THE PHYSICALLY FRAIL
Some years ago there came into our offices in Boston a young man
twenty-six years of age. He was about medium height, with keen,
intelligent face, fine skin, fine hair, delicately modeled features,
refined looking hands, and small, well-shaped feet.
He was inexpensively, but neatly, dressed, and, while somewhat diffident,
was courteous, affable, and respectful in demeanor. After a little
conversation with him, we asked him if he would be willing to appear
before one of our classes and permit the students to try to analyze him,
decide what his aptitudes were, and for what profession he was best
fitted. An evening or two later he appeared and we placed him before the
class. After some little examination of his appearance, this is the
judgment passed upon him by those present:
"Fairly observant; capable of learning well through his powers of
observation; good intellect, of the thoughtful, meditative type; a fair
degree of constructive ability; in disposition, optimistic, cheerful;
inclined to take chances; sympathetic, generous, sensitive, kindly, well
disposed, and agreeable; rather lacking in self-confidence and, therefore,
somewhat diffident, but courteous and friendly in contact with others;
responsive and, therefore, easily influenced by his associates, and
affected by his environment. Lacking in sense of justice and property
sense. A man of natural refinement and refined tastes; fond of beauty,
elegance and luxury. Energetic and alert mentally, but rather disinclined
to physical effort. Somewhat deficient in aggressiveness, but endowed with
an excellent constructive imagination, and so great mental energy that he
would be able to take the initiative in an intellectual way, especially in
the formation of plans and in the devising of means and ways. Fond of
change, variety; loves excitement; likes social life, and somewhat
deficient in constancy, conservatism, prudence, and responsibility. Keen,
alert, somewhat impatient and restless. Well fitted by nature for
intellectual work of any kind; with training would have done well as
teacher, writer, private secretary or high-class clerical worker, but
expression indicates that, through lack of training, he has failed in
physical work and has fallen into evil ways."
After this analysis had been carefully made, we excused the young man and
explained that thirteen of his twenty-six years had been spent in jail. He
had been left an orphan early in life and secured so little education that
he was almost entirely illiterate.
THE EASY DESCENT TO CRIME
As soon as he was old enough, he was set to work at the only thing he
could do, namely, manual labor. He was small and slight for his age, and
the services he was able to render were not worth much. He, therefore,
received very small pay. Because of his physical disabilities, he was
behind the other boys in his gang and suffered frequently from the
tongue-lashings of an unsympathetic foreman. His pay was not commensurate
with his tastes. He constantly felt the desire for finer, better, cleaner
things than he was able to earn. The work was hard for him; he suffered
much from the punishment inflicted upon his tender hands, from muscular
soreness and from weariness. As the days rolled on, he grew weaker, rather
than stronger, and became weary earlier in the day. Finally, the time came
when he felt that he could endure the taunts of his foreman no longer, and
he was about to give up when the foreman, exasperated with his
inefficiency, his clumsiness, and his weakness, discharged him.
Having been discharged, it was difficult for him to find another place to
work. At this critical stage, being out of money, and having fallen in
with idlers--and worse--he was influenced to use his keen intellect and
ability in plans and schemes, to commit a small crime, which yielded him
$10 or $15. Being a novice in crime, not naturally a criminal, he did not
protect himself from discovery and punishment, and, as a result, was sent
to a reformatory. After a short term in the reformatory, his behavior was
so good that he was released. After his release, a kind-hearted person,
who had observed him and liked his appearance, secured another position
for him. This also was at manual labor. At first he entered upon his new
work with a determination to succeed, to live down the stain upon his
character caused by his previous speculation, and, therefore, to live an
honorable and successful life.
STRUGGLING AGAINST ODDS
He worked hard and did his best, but the best he could do was not good
enough. He possessed no manual skill, he had no strength, and little by
little he again became physically tired out, mentally discouraged and
sore, and, having once committed a crime, found it easy to seek his former
associates and drop again into the old ways. An opportunity presented
itself to rob a companion's pocket of a few dollars, and he did so. Again
he was sent to the reformatory, this time for a longer term. Then, until
he came to our office, his career was a repetition of what has already
been related. A few months or a year or two in a reformatory, a jail, or a
penitentiary, a month or two trying to rehabilitate himself in some form
of manual labor, and, then, inefficiency, incompetency, lack of skill,
lack of strength, and discharge, to be followed by another attempt to add
to his resources by some petty crime.
