Leave-taking in a letter is the same:

"Good-by, dearest, for to-day. Devotedly, Kate."

Or:

"Best love to you all, Martin."

Or:

"Will write again in a day or two. Lovingly, Mary."

Or:

"Luncheon was announced half a page ago! So good-by, dear Mary, for to-day."

The close of a less intimate letter, like taking leave of a visitor in your drawing-room, is necessarily more ceremonious. And the "ceremonious close" presents to most people the greatest difficulty in letter-writing.

It is really quite simple, if you realize that the aim of the closing paragraph is merely to bring in a personal hyphen between the person writing and the person written to.

"The mountains were beautiful at sunset." It is a bad closing sentence because "the mountains" have nothing personal to either of you. But if you can add "—they reminded me of the time we were in Colorado together," or "—how different from our wide prairies at home," you have crossed a bridge, as it were.

Or:

"We have had a wonderful trip, but I do miss you all at home, and long to hear from you soon again."

Or (from one at home):

"Your closed house makes me very lonely to pass. I do hope you are coming back soon."

Sometimes an ending falls naturally into a sentence that ends with your signature. "If I could look up now and see you coming into the room, there would be no happier woman in the whole State than

Your devoted mother."

LETTERS NO ONE CARES TO READ

LETTERS OF CALAMITY

First and foremost in the category of letters that no one can possibly receive with pleasure might be put the "letter of calamity," the letter of gloomy apprehension, the letter filled with petty annoyances. Less disturbing to receive but far from enjoyable are such letters as "the blank," the "meandering," the "letter of the capital I," the "plaintive," the "apologetic." There is scarcely any one who has not one or more relatives or friends whose letters belong in one of these classes.

Even in so personal a matter as the letter to an absent member of one's immediate family, it should be borne in mind, not to write needlessly of misfortune or unhappiness. To hear from those we love how ill or unhappy they are, is to have our distress intensified in direct proportion to the number of miles by which we are separated from them. This last example, however, has nothing in common with the choosing of calamity and gloom as a subject of welcome tidings in ordinary correspondence.

The chronic calamity writers seem to wait until the skies are darkest, and then, rushing to their desk, luxuriate in pouring all their troubles and fears of troubles out on paper to their friends.

LETTERS OF GLOOMY APPREHENSION

"My little Betty ["My little" adds to the pathos much more than saying merely "Betty"] has been feeling miserable for several days. I am worried to death about her, as there are so many sudden cases of typhoid and appendicitis. The doctor says the symptoms are not at all alarming as yet, but doctors see so much of illness and death, they don't seem to appreciate what anxiety means to a mother," etc.

Another writes: "The times seem to be getting worse and worse. I always said we would have to go through a long night before any chance of daylight. You can mark my words, the night of bad times isn't much more than begun."

Or, "I have scarcely slept for nights, worrying about whether Junior has passed his examinations or not."

LETTERS OF PETTY MISFORTUNES

Other perfectly well-meaning friends fancy they are giving pleasure when they write such "news" as: "My cook has been sick for the past ten days," and follow this with a page or two descriptive of her ailments; or, "I have a slight cough. I think I must have caught it yesterday when I went out in the rain without rubbers"; or, "The children have not been doing as well in their lessons this week as last. Johnny's arithmetic marks were dreadful and Katie got an E in spelling and an F in geography." Her husband and her mother would be interested in the children's weekly reports, and her own slight cough, but no one else. How could they be?

If the writers of all such letters would merely read over what they have written, and ask themselves if they could find pleasure in receiving messages of like manner and matter, perhaps they might begin to do a little thinking, and break the habit of cataleptic unthinkingness that seemingly descends upon them as soon as they are seated at their desk.

THE BLANK

The writer of the "blank" letter begins fluently with the date and "Dear Mary," and then sits and chews his penholder or makes little dots and squares and circles on the blotter-utterly unable to attack the cold, forbidding blankness of that first page. Mentally, he seems to say: "Well, here I am—and now what?" He has not an idea! He can never find anything of sufficient importance to write about. A murder next door, a house burned to the ground, a burglary or an elopement could alone furnish material; and that, too, would be finished off in a brief sentence stating the bare fact.

A person whose life is a revolving wheel of routine may have really very little to say, but a letter does not have to be long to be welcome—it can be very good indeed if it has a message that seems to have been spoken.

Dear Lucy:

"Life here is as dull as ever—duller if anything. Just the same old things done in the same old way—not even a fire engine out or a new face in town, but this is to show you that I am thinking of you and longing to hear from you."

Or: "I wish something really exciting would happen so that I might have something with a little thrill in it to write you, but everything goes on and on—if there were any check in its sameness, I think we'd all land in a heap against the edge of the town."

THE MEANDERING LETTER

As its name implies, the meandering letter is one which dawdles through disconnected subjects, like a trolley car gone down grade off the track, through fences and fields and flower-beds indiscriminately. "Mrs. Blake's cow died last week, the Governor and his wife were on the Reception Committee; Mary Selfridge went to stay with her aunt in Riverview; I think the new shade called Harding blue is perfectly hideous."

Another that is almost akin to it, runs glibly on, page after page of meaningless repetition and detail. "I thought at first that I would get a gray dress—I think gray is such a pretty color, and I have had so many blue dresses. I can't decide this time whether to get blue or gray. Sometimes I think gray is more becoming to me than blue. I think gray looks well on fair-haired people—I don't know whether you would call my hair fair or not? I am certainly not dark, and yet fair hair suggests a sort of straw color. Maybe I might be called medium fair. Do you think I am light enough to wear gray? Maybe blue would be more serviceable. Gray certainly looks pretty in the spring, it is so clean and fresh looking. There is a lovely French model at Benson's in gray, but I can have it copied for less in blue. Maybe it won't be as pretty though as the gray," etc., etc. By the above method of cud-chewing, any subject, clothes, painting the house, children's school, planting a garden, or even the weather, need be limited only by the supply of paper and ink.

THE LETTER OF THE "CAPITAL I"

The letter of the "capital I" is a pompous effusion which strives through pretentiousness to impress its reader with its writer's wealth, position, ability, or whatever possession or attribute is thought to be rated most highly. None but unfortunate dependents or the cringing in spirit would subject themselves to a second letter of this kind by answering the first. The letter which hints at hoped-for benefits is no worse!

THE LETTER OF CHRONIC APOLOGY

The letter written by a person with an apologetic habit of mind, is different totally from the sometimes necessary letter of genuine apology. The former is as senseless as it is irritating:

"It was so good of you to come to my horrid little shanty. [The house and the food she served were both probably better than that of the person she is writing to.] I know you had nothing fit to eat, and I know that everything was just all wrong! Of course, everything is always so beautifully done at everything you give, I wonder I have the courage to ask you to dine with me."

THE DANGEROUS LETTER

A pitfall that those of sharp wit have to guard against is the thoughtless tendency toward writing ill-natured things. Ridicule is a much more amusing medium for the display of a subject than praise, which is always rather bromidic. The amusing person catches foibles and exploits them, and it is easy to forget that wit flashes all too irresistibly at the expense of other people's feelings, and the brilliant tongue is all too often sharpened to rapier point. Admiration for the quickness of a spoken quip, somewhat mitigates its cruelty. The exuberance of the retailer of verbal gossip eliminates the implication of scandals but both quip and gossip become deadly poison when transferred permanently to paper.

PERMANENCE OF WRITTEN EMOTION

For all emotions written words are a bad medium. The light jesting tone that saves a quip from offense can not be expressed; and remarks that if spoken would amuse, can but pique and even insult their subject. Without the interpretation of the voice, gaiety becomes levity, raillery becomes accusation. Moreover, words of a passing moment are made to stand forever.

Anger in a letter carries with it the effect of solidified fury; the words spoken in reproof melt with the breath of the speaker once the cause is forgiven. The written words on the page fix them for eternity.

Love in a letter endures likewise forever.

Admonitions from parents to their children may very properly be put on paper—they are meant to endure, and be remembered, but momentary annoyance should never be more than briefly expressed. There is no better way of insuring his letters against being read than for a parent to get into the habit of writing irritable or faultfinding letters to his children.

THE LETTERS OF TWO WIVES

Do you ever see a man look through a stack of mail, and notice that suddenly his face lights up as he seizes a letter "from home"? He tears it open eagerly, his mouth up-curving at the corners, as he lingers over every word. You know, without being told, that the wife he had to leave behind puts all the best she can devise and save for him into his life as well as on paper!

Do you ever see a man go through his mail and see him suddenly droop—as, though a fog had fallen upon his spirits? Do you see him reluctantly pick out a letter, start to open it, hesitate and then push it aside? His expression says plainly: "I can't face that just now." Then by and by, when his lips have been set in a hard line, he will doggedly open his letter to "see what the trouble is now."

If for once there is no trouble, he sighs with relief, relaxes, and starts the next thing he has to do.

Usually, though, he frowns, looks worried, annoyed, harassed, and you know that every small unpleasantness is punctiliously served to him by one who promised to love and to cherish and who probably thinks she does!

THE LETTER EVERYONE LOVES TO RECEIVE

The letter we all love to receive is one that carries so much of the writer's personality that she seems to be sitting beside us, looking at us directly and talking just as she really would, could she have come on a magic carpet, instead of sending her proxy in ink-made characters on mere paper.

