Manners and Social Usages by Mrs John M. E. W. Sherwood (great book club books TXT) 📖

are, when seen as a whole, so

judiciously blended that they can hardly be pronounced upon

individually: one only admires the tout ensemble, and that

uncritically, perhaps.

 

That society is bad whose members, however tenacious they be of

forms of etiquette and elaborate ceremonials, have one code of

manners for those whom they deem their equals, and another for

those whom they esteem to be of less importance to them by reason

of age, pecuniary condition, or relative social influence. Bad

manners are apt to prove the concomitant of a mind and disposition

that are none too good, and the fashionable woman who slights and

wounds people because they cannot minister to her ambition,

challenges a merciless criticism of her own moral shortcomings. A

young girl who is impertinent or careless in her demeanor to her

mother or her mother’s friends; who goes about without a chaperon

and talks slang; who is careless in her bearing towards young men,

permitting them to treat her as if she were one of themselves;

who accepts the attention of a young man of bad character or

dissipated habits because he happens to be rich; who is loud in

dress and rough in manner—such a young girl is “bad society,” be

she the daughter of an earl or a butcher. There are many such

instances of audacity in the so-called “good society” of America,

but such people do not spoil it; they simply isolate themselves.

 

A young man is “bad society” who is indifferent to those older

than himself, who neglects to acknowledge invitations, who sits

while a lady stands, who goes to a ball and does not speak to his

host, who is selfish, who is notoriously immoral and careless of

his good name, and who throws discredit on his father and mother

by showing his ill-breeding. No matter how rich, how externally

agreeable to those whom he may wish to court, no matter how much

varnish of outward manner such a man may possess, he is “bad

society.”

 

A parvenue who assumes to keep other people out of the society

which she has just conquered, whose thoughts are wholly upon

social success (which means, with her, knowing somebody who has

heretofore refused to know her), who is climbing, and throwing

backward looks of disdain upon those who also climb—such a woman,

unfortunately too common in America, is, when she happens to have

achieved a fashionable position, one of the worst instances of bad

society. She may be very prominent, powerful, and influential. She

may have money and “entertain,” and people desirous of being

amused may court her, and her bad manners will be accepted by the

careless observer as one of the concomitants of fashion. The

reverse is true. She is an interloper in the circles of good

society, and the old fable of the ass in the lion’s skin fits her

precisely. Many a duchess in England is such an interloper; her

supercilious airs betray the falsity of her politeness, but she is

obliged by the rules of the Court at which she has been educated

to “behave like a lady;” she has to counterfeit good-breeding; she

cannot, she dare not, behave as a woman who has suddenly become

rich may sometimes, nay does, behave in American society, and

still be received.

 

It will thus be seen, as has been happily expressed, that “fashion

has many classes, and many rules of probation and admission.” A

young person ignorant of its laws should not be deluded, however,

by false appearances. If a young girl comes from the most secluded

circles to Saratoga, and sees some handsome, well-dressed,

conspicuous woman much courted, lionized, as it were, and observes

in her what seems to be insolent pretence, unkindness, frivolity,

and superciliousness, let her inquire and wait before she accepts

this bit of brass for pure gold. Emerson defines “sterling fashion

as funded talent.” Its objects may be frivolous or objectless;

but, in the long-run, its purposes are neither frivolous nor

accidental. It is an effort for good society; it is the bringing

together of admirable men and women in a pleasant way.

Good-breeding, personal superiority, beauty, genius, culture, are

all very good things. Every one delights in a person of charming

manners. Some people will forgive very great derelictions in a

person who has charming manners, but the truly good society is the

society of those who have virtue and good manners both.

 

Some Englishman asked an American, “What sort of a country is

America?” “It is a country where everybody can tread on

everybody’s toes,” was the answer.

 

It is very bad society where any one wishes to tread on his

neighbor’s toes, and worse yet where there is a disposition to

feel aggrieved, or to show that one feels aggrieved. There are

certain people new in society who are always having their toes

trodden upon. They say: “Mrs. Brown snubbed me; Mrs. Smith does

not wish to know me; Mrs. Thompson ought to have invited me. I am

as good as any of them.” This is very bad society. No woman with

self-respect will ever say such things. If one meets with

rudeness, take no revenge, cast no aspersions. Wit and tact,

accomplishments and social talents, may have elevated some woman

to a higher popularity than another, but no woman will gain that

height by complaining. Command of temper, delicacy of feeling, and

elegance of manner—all these are demanded of the persons who

become leaders of society, and would remain so. They alone are

“good society.” Their imitators may masquerade for a time, and

tread on toes, and fling scorn and insult about them while in a

false and insecure supremacy; but such pretenders to the throne

are soon unseated. There is a dreadful Sedan and Strasburg

awaiting them. They distrust their own flatterers; their

“appanage” is not a solid one.

