well own ignorance on any country subject as try to disguise it ; the ignorance will be recognized in any case ; and in the end he will be accepted frankly for what he is. If he is a born countryman, even though he has spent most of his years in a town, he will settle inns a countryman at once ; if he is a townsman turned countryman, willing to learn and to listen, he may come through in time to some such achievement as Mr. Rudyard Kipling has described in that fascinating story, "An Habita- tion Enforced." There is no more delightful study of the acceptance of newcomers by a countryside. The acceptance of the newcomer in town or countryside has its parallel every day in the average railway carriage. When the door o a carriage opens to admit a fifth traveller to four others, he enters an atmosphere of reserve, almost of hostility. Why should he be added to a company of persons quite large enough already? The train moves off, and his behaviour and appearance are silently observed by each of his fellow. travellers. If he behaves as a properly conducted traveller should, if he does not take up too much room, or bring in too many parcels, or spread his newspaper inconveniently, or smoke abominable tobacco, or try to pull the window up or down when it does not belong to him, he passes insensibly into the atmosphere of the carriage ; he becomes part of the company; and if a sixth traveller gets in at the next station, he intrudes on a community, not of four, but of five. The newcomer has already been accepted—more, perhaps, for what he has omitted to do than for what he has done.
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