 CHAPTER XXV. THE KINDERGARTEN OF EDICATE In the houses of the well-to-do, where the nursery is in charge of a woman of refinement who is competent to teach little children proper behavior, they are never allowed to come to table in the dining room until they have learned at least the elements of good manners. But whether in a big house of this description, or in a small house where perhaps the mother alone must be the teacher, children can scarcely be too young to be taught the rudiments of etiquette, nor can the teaching be too patiently or too conscientiously carried out. Training a child is exactly like training a puppy, a little heedless inattention, and it is out of hand immediately. The great thing is not to let it acquire bad habits that must afterward be broken. Any child can be taught to be beautifully behaved with no effort greater than quiet patience and perseverance, whereas to break bad habits once they are acquired is a Herculean task. ELEMENTARY TABLE MANNERS Since a very little child cannot hold a spoon properly, and as neatness is the first requisite in table manners, it should be allowed to hold its spoon as it might take hold of a bar in front of it, back of the hand up, thumb closed over fist. The pusher, a small flat piece of silver at right angles to a handle, is held in the same way in the left hand. Also in the first eating lessons, a baby must be allowed to put a spoon in its mouth, pointed in foremost. Its first lessons must be to take small mouthfuls, to eat very slowly, to spill nothing, to keep the mouth shut while chewing, and not smear its face over. In drinking a child should use both hands to hold a mug or glass until its hand is big enough so it can easily hold a glass in one. When it can eat without spilling anything or smearing its lips, and drink without making grease, moons on its mug or tumbler, by always wiping its mouth before drinking, it may be allowed to come to table in the dining room as a treat for Sunday lunch or breakfast. Or, if it has been taught by its mother at table, she can relax her attention somewhat from its progress. Girls are usually dantier and more easily taught than boys. But most children will behave badly at table if left to their own devices. Even though they may commit no serious offenses, such as making a mess of their food or themselves, or talking with their mouths full, all children love to crumb bread, flop this way and that in their chairs, knock spoons and forks together, doddle over their food, feed animals, if any are allowed in the room, or become restless and noisy. Once graduated to the dining room, any reversion to such tactics must be firmly reprehended, and the child should understand that continued offense means a return to the nursery. But before company it is best to say as little as possible, since too much nagging in the presence of strangers lessens a child's incentive to good behavior before them. If it refuses to behave nicely, much the best thing to do is to say nothing but get up and quietly lead it from the table back to the nursery. It is not only bad for the child but annoying to a guest to continue instructions before company, and the child learns much more quickly to be well-behaved if it understands that good behavior is the price of admission to grown-up society. A word or two such as, Don't lean on the table, darling, or pay attention to what you are doing, dear, should suffice. But a child that is noisy, that reaches out to help itself to candy or cake, that interrupts the conversation, that eats untitly, has been allowed to leave the nursery before it has been properly graduated. Table manners must, of course, proceed slowly in exactly the same way that any other lessons proceed in school. Having learned when a baby to use the nursery implements of spoon and pusher, the child, when it is a little older, discards them for the fork, spoon, and knife. The Proper Use of the Fork As soon, therefore, as his hand is dexterous enough, the child must be taught to hold his fork no longer gripped baby fashion in his fist, but much as a pencil is held in writing. Only the fingers are placed nearer the top than the point. The thumb and two first fingers are closed around the handle two-thirds of the way up the shank, and the food is taken up shovel-wise on the turned-up prongs. At first his little fingers will hold his fork stiffly, but as he grows older his fingers will become more flexible, just as they will in holding his pencil. If he finds it hard work to shovel his food, he can, for a while, continue to use his nursery pusher. By and by the pusher is changed for a small piece of bread, which is held in his left hand and between thumb and first two fingers, and against which the fork shovels up such elusive articles as corn, peas, poached egg, etc. The Spoon In using the spoon he holds it in his right hand like the fork. In eating cereal or dessert he may be allowed to dip the bowl of the spoon toward him and eat from the end, but in eating soup he must dip his spoon away from him, turning the outer rim of the bowl down as he does so, fill the bowl not more than three-quarters full and sip it without noise out of the side, not the end of the bowl. The reason why the bowl must not be filled full is because it is impossible to lift a brimming spoon full of liquid to his mouth without spilling some, or in the case of porridge without filling his mouth too full. While still very young he may be taught never to leave the spoon in a cup while drinking out of it, but after stirring the cocoa or whatever it is, to lay the spoon in the saucer. A very