Chapter 11

In driving with ladies, a gentleman gives them the seat facing the horses, riding backward himself if any one must. He will alight from the carriage first, on the side nearest his seat, to avoid passing in front of the ladies; and will assist them to alight, giving as much or as little support as the case demands. A light finger-tip on an elbow is all the help that a sprightly girl may need, but her grandmother may require to be tenderly lifted out bodily. A gentleman will discriminate, and not use an uncalled-for familiarity in helping a lady out of a carriage.

When several ladies are driving, the youngest ones in the party will ride backwards. A hostess driving with her guests enters her carriage _after_ them, unless they are noticeably younger than she is; but she does not relinquish her usual seat to _any one_, unless she happens to have a party of venerable ladies.

ETIQUETTE OF GIFTS

Wedding presents should be chosen with due reference to the circumstances of the bride. For the daughter of wealthy parents, who weds a husband of large means--and to whom all desirable _useful_ things are assured--articles of _virtu_, and bewildering creations in the way of costly "fancy articles," are suitable wedding gifts. For a quiet little bride who is going to housekeeping on a moderate income, articles that are useful as well as beautiful are appropriate and acceptable. A handsome substantial chair, a cabinet for china, pretty china to put in it, some standard books, a set of fine table linen,--almost anything within the range of dainty house-furnishing shows the good taste of the giver.

Presents that owe their creation to the ingenuity and labor of one's friends--as hand-painted screens or china, embroidered work, or, if one is artistic, a painting or etching--are peculiarly complimentary wedding gifts.

In general, the exchange of gifts is desirable only between friends who care enough for each other not only to _give_, but to be willing to _accept_--the latter being a severer test of friendship. Between two women, or between two men, these matters adjust themselves.

A man should not offer valuable gifts to any lady outside of his own family, unless she is very much his senior, and a friend of long standing. Similarly, a lady should not accept valuable gifts from a gentleman unless his relationship to her warrants it. Trifling tokens of friendship or gallantry--a book, a bouquet, or a basket of bon-bons--are not amiss; but a lady should not be under obligation to a man for presents that plainly represent a considerable money value.

When a gift is accepted, the recipient should not make too obvious haste to return the compliment, lest he or she seem unwilling to rest under obligation. It is polite to allow a generous friend some space of time in which to enjoy the "blessedness of giving."

"Independence" is an excellent thing; but it becomes peculiarly rude when it takes the form of refusing all trifling favors. It is often the greatest wisdom as well as kindness, to allow some one to do us a favor. Enemies have been transformed into friends by this tactful process; for, as one always hates one whom he has injured, so, on the reverse, he cannot help feeling an increased glow of kindliness toward one whom he has benefited.

When some unsophisticated person innocently offers a gift that strict conventionality would forbid one to accept, it is sometimes better to suspend the rules and accept the token, than by refusal to hurt the feelings of one who has perhaps offended the letter, but not the spirit, of the law.

Gifts of flowers to the convalescent--tokens that the busy outside world has not forgotten him--are among the most graceful expressions of courteous interest. Any one--even a total stranger--may send these, if "the spirit moves," and the circumstances are such that the act could bear no possible misinterpretation.

GALLANTRY AND COQUETRY

That a man enjoys the society of a charming woman, that a woman delights in the conversation of a brilliant man, is no sign that either of them is a flirt.

Few things are more vulgar than the readiness to infer a flirtation from every case of marked mutual interest between a man and a woman. The interchange of bright ideas, interspersed with the spontaneous sallies of gallantry and the instinctive _repartee_ of innocent coquetry--an archery of wit and humor, grave and gay,--this is one of the salient features of civilized social life. It has nothing in common with the shallow travesty of sentiment that characterizes a pointless flirtation. The latter is _bad form_ whenever and wherever existing. A sincere sentiment is not reduced to the straits of expressing itself in such uncertain language. It is fair to conclude that some insincerity, or some lack of a correct basis for sentiment, is betrayed in every pointless flirtation. It is hopelessly bad form. Young people who gratify vanity by idle "conquests," so called, make a sufficiently conspicuous show of ill-breeding; but a _married flirt_ is worse than vulgar.

A woman may accept every tribute that a chivalrous man may offer to her talent or wit, so long as it is expressed in a hearty spirit of good comradeship, and with a clear and unmistakable deference to her self-respecting dignity; but a well-bred woman will resent as an insult to her womanhood any quasi-sentimental overtures _from a man who has not the right to make them_.

Etiquette requires that the association of men and women in refined circles shall be frank without freedom, friendly without familiarity. "Flirting" is a plebeian diversion. Every well-bred woman is a queen, for whose sake every well-bred man will hold a lance in rets.

IN CONCLUSION

Since censoriousness is a quality utterly antagonistic to good manners, it is well to reflect that, while etiquette lays down many laws, it also indulgently grants generous absolution. While we decide that certain forms and methods of action are _correct_ and _good form_, we must remember that all people, ourselves included, are liable to be occasionally remiss in little things, and that we must not too hastily decide a man's status on the score of breeding by his punctilious observance of conventional laws. There are some requirements of etiquette that have their foundation in the idea of convenience or feasibility; others that are essentially requisite as the exponent of decency. A man may easily be far from perfect in details of the former class, and yet be a refined gentleman; but he cannot offend in the latter class of instances without being a boor. Something worse than eating with his knife must ostracize a man, and something no greater than spitting on the sidewalk should accomplish the feat at one fell stroke.

There is an infallible constancy in good breeding. Like charity, of which it is so largely an exponent, it "never faileth." One's manner to two different people, respectively, may not be _the same_, but it should be _equally courteous_, whether it expresses the cordial friendliness of social equals or the just esteem of one either higher or lower than one's self in the social scale. "No man is a hero to his _valet_," because the heroic is confined to great and rare occasions. But every gentleman is a _gentleman_ to his _valet_, for the qualities that distinguish the gentleman are every day and every hour manifested.