For several years following this first interview with Mr. L. we followed
him, and did our best to assist him to enter upon some vocation for which
he was better fitted. Again and again we and other friends of his helped
him to secure work, but always it was the old story. His mind was so
active, so intelligent, so eager for expression, that the drudgery, the
monotony, the routine, the small pay, and the consequent lack of the many
elegances and luxuries he so strongly desired were too much for him. His
crimes were never serious, and never those requiring great courage. He
never stole any very large sums. For this reason much of his time was
spent in the work house or in jail, rather than in the penitentiary. In
addition to petty thieving, he had acquired some little ability as a
confidence man, and was capable of ensnaring small sums from credulous or
sympathetic people on various pretexts. The last time we heard of him he
had called upon a friend of ours, professed his complete and permanent
reform, wept over his former failures, and promised faithfully--and with
the greatest possible fervency and apparent sincerity--to do better in the
future. He said that he had an opportunity to make a trip on a whaling
vessel and he thought this opportunity would be the best thing in the world
for him, as it would take him away from his old, evil associates and give
him an opportunity to save money and make good in a new life. He wished
our friend to give him $4 to buy a ticket to New Bedford. Our friend gave
him the money and also a postal card, on which he had written his own
address. "Now, L.," he said, "I believe you, and I want you to show me
that you are playing square with me. When you get your new position and
are about to sail, I want you to write me about it on this postal card,
and mail it to me so that I will know that you are carrying out your
promises."
THE OLD, OLD STORY
L. promised faithfully, and said, "I want to write a letter to my mother,
and tell her where I am going. I wish you would let me have an envelope
and a stamp." Our friend obliged him with the necessaries, and L. left the
office beaming with gratitude and profuse in his promises to return the
loan as soon as he came back from his trip on the whaling vessel. A few
days later my friend received a postal card, dated at New Bedford,
Massachusetts. In one corner of the postal card was the notation,
"Received at the post office at New Bedford in an envelope, with a letter,
requesting that it be mailed here. (Signed) Postmaster."
Here was a man so well-intentioned by nature, of such a kindly,
sympathetic, generous disposition, so intelligent, so naturally capable
mentally that, with proper training and properly placed in a vocation in
which he could have used his talents, he would doubtless have become an
excellent asset to society.
This case is typical of many others. They have natural aptitudes which fit
them to become useful, but their talents have never been trained, their
aptitudes have never been given an opportunity to develop. They have no
inherent tendencies toward crime. In fact, there is no "criminal" type.
Most--but not all--criminals fall into their evil ways simply because they
have never been taught how to direct their mental and physical energies in
a way which will give them pleasure, as well as profit.
DESCRIPTION OF THIS TYPE
The physically frail individual of this type is frail because the brain
and nervous system are so highly developed that they require a great deal
of his vitality and endurance to nourish them and to sustain their
activities. The result is that mental powers grow and thrive at the
expense of physical.
Such people have large heads in proportion to their bodies. Their heads
also are inclined to be very much larger above the ears and in the
neighborhood of the forehead and temples than at the jaw and at the nape
of the neck. This gives their heads a rather top-heavy effect--like a pear
with the small end down--and their faces a triangular shape. Their jaws
are usually fine and slender, and their chins not particularly broad and
strong.
Such people have very fine hair and fine skin. Their nerves are sensitive
and close to the surface. Their entire build of body is delicate and
slender. Their hands and feet also are usually delicately and slenderly
fashioned; their shoulders are narrow and oftentimes sloping. It is folly
to talk of building up rugged, muscular and bony systems by means of
strenuous exercise in people thus endowed. Much, of course, can be done
to strengthen and harden the muscles, but they are frail physically, by
nature, and can never be anything else.
VOCATIONS FOR THE PHYSICALLY FRAIL
People with this type of organization are not inclined to be skillful with
their fingers. They do not care for physical work of any kind; they do not
take an interest in it and, therefore, cannot do it well. Properly
trained, men and women of this type take their place in the professions.
They are teachers, preachers, lawyers, educators, reformers, inventors,
authors, and artists. Among those of mediocre abilities we find clerks,
secretaries, accountants, salesmen, window trimmers, decorators,
advertisers, and others working along similar mental lines. When such
people are not trained and educated, they are misfits always, because they
do not have opportunities to use to their fullest extent the natural
intellectual talents with which they have been endowed.