ugly table habit, which seems to be an impulse among all children, is to pile a great quantity of food on a fork and then lick or bite it off a piece meal. This must on no account be permitted. It is perfectly correct, however, to sip a little at a time of hot liquid from a spoon. And taking any liquid either from a spoon or drinking vessel no noise must ever be made. The fork and knife together. In being taught to use his knife the child should at first cut only something very easy, such as a slice of chicken. He should not attempt anything with bones or gristle or anything that is tough. In his left hand is put his fork with the prongs downward, held near the top of the handle. His index finger is placed on the shank so that it points to the prongs and is supported at the side by his thumb. His other fingers close underneath and hold the handle tight. He must never be allowed to hold his fork immigrant fashion, perpendicularly clutched in the clenched fist, and to saw across the food at its base with his knife. The knife. The knife is held in his right hand exactly as the fork is held in his left, firmly and at the end of the handle with the index finger pointing down the back of the blade. In cutting he should learn not to scrape the back of the fork prongs with the cutting edge of the knife. Having cut off a mouthful he thrusts the fork through it with prongs pointed downward and conveys it to his mouth with his left hand. He must learn to cut off and eat one mouthful at a time. It is unnecessary to add that the knife must never be put in his mouth nor is it good form to use the knife unnecessarily. Soft foods like croquettes, hash on toast, all eggs and vegetables should be cut or merely broken apart with the edge of the fork held like the knife, after which the fork is turned in the hand to first or shovel position. The knife must never be used to scoop baked potato out of the skin or to butter potato. A fork must be used for all manipulations of vegetables. Butter for baked potatoes taken on the tip of the fork shovel fashion, laid on the potato, and then pressed down and mixed with the prongs held points curved up. When no knife is being used the fork is held in the right hand whether used prongs down to impale the meat or prongs up to lift vegetables. To pile mashed potato and other vegetables on the convex side of the fork on top of the meat for two or more inches of its length is a disgusting habit dear to school boys and one that is more easily prevented than corrected. In fact taking a big mouthful next to smearing his face and chewing with mouth open is the worst offence at table. When he has finished eating he should lay his knife and fork close together side by side with handles toward the right side of his plate the handles projecting an inch or two beyond the rim of the plate. They must be placed far enough on the plate so that there is no danger of their overbalancing onto the table or floor when removed at the course. Other table matters. The distance from the table at which it is best to sit is a matter of personal comfort. A child should not be allowed to be so close that his elbows are bent like a grasshopper's nor so far back that food is apt to be spilled in transit from plate to mouth. Children like to drink very long and rapidly all in one breath until they are pink around the eyes and are literally gasping. They also love to put their whole hands in their finger balls and wiggle their fingers. A baby of two or at least by the time he is three should be taught to dip the tips of his fingers in the finger ball without playing, draw the fingers of the right hand across his mouth and then wipe his lips and fingers on the apron of his bib. No small child can be expected to use a napkin instead of a bib. No matter how nicely behaved he may be there is always danger of his spilling something sometime. Soft boiled egg is hideously difficult to eat without ever getting a drop of it down the front and it is much easier to supply him with a clean bib for the next meal than to change his dress for the next moment. Very little children usually have hot water plates that are specially made like a double plate with hot water plates placed between on which the meat is cut up and the vegetables fixed in the pantry and brought to the children before other people at the table are served. Not only because it is hard for them to be made to wait and have their attention attracted by food not for them but because they take so long to eat. As soon as they are old enough to eat everything on the table they are served not last but in the regular rotation at table in which they come. Table tricks that must be corrected. To sit up straight and keep their hands in their laps when not occupied with eating is very hard for a child but should be insisted upon in order to prevent a careless attitude that all too readily degenerates into flopping this way and that and into fingering whatever is in reach. He must not be allowed to warm his hands on his plate or drum on the table or screw his napkin into a rope or make marks on the tablecloth. If he shows talent as an artist give him utensils or modeling wax in his playroom but do not let him bite his slice of bread into the silhouette of an animal or model figures in soft bread at the table and do not allow him to construct a tent out of two forks or an automobile chassis out of tumblers and knives. Food and table implements are not playthings nor is the dining room a playground. Talking at Table When older people are present at table and a child wants to make something he must be taught