For just consider what a miserable sort of boy this Tom Sulks, that we all of us know, is. Why, almost before he could speak he had learned to pout. If a toy was denied him, he neither bellowed like his little brother nor raved like his little sister, but toddled off and sulked in a corner all day long. When he grew a little older, if he was not allowed to play in the garden because it was damp, he refused to play in the nursery, he refused to come down to the dining-room, he refused to say his prayers at bedtime. When he was old enough to go to school, he would either play marbles the way he was used to (which was the wrong way), or not at all. If found fault with for not knowing his lesson, he pushed his books from him, and endured to be stood in the corner, or punished some other way, rather than learn his task. The vice only became worse and worse as time went on, and to-day Tom is an odious fellow. Look at him playing at cricket. He steps across the wickets to hit at a ball, but, instead, stops it with his foot. “How’s that, umpire?” cries the bowler. “Out, leg before,” is the answer.
Tom still keeps his place.
“Out, do you hear, leg before?”
“It wasn’t!” growls Tom.
“The umpire gives it out,” is the unanswerable reply.
Thereupon Tom’s face clouds over, his eyebrows gather, and his lips shape themselves into a pout, as he drops his bat and walks from the wicket without a word. No one takes any notice of him, for the event is too common, alas, to occasion surprise. We know what his sulks mean. No one will get a word from him for hours, perhaps a day; no attempts at conciliation will tempt him back to the game, no friendly talk will chase the cloud from his face. There he goes, slouching up the playground into the house, and he will skulk upstairs to his study and slam the door, and that’s all we shall see of Tom till suppertime.
Once, I remember, young Jim Friendly, a new boy, tried hard to coax Tom back into good humour. They had been having a match at something, I forget what, and Jim happened to say that something Tom did was against the rules. Tom, as usual, grew sulky and walked off.
“What, you aren’t going in?” said Jim, disconcerted. No answer. “I didn’t mean to offend you, old fellow; you may be right, after all.” No answer. “I beg your pardon, Tom. I wouldn’t have said it if I thought you’d have minded.” No answer. “Don’t be angry with a fellow, I didn’t mean—”
No answer. And so Jim went on apologising, as if he had been all in the wrong and the other all in the right, and getting no word in reply, only the same scowl and uncompromising sullenness. “I’ll take jolly good care not to stroke that fellow the wrong way again,” said Jim, afterwards; “and if I should, I won’t waste my time in stroking him the right way.”
Just fancy what sort of man such a fellow as Tom is likely to turn out. Is he likely to have many friends? Unless he can get a few of his own sort, I’m afraid he’ll be rather badly off in that respect. And then, oh, horrors! fancy half a dozen Tom Sulks together! What a happy family they would be! When Tom goes to business, he had better make up his mind to start a concern of his own, for I’m afraid he would have some difficulty in getting a partner, or, at any rate, keeping one. I could quite fancy some important question arising where Tom and his partner might hold different views. Tom insists he’s right, the partner insists he’s right. Tom consequently stays away for a week from the office, during which the poor partner has to manage as best he can.