Gardiner's Views on Umbrella Morals
Introduction:
Gardiner has written this essay "On Umbrella Morals" with balance, confidence and grace. He has made comments on human behaviour and the habit of exchanging. He, after anecdotes and illustration, gives an ultimate solution to us also to get back our umbrellas.
Views on Umbrella:
The writer passes a comment on the loose morals of the modern people in respect of honesty in our daily matters of life. In the beginning of the essay, says Gardiner, that one day he got fully drenched but he could not use his umbrella because it belonged to somebody else.
That gentleman had taken away, by accident his silk umbrella and had left his old and rotten one which the writer could not open even if it was raining while that gentleman, says Gardiner, would be walking along the strand "gracefully" and looking down upon other people with scorn.
Gardiner doesn't call that gentleman dishonest but suggests that he needs to have an "umbrella conscience". He says that if after having gone a good distance, he realizes his mistake, he would satisfy himself with the fact that there is no use of going back and that the real owner of the umbrella would have gone. Such people are honest in all matters, but as far as umbrellas are concerned, their honesty can't be trusted at all. They play just a game of "hide and seek" with their own conscience.
Views on Books:
Next to the umbrella, the writer presents another example of books. Most people carry the book intentionally and never return it. The writer had a friend who developed a personal library with the help of borrowed books.
There are many book lovers who, throughout their whole lives, never bought any book. They only borrowed books from their friends or relatives and never returned them. The writer, to escape from such a situation provides a solution, that the golden rule is not to and never to lend a book to anybody.
Views on Hats:
Finally, after the umbrella and books, Gardiner gives a very nice example of hats. He says that people often exchange hats but they do not realize that others that don't suit them. Once somebody took the hat of the essayist and did not leave his own hat in exchange and the essayist for a long time sat thinking about how that gentleman would have walked home with two hats on his head.
Advise of the writers:
'Gardiner, therefore advises his readers not to trust anybody, even the best friends, in the case of books because they show a great interest at the time of borrowing but at the time of returning their memory seems to be working less than its previous perfection and they forget all about it and consider the borrowed book as their personal property. As for umbrellas, he says that the best way is to engrave the name and address on it so that it may be returned.
Style:
To decorate this essay, Gardiner has added humorous incidents also and he has very effectively transmuted such a small thing into literary beauty. This essay has all the features of a good essay.
It has been written in a very good style. It not only has humorous touches but also a moral sense. The writer very beautifully provides solutions to every problem whether it is about losing hats, umbrellas or books. Besides being a humorous one, it is a didactic essay.