Let us suppose we have received one of those perfect letters from Mary, one of those letters that seem almost to have written themselves, so easily do the words flow, so bubbling and effortless is their spontaneity. There is a great deal in the letter about Mary, not only about what she has been doing, but what she has been thinking, or perhaps, feeling. And there is a lot about us in the letter—nice things, that make us feel rather pleased about something that we have done, or are likely to do, or that some one has said about us. We know that all things of concern to us are of equal concern to Mary, and though there will be nothing of it in actual words, we are made to feel that we are just as secure in our corner of Mary's heart as ever we were. And we finish the letter with a very vivid remembrance of Mary's sympathy, and a sense of loss in her absence, and a longing for the time when Mary herself may again be sitting on the sofa beside us and telling us all the details her letter can not but leave out.

THE LETTER NO WOMAN SHOULD EVER WRITE

The mails carry letters every day that are so many packages of TNT should their contents be exploded by falling into wrong hands. Letters that should never have been written are put in evidence in court rooms every day. Many can not, under any circumstances, be excused; but often silly girls and foolish women write things that sound quite different from what, they innocently, but stupidly, intended.

Few persons, except professional writers, have the least idea of the value of words and the effect that they produce, and the thoughtless letters of emotional women and underbred men add sensation to news items in the press almost daily.

Of course the best advice to a young girl who is impelled to write letters to men, can be put in one word, don't!

However, if you are a young girl or woman, and are determined to write letters to an especial—or any other—man, no matter how innocent your intention may be, there are some things you must remember—remember so intensely that no situation in life, no circumstances, no temptation, can ever make you forget. They are a few set rules, not of etiquette, but of the laws of self-respect:

Never send a letter without reading it over and making sure that you have said nothing that can possibly "sound different" from what you intend to say.

Never so long as you live, write a letter to a man—no matter who he is—that you would be ashamed to see in a newspaper above your signature.

Remember that every word of writing is immutable evidence for or against you, and words which are thoughtlessly put on paper may exist a hundred years hence.

Never write anything that can be construed as sentimental.

Never take a man to task about anything; never ask for explanations; to do so implies too great an intimacy.

Never put a single clinging tentacle into writing. Say nothing ever, that can be construed as demanding, asking, or even being eager for, his attentions!

Always keep in mind and never for one instant forget that a third person, and that the very one you would most object to, may find and read the letter.

One word more: It is not alone "bad form" but laying yourself open to every sort of embarrassment and danger, to "correspond with" a man you slightly know.

PROPER LETTERS OF LOVE OR AFFECTION

If you are engaged, of course you should write love letters—the most beautiful that you can—but don't write baby-talk and other sillinesses that would make you feel idiotic if the letter were to fall into strange hands.

On the other hand, few can find objection to the natural, friendly and even affectionate letter from a young girl to a young man she has been "brought up" with. It is such a letter as she would write to her brother. There is no hint of coquetry or self-consciousness, no word from first to last that might not be shouted aloud before her whole family. Her letter may begin "Dear" or even "Dearest Jack." Then follows all the "home news" she can think of that might possibly interest him; about the Simpsons' dance, Tom and Pauline's engagement, how many trout Bill Henderson got at Duck Brook, how furious Mrs. Davis was because some distinguished visitor accepted Mrs. Brown's dinner instead of hers, how the new people who have moved onto the Rush farm don't know the first thing about farming, and so on.

Perhaps there will be one "personal" line such as "we all missed you at the picnic on Wednesday—Ollie made the flap-jacks and they were too awful! Every one groaned: 'If Jack were only here!'" Or, "we all hope you are coming back in time for the Towns' dance. Kate has at last inveigled her mother into letting her have an all-black dress which we rather suspect was bought with the especial purpose of impressing you with her advanced age and dignity! Mother came in just as I wrote this and says to tell you she has a new recipe for chocolate cake that is even better than her old one, and that you had better have a piece added to your belt before you come home. Carrie will write you very soon, she says, and we all send love.

"Affectionately, "Ruth."

THE LETTER NO GENTLEMAN WRITES

One of the fundamental rules for the behavior of any man who has the faintest pretension to being a gentleman, is that never by word or gesture must he compromise a woman; he never, therefore, writes a letter that can be construed, even by a lawyer, as damaging to any woman's good name.

His letters to an unmarried woman may express all the ardor and devotion that he cares to subscribe to, but there must be no hint of his having received especial favors from her.

DON'TS FOR CORRESPONDENCE

Never typewrite an invitation, acceptance, or regret.

Never typewrite a social note.

Be chary of underscorings and postscripts.

Do not write across a page already written on.

Do not use unmatched paper and envelopes.

Do not write in pencil—except a note to one of your family written on a train or where ink is unprocurable, or unless you are flat on your back because of illness.

Never send a letter with a blot on it.

Never sprinkle French, Italian, or any other foreign words through a letter written in English. You do not give an impression of cultivation, but of ignorance of your own language. Use a foreign word if it has no English equivalent, not otherwise unless it has become Anglicized. If hesitating between two words, always select the one of Saxon origin rather than Latin. For the best selection of words to use, study the King James version of the Bible.



CHAPTER XXIX

THE FUNDAMENTALS OF GOOD BEHAVIOR

Far more important than any mere dictum of etiquette is the fundamental code of honor, without strict observance of which no man, no matter how "polished," can be considered a gentleman. The honor of a gentleman demands the inviolability of his word, and the incorruptibility of his principles; he is the descendant of the knight, the crusader; he is the defender of the defenseless, and the champion of justice—or he is not a gentleman.

DECENCIES OF BEHAVIOR

A gentleman does not, and a man who aspires to be one must not, ever borrow money from a woman, nor should he, except in unexpected circumstances, borrow money from a man. Money borrowed without security is a debt of honor which must be paid without fail and promptly as possible. The debts incurred by a deceased parent, brother, sister, or grown child, are assumed by honorable men and women, as debts of honor.

A gentleman never takes advantage of a woman in a business dealing, nor of the poor or the helpless.

One who is not well off does not "sponge," but pays his own way to the utmost of his ability.

One who is rich does not make a display of his money or his possessions. Only a vulgarian talks ceaselessly about how much this or that cost him.

A very well-bred man intensely dislikes the mention of money, and never speaks of it (out of business hours) if he can avoid it.

A gentleman never discusses his family affairs either in public or with acquaintances, nor does he speak more than casually about his wife. A man is a cad who tells anyone, no matter who, what his wife told him in confidence, or describes what she looks like in her bedroom. To impart details of her beauty is scarcely better than to publish her blemishes; to do either is unspeakable.

Nor does a gentleman ever criticise the behavior of a wife whose conduct is scandalous. What he says to her in the privacy of their own apartments is no one's affair but his own, but he must never treat her with disrespect before their children, or a servant, or any one.

A man of honor never seeks publicly to divorce his wife, no matter what he believes her conduct to have been; but for the protection of his own name, and that of the children, he allows her to get her freedom on other than criminal grounds. No matter who he may be, whether rich, or poor, in high life or low, the man who publicly besmirches his wife's name, besmirches still more his own, and proves that he is not, was not, and never will be, a gentleman.

No gentleman goes to a lady's house if he is affected by alcohol. A gentleman seeing a young man who is not entirely himself in the presence of ladies, quietly induces the youth to depart. An older man addicted to the use of too much alcohol, need not be discussed, since he ceases to be asked to the houses of ladies.

A gentleman does not lose control of his temper. In fact, in his own self-control under difficult or dangerous circumstances, lies his chief ascendancy over others who impulsively betray every emotion which animates them. Exhibitions of anger, fear, hatred, embarrassment, ardor or hilarity, are all bad form in public. And bad form is merely an action which "jars" the sensibilities of others. A gentleman does not show a letter written by a lady, unless perhaps to a very intimate friend if the letter is entirely impersonal and written by some one who is equally the friend of the one to whom it is shown. But the occasions when the letter of a woman may be shown properly by a man are so few that it is safest to make it a rule never to mention a woman's letter.

A gentleman does not bow to a lady from a club window; nor according to good form should ladies ever be discussed in a man's club!

A man whose social position is self-made is apt to be detected by his continual cataloguing of prominent names. Mr. Parvenu invariably interlards his conversation with, "When I was dining at the Bobo Gilding's"; or even "at Lucy Gilding's," and quite often accentuates, in his ignorance, those of rather second-rate, though conspicuous position. "I was spending last week-end with the Richan Vulgars," or "My great friends, the Gotta Crusts." When a so-called gentleman insists on imparting information, interesting only to the Social Register, shun him!

The born gentleman avoids the mention of names exactly as he avoids the mention of what things cost; both are an abomination to his soul.

A gentleman's manners are an integral part of him and are the same whether in his dressing-room or in a ballroom, whether in talking to Mrs. Worldly or to the laundress bringing in his clothes. He whose manners are only put on in company is a veneered gentleman, not a real one.