to stop eating momentarily and look at his mother who at the first pause in the conversation will say, what is it dear? And the child then has his say. If he wants merely to launch forth on a long subject of his own conversation his mother says, not now darling we will talk about that by and by or don't you see that mother is talking to Aunt Mary? When children are at table alone with their mother they should not only be allowed to talk but unconsciously trained in table conversation as well as in table manners. Children are all more or less little monkeys in that they imitate everything they see. If their mother treats them exactly as she does for visitors they in turn play visitor to perfection. Nothing hurts the feelings of children more than not being allowed to behave like grown persons when they think they are able. To be helped, to be fed, to have their food cut up all have a stultifying effect upon their development as soon as they have become expert enough to attempt these services for themselves. Children should be taught from the time they are little not to talk about what they like and don't like. A child who is not allowed to say anything but no thank you at home will not mortify his mother in public by screaming I hate steak I won't eat potato I won't ice cream. Quietness at table. Older children should not be allowed to jerk out their chairs to flop down sideways to flick their napkins by one corner to reach out for something or begin to eat nuts fruit or other table decorations. A child as well as a grown person should sit down quietly in the center of his chair and draw it up to the table if there is no one to push it in for him by holding the seat in either hand while momentarily lifting himself on his feet. He must not jump or rock his chair into place at the table. In getting up from the table again he must push his chair back quietly using his hands on either side of the chair seat and not by holding on to the table edge and giving himself chair and all a sudden shove. There should never be a sound made by the pushing in or out of chairs at table. The spoiled child. The bad manners of American children which unfortunately are supposed by foreigners to be typical are nearly always the result of their being given star parts by over-fond but equally over-foolish mothers. It is only necessary to bring to mind the most irritating and objectionable child one knows and the chances are that its mother continually throws the spotlight on it by talking to it and about it and by calling attention to its looks or its cunning ways or even possibly its naughtiness. It is humanly natural to make a fuss over little children particularly if they are pretty and it takes quite superhuman control for a young mother not to show off her treasure but to say instead please do not pay any attention to her. Some children who are especially free from self-consciousness stand stardom better than others who are more readily spoiled but in nine cases out of ten the old-fashioned method that assign children to inconspicuous places in the background and decree that they might be seen but not heard produced men and women a far greater charm than the modern method of encouraging public self-expression from infancy upward. Chief Virtue, obedience. No young human being any more than a young dog has the least claim to attractiveness unless it is trained to manners and obedience. The child that whines, interrupts, fusses, fidgets and does nothing that it is told to do has not the least power of attraction for anyone even though it may have the features of an angel and be dressed like a picture. Another that may have no claim to beauty whatever but that is sweet and nicely behaved exerts charm over everyone. When possible a child should be taken away the instant it becomes disobedient. It soon learns that it cannot stay with mother unless it is well behaved. This means that it learns self-control in babyhood. Not only must children obey but they must never be allowed to show off or become pert or to contradict or to answer back and after having been told no they must never be allowed by persistent nagging to win yes. A child that loses its temper, that teases, that is petulant and disobedient and a nuisance to everybody is merely a victim poor little thing of parents who have been too incompetent or negligent to train it to obedience. Moreover that same child when grown will be the first to resent and blame the mother's mistaken spoiling and lack of good sense. Fair play. Nothing appeals to children more than justice and they should be taught in the nursery to play fair in games to respect each other's property and rights to give credit to others and not to take too much credit to themselves. Every child must be taught never to draw attention to the meager possessions of another child whose parents are not as well off as her own. A purse-proud overbearing child who says to a playmate, my clothes were all made in Paris and my doll is ever so much handsomer than yours. Or is that real lace on your collar? Is not impressing her young friend with her grandeur in discrimination but with her disagreeableness and rudeness. A boy who brags about what he has and boasts of what he can do is only less objectionable because other boys are sure to take it out of him promptly and thoroughly. Nor should a bright observing child be encouraged to pick out other people's failings or to tell her mother how inferior other children are compared with herself. If she wins a race or a medal or is praised she naturally tells her mother and her mother naturally rejoices with