28 NATURE IN A CITY YARD 



type of man we have, because he is a man 

 whose expediences are so many that he 

 suffices to himself. He lives his own life, 

 and leaves strong sons to man the cities. 

 If he were in town he would stick at some 

 one trade, or some department of a trade, 

 and hire his nailing, sawing, accounting, 

 and killing ; for in the specialization of 

 business, begotten of large manufactures, 

 the city man's limitations of industry are 

 narrowing every year. When one has not 

 self-poise to stand by himself, or to do 

 his work without company, he topples into 

 a town, and the neighbors help him as he 

 helps the neighbors : they wedge together, 

 so that none may tip over. 



The coarseness of city life is usually 

 sorest to those who are best able to keep 

 aloof. It is courted by those who would 

 be better away from it : the tenement pop- 

 ulation. The drinking, the righting, the 

 yelling, the sickness, closeness, vice, igno- 

 rance, and slum politics disgust the visitor; 

 but the resident glories in them, for to him 

 they express society. 



Wretched is that man who has no re- 