A man of breeding does not slap strangers on the back nor so much as lay his finger-tips on a lady. Nor does he punctuate his conversation by pushing or nudging or patting people, nor take his conversation out of the drawing-room! Notwithstanding the advertisements in the most dignified magazines, a discussion of underwear and toilet articles and their merit or their use, is unpleasant in polite conversation.

All thoroughbred people are considerate of the feelings of others no matter what the station of the others may be. Thackeray's climber who "licks the boots of those above him and kicks the faces of those below him on the social ladder," is a, very good illustration of what a gentleman is not.

A gentleman never takes advantage of another's helplessness or ignorance, and assumes that no gentleman will take advantage of him.

SIMPLICITY AND UNCONSCIOUSNESS OF SELF

These words have been literally sprinkled through the pages of this book, yet it is doubtful if they convey a clear idea of the attributes meant.

Unconsciousness of self is not so much unselfishness as it is the mental ability to extinguish all thought of one's self—exactly as one turns out the light.

Simplicity is like it, in that it also has a quality of self-effacement, but it really means a love of the essential and of directness. Simple people put no trimmings on their phrases, nor on their manners; but remember, simplicity is not crudeness nor anything like it. On the contrary, simplicity of speech and manners means language in its purest, most limpid form, and manners of such perfection that they do not suggest "manner" at all.

THE INSTINCTS OF A LADY

The instincts of a lady are much the same as those of a gentleman. She is equally punctilious about her debts, equally averse to pressing her advantage; especially if her adversary is helpless or poor.

As an unhappy wife, her dignity demands that she never show her disapproval of her husband, no matter how publicly he slights or outrages her. If she has been so unfortunate as to have married a man not a gentleman, to draw attention to his behavior would put herself on his level. If it comes actually to the point where she divorces him, she discusses her situation, naturally, with her parents or her brother or whoever are her nearest and wisest relatives, but she shuns publicity and avoids discussing her affairs with any one outside of her immediate family. One can not too strongly censure the unspeakable vulgarity of the woman so unfortunate as to be obliged to go through divorce proceedings, who confides the private details of her life to reporters.

THE HALL-MARK OF THE CLIMBER

Nothing so blatantly proclaims a woman climber as the repetition of prominent names, the owners of which she must have struggled to know. Otherwise, why so eagerly boast of the achievement? Nobody cares whom she knows—nobody that is, but a climber like herself. To those who were born and who live, no matter how quietly, in the security of a perfectly good ledge above and away from the social ladder's rungs, the evidence of one frantically climbing and trying to vaunt her exalted position is merely ludicrous.

All thoroughbred women, and men, are considerate of others less fortunately placed, especially of those in their employ. One of the tests by which to distinguish between the woman of breeding and the woman merely of wealth, is to notice the way she speaks to dependents. Queen Victoria's duchesses, those great ladies of grand manner, were the very ones who, on entering the house of a close friend, said "How do you do, Hawkins?" to a butler; and to a sister duchess's maid, "Good morning, Jenkins." A Maryland lady, still living on the estate granted to her family three generations before the Revolution, is quite as polite to her friends' servants as to her friends themselves. When you see a woman in silks and sables and diamonds speak to a little errand girl or a footman or a scullery maid as though they were the dirt under her feet, you may be sure of one thing; she hasn't come a very long way from the ground herself.



CHAPTER XXX

CLUBS AND CLUB ETIQUETTE

A club, as every one knows, is merely an organization of people—men or women or both—who establish club rooms, in which they meet at specified times for specified purposes, or which they use casually and individually. A club's membership may be limited to a dozen or may include several thousands, and the procedure in joining a club may be easy or difficult, according to the type of club and the standing of the would-be member.

Membership in many athletic associations may be had by walking in and paying dues; also many country golf-clubs are as free to the public as country inns; but joining a purely social club of rank and exclusiveness is a very different matter. A man to be eligible for membership in such a club must not only be completely a gentleman, but he must have friends among the members who like him enough to be willing to propose him and second him and write letters for him; and furthermore he must be disliked by no one—at least not sufficiently for any member to object seriously to his company.

There are two ways of joining a club; by invitation and by making application or having it made for you. To join by invitation means that you are invited when the club is started to be one of the founders or charter members, or if you are a distinguished citizen you may at the invitation of the governors become an honorary member, or in a small or informal club you may become an ordinary member by invitation or suggestion of the governors that you would be welcome. A charter member pays dues, but not always an initiation fee; an honorary member pays neither dues nor initiation, he is really a permanent guest of the club. A life member is one who pays his dues for twenty years or so in a lump sum, and is exempted from dues even if he lives to be a hundred. Few clubs have honorary members and none have more than half a dozen, so that this type of membership may as well be disregarded.

The ordinary members of a club are either resident, meaning that they live within fifty miles of the club; or non-resident, living beyond that distance and paying less dues but having the same privileges.

In certain of the London clubs, one or two New York ones, and the leading club in several other cities, it is not unusual for a boy's name to be put up for membership as soon as he is born. If his name comes up while he is a minor, it is laid aside until after his twenty-first birthday and then put at the head of the list of applicants and voted upon at the next meeting of the governors.

In all clubs in which membership is limited and much sought after, the waiting list is sure to be long and a name takes anywhere from five to more than ten years to come up.

HOW A NAME IS "PUT UP"

Since a gentleman is scarcely likely to want to join a club in which the members are not his friends, he tells a member of his family, or an intimate friend, that he would like to join the Nearby Club, and adds, "Do you mind putting me up? I will ask Dick to second me." The friend says, "I'll be very glad to," and Dick says the same. It is still more likely that the suggestion to join comes from a friend, who says one day, "Why don't you join the Nearby Club? It would be very convenient for you." The other says, "I think I should like to," and the first replies, "Let me put you up, and Dick will be only too glad to second you."

It must be remembered that a gentleman has no right to ask any one who is not really one of his best friends to propose or second him. It is an awkward thing to refuse in the first place, and in the second it involves considerable effort, and on occasion a great deal of annoyance and trouble.

For example let us suppose that Jim Smartlington asks Donald Lovejoy to propose him and Clubwin Doe to second him. His name is written in the book kept for the purpose and signed by both proposer and seconder:

Smartlington, James Proposer: Donald Lovejoy Seconder: Clubwin Doe

Nothing more is done until the name is posted—meaning that it appears among a list of names put up on the bulletin-board in the club house. It is then the duty of Lovejoy and Doe each to write a letter of endorsement to the governors of the club, to be read by them when they hold the meeting at which his name comes up for election.

Example:

Board of Governors, The Nearby Club.

Dear sirs:

It affords me much pleasure to propose for membership in the Nearby Club Mr. James Smartlington. I have known Mr. Smartlington for many years and consider him qualified in every way for membership.

He is a graduate of Yalvard, class 1916, rowed on the Varsity crew, and served in the 180th, as 1st Lieut., overseas during the war. He is now in his father's firm (Jones, Smartlington & Co.).

Yours very truly, Donald Lovejoy.

Lovejoy must also at once tell Smartlington to ask about six friends who are club-members (but not governors) to write letters endorsing him. Furthermore, the candidate can not come up for election unless he knows several of the governors personally, who can vouch for him at the meeting. Therefore Lovejoy and Doe must one or the other take Smartlington to several governors (at their offices generally) and personally present him, or very likely they invite two or three of the governors and Smartlington to lunch.

Even under the best of circumstances it is a nuisance for a busy man to have to make appointments at the offices of other busy men. And since it is uncertain which of the governors will be present at any particular meeting, it is necessary to introduce the candidate to a sufficient number so that at least two among those at the meeting will be able to speak for him.

In the example we have chosen, Clubwin Doe, having himself been a governor and knowing most of the present ones very well, has less difficulty in presenting his candidate to them than many other members might have, who, though they have for years belonged to the club, have used it so seldom that they know few, if any, of the governors even by sight.

At the leading woman's club of New York, the governors appoint an hour on several afternoons before elections when they are in the visitors' rooms at the club house on purpose to meet the candidates whom their proposers must present. This would certainly seem a more practicable method, to say nothing of its being easier for everyone concerned, than the masculine etiquette which requires that the governors be stalked one by one, to the extreme inconvenience and loss of time and occasionally the embarrassment of every one.

As already said, Jim Smartlington, having unusually popular and well-known sponsors and being also very well liked himself, is elected with little difficulty.

But take the case of young Breezy: He was put up by two not well-known members, who wrote half-hearted endorsements themselves and did nothing about getting letters from others; they knew none of the governors, and trusted that two who knew Breezy slightly "would do." His casual proposer forgot that enemies write letters as well as friends—and that moreover enmity is active where friendship is often passive. Two men who disliked his "manner" wrote that they considered him "unsuitable," and as he had no friends strong enough to stand up for him, he was turned down. A gentleman is rarely "black-balled," as such an action could not fail to injure him in the eyes of the world. (The expression "black ball" comes from the custom of voting for a member by putting a white ball in a ballot box, or against him by putting in a black one.) If a candidate is likely to receive a black ball, the governors do not vote on him at all, but inform the proposer that the name of his candidate would better be withdrawn. Later on, if the objection to him is disproved or overcome, his name can again be put up.

The more popular the candidate, the less work there is for his proposer and seconder. A stranger—if he is not a member of the representative club in his own city—would have need of strong friends to elect him to an exclusive one in another, and an unpopular man has no chance at all.