her and it is proper that she should. But a wise mother directs her child's mental attitude to appreciate the fact that arrogance, selfishness and conceit can win no place worth having in the world. Children at Afternoon Tea A custom in many fashionable houses is to allow children as soon as they are old enough to come into the drawing room or library at tea time as nothing gives them a better opportunity to learn how to behave in company. Little boys are always taught to bow to visitors, little girls to curtsy. Small boys are taught to place the individual tables, hand plates and tea and past sandwiches and cakes. If there are no boys girls perform this office very often they both do. When everybody has been helped the children are perhaps allowed a piece of cake which they put on a tea plate and sit down and eat nicely. But as the tea hour is very near their supper time they are often allowed nothing and after making themselves useful go out of the room again. If many people are present and the children are not spoken to they leave the room unobtrusively and quietly. If only one or two are present especially those whom the children know well they shake hands and say goodbye and walk not run out of the room. This is one of the ways in which well-bred people become used from childhood to instinctive good manners unless they are spoken to they would not think of speaking or making themselves noticed in any way. Very little children who have not reached the age of discretion which may be placed at about five possibly not until six usually go in the drawing-room at tea-time only when near relatives or intimate friends of the family are there. Needless to say that they are always washed and dressed. Some children wear special afternoon clothes but usually the clean clothes put on at tea-time go on again the next morning except the thin socks and house slippers which are reserved for the evening hour of their day. Children's Parties A small girl or boy giving a party should receive with her mother at the door and greet all her friends as they come in. If it is her birthday and other children bring her gifts she must say thank you politely. On no account must she be allowed to tell a child I hate dolls if a friend has brought her one. She must learn at an early age that as hostess she must think of her guests rather than herself and not want the best toys in the grab bag or scream because another child gets the prize that is offered in a contest. If beaten in a game a little girl no less than her brothers must never cry or complain that the contest is not fair when she loses. She must try to help her guests have a good time and not insist on playing the game she likes instead of those which the other children suggest. When she herself goes to a party she must say how do you do when she enters the room and curtsy to the lady who receives. A boy makes a bow. They should have equally good manners as when at home and not try to grab more than their share of favors or toys. When it is time to go home they must say goodbye I had a very good time or goodbye thank you ever so much. The child's reply. If the hostess says goodbye give my love to your mother the child answers yes Mrs. Smith. In all monosyllabic replies a child must not say yes or no or what. A boy in answering a gentleman still uses the old fashioned yes sir no sir I think so sir but ma'am has gone out of style. Both boys and girls must therefore answer no Mrs. Smith yes Mrs. Jones. A girl says yes Mr. Smith rather than sir. All children should say what did you say mother no father thank you Aunt Kate yes Uncle Fred etc. They need not insert a name in a long sentence nor with please or thank you. Yes please or no thank you is quite sufficient or in answering I just saw Mary down in the garden it is not necessary to add Mrs. Smith at the end. Etiquette for grown children. Etiquette for grown children is precisely the same as for grown persons accepting that in many ways the manners exacted of young people should be more alert and punctilious. Young girls and boys of course should have the manners of a gentleman rather than those of a lady in that a gentleman always rises relinquishes the best seat and walks last into a room whereas these courtesies are shown to and not observed by ladies except to other ladies older than themselves. In giving parties young girls send out their invitations as their mothers do and their deportment is the same as that of their debutante sister. Boys behave as their fathers do and are equally punctilious in following the code of honor of all gentlemen. The only details therefore not likely to be described in other chapters of this book are a few admonitions on table manners that are somewhat above kindergarten grade. The graduating tests in table manners. A young person may be supposed to have graduated from the school of table etiquette when she or he would be able to sit at a formal lunch or dinner table and find no difficulty in eating properly any of the commestibles which are supposed to be hurdles to the inexpert. Corn on the cob. Corn on the cob could be eliminated so far as ever having to eat it in formal company is concerned since it is never served at a luncheon or a dinner but if you insist on eating it at home or in a restaurant to attack it with as little ferocity as possible is perhaps the only direction to be given since at best it is an ungraceful performance and to eat it greedily a horrible sight. Asparagus. Although asparagus may be taken in the fingers don't take a long drooping stalk hold it up in the air and catch the end of it in your