 

People who are looking on at society from a distance must remember

that women of the world are not always worldly women. They forget

that brilliancy in society may be accompanied by the best heart

and the sternest principle. The best people of the world are those

who know the world best. They recognize the fact that this world

should be known and served and treated with as much respect and

sincerity as that other world, which is to be our reward for

having conquered the one in which we live now.

 

CHAPTER IV.

ON INTRODUCING PEOPLE.

 

A lady in her own house can in these United States do pretty much

as she pleases, but there is one thing in which our cultivated and

exclusive city fashionable society seems agreed, and that is, that

she must not introduce two ladies who reside in the same town. It

is an awkward and an embarrassing restriction, particularly as the

other rule, which renders it easy enough—the English rule—that

the “roof is an introduction,” and that visitors can converse

without further notice, is not understood. So awkward, however,

are Americans about this, that even in very good houses one lady

has spoken to another, perhaps to a young girl, and has received

no answer, “because she had not been introduced;” but this state

of ignorance is, fortunately, not very common. It should be met by

the surprised rejoinder of the Hoosier school-mistress: “Don’t yer

know enough to speak when yer spoken to?” Let every woman

remember, whether she is from the backwoods, or from the most

fashionable city house, that no such casual conversation can hurt

her. It does not involve the further acquaintance of these two

persons. They may cease to know each other when they go down the

front steps; and it would be kinder if they would both relieve the

lady of the house of their joint entertainment by joining in the

conversation, or even speaking to each other.

 

A hostess in this land is sometimes young, embarrassed, and not

fluent. The presence of two ladies with whom she is not very well

acquainted herself, and both of whom she must entertain, presents

a fearful dilemma. It is a kindness to her, which should outweigh

the dangers of making an acquaintance in “another set,” if those

ladies converse a little with each other.

 

If one lady desires to be introduced to another, the hostess

should ask if she may do so, of course unobtrusively. Sometimes

this places one lady in an unlucky position towards another. She

does not know exactly what to do. Mrs. So-and-so may have the gift

of exclusiveness, and may desire that Mrs. That-and-that shall not

have the privilege of bowing to her. Gurowski says, in his very

clever book on America, that snobbishness is a peculiarity of the

fashionable set in America, because they do not know where they

stand. It is the peculiarity of vulgar people everywhere, whether

they sit on thrones or keep liquor-shops; snobs are born—not

made. If, ever, a lady has this gift or this drawback of

exclusiveness, it is wrong to invade her privacy by introducing

people to her.

 

Introducing should not be indiscriminately done either at home or

in society by any lady, however kind-hearted. Her own position

must be maintained, and that may demand a certain loyalty to her

own set. She must be careful how she lets loose on society an

undesirable or aggressive man, for instance, or a great bore, or a

vulgar, irritating woman. These will all be social obstacles to

the young ladies of her family, whom she must first consider. She

must not add to the embarrassments of a lady who has already too

large a visiting list. Unsolicited introductions are bad for both

parties. Some large-hearted women of society are too generous by

half in this way. A lady should by adroit questions find out how a

new acquaintance would be received, whether or not it is the

desire of both parties to know each other; for, if there is the

slightest doubt existing on this point, she will be blamed by

both. It is often the good-natured desire of a sympathetic person

that the people whom she knows well should know each other. She

therefore strives to bring them together at lunch or dinner, but

perhaps finds out afterwards that one of the ladies has particular

objections to knowing the other, and she is not thanked. The

disaffected lady shows her displeasure by being impolite to the

pushing lady, as she may consider her. Had no introduction taken

place, she argues, she might have Still enjoyed a reputation for

politeness. Wary women of the world are therefore very shy of

introducing two women to each other.

 

This is the awkward side. The more agreeable and, we may say,

humane side has its thousands and thousands of supporters, who

believe that a friendly introduction hurts no one; but we are now

not talking of kindness, but of etiquette, which is decidedly

opposed to indiscriminate introductions.

 

Society is such a complicated organization, and its laws are so

lamentably unwritten, yet so deeply engraved on certain minds,

that these things become important to those who are always winding

and unwinding the chains of fashion.

 

It is therefore well to state it as a received rule that no

gentleman should ever be introduced to a lady unless her

permission has been asked, and she be given an opportunity to

refuse; and that no woman should be introduced formally to another

woman unless the introducer has consulted the wishes of both

women. No delicate-minded person would ever intrude herself upon

the notice of a person to whom she had been casually introduced in

a friend’s drawing-room; but all the world, unfortunately, is not

made up of delicate-minded persons.

 

In making an introduction, the gentleman is presented to the lady

with some such informal speech as this: “Mrs. A, allow me to

present Mr. B;” or, “Mrs. A, Mr. B desires the