However, in all except very rare instances events run smoothly; the candidate is voted on at a meeting of the board of governors and is elected.

A notice is mailed to him next morning, telling him that he has been elected and that his initiation fee and his dues make a total of so much. The candidate thereupon at once draws his check for the amount and mails it. As soon as the secretary has had ample time to receive the check, the new member is free to use the club as much or as little as he cares to.

THE NEW MEMBER

The new member usually, but not necessarily, goes for the first time to a club with his proposer or his seconder, or at least an old member; for since in exclusive clubs visitors living in the same city are never given the privilege of the club, none but members can know their way about. Let us say he goes for lunch or dinner, at which he is host, and his friend imparts such unwritten information as: "That chair in the window is where old Gotrox always sits; don't occupy it when you see him coming in or he will be disagreeable to everybody for a week." Or "They always play double stakes at this table, so don't sit at it, unless you mean to." Or "That's Double coming in now, avoid him at bridge as you would the plague." "The roasts are always good and that waiter is the best in the room," etc.

A new member is given—or should ask for—a copy of the Club Book, which contains besides the list of the members, the constitution and the by-laws or "house rules," which he must study carefully and be sure to obey.

COUNTRY CLUBS

Country clubs are as a rule less exclusive and less expensive than the representative city clubs, but those like the Myopia Hunt, the Tuxedo, the Saddle and Cycle, the Burlingame, and countless others in between, are many of them more expensive to belong to than any clubs in London or New York, and are precisely the same in matters of membership and management. They are also quite as difficult to be elected to as any of the exclusive clubs in the cities—more so if anything, because they are open to the family and friends of every member, whereas in a man's club in a city his membership gives the privilege of the club to no one but himself personally. The test question always put by the governors at elections is: "Are the candidate's friends as well as his family likely to be agreeable to the present members of the Club?" If not, he is not admitted.

Nearly all country clubs have, however, one open door—unknown to city ones. People taking houses in the neighborhood are often granted "season privileges"; meaning that on being proposed by a member and upon paying a season subscription, new householders are accepted as transient guests. In some clubs this season subscription may be indefinitely renewed; in others a man must come up for regular election at the end of three months or six or a year.

Apart from what may be called the few representative and exclusive country clubs, there are hundreds—more likely thousands—which have very simple requirements for membership. The mere form of having one or two members vouch for a candidate's integrity and good behavior is sufficient.

Golf clubs, hunting clubs, political or sports clubs have special membership qualifications; all good golf players are as a rule welcomed at all golf clubs; all huntsmen at hunting clubs, and yet the Myopia would not think of admitting the best rider ever known if he was not unquestionably a gentleman. But this is unusual. As a rule, the great player is welcomed in any club specially devoted to the sport in which he excels.

In many clubs a stranger may be given a three (sometimes it is six) months' transient membership, available in some instances to foreigners only; in others to strangers living beyond a certain distance. A name is proposed and seconded by two members and then voted on by the governors, or the house committee.

The best known and most distinguished club of New England has an "Annex" in which there are dining-rooms to which ladies as well as gentlemen who are not members are admitted, and this annex plan has since been followed by others elsewhere.

All men's clubs have private dining-rooms in which members can give stag dinners, but the representative men's clubs exclude ladies absolutely from ever crossing their thresholds.

WOMEN'S CLUBS

Excepting that the luxurious women's club has an atmosphere that a man rarely knows how to give to the interior of a house, no matter how architecturally perfect it may be, there is no difference between women's and men's clubs.

In every State of the Union there are women's clubs of every kind and grade; social, political, sports, professional; some housed in enormous and perfect buildings constructed for them, and some perhaps in only a room or two.

When the pioneer women's club of New York was started, a club that aspired to be in the same class as the most important men's club, various governors of the latter were unflatteringly outspoken; women could not possibly run a club as it should be run—it was unthinkable that they should be foolish enough to attempt it! And the husbands and fathers of the founders expected to have to dig down in their pockets to make up the deficit; forgetting entirely that the running of a club is merely the running of a house on a large scale, and that women, not men, are the perfect housekeepers. To-day, no clubs anywhere are more perfect in appointment or better run than the representative women's clubs. In fact, some of the men's clubs have been forced to follow the lead of the foremost of them and to realize that a club in which members merely sit about and look out of the window is a pretty dull place to the type of younger members they most want to attract, and that the combination of the comfort and smartness of a perfectly run private house with every equipment for athletics, is becoming the ideal in club-life and club-building to-day.

GOOD MANNERS IN CLUBS

Good manners in clubs are the same as good manners elsewhere—only a little more so. A club is for the pleasure and convenience of many; it is never intended as a stage-setting for a "star" or "clown" or "monologist." There is no place where a person has greater need of restraint and consideration for the reserves of others than in a club. In every club there is a reading-room or library where conversation is not allowed; there are books and easy chairs and good light for reading both by day and night; and it is one of the unbreakable rules not to speak to anybody who is reading—or writing.

When two people are sitting by themselves and talking, another should on no account join them unless he is an intimate friend of both. To be a mere acquaintance, or, still less, to have been introduced to one of them, gives no privilege whatever.

The fact of being a club member does not (except in a certain few especially informal clubs) grant any one the right to speak to strangers. If a new member happens to find no one in the club whom he knows, he goes about his own affairs. He either sits down and reads or writes, or "looks out of the window," or plays solitaire, or occupies himself as he would if he were alone in a hotel.

It is courteous of a governor or habitual member, on noticing a new member or a visitor, especially one who seems to be rather at a loss—to go up and speak to him, but the latter must on no account be the one to speak first. Certain New York and Boston clubs, as well as those of London, have earned a reputation for snobbishness because the members never speak to those they do not know. Through no intent to be disagreeable, but just because it is not customary, New York people do not speak to those they do not know, and it does not occur to them that strangers feel slighted until they themselves are given the same medicine in London; or going elsewhere in America, they appreciate the courtesy and kindness of the South and West.

The fundamental rule for behavior in a club is the same as in the drawing-room of a private house. In other words, heels have no place on furniture, ashes belong in ash-receivers, books should not be abused, and all evidence of exercising should be confined to the courts or courses and the locker room. Many people who wouldn't think of lolling around the house in unfit attire, come trooping into country clubs with their steaming faces, clammy shirts, and rumpled hair, giving too awful evidence of recent exertion, and present fitness for the bathtub.

THE PERFECT CLUBMAN

The perfect clubman is another word for the perfect gentleman. He never allows himself to show irritability to any one, he makes it a point to be courteous to a new member or an old member's guest. He scrupulously observes the rules of the club, he discharges his card debts at the table, he pays his share always, with an instinctive horror of sponging, and lastly, he treats everyone with the same consideration which he expects—and demands—from them.

THE INFORMAL CLUB

The informal club is often more suggestive of a fraternity than a club, in that every member speaks to every other—always. In one of the best known of this type, the members are artists, authors, scientists, sportsmen and other thinkers and doers. There is a long table set every day for lunch at which the members gather and talk, every one to every one else. There is another dining-room where solitary members may sit by themselves or bring in outsiders if they care to. None but members sit at the "round" table which isn't "round" in the least!

The informal club is always a comparatively small one, but the method of electing members varies. In some, it is customary to take the vote of the whole club, in others members are elected by the governors first, and then asked to join. In this case no man may ask to have his name put up. In others the conventional methods are followed.

THE VISITORS IN A CLUB

In every club in the United States a member is allowed to "introduce" a stranger (living at least fifty miles away) for a length of time varying with the by-laws of the club. In some clubs guests may be put up for a day only, in others the privilege extends for two weeks or more.

Many clubs allow each member a certain number of visitors a year; in others visitors are unlimited. But in all city clubs the same guest can not be introduced twice within the year. In country clubs visitors may always be brought in by members in unlimited numbers.

As a rule when a member introduces a stranger, he takes him to the club personally, writes his name in the visitors' book, and introduces him to those who may be in the room at the time—very possibly asking another member whom he knows particularly well to "look out" for his guest. If for some reason it is not possible for the stranger's host to take him to the club, he writes to the secretary of the club for a card of introduction.

Example:

Secretary, The Town Club.

Dear Sir:

Kindly send Mr. A.M. Strangleigh a card extending the privileges of the Club for one week.

Mr. Strangleigh is a resident of London.

Yours very truly, Clubwin Doe.

The secretary then sends a card to Mr. Strangleigh:

The Town Club

Extends its privileges to

Mr. [HW: Strangleigh]

from [HW: Jan. 7.] to [HW: Jan. 14.]

Through the courtesy of

Mr. [HW: Clubwin Doe]

Mr. Strangleigh goes to the club by himself. A visitor who has been given the privileges of the club has, during the time of his visit, all the rights of a member excepting that he is not allowed to introduce others to the club, and he can not give a dinner in the private dining-room. Strict etiquette also demands, if he wishes to ask several members to dine with him, that he take them to a restaurant rather than into the club dining-room, since the club is their home and he is a stranger in it. He may ask a member whom he knows well to lunch with him in the club rooms, but he must not ask one whom he knows only slightly. As accounts are sent to the member who put him up—unless the guest arranges at the club's office to have his charges rendered to himself, he must be punctilious to ask for his bill upon leaving, and pay it without question.