THE MENTALLY MECHANICAL
There is a type of boy who is oftentimes thrown into the wrong vocation in
life, owing to a lack of appreciation of his true abilities on the part of
parents or teachers. This boy has a large head and small body, and is
intensely interested in machinery. He probably learns to handle tools,
after a fashion, at a very early age; spends his spare time in machine
shops; is intensely interested in locomotives and steamships, and
otherwise manifests a passion for machinery and mechanics. Oftentimes, on
account of this, he is very early apprenticed to a mechanic or is given a
job in some place where he will have an opportunity to build, operate or
repair machinery.
Some years ago we visited in a family in which there was a boy of this
type. At that time his chief interest was in locomotives. He had a toy
locomotive and took the greatest delight in operating it. Whenever he went
near a railroad station he improved every opportunity to examine carefully
the parts of a locomotive and, if possible, to induce the engineer to
take him up into the cab and show him the levers, valves and other parts
to be seen there. As soon as he was old enough, he begged his father to be
permitted to go to work in a railroad shop. Fortunately, however, his
father was too intelligent and too sensible to be misled by mere surface
indications. The boy was encouraged to finish his education. Being a
bright, capable youngster, he learned readily and rapidly. By means of
proper educational methods, giving him plenty of opportunity for the
exercise of his mechanical activities, he was induced to remain in school
until he secured an excellent college education. As he grew older his
interest in machinery did not wane. He found, however, that it was
becoming almost wholly intellectual. He lost all desire to handle, build,
operate or repair machinery. When, in later life, he became the owner of
an automobile, he was more than willing to leave all of the details of its
care to his chauffeur and mechanician.
As he cultivated his mental powers, he became more and more interested in
the use of his constructive aptitudes in the formation of ideas. He liked
to put ideas together; to work out the mechanics of expression in writing.
Instead of building machinery, he loved to build plots. Instead of
operating machinery, his abilities turned in the direction of working out
the technique of literary expression. Instead of repairing machinery he
loved rather to revise and rewrite his stories and plays. In other words,
the constructive talent, which he had shown as a child in material
mechanics, turned in the direction of mental and intellectual construction
as he grew older.
COMMERCIAL CONSTRUCTIVENESS
There are many boys who exhibit in their early years a great love of
machinery, and it is usually considered a kindness to them to prepare them
for either mechanics or engineering. In mechanical lines, they are
misfits, because they are frail and insufficient physically. In
engineering lines they are more at home, because the engineer works
principally with his brains. But very often they would still be more at
home in the realms of literature or oratory.
In a similar way boys often manifest great interest in machinery in their
youth, and afterward, if given the right opportunities, show their
constructive ability in the organization of business enterprises and the
successful devising of plans and schemes for pushing these enterprises to
success.
Sometimes those of this type of organization devote themselves rather to
invention and improvement than to the direct physical handling of
machinery. The following brief story of the struggles of Elias Howe[7]
should be an inspiration to every individual who fights physical frailty;
also, a lesson to him as to the way in which he should express his
mechanical ability:
[Footnote 7: From "Great Fortunes," by James D. McCabe. Published by
George Maclean.]
INTELLECTUAL TRIUMPH OF A FRAIL MAN
"Elias Howe was born in the town of Spencer, Massachusetts, in 1819. He
was one of eight children, and it was no small undertaking on the part of
his father to provide a maintenance for such a household. Mr. Howe, Sr.,
was a farmer and miller, and, as was the custom at that time in the
country towns of New England, carried on in his family some of those minor
branches of industry suited to the capacity of children, with which New
England abounds. When Elias was six years old, he was set, with his
brothers and sisters, to sticking wire teeth through the leather straps
used for making cotton cards. When he became old enough, he assisted his
father in his saw-mill and grist-mill, and during the winter months picked
up a meager education at the district school. He has said that it was the
rude and imperfect mills of his father that first turned his attention to
machinery. He was not fitted for hard work, however, as he was frail in
constitution and incapable of bearing much fatigue. Moreover, he inherited
a species of lameness which proved a great obstacle to any undertaking on
his part, and gave him no little trouble all through life. At the age of
eleven he went to live out on the farm of a neighbor, but the labor
proving too severe for him he returned home and resumed his place in his
father's mills, where he remained until he was sixteen years old.
