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- 11515
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- 2026-01-30T03:48:16.153Z
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- 11459
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- PORTRAIT OF A GENTLEMAN
John Gentian, Esq., or Major Gentian, or the Dean, or the Major, or
Jack--for all these styles are his according to circumstances and the
person mentioning or addressing him--is one of those socially notable
characters whose names for all the notability will be found rather in
the trustworthy City Directory than in the not-always-reliable
Biographical Dictionary. Accordingly in the former ‘John Gentian’ is set
down as hailing from the ‘Burgundy Club,’ the street and number of the
club-house duly and accurately given. In brief, John Gentian is a
bachelor having chambers on an upper story of the club-house, a
privilege which at his solicitation was cheerfully accorded him, as by
seniority of membership, to say nothing of happy qualifications in his
character, Dean of the Chapter of _Burgundians_, for so do they
denominate themselves, the brethren of that congenial fraternity.
This captain of the good fellows belongs to a transplanted shoot of
Southern stock for two generations taking root and branching out in the
North, within the borders of a State which, thanks to its relative
geographical position and circumstances originating in that, least
partakes of a sectional spirit. For now a fair period, ever since the
latter part of 1865, the Dean has gone on in what would seem to be the
after-mission of his life, namely, the dispensing of those less
abbreviated greetings on the Avenue and considerate old-school
hospitalities of the board, hardly practicable for the ‘business-man’ of
our day, or, for that matter, the man of leisure either, unless
abounding in natural benevolence backed up by its desirable concomitant,
a comfortable bank account. Do not infer, however, that there is aught
of Count D’Orsay superannuated, or Sir Charles Grandison, become senile,
in our Dean of the Burgundians. He is no prodigal in airs and graces,
and, on the contrary, sometimes takes singular liberties with etiquette,
not out of ignorance, to be sure, or the Leveller’s contempt; no, but
from a certain impulsive straightforwardness at times, hardly compatible
with the abstract theory of a formalised gentlemanhood. Furthermore, he
of late has permitted himself an easy latitude in his dress, evincing a
lack of proper reverence for mercers and the mode. But yet more astray,
he will, upon provocation--say, at some story of perfidy or brutal
behaviour--incontinently rap out an expletive, startling to the ladies
as Brandt’s flourished tomahawk at the London masked ball long ago. Then
again, as if there were no end to his derelictions, he, when convenient
to him, thinks nothing of carrying a brown paper parcel in the street
rather than trouble the shopkeeper to send some inexpensive small matter
to his rooms. Notwithstanding these deviations from the conventionally
correct, there is that in the look of Major Gentian, something in the
‘cut of his jib,’ as the sailors say, if not in the end of his coat,
that involuntarily inspires respect, yes, even in cabby himself. Cabby,
before club-house or theatre, poised on the curb, expectant of the prey,
would never dream of hailing him (_the Dean_) with the ambiguous
‘_Gent._’ Should he do so, whether out of ignorance or sly impudence,
the Major would have to hold his temper well in hand to obviate a
violent breach of the peace. To _Boss_ he objects not, that Dutch
monosyllable having an honest bovine sound to it, and being, in fact, a
natural localism of a city first settled by the Hollander; and if
_master_ be not the word’s exact equivalent, it would be difficult to
find one.
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