Putting a man up at a club never means that the member is "host." The visitor's status throughout his stay is founded on the courtesy of the member who introduced him, and he should try to show an equal courtesy to every one about him. He should remember not to obtrude on the privacy of the members he does not know. He has no right to criticise the management, the rules or the organization of the club. He has, in short, no actual rights at all, and he must not forget that he hasn't!

CLUB ETIQUETTE IN LONDON, PARIS AND NEW YORK

"In a very smart London club" (the words quoted are Clubwin Doe's) "you keep your hat on and glare about! In Paris you take your hat off and behave with such courtesy and politeness as seems to you an affectation. In New York you take your hat off and behave as though the rooms were empty; but as though you were being observed through loop-holes in the walls."

In New York you are introduced occasionally, but you may never ask to be introduced, and you speak only to those you have been introduced to. In London, you are never introduced to any one, but if the member who has taken you with him joins a group and you all sit down together, you talk as you would after dinner in a gentleman's house. But if you are made a temporary member and meet those you have been talking to when you are alone the next day, you do not speak unless spoken to. In Paris, your host punctiliously introduces you to various members and you must just as punctiliously go the next day to their houses and leave your card upon each one! This is customary in the strictly French clubs only. In any one which has members of other nationalities—especially with Americans predominating, or seeming to, American customs obtain. In French clubs a visitor can not go to the club unless he is with a member, but there are no restrictions on the number of times he may be taken by the same member or another one.

UNBREAKABLE RULES

Failure to pay one's debts, or behavior unbefitting a gentleman, is cause for expulsion from every club; which is looked upon in much the same light as expulsion from the Army. In certain cases expulsion for debt may seem unfair, since one may find himself in unexpectedly straitened circumstances, and the greatest fault or crime could not be more severely dealt with than being expelled from his club; but "club honor"—except under very temporary and mitigating conditions—takes no account of any reason for being "unable" to meet his obligations. He must—or he is not considered honorable.

If a man can not afford to belong to a club he must resign while he is still "in good standing." If later on he is able to rejoin, his name is put at the head of the waiting list, and if he was considered a desirable member, he is re-elected at the next meeting of the governors. But a man who has been expelled (unless he can show cause why his expulsion was unjust and be re-instated) can never again belong to that, or be elected to any other, club.



CHAPTER XXXI

GAMES AND SPORTS

The popularity of bridge whist began a quarter of a century ago with the older people and has increased slowly but steadily until it is scarcely an exaggeration to say that those who do not play bridge, which means "auction," are seldom asked out. And the epidemic is just as widespread among girls and boys as among older people. Bridge is always taken seriously; a bumble puppy game won't do at all, even among the youngest players, and other qualifications of character and of etiquette must be observed by every one who would be sought after to "make up a four."

PEOPLE CHARMING TO PLAY BRIDGE WITH

That no one likes a poor partner—or even a poor opponent—goes without saying.

The ideal partner is one who never criticises or even seems to be aware of your mistakes, but on the contrary recognizes a good maneuver on your part, and gives you credit for it whether you win the hand or lose; whereas the inferior player is apt to judge you merely by what you win, and blame your "make" if you "go down," though your play may have been exceptionally good and the loss even occasioned by wrong information which he himself gave you. Also, to be continually found fault with makes you play your worst; whereas appreciation of good judgment on your part acts as a tonic and you play seemingly "better than you know how."

PEOPLE DISLIKED AT THE BRIDGE TABLE

There is nothing which more quickly reveals the veneered gentleman than the card table, and his veneer melts equally with success or failure. Being carried away by the game, he forgets to keep on his company polish, and if he wins, he becomes grasping or overbearing, because of his "skill"; if he loses he sneers at the "luck" of others and seeks to justify himself for the same fault that he criticised a moment before in another.

A trick that is annoying to moderately skilled players, is to have an over-confident opponent throw down his hand saying: "The rest of the tricks are mine!" and often succeed in "putting it over," when it is quite possible that they might not be his if the hand were played out. Knowing themselves to be poorer players, the others are apt not to question it, but they feel none the less that their "rights" have been taken from them.

A rather trying partner is the nervous player, who has no confidence in his own judgment and will invariably pass a good hand in favor of his partner's bid. If, for instance, he has six perfectly good diamonds, he doesn't mention them because, his partner having declared a heart, he thinks to himself "Her hearts must be better than my diamonds." But a much more serious failing—and one that is far more universal—is the habit of overbidding.

OVERBIDDING

In poker you play alone and can therefore play as carefully or as foolishly as you please, but in bridge your partner has to suffer with you, and you therefore are in honor bound to play the best you know how—and the best you know how is as far as can possibly be from overbidding.

Remember that your partner, if he is a good player, counts on you for certain definite cards that you announce by your bid to be in your hand, and raises you accordingly. If you have not these cards you not only lose that particular hand, but destroy his confidence in you, and the next time when he has a legitimate raise for you, he will fail to give it. He disregards you entirely because he is afraid of you! You must study the rules for makes and never under any circumstances give your partner misinformation; this is the most vital rule there is, and any one who disregards it is detested at the bridge table. No matter how great the temptation to make a gambler's bid, you are in honor bound to refrain.

The next essential, if you would be thought "charming," is never to take your partner to task no matter how stupidly he may have "thrown the hand."

DON'TS FOR THOSE WHO WOULD BE SOUGHT AFTER

Don't hold a "post-mortem" on anybody's delinquencies (unless you are actually teaching).

If luck is against you, it will avail nothing to sulk or complain about the "awful" cards you are holding. Your partner is suffering just as much in finding you a "poison vine" as you are in being one—and you can scarcely expect your opponents to be sympathetic. You must learn to look perfectly tranquil and cheerful even though you hold nothing but yarboroughs for days on end, and you must on no account try to defend your own bad play—ever. When you have made a play of poor judgment, the best thing you can say is, "I'm very sorry, partner," and let it go at that.

Always pay close attention to the game. When you are dummy you have certain duties to your partner, and so do not wander around the room until the hand is over. If you don't know what your duties are, read the rules until you know them by heart and then—begin all over again! It is impossible to play any game without a thorough knowledge of the laws that govern it, and you are at fault in making the attempt.

Don't be offended if your partner takes you out of a bid, and don't take him out for the glory of playing the hand. He is quite as anxious to win the rubber as you are. It is unbelievable how many people regard their partner as a third opponent.

MANNERISMS AT THE CARD TABLE

Mannerisms must be avoided like the plague. If there is one thing worse than the horrible "post-mortem," it is the incessant repetition of some jarring habit by one particular player. The most usual and most offensive is that of snapping down a card as played, or bending a "trick" one has taken into a letter "U," or picking it up and trotting it up and down on the table.

Other pet offenses are drumming on the table with one's fingers, making various clicking, whistling, or humming sounds, massaging one's face, scratching one's chin with the cards, or waving the card one is going to play aloft in the air in Smart Alec fashion as though shouting, "I know what you are going to lead! And my card is ready!" All mannerisms that attract attention are in the long run equally unpleasant—even unendurable to one's companions.

Many people whose game is otherwise admirable are rarely asked to play because they have allowed some such silly and annoying habit to take its hold upon them.

THE GOOD LOSER

The good loser makes it an invariable rule never to play for stakes that it will be inconvenient to lose. The neglect of this rule has been responsible for more "bad losers" than anything else, and needless to say a bad loser is about as welcome at a card table as rain at a picnic.

Of course there are people who can take losses beyond their means with perfect cheerfulness and composure. Some few are so imbued with the gambler's instinct that a heavy turn of luck, in either direction, is the salt of life. But the average person is equally embarrassed in winning or losing a stake "that matters" and the only answer is to play for one that doesn't.

GOLF

Golf is a particularly severe strain upon the amiability of the average person's temper, and in no other game, except bridge, is serenity of disposition so essential. No one easily "ruffled" can keep a clear eye on the ball, and exasperation at "lost balls" seemingly bewitches successive ones into disappearing with the completeness and finality of puffs of smoke. In a race or other test of endurance a flare of anger might even help, but in golf it is safe to say that he who loses his temper is pretty sure to lose the game.

Golf players of course know the rules and observe them, but it quite often happens that idlers, having nothing better to do, walk out over a course and "watch the players." If they know the players well, that is one thing, but they have no right to follow strangers. A player who is nervous is easily put off his game, especially if those watching him are so ill-bred as to make audible remarks. Those playing matches of course expect an audience, and erratic and nervous players ought not to go into tournaments—or at least not in two-ball foursomes where they are likely to handicap a partner.

In following a match, onlookers must be careful to stand well within bounds and neither talk nor laugh nor do anything that can possibly distract the attention of the players.

The rule that you should not appoint yourself mentor holds good in golf as well as in bridge and every other game. Unless your advice is asked for, you should not instruct others how to hold their clubs or which ones to use, or how they ought to make the shot.

A young woman must on no account expect the man she happens to be playing with to make her presents of golf-balls, or to caddy for her, nor must she allow him to provide her with a caddy. If she can't afford to hire one of her own, she must either carry her own clubs or not play golf.