"At the age of twenty-one he married. This was a rash step for him, as his
health was very delicate, and his earnings were but nine dollars per week.
Three children were born to him in quick succession, and he found it no
easy task to provide food, shelter and clothing for his little family. The
light heartedness for which he had formerly been noted entirely deserted
him, and he became sad and melancholy. His health did not improve, and it
was with difficulty that he could perform his daily task. His strength was
so slight that he would frequently return from his day's work too
exhausted to eat. He could only go to bed, and in his agony he wished 'to
lie in bed forever and ever,' Still he worked faithfully and
conscientiously, for his wife and children were very dear to him; but he
did so with a hopelessness which only those who have tasted the depths of
poverty can understand.
"About this time he heard it said that the great necessity of the age was
a machine for doing sewing. The immense amount of fatigue incurred and the
delay in hand sewing were obvious, and it was conceded by all who thought
of the matter at all that the man who could invent a machine which would
remove these difficulties would make a fortune. Howe's poverty inclined
him to listen to these remarks with great interest. No man needed money
more than he, and he was confident that his mechanical skill was of an
order which made him as competent as any one else to achieve the task
proposed. He set to work to accomplish it, and, as he knew well the
dangers which surround an inventor, kept his own counsel. At his daily
labor, in all his waking hours, and even in his dreams, he brooded over
this invention. He spent many a wakeful night in these meditations, and
his health was far from being benefitted by this severe mental
application. Success is not easily won in any great undertaking, and Elias
Howe found that he had entered upon a task which required the greatest
patience, perseverance, energy and hopefulness. He watched his wife as
she sewed, and his first effort was to devise a machine which should do
what she was doing. He made a needle pointed at both ends, with the eye in
the middle, that should work up and down through the cloth, and carry the
thread through at each thrust, but his elaboration of this conception
would not work satisfactorily. It was not until 1844, fully a year after
he began the attempt to invent the machine, that he came to the conclusion
that the movement of a machine need not of necessity be an imitation of
the performance by hand. It was plain to him that there must be another
stitch by the aid of a shuttle and a curved needle with the eye near the
point. This was the triumph of his skill. He had now invented a perfect
sewing machine, and had discovered the essential principles of every
subsequent modification of his conception. Satisfied that he had at length
solved the problem, he constructed a rough model of his machine of wood
and wire, in October, 1844, and operated it to his perfect satisfaction.
"It has been stated by Professor Renwick and other scientists that Elias
Howe 'carried the invention of the sewing machine further on toward its
complete and final utility than any other inventor has ever brought a
first-rate invention at the first trial.' ...
"Having patented his machine, Howe endeavored to bring it into use. He was
full of hope, and had no doubt that it would be adopted at once by those
who were so much interested in the saving of labor. He first offered it to
the tailors of Boston; but they, while admitting its usefulness, told him
it would never be adopted by their trade, as it would ruin them.
Considering the number of machines now used by the tailoring interests
throughout the world, this assertion seems ridiculous. Other efforts were
equally unsuccessful. Every one admitted and praised the ingenuity of the
machine, but no one would invest a dollar in it. Fisher (Howe's partner)
became disgusted and withdrew from his partnership, and Howe and his
family moved back to his father's house. Thoroughly disheartened, he
abandoned his machine. He then obtained a place as engineer on a
railroad, and drove a locomotive until his health entirely broke down....
"In 1850 Howe removed to New York, and began in a small way to manufacture
machines to order. He was in partnership with a Mr. Bliss, but for several
years the business was so unimportant that upon the death of his partner,
in 1855, he was enabled to buy out that gentleman's interest, and thus
became the sole proprietor of his patent. Soon after this his business
began to increase, and continued until his own proper profits, and the
royalty which the courts compelled other manufacturers to pay him for the
use of his invention, grew from $300 to $200,000 per annum. In 1867, when
the extension of his patent expired, it is stated that he had earned a
total of two millions of dollars by it."
STARVED BY HIS HANDS, ENRICHED BY HIS HEAD
Robert Burns was a failure as plowman and farmer. Rousseau was a failure
at every kind of physical work. Henry George nearly starved himself and
his family to death trying to make a living as a journeyman printer. The
following extract from the autobiography of Jacob Riis[8]--another
excellent example of this type of organization--shows how useless it was
for him to attempt to make his living at physical labor:
[Footnote 8: From "The Making of an American," by Jacob A. Riis. Macmillan
& Company, New York.]