mouth like a fish. When the stalks are thin it is best to cut them in half with the fork eating the tips like all fork food the ends may then be taken in the fingers and eaten without a dropping fountain effect. Don't squeeze the stalks or hold your hand below the end and let the juice run down your arm. Artichokes. Artichokes are always eaten with the fingers a leaf at a time is pulled off and the edible end dipped in the sauce and then bitten off. Bread and Butter. Bread should always be broken into small pieces with the fingers before being eaten. If it is to be buttered at lunch breakfast or supper but not at dinner a piece is held on the edge of the bread and butter plate or the place plate and enough butter spread on it for a mouthful or two at a time with a small silver butter knife. Bread must never be held flat on the palm of the hand and buttered until knife is used care must be taken not to smear food from the knife side on the butter. Any food that is smeared about is loathsome. People who have beautiful table manners always keep their places at table neat. People with disgusting manners get everything in a horrible mess. The Management of Bones and Pits. Terrapin bones, fish bones and grape seed must be eaten quite bare and clean in the mouth and one at a time between finger and thumb. All spitting out of bones and pits into the plate is disgusting. If food is too hot quickly take a swallow of water. On no account spit it out. If food has been taken into your mouth no matter how you hate it you have got to swallow it. It is unforgivable to take anything out of your mouth that has been put in it except dry bones and stones. To spit anything whatever into the corner of your napkin is too nauseating to comment on. It is hard to see anyone spit skins or pits on a fork or into the plate. The only way to take anything out of your mouth is between first finger and thumb. Dry grape seeds or cherry pits can be dropped from the lips into the cupped hand. Peaches or other very juicy fruits are peeled and then eaten with knife and fork but dry fruits such as apples may be cut or eaten in the fingers. Never wipe hands that have fruit juice on them on a napkin without first using a finger bowl because fruit juices make indelible stains. Birds Birds are not eaten with the fingers in company. You cut off as much of the meat as you can and leave the rest on your plate. Forks or fingers All juicy or gooey fruits or cakes are best eaten with a fork but in most cases it is a matter of dexterity. If you are able to eat a peach in your fingers and not smear your face, let juice run down or make a sucking noise you are the one in a thousand who may and with utmost propriety continue the feat. If you can eat a napoleon or a cream puff and not let the cream ooze out on the far side, you need not use a fork. But if you cannot eat something, no matter what it is without getting it all over your fingers you must use a fork and if necessary a knife also. All rules of table manners are made to avoid ugliness to let anyone see what you have in your mouth is repulsive. To make a noise is to suggest an animal. To make a mess is disgusting. On the other hand there are a number of trifling decrees of etiquette that are merely finical, unreasonable and silly. Why one should not cut one salad is, if one wants to, makes little sense unless one wants to cut up a whole plateful and make the plate messy. A steel knife must not be used for salad or fruit because it turns black. To condemn the American custom of eating a soft-boiled egg in a glass or cup because it happens to be the English fashion to scoop it through the ragged edge of the shell is about as reasonable as though we were to proclaim English manners bad because they tag a breakfast dish called a savory of fish, roe or something equally inappropriate after the dessert at dinner. Many other arbitrary rules for eating food with fork, spoon or fingers are also stumbling blocks rather than aids to smoothness. As said above, one eats with a fork or spoon, finger foods that are messy and sticky. One eats with the finger, those which are dry. It is true that one should not eat french fried potatoes or Saratoga chips and fingers but that is because they belong to the meat course. Separate vegetable saucers are never put on a fashionable table, neither is butter allowed at dinner. Therefore both must be avoided in company because company is formal and etiquette is first aid always to formality. But if a man in his own house likes butter with his dinner or a saucer for his tomatoes he is breaking the rule of fashion to have them but he is scarcely committing an offense. In the same way if he likes to eat a chicken wing or a squab leg in his fingers he can ask for a finger ball. The real objection to eating with the fingers is getting them greasy or sticky and to suck them or smear one's napkin is equally unsightly. On the subject of elbows Although elbows on the table are seen constantly in highest fashionable circles, a whole table's length of elbows planted like clothesline poles and hands and glasses or forks about in between is neither an attractive nor fortunately an accurate picture of a fashionable dinner table. As a matter of fact the tolerated elbow on table is used only on occasion and for a reason and should neither be permitted to children nor practiced in their presence. Elbows are universally seen on tables in restaurants especially when people are lunching or dining at a small table of two or four and it is impossible for one self-heard above the music by one's table companions and at the same