OTHER GAMES AND SPORTS

There are fixed rules for the playing of every game—and for proper conduct in every sport. The details of these rules must be studied in the "books of the game," learned from instructors, or acquired by experience. A small boy perhaps learns to fish or swim by himself, but he is taught by his father or a guide—at all events, some one—how and how not to hold a gun, cast a fly, or ride a horse. But apart from the technique of each sport, or the rules of each game, the etiquette—or more correctly, the basic principles of good sportsmanship, are the same.

In no sport or game can any favoritism or evasion of rules be allowed. Sport is based upon impersonal and indiscriminating fairness to every one alike, or it is not "sport."

And to be a good sportsman, one must be a stoic and never show rancor in defeat, or triumph in victory, or irritation, no matter what annoyance is encountered. One who can not help sulking, or explaining, or protesting when the loser, or exulting when the winner, has no right to take part in games and contests.

"PLAYING THE GAME"

If you would be thought to play the game, meaning if you aspire to be a true sportsman, you must follow the rules of sportsmanship the world over:

Never lose your temper.

Play for the sake of playing rather than to win.

Never stop in the middle of a tennis or golf match and complain of a lame ankle, especially if you are losing. Unless it is literally impossible for you to go on, you must stick it out.

If you are a novice, don't ask an expert to play with you, especially as your partner. If he should ask you in spite of your shortcomings, maintain the humility proper to a beginner.

If you are a woman, don't ape the ways and clothing of men. If you are a man, don't take advantage of your superior strength to set a pace beyond the endurance of a woman opponent.

And always give the opponent the benefit of the doubt! Nothing is more important to your standing as a sportsman, though it costs you the particular point in question.

A true sportsman is always a cheerful loser, a quiet winner, with a very frank appreciation of the admirable traits in others, which he seeks to emulate, and his own shortcomings, which he tries to improve.



CHAPTER XXXII

ETIQUETTE IN BUSINESS AND POLITICS

A certain rich man whose appointment to a foreign post of importance was about to be ratified, came into the corridor of a Washington hotel and stopped to speak with a lady for a few moments. During the whole conversation he kept his hat on his head and a cigar in the corner of his mouth. It happened that the lady was the wife of a prominent senator, and she lost no time in reporting the incident to her husband, who in turn brought the matter to the attention of certain of his colleagues with the result that the appointment did not go through.

It is not unlikely that this man thinks "politics played against him," whereas the only factor against him was his exhibition of ill-breeding which proved him unsuitable to represent the dignity of his country.

Etiquette would not seem to play an important part in business, and yet no man can ever tell when its knowledge may be of advantage, or its lack may turn the scale against him. The man who remains "planted" in his chair when a lady (or an older man) speaks to him, who receives customers in his shirt sleeves, who does not take off his hat when talking with a lady and take his cigar out of his mouth when bowing or when addressing her, can never be sure that he is not preparing a witness for the prosecution.

ETIQUETTE IN SMOKING

The above does not mean that a gentleman may never smoke in the presence of ladies—especially in the presence of those who smoke themselves—but a gentleman should not smoke under the following circumstances:

When walking on the street with a lady.

When lifting his hat or bowing.

In a room, an office, or an elevator, when a lady enters.

In any short conversation where he is standing near, or talking with a lady.

If he is seated himself for a conversation with a lady on a veranda, in an hotel, in a private house, anywhere where "smoking is permitted," he first asks, "Do you mind if I smoke?" And if she replies, "Not at all" or "Do, by all means," it is then proper for him to do so. He should, however, take his cigar, pipe, or cigarette, out of his mouth while he is speaking. One who is very adroit can say a word or two without an unpleasant grimace, but one should not talk with one's mouth either full of food or barricaded with tobacco.

In the country, a gentleman may walk with a lady and smoke at the same time—especially a pipe or cigarette. Why a cigar is less admissible is hard to determine, unless a pipe somehow belongs to the country. A gentleman in golf or country clothes with a pipe in his mouth and a dog at his heels suggests a picture fitting to the scene; while a cigar seems as out of place as a cutaway coat. A pipe on the street in a city, on the other hand, is less appropriate than a cigar in the country. In any event he will, of course, ask his companion's permission to smoke.

MANNERS AND BUSINESS

If you had a commission to give and you entered a man's office and found him lolling back in a tipped swivel chair, his feet above his head, the ubiquitous cigar in his mouth and his drowsy attention fixed on the sporting page of the newspaper, you would be impressed not so much by his lack of good manners as by his bad business policy, because of the incompetence that his attitude suggests. It is scarcely necessary to ask: Would you give an important commission to him who has no apparent intention of doing anything but "take his ease"; or to him who is found occupied at his desk, who gets up with alacrity upon your entrance, and is seemingly "on his toes" mentally as well as actually? Or, would you go in preference to a man whose manners resemble those of a bear at the Zoo, if you could go to another whose business ability is supplemented by personal charm? And this again is merely an illustration of bad manners and good.

AN ADVANTAGE OF POLISH

One advantage of polish is that one's opponent can never tell what is going on under the glazed surface of highly finished manners, whereas an unfinished surface is all too easily penetrated. And since business encounters are often played like poker hands, it is surely a bad plan to be playing with a mind-reader who can plainly divine his opponent's cards, while his own are unrevealed.

Manners that can by any possibility be construed as mincing, foppish or effeminate are not recommended; but a gentleman who says "Good morning" to his employees and who invariably treats all women as "ladies," does not half so much flatter their vanity as win their respect for himself as a gentleman. Again, good manners are, after all, nothing but courteous consideration of other people's interests and feelings. That being true, does it not follow that all customers, superior officers and employees prefer an executive whose good manners imply consideration of his customer's, his company's and his employee's interest as well as merely his own?

PERFECT POLISH THAT IS UNSUSPECTED

The president of a great industry, whose mastery of etiquette is one of his chief assets, so submerges this asset in other and more apparent qualifications, that every plain man he comes in contact with takes it for granted that he is an equally "plain" man himself. He is plain in so far as he is straightforward in attitude and simple in manner. No red tape is required apparently to penetrate into this president's private office, whereas many "small" men are guarded with pretentiousness that is often an effort to give an impression of "importance."

In this big man's employ there is an especial assistant chosen purposely because of his tact and good manners. If an unknown person asks to see Mr. President, this deputy is sent out (as from most offices) to find out what the visitor's business is; but instead of being told bluntly the boss doesn't know him and can't see him, the visitor is made to feel how much the president will regret not seeing him. Perhaps he is told, "Mr. President is in conference just now. I know he would not like you to be kept waiting; can I be of any service to you? I am his junior assistant." If the visitor's business is really with the president, he is admitted to the chief executive's office, since it is the latter's policy to see every one that he can.

He has a courteous manner that makes every one feel there is nothing in the day's work half so important as what his visitor has come to see him about! Nor is this manner insincere; for whatever time one sees him, he gives his undivided attention. Should his time be short, and the moment approach when he is due at an appointment, his secretary enters, a purposely arranged ten minutes ahead of the time necessary for the close of the present interview, and apologetically reminds him, "I'm sorry, Mr. President, but your appointment with the 'Z' committee is due." Mr. President with seeming unconcern, uses up most of the ten minutes, and his lingering close of the conversation gives his visitor the impression that he must have been late at his appointment, and wholly because of the unusual interest felt in his caller.

This is neither sincerity nor insincerity, but merely bringing social knowledge into business dealing. To make a pleasant and friendly impression is not alone good manners, but equally good business. The crude man would undoubtedly show his eagerness to be rid of his visitor, and after offending the latter's self-pride because of his inattentive discourtesy, be late for his own appointment! The man of skill saw his visitor for fewer actual minutes, but gave the impression that circumstances over which he had no control forced him unwillingly to close the interview. He not only gained the good will of his visitor, but arrived at his own appointment in plenty of time.

To listen attentively when one is spoken to, is merely one of the rules of etiquette. The man who, while some one is talking to him, gazes out of the window or up at the ceiling, who draws squares and circles on the blotter, or is engrossed in his finger-nails or his shoes, may in his own mind be "finessing," or very likely he is bored! In the first case, the chances are he will lose the game; in the second, lots of people are bored, hideously bored, and most often the fault is their own; always they are at fault who show it.

GOOD MANNERS AND "GOOD MIXERS"

When one thinks of a man who is known in politics and business as a "good mixer," one is apt to think of him as a rough diamond rather than a polished one. In picturing a gentleman, a man of high cultivation, one instinctively thinks of one who is somewhat aloof and apart. A good mixer among uncouth men may quite accurately be one who is also uncouth; but the best "mixer" of all is one who adjusts himself equally well to finer as well as to plainer society. Education that does not confer flexibility of mind is an obviously limited education; the man of broadest education tunes himself in unison with whomever he happens to be. The more subjects he knows about, the more people he is in sympathy with, and therefore the more customers or associates or constituents he is sure to have.

The really big man—it makes little difference whether he was born with a gold spoon in his mouth or no spoon at all—is always one whose interest in people, things, and events is a stimulating influence upon all those he comes in contact with.