A missionary in Castle Garden was getting up a gang of men for the Brady's
Bend Iron Works on the Allegheny River, and I went along. We started a
full score, with tickets paid, but only two of us reached the Bend. The
rest calmly deserted in Pittsburgh and went their own way....
The iron works company mined its own coal. Such as it was, it cropped out
of the hills right and left in narrow veins, sometimes too shallow to
work, seldom affording more space to the digger than barely enough to
permit him to stand upright. You did not go down through a shaft, but
straight in through the side of a hill to the bowels of the mountain,
following a track on which a little donkey drew the coal to the mouth of
the mine and sent it down the incline to run up and down a hill a mile or
more by its own gravity before it reached the place of unloading. Through
one of these we marched in, Adler and I, one summer morning with new
pickaxes on our shoulders and nasty little oil lamps fixed in our hats to
light us through the darkness where every second we stumbled over chunks
of slate rock, or into pools of water that oozed through from above. An
old miner, whose way lay past the fork in the tunnel where our lead began,
showed us how to use our picks and the timbers to brace the slate that
roofed over the vein, and left us to ourselves in a chamber perhaps ten
feet wide and the height of a man.
We were to be paid by the ton, I forget how much, but it was very little,
and we lost no time in getting to work. We had to dig away the coal at the
floor with our picks, lying on our knees to do it, and afterward drive
wedges under the roof to loosen the mass. It was hard work, and, entirely
inexperienced as we were, we made but little headway.
When toward evening we quit work, after narrowly escaping being killed by
a large stone that fell from the roof in consequence of our neglect to
brace it up properly, our united efforts had resulted in barely filling
two of the little carts, and we had earned, if I recollect aright,
something like sixty cents each. The fall of the roof robbed us of all
desire to try mining again....
Up the railroad track I went, and at night hired out to a truck farmer,
with the freedom of his hay-mow for my sleeping quarters. But when I had
hoed cucumbers three days in a scorching sun, till my back ached as if it
were going to break, and the farmer guessed he would call it square for
three shillings, I went farther. A man is not necessarily a
philanthropist, it seems, because he tills the soil. I did not hire out
again. I did odd jobs to earn my meals, and slept in the fields at
night....
The city was full of idle men. My last hope, a promise of employment in a
human-hair factory, failed, and, homeless and penniless, I joined the
great army of tramps, wandering about the streets in the daytime with the
one aim of somehow stilling the hunger that gnawed at my vitals, and
fighting at night with vagrant curs or outcasts as miserable as myself for
the protection of some sheltering ash-bin or doorway. I was too proud in
all my misery to beg. I do not believe I ever did.
There was until last winter a doorway in Chatham Square, that of the old
Barnum clothing store, which I could never pass without recalling those
nights of hopeless misery with the policeman's periodic 'Get up there!
move on!' reinforced by a prod of his club or the toe of his boot. I slept
there, or tried to when crowded out of the tenements in the Bend by their
utter nastiness. Cold and wet weather had set in, and a linen duster was
all that covered my back. There was a woolen blanket in my trunk which I
had from home--the one, my mother had told me, in which I was wrapped when
I was born; but the trunk was in the 'hotel' as security for money I owed
for board, and I asked for it in vain. I was now too shabby to get work,
even if there had been any to get. I had letters still to friends of my
family in New York who might have helped me, but hunger and want had not
conquered my pride. I would come to them, if at all, as their equal, and,
lest I fall into temptation, I destroyed the letters. So, having burned my
bridges behind me, I was finally and utterly alone in the city, with the
winter approaching and every shivering night in the streets reminding me
that a time was rapidly coming when such a life as I led could no longer
be endured.
Not in a thousand years would I be likely to forget the night when it
came. It had rained all day, a cold October storm, and night found me,
with the chill downpour unabated, down by the North River, soaked through
and through, with no chance for a supper, forlorn and discouraged. I sat
on the bulwark, listening to the falling rain and the swish of the dark
tide, and thinking of home. How far it seemed, and how impassable the
gulf now between the 'castle,' with its refined ways, between her, in her
dainty girlhood, and me sitting there, numbed with the cold that was
slowly stealing away my senses with my courage. There was warmth and cheer
where she was. Here an overpowering sense of desolation came upon me. I
hitched a little nearer to the edge. What if----? Would they miss me much
or long at home if no word came from me? Perhaps they might never hear.