time not be heard at other tables nearby without leaning far forward. And in leaning forward a woman's figure makes a more graceful outline supported on her elbows than doubled forward over her hands in her lap as though in pain. At home when there is no reason for leaning across the table there is no reason for elbows and at a dinner of ceremony except at the ends of the table where again one has to lean forward in order to talk to a companion at a distance across the table corner. Elbows are never put on the table while one is eating. To sit with the left elbow propped on the table while eating with the right hand unless one is alone and ill or to prop the right one on the table while lifting the fork or glass to the mouth must be avoided. End of Chapter 35 Chapter 36 of Etiquette This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Recording by Chris Gladys Etiquette in Society in Business in Politics and at Home by Emily Post in Politics Everyday Manners at Home Just as no chain is stronger than its weakest link no manners can be expected to stand a strain beyond their daily test at home. Those who are used to losing their temper in the bosom of their family will sooner or later lose it in public. Families which exerts neither courtesy nor charm alone can no more deceive other people into believing that either attribute belongs to them then they could hope to make painted faces look like real complexions. A mother should exact precisely the same behaviour at home and every day that she would like her children to display in public and she herself, if she expects them to take good manners seriously must show the same manners to them alone that she shows to company. A really charming woman exerts her charm nowhere more than upon her husband and children and a noble nature through daily though unconscious example is of course the greatest influence for good that there is in the world. No preacher no matter how saints like his precept or gold in his voice can equal the home influence of admirable parents. It is not merely in such matters as getting up when their mother or other older relatives enter a room answering civilly and having good table manners but informing habits of admirable living and thinking that a parent's example makes or Mars. If children see temper controlled, hear gossip uncharitableness and suspicion of neighbors, witness arrogant sharp dealing or lax honour, their own characters can scarcely escape perversion. In the same way, others cannot easily fail to be thoroughbred who have never seen or heard their parents do or say an ignoble thing. No child will ever accept a maxim that is preached but not followed by the preacher. It is a waste of breath for the father to order his sons to keep their temper to behave like gentlemen or to be good sportsmen if he does or is himself none of these things. In the present day of rush and hurry there is little time for home example. To the over busy or gaily fashionable home might as well be a railroad station and members of a family passengers who see each other only for a few hurried minutes before taking trains in opposite directions. The days are gone when the family sat in the evening round the fire or a table with a lamp. When it was customary to read aloud or to talk few people talk well in these days fewer read aloud and fewer still endure listening to any book literally word by word. Railroad station reading is as much in vogue as railroad station bolting of meals. Magazines, picture ones are all that the hurried have time for. And even those who profess to love reading dart tourist fashion from page to page only pausing at attractive paragraphs and family relationships are followed somewhat in the same way. Any number of busy men scarcely know their children at all and have not even stopped to realize that they seldom or never talk to them never exert themselves to be sympathetic with them or in the slightest degree to influence them to growl morning or don't Johnny or be quiet Alice. is very very far from being an influence on your children's morals, minds or manners. Home Education A supreme court justice whose education had been cut short in his youth by the Civil War when asked how under the circumstances his scholastic attainments had been acquired answered my father believed it was the duty of every gentleman to bequeath the wealth of his intellect no less than that of his pocket to his children. Wealth might be acquired by luck but proper cultivation was the birthright of every child born of cultivated parents. We learned Latin and Greek by having him talk and read them to us. We learned dogaral rhymes of history which took the place of Mother Goose He also told us bedtime stories of history and read classics to us after supper. When there was company we were brought down from the nursery so that we might profit by the conversation of our betters. Volumes full of manners acquired after they are grown are not worth half so much than the simplest precepts acquired through lifelong habits and through having known nothing else. The Old Gray Rapper Habit How many times has one heard someone say I won't dress for dinner no one is coming in or that old dress will do old clothes no manners and what is the result the wife Moore wonders why her husband neglects her curious how the habit of careless manners and the habit of old clothes go together if you doubt it put the question to yourself who could possibly have the manners of a queen in a gray flannel wrapper and how many women really lovely and good especially good commit aesthetic suicide by letting themselves