He who says, "That does not interest me," or "That bores me," defines his own limitations. He who is unable to project sympathy into other problems or classes than his own is an unimportant person though he have the birth of a Cecil and the manners of a Chesterfield. Every gentleman has an inalienable right to his own reserves—that goes without saying—and because he can project sympathy and understanding where and when he chooses, does not for one moment mean that he thereby should break down the walls of his instinctive defenses.

It is not the latter type, but the "Gentleman Limited" who has belittled the name of "gentleman" in the world of work; not so much because he is a gentleman, as because he is not entirely one. He who is every inch a gentleman as well as every inch a man is the highest type in the world to-day, just as he has always been. The do-nothing gentleman is equally looked down upon everywhere.

ETIQUETTE IN "REVERSE GEAR"

Etiquette, remember, is merely a collection of forms by which all personal contacts in life are made smooth. The necessity for a "rough" man to become polished so that he may meet men of cultivation on an equal footing, has an equally important reverse. The time has gone by when a gentleman by grace of God, which placed him in a high-born position, can control numbers of other men placed beneath him. Every man takes his place to-day according to born position plus the test of his own experience. And just as an unlettered expert in business is only half authoritative to men of high cultivation, so also is the gentleman, no matter how much he knows of Latin, Greek, history, art and polish of manner, handicapped according to his ignorance on the subject of another's expertness. Etiquette, in reverse, prescribes this necessity for complete knowledge in every contact in life. Through knowledge alone, does one prove one's right to authority. For instance:

A man in a machine ship is working at a lathe. An officer of the company comes into the shop, a gentleman in white collar and good clothes! He stands behind the mechanic and "curses him out" because his work is inefficient. When he turns away, the man at the lathe says, "Who was that guy anyway? What business has he to teach me my job?" Instead of accepting the criticism, he resents what he considers unwarranted interference by a man in another "class."

But supposing instead of standing by and talking about inefficiency, the "gentleman" had said, "Get out of there a moment!" and throwing off his coat and rolling up his silk shirt sleeves, he had operated the lathe with a smoothness and rapidity that could only have been acquired through long experience at a bench. The result would be that the next time he came on a tour of inspection that particular man (as well as all those who were witnesses of the former scene) would not only listen to him with respect but without resentment of his "class," because his expertness proved that he had earned his right to good clothes and silk shirts, and to tell those beneath him how work should be done.

The same test applies to any branch of experience: a man who knows as much about any "specialty" as an expert does himself, makes the "expert" think at once, "This man is a wonder!" The very fact that the first man is not making the subject his specialty, intensifies the achievement. Everything he says after that on subjects of which the second man knows nothing is accepted without question. Whenever you know as much as the other man, whether you are socially above, or below him, you are on that subject his equal; when you know more than he does, you have the advantage.

THE SELF-MADE MAN AND WORLD-MADE MANNERS

It is not in order to shine in society that grace of manner is an asset; comparatively few people in a community care a rap about "society" anyway! A man of affairs whose life is spent in doing a man's work in a man's way is not apt to be thrilled at the thought of putting on "glad" clothes and going out with his wife to a "pink" tea or a ball.

But what many successful men do not realize is that a fundamental knowledge of etiquette is no less an asset in business or public life, or in any other contact with people, than it is in society.

Just as any expert, whether at a machine bench, an accountant's desk, or at golf, gives an impression of such ease as to make his accomplishment seemingly require no skill, a bungler makes himself and every one watching him uneasy if not actually fearful of his awkwardness. And as inexpertness is quite as irritating in personal as in mechanical bungling, so there is scarcely any one who sooner or later does not feel the need of social expertness. Something, some day, will awaken him to the folly of scorning as "soft," men who have accomplished manners; despising as "effeminate," youths who have physical grace; of being contemptuous of the perfect English of the well-bred gentleman; of consoling himself with the thought that his own crudeness is strong, and manly, and American!

THE "X" MARKERS

But let "success" come to this same inexpert man—let him be appointed to high office, let him then shuffle from foot to foot, never knowing what to do or say, let him meet open derision or ill-concealed contempt from every educated person brought in contact with him, let opprobrium fall upon his State because its governor is a boor, and let him as such be written of in the editorials of the press and in the archives of history! Will he be so pleased with himself then? Does any one think of Theodore Roosevelt as "soft" or "effeminate" because he was one of the greatest masters of etiquette who ever bore the most exalted honor that can be awarded by the people of the United States? Washington was completely a gentleman—and so was Abraham Lincoln. Because Lincoln's etiquette was self-taught it was no less masterly for that! Whether he happened to know a lot of trifling details of pseudo etiquette matters not in the least. Awkward he may have been, but the essence of him was courtesy—unfailing courtesy. No "rough, uneducated" man has command of perfect English, and Lincoln's English is supreme.

One thing that some Men of Might forget is that lack of polish in its wider aspects is merely lack of education. They themselves look down upon a man who has to make an "X" mark in place of signing his name—but they overlook entirely that to those more highly educated, they are themselves in degree quite as ignorant.

SONS OF SELF-MADE MEN

And yet, speak to self-made men of the need of the social graces for their sons, and nine out of ten stampede—for all the world as though it were suggested to put them in petticoats. Do they think a poor unlettered lout who shambles at the door, who stands unable to speak, who turns his cap in his hands, who sidles into the room, and can't for the life of him get out again, well trained for the battle of life?

Picture that Mr. Strong Man who thrusts his thumbs into his armholes and sits tipped back in his chair with a cigar in the corner of his mouth and his heels comfortably reposing on his solid mahogany desk. This is not in criticism of his relaxation, it is his own desk and certainly he has a right to put his heels on it if he wants to; likewise thumbs and armholes are his own. It is merely a picture that leads to another: Supposing a very great man comes into Mr. Strong Man's office—one whom he may consider a great man, a president perhaps of a big industry or of a railroad, or a senator—and shortly afterwards, Strong Man's own son comes into the room. Would he like to see his son abashed, awkward, spasmodically jerky, like the poor bumpkin who came the other day to ask about removing the ashes, or worse yet, bold and boisterous or cheeky; or would he like that boy of his to come forward with an entire lack of self-consciousness, and as his father introduces him as "My Son!" have him put out his hand in frank and easy and yet deferential friendliness? And then saying quickly and quietly whatever it was he came to say, as quickly and quietly make his way out again? Would he be sorry that the big man thought, "Fine boy that! Ability too!" Why would he think he had ability? Because the ease and dexterity with which he handled the social incident automatically suggests ability to handle other situations!

ETIQUETTE AND BUSINESS AUTHORITY

Another point: Does the self-made man stop to realize that his authority in business would be even greater than it is if he had the hall-marks, of cultivation? For instance, when he comes in contact with college graduates and other cultivated men, his opinions gain or lose in weight exactly in proportion as he proves to be in their own "class" or below it.

A man unconsciously judges the authority of others by the standard of his own expert knowledge. A crude man may be a genius in business management, but in the unspoken opinion of men of education, he is in other contacts inferior to themselves. He is an authority they grant, but in limited lines only.

But when a man is met with who combines with business genius the advantage of polished manners and evident cultivation, his opinion on any subject broached at once assumes added weight. Doesn't it?



CHAPTER XXXIII

DRESS

Clothes are to us what fur and feathers are to beasts and birds; they not only add to our appearance, but they are our appearance. How we look to others entirely depends upon what we wear and how we wear it; manners and speech are noted afterward, and character last of all.

In the community where we live, admirableness of character is the fundamental essential, and in order to achieve a position of importance, personality is also essential; but for the transient impression that we make at home, abroad, everywhere in public, two superficial attributes are alone indispensable: good manners and a pleasing appearance.

It is not merely a question of vanity and inclination. In New York, for instance, a woman must dress well, to pay her way. In Europe, where the title of Duchess serves in lieu of a court train of gold brocade; or in Bohemian circles where talent alone may count; or in small communities where people are known for what they really are, appearance is of esthetic rather than essential importance.

In the world of smart society—in America at any rate—clothes not only represent our ticket of admission, but our contribution to the effect of a party. What makes a brilliant party? Clothes. Good clothes. A frumpy party is nothing more nor less than a collection of badly dressed persons. People with all the brains, even all the beauty imaginable, make an assemblage of dowds, unless they are well dressed.

Not even the most beautiful ballroom in the world, decorated like the Garden of Eden, could in itself suggest a brilliant entertainment, if the majority of those who filled it were frumps—or worse yet, vulgarians! Rather be frumpy than vulgar! Much. Frumps are often celebrities in disguise—but a person of vulgar appearance is vulgar all through.

THE SHEEP

Frumps are not very typical of America, vulgarians are somewhat more numerous, but the greatest number of all are the quietly dressed, unnoticeable men and women who make up the representative backbone in every city; who buy good clothes but not more than they need, and whose ambition is merely to be well enough dressed to fit in with their background, whatever their background may be.