What was the use of keeping it up any longer, with, God help us,
everything against, and nothing to back, a lonely lad?...
It was not only breakfast we lacked. The day before we had had only a
crust together. Two days without food is not good preparation for a day's
canvassing. We did the best we could. Bob stood by and wagged his tail
persuasively while I did the talking; but luck was dead against us, and
'Hard Times' stuck to us for all we tried. Evening came and found us down
by the Cooper Institute, with never a cent. Faint with hunger, I sat down
on the steps under the illuminated clock, while Bob stretched himself at
my feet. He had beguiled the cook in one of the last houses we called at,
and his stomach was filled. From the corner I had looked on enviously. For
me there was no supper, as there had been no dinner and no breakfast.
To-morrow there was another day of starvation. How long was this to last?
Was it any use to keep up a struggle so hopeless? From this very spot I
had gone, hungry and wrathful, three years before when the dining
Frenchmen for whom I wanted to fight thrust me forth from their company.
Three wasted years! Then I had one cent in my pocket, I remembered. To-day
I had not even so much. I was bankrupt in hope and purpose. Nothing had
gone right; and worse, I did not care. I drummed moodily upon my book.
Wasted! Yes, that was right. My life was wasted, utterly wasted.
A voice hailed me by name, and Bob sat up, looking attentively at me for
his cue as to the treatment of the owner of it. I recognized in him the
principal of the telegraph school where I had gone until my money gave
out. He seemed suddenly struck by something.
[Illustration: Photo by Marceau, N.Y.
FIG. 9. Richard Mansfield, Actor-Manager. A fine, balanced combination of
artistic talent, creative power, and capacity for great emotion, with good
judgment, financial sense, great energy, great determination,
uncompromising devotion to ideals, fine powers of expression, and
executive ability of the driving, compelling, rigid type. Note high head,
domed above temples and wide across center of forehead; large nose; long,
straight upper lip; firm mouth; prominent chin; long line from point of
chin to crown of head; intense expression.]
[Illustration: FIG. 10. Hon. A.I. Cutting (same as FIG. 11).
Intellectual, idealistic, yet practical; mild, but very shrewd and
persistent; good-natured, friendly, social, sympathetic, kindly, yet with
good commercial and financial judgment. Observe height of head, with dome
above temples; moderate width of head; pleasant, but firm-set, mouth; fine
texture and fine chiseling of features; strong, prominent chin, and
genial, kindly, friendly expression.]
[Illustration: FIG. 11. Hon. A.L. Cutting. Ambitious, aspiring, hopeful,
cheerful, friendly, social. A good public speaker. Excellent planner,
prudent, far-sighted, and deliberate in speech and action. Note high head,
both at crown and above temples, long behind ears; high forehead;
well-formed eyes and nose, and prominent chin.]
[Illustration: FIG. 12. The late Melville Fuller, Chief Justice of
the Supreme Court of the United States. Unusually keen analytical powers,
unaffected by sentiment or irrelevant considerations. Great ability to get
down to essentials. Note fullness of brows and of upper corners of
forehead; keen, penetrating eyes, and long nose with depressed tip.]
[Illustration: FIG. 13. Frank A. Vanderlip, President of National
City Bank, of New York. A man of both financial and political acumen--also
humanitarian. Note high, domed head; width across center and lower part of
forehead; inclination to stoutness; large, well-formed features; long
lines of face.]
[Illustration: _Copyright American Press Association_.
FIG. 14. Hon. Joseph W. Folk, of Missouri. A keen politician, shrewd
lawyer, and hard fighter. Note height and width of head; large, prominent
nose; square, firm jaw; long upper lip; dogged set of mouth; unflinching
eyes, and inclination to stoutness.]
[Illustration: FIG. 15. The late Senator Nelson W. Aldrich, of Rhode
Island. Keen, practical observation, financial judgment, diplomacy,
shrewdness, energy, intellect, industry, courage, determination, and
command. Note well-developed brows; height and width of forehead,
especially across center; long, well-developed nose; straight, firm mouth;
broad, square, prominent chin; long ears; long line from point of chin to
crown of head, and keen, shrewd, alert, penetrating expression of eye.]