slide down to where they feel natural in an old gray flannel wrapper not only actually but mentally the woman of charm in company is the woman of fastidiousness at home she who dresses for her children and prinks for her husband's homecoming is sure to greet them with greater charm than she who thinks whatever he happens to have on is good enough any old thing good enough for those she loves most? think of it a certain very lovely lady whose husband is quite as much her lover as in the days of his courtship has never in 20 years allowed him to watch the progress of her toilet because of her determination never to let him see her except at her prettiest needless to say he never meets anything but prettiest manners either no matter how out of sorts she may be feeling his key in the door is a signal for her to put aside everything that is annoying or depressing with the result that wild horses couldn't drag his attention from her all because neither she nor he has ever slumped into her habit so many people save up all their troubles to pour on the one they most love the idea being seemingly that no reserves are necessary between lovers nor need there be really but why when their house looks out upon a garden that has charming vistas must she insist on his looking into the clothes yard and the ash can means incessantly that this is wrong or that hurts or any other thing worries or vexes her so that his inevitable answer to her greeting is I'm so sorry dear or that's too bad or poor darling it's a shame is getting mentally into a grey flannel wrapper if something is seriously wrong if she is really ill that is different but of the petty things that are only remembered in order to be told to gain sympathy beware there is a big deposit of sympathy in the bank of love but don't draw out little sums every hour or so so that by and by when perhaps you need it badly it is all drawn out and you yourself don't know how or on what it was spent all that has been said to warn a wife from slovenly habits of mind or dress may be adapted to apply with equal force in suggesting a rule for husbands a man should always remember that a woman's regard for him is founded on her impressions when seeing him at his best even granting that she has no great illusions about men in general he at his best is at least an approximation to her ideal and it is his chief duty never to fall below the standard he set for himself in making his most cogent appeal consequently he should continue through the years to be scrupulous about his personal appearance and his clothes remembering the adage that the most successful marriages are those in which both parties and contracts succeed in keeping up the illusion it is of importance also that he refrain from burdening his wife with the cares and worries of his business day many writers insist that the wife should be ready to receive a complete consignment of all his troubles when the husband comes home at the end of the day it is a sounder practice for him as much as possible from the trials of his business hours and incidentally it is the best kind of mental training for him to put all business cares behind him as he closes the door of his office and goes home when it is said that a husband should not fling all the days trifling annoyances into the lap of his wife without reflecting that she may have some cares of her own there is no intention to indicate that a wife should not have a thorough understanding of her husband's affairs complete acquaintance and sympathy with his work is one of the foundation stones of the domestic edifice the family at table whether there is company or whether the family is alone the linen must be as spotless the silver as clean and the table as carefully set as though 20 were coming for dinner sloppy service is no more to be tolerated every day at home than at a dinner party and in so far as etiquette is concerned you should live in exactly the same way whether there is company or none company manners and everyday manners must be identical in service as well as in family behaviour you may not be able to afford quantities of flowers in your house and on your table or perhaps any but there is no excuse for wilted flowers or an empty vase that merely accentuates your table's flowerlessness there are plenty of table ornaments that need no flowers in the same way the compoteers can be filled with candies or conserves of the everlasting silver foiled chocolates or nougat or gum drops or crystallized ginger or conserved fruits will keep for months but the table must be decorated and a certain form observed at the dinner hour otherwise grey flannel wrapper habits become imminent letters, newspapers and books have no place at a dinner table reading at table is allowable for breakfast and when eating alone but a man and his wife should no more read at lunch or dinner before each other or their children than they should allow their children to read before them the table is not a place for private discussion one very bad habit in many families is the discussion of all their most intimate affairs at table entirely forgetting whomever may be waiting on it and nine times out of ten those serving in the dining room see no harm, if they feel like it in repeating what is said why should they it scarcely occurs to them that they were invisible and that what was openly talked about at the table was supposed to be a secret apart from the stupidity and imprudence of talking for witnesses it is bad form to discuss one's private affairs before anyone and it should be unnecessary to add that a man and his wife who quarrel