Less numerous, but far more conspicuous, are the dressed-to-the-minute women who, like sheep exactly, follow every turn of latest fashion blindly and without the slightest sense of distance or direction. As each new season's fashion is defined, all the sheep run and dress themselves each in a replica of the other, their own types and personalities have nothing to do with the case. Fashion says: "Wear bolster cases tied at the neck and ankle," or "A few wisps of gauze held in place with court plaster," and daughter, mother, grandmother, and all the neighbors wear the same. If emerald green is the fashionable color, all of the yellowest skins will be framed in it. When hobble skirts are the thing, the fattest wabble along, looking for all the world like chandeliers tied up in mosquito netting. If ball dresses are cut to the last limit of daring, the ample billows of the fat will vie blandly with the marvels of anatomy exhibited by the thin. Comfort, convenience, becomingness, adaptability, beauty are of no importance. Fashion is followed to the letter—therefore they fancy, poor sheep, they are the last word in smartness. Those whom the fashion suits are "smart," but they are seldom, if ever, distinguished, because—they are all precisely alike.

THE WOMAN WHO IS REALLY CHIC

The woman who is chic is always a little different. Not different in being behind fashion, but always slightly apart from it. "Chic" is a borrowed adjective, but there is no English word to take the place of "elegant" which was destroyed utterly by the reporter or practical joker who said "elegant dresses," and yet there is no synonym that will express the individuality of beautiful taste combined with personal dignity and grace which gives to a perfect costume an inimitable air of distinction. Une dame elegante is all of that! And Mrs. Oldname is just such a person. She follows fashion merely so far as is absolutely necessary. She gets the latest model perhaps, but has it adapted to her own type, so that she has just that distinction of appearance that the sheep lack. She has even clung with slight modifications to the "Worth" ball dress, and her "wrapped" or fitted bodice has continued to look the smartest in every ballroom in spite of the Greek drapery and one-piece meal bag and all the other kaleidoscopic changes of fashion the rest of us have been through.

But the average would-be independent who determines to stand her ground, saying, "These new models are preposterous! I shall wear nothing of the sort!" and keeps her word, soon finds herself not at all an example of dignity but an object of derision.

FASHION HAS LITTLE IN COMMON WITH BEAUTY

Fashion ought to be likened to a tide or epidemic; sometimes one might define it as a sort of hypnotism, seemingly exerted by the gods as a joke. Fashion has the power to appear temporarily in the guise of beauty, though it is the antithesis of beauty nearly always. If you doubt it, look at old fashion plates. Even the woman of beautiful taste succumbs occasionally to the epidemics of fashion, but she is more immune than most. All women who have any clothes sense whatever know more or less the type of things that are their style—unless they have such an attack of fashionitis as to be irresponsibly delirious.

To describe any details of dress, that will not be as "queer" to-morrow as to-day's fashions are bound to be, would seem at the outset pretty much like writing about next year's weather. And yet, there is one unchanging principle which must be followed by every woman, man and child that is well dressed—suitability. Nor does suitability mean merely that you must choose clothes suitable to your age and appearance, and that you must get a ball dress for a ball, and a street dress to walk in; it means equally that you must not buy clothes out of proportion to your income, or out of keeping with your surroundings.

DISPROPORTIONATE EXPENDITURE IN BAD TASTE

About fifteen years ago the extravagance in women's dress reached such a high-water mark that it was not unheard of for a New York woman to spend a third of her husband's income on clothes. All women of fashion bought clothes when it would not have occurred to them to buy furniture—when it would have seemed preposterous to buy a piece of jewelry—but clothes, clothes, and more clothes, each more hand-embroidered than the last, until just as it seemed that no dress was fit to be seen if it hadn't a month or two of some one's time embroidered on it, the work on clothes subsided, until now we are at the other extreme; no work is put on them at all. At least, clothes to-day are much more sensible, and let us hope the sense will be lasting.

The war did at least make people realize that luxuries and trimmings could go too far. Ten years ago the American woman who lived in a little cottage, who walked when she went out or took the street car, wore the same clothes exactly that Mrs. Gilding wore in her victoria, or trailed over a Ming rug. The French woman has always been (and the American woman of taste is now) too great an artist to sit in a little room with its cotton-print slip covers, muslin curtains, and geranium pots on the window ledge, in anything strikingly elaborate and expensive. Charming as her dress may be in line and cut and color, she keeps it (no matter how intrinsically good it may be) in harmony with her geranium pots and her chintz.

On the other hand, clothes that are too plain can be equally out of proportion. Last winter, for instance, a committee of ladies met in what might safely be called the handsomest house in New York, in a room that would fit perfectly in the Palace of Versailles, filled with treasures such as those of the Wallace collection. The hostess presided in a black serge golf skirt, a business woman's white shirt-waist, and stout walking boots, her hair brushed flat and tidily back and fastened as though for riding, her face and hands redolent of soap. No powder, not a nail manicured. Had she been a girl earning her living, she could not have been more suitably dressed, but her millions and her palace background demand that her clothes be at least moderately in keeping.

One does not have to be dowdy as an alternative to being too richly dressed, and to define differences between clothes that are notable because of their distinction and smartness, and clothes that are merely conspicuous and therefore vulgar, is a very elusive point. However, there are certain rules that seem pretty well established.

VULGAR CLOTHES

Vulgar clothes are those which, no matter what the fashion of the moment may be, are always too elaborate for the occasion; too exaggerated in style, or have accessories out of proportion. People of uncultivated taste are apt to fancy distortions; to exaggerate rather than modify the prevailing fashions.

For example: A conspicuous evidence of bad style that has persisted through numberless changes in fashion, is the over-dressed and over-trimmed head. The woman of uncultivated taste has no more sense of moderation than the Queen of the Cannibals. She will elaborate her hair-dressing to start with (this is all right, if elaboration really suits her type) and then she will "decorate" it with everything in the way of millinery and jewelry that she can lay her hands on. Or, in the daytime, she fancies equally over-weighted hats, and rich-looking fur coats and the latest edition in the most conspicuous possible footwear. And she much prefers wearing rings to gloves. Maybe she thinks they do not go together? She despises sensible clothing; she also despises plain fabrics and untrimmed models. She also cares little (apparently) for staying at home, since she is perpetually seen at restaurants and at every public entertainment. The food she orders is rich, the appearance she makes is rich; in fact, to see her often is like nothing so much as being forced to eat a large amount of butter-plain.

Beau Brummel's remark that when one attracted too much notice, one could be sure of being not well-dressed but over-dressed, has for a hundred years been the comfort of the dowdy. It is, of course, very often true, but not invariably. A person may be stared at for any one of many reasons. It depends very much on the stare. A woman may be stared at because she is indiscreet, or because she looks like a left-over member of the circus, or because she is enchanting to look at.

If you are much stared at, what sort of a stare do you usually meet? Is it bold, or mocking, or is it merely that people look at you wistfully? If the first, change your manner; if the second, wear more conventional clothes; if the third, you may be left as you are. But be sure of your diagnosis of this last.

EXTRAVAGANCE NOT VULGARITY

Ostentation is always vulgar but extravagance is not necessarily vulgar—not by any means. Extravagance can become dishonest if carried beyond one's income.

Nearly everything that is beautiful or valuable is an extravagance—for most of us. Always to wear new gloves is an extravagant item for one with a small allowance—but scarcely vulgar! A laundry bill can be extravagant, flowers in one's city house, a piece of beautiful furniture, a good tapestry, each is an extravagance to an income that can not easily afford the expenditure. To one sufficient to buy the tapestry, the flowers are not an extravagance at all.

To buy quantities of things that are not even used after they are bought is sheer wastefulness, and to buy everything that tempts you, whether you can afford to pay for it or not, is, if you can not afford it, verging on the actually dishonest.

DRESSES FOR DINNERS AND BALLS

Supposing, since clothes suitable to the occasion are the first requisite of good taste, we take up a few details that are apart from fashion.

A dinner dress really means every sort of low, or half low evening dress. A formal dinner dress, like a ball dress, is always low-necked and without sleeves, and is the handsomest type of evening dress that there is. A ball dress may be exquisite in detail but it is often merely effective. The perfect ball dress is one purposely designed with a skirt that is becoming when dancing. A long wrapped type of dress would make Diana herself look like a toy monkey-on-a-stick, but might be dignified and beautiful at a dinner. A dinner dress differs from a ball dress in little except that it is not necessarily designed for freedom of movement.

Hair ornaments always look well at a ball but are not especially appropriate (unless universally in fashion) on other occasions. A lady in a ball dress with nothing added to the head, looks a little like being hatless in the street. This sounds like a contradiction of the criticism of the vulgarian. But because a tiara is beautiful at a ball, or a spray of feathers, or a high comb, or another ornament, does not mean that all of these should be put on together and worn in a restaurant; which is just what the vulgarian would do. Whether, to wear a head-dress, however, depends not alone upon fashion but upon the individual. If the type of hair ornament at the moment in fashion is becoming, wear it, especially to balls and in a box at the opera. But if it is not becoming, don't.

Ladies of fashion, by the way, do not have their hair especially dressed for formal occasions. Each wears her hair a certain way, and it is put up every morning just as carefully as for a ball. The only time it is arranged differently is for riding. Ah informal dinner dress is merely a modified formal one. It is low in front and high in the back, with long or elbow sleeves—or perhaps it is Dutch neck and no sleeves.

When trains are in fashion, all older women should wear them. Fashion or no fashion, no woman who has passed forty looks really well in a cut-off evening dress. An effect of train, however, can very adequately be produced with any arrangement or trimming that extends upon the floor.