[Illustration: FIG. 16. Showing large, well-developed base of brain,
usually an indication of a tendency to stoutness. Note fullness of back of
head at nape of neck.]
"'Why, what are you doing here?' he asked. I told him Bob and I were just
resting after a day of canvassing.
"'Books!' he snorted. 'I guess that won't make you rich. Now, how would
like to be a reporter, if you have got nothing better to do? The manager
of a news agency downtown asked me to-day to find him a bright young
fellow whom he could break in. It isn't much--$10 a week to start with.
But it is better than peddling books, I know,'
"He poked over the book in my hand and read the title. 'Hard Times,' he
said, with a little laugh. 'I guess so. What do you say? I think you will
do. Better come along and let me give you a note to him now.'
"As in a dream. I walked across the street with him to his office and got
the letter which was to make me, half starved and homeless, rich as
Croesus, it seemed to me.
"When the sun rose I washed my face and hands in a dog's drinking trough,
pulled my clothes into such shape as I could, and went with Bob to his new
home. The parting over, I walked down to 23 Park Row and delivered my
letter to the desk editor in the New York News Association up on the top
floor.
"He looked me over a little doubtfully, but evidently impressed with the
early hours I kept told me that I might try. He waved me to a desk,
bidding me wait until he had made out his morning book of assignments; and
with such scant ceremony was I finally introduced to Newspaper Row, that
had been to me like an enchanted land. After twenty-seven years of hard
work in it, during which I have been behind the scenes of most of the
plays that go to make up the sum of the life of the metropolis, it
exercises the old spell over me yet. If my sympathies need quickening, my
point of view adjusting, I have only to go down to Park Row at eventide,
when the crowds are hurrying homeward and the City Hall clock is lighted,
particularly when the snow lies on the grass in the park, and stand
watching them awhile, to find all things coming right. It is Bob who
stands by and watches with me then, as on that night."
TALENT IN THE BUD AND BLOSSOM
The big important lesson underlying all of these concrete examples is that
the individual of this type never ought to attempt to do any kind of work
in which success depends upon physical effort. Whatever talents he may
have will express themselves always best in an intellectual way. It may be
art, it may be music, it may be machinery, it may be business, it may be
mining or agriculture, it may be any one of many other active pursuits
which have also a purely intellectual side. In his early youth his mind
naturally turns to the more material manifestation of his talent. But,
with proper training and given the proper opportunities, he will always
gravitate surely to the mental and intellectual phases of his bent. The
boy who is interested in machinery may become an inventor or he may become
a playwright or an author. The boy who is interested in plants and flowers
may become a botanist or a naturalist, or, perhaps, even a poet. The boy
who is deeply interested in battles and fighting may be far better adapted
to the profession of historian than to the trade of soldier. The boy who
likes to build houses and factories in his play, and seems to be deeply
interested in the construction of edifices, may not be fitted to become a
contractor or a draughtsman. If he is of this intellectual type, he is far
more likely to become an architect, or, perhaps, to idealize his talents
even further and devote himself to literature on the subject of
architecture, home planning, and home decoration. The boy of this type,
who in his youth seems to take a particular interest in horses, cattle,
dogs, and other animals, may not necessarily be best qualified for a stock
breeder or a dairyman. Possibly he should become a veterinarian or even a
physician and surgeon. Or his bent may be in the direction of science, so
that he makes a name as a naturalist.
The first and most important thing for people of this type, and for
parents having children of this type, is to get it firmly fixed in their
minds, once for all, that they are not fitted for hard physical work. The
next important thing, of course, is to secure a broad and complete
education along general lines. If there is any striking and particular
talent along any one line, such an education is more than likely to bring
it out and to cause it to seek further development. In case there is no
such distinct predilection manifested, further and more minute study of
the individual will have to be made in order to determine just what kind
of intellectual work will give him the best opportunities for success and
happiness. Even in the want of such a careful analysis, it is,
nevertheless, true that an individual of this type, who has no marked
inclination toward any one form of mental activity, is always far better
placed, far happier, and far more successful if trained to do any kind of
intellectual work than if left untrained and compelled to try to earn his
own living by the use of his bones and muscles.