before their children or the servants deprived the former of good reading through inheritance and published to the latter that they do not belong to the better class through any qualification except the possession of a bank account parents must never disagree before the children it simply can't be nor can there be an appeal to one parent against the other by a child father told me to jump down the well then you must do it, dear is the mother's only possible comment when the child has jumped down the well she may pull him out promptly tell her husband what she thinks about his issuing such orders and stand her own ground against them but so long as parents are living under the same roof that roof must shelter unity of opinion so far as any witnesses are concerned End of Chapter 36 Chapter 37 Part 1 of Etiquette this is a Librivox recording all Librivox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit Librivox.org recording by Chris Gladys Etiquette in Society in Business in Politics and at Home by Emily Post Chapter 37 Travelling at Home and Abroad Chapter 1 to do nothing that can either annoy or offend the sensibilities of others sums up the principle rules for conduct under all circumstances whether staying at home or travelling but in order to do nothing that can annoy or give offence it is necessary for us to consider the point of view of those with whom we come in contact and in travelling abroad it is necessary to know something of foreign customs which affect the foreign point of view if we would be thought a cultivated and charming people instead of an uncivilized and objectionable one before going abroad however let us first take up the subject of travel at home since it is not likely that anyone would go around the world being deliberately offensive to others it may be taken for granted that obnoxious behaviour is either the fault of thoughtlessness or ignorance and for the former there is no excuse On a railroad train you should be careful not to assail the nostrils of fellow passengers with strong odours of any kind an odour that may seem to you refreshing may cause others who dislike it and are poor travellers to suffer really great distress there is a combination of banana and the leather smell of a valise containing food that is to many people an immediate emetic the smell of a banana or an orange is in fact to nearly all the last straw in America where there are diners on every pullman train the food odours are seldom encountered in parlor cars but in Europe where railroad carriages are small one fruit enthusiast can make his travelling companions more utterly wretched than perhaps he can imagine the cigar which is smouldering has on most women the same effect certain perfumes that are particularly heavy make others ill to at least half of an average train full of people strong odours of one kind or another are disagreeable if not actually nauseating children on trains people with children are most often the food offenders any number not only let small children eat continuously so that the car is filled with food odours but occasional mothers have been known to let a child with smeary fingers clutch a nearby passenger by the dress or coat and seemingly think it cunning those who can afford it usually take the drawing room and keep the children in it those who are to travel in seats should plan diversions time since it is unreasonable to expect little children to sit quietly for hours on end merely by telling them to be good two little girls on the train to Washington the other day were crocheting dolls sweaters with balls of worsted in which were wound wrapped and disguised prizes the amount of wool covering each might take perhaps half an hour to use up they were allowed the prize only when the last strand of wool around it was used they were then occupied for a while with whatever it was a little book or a puzzle or a game when they grew tired of its novelty they crocheted again until they came to the next prize in the end they had also new garments for their dolls ladies do not travel with escorts in a curiously naive book on etiquette appeared a chapter purporting to give advice to a lady traveling for an indefinite number of days with a gentleman escort that any lady could go traveling for days under the protection of a gentleman is at least a novelty in etiquette as said elsewhere in fashionable society an escort is unheard of and in decent society a lady doesn't go traveling around the country with a gentleman unless she is outside the pale of society in which case social convention at least is not concerned with her ladies are sometimes accompanied on short direct trips by gentlemen of their acquaintance but not for longer than a few hours if a lady traveling alone on a long journey such as a trip across the continent happens to find a gentleman on board whom she knows she must not allow him to sit with her in the dining car more often than a casual once or twice nor must she allow him to sit with her or talk to her enough to give a possible impression that they are together in fact she would be more prudent to take her meals by herself as it is scarcely worth running the risk of other passengers' criticism for the sake of having companionship at a meal or two if on a short trip a gentleman asks a lady whom he knows to lunch with him in the dining car there is no reason why she shouldn't the young woman traveling alone in America a young woman can go across every one of our thousands upon thousands of railed miles without the slightest risk of a disagreeable occurrence if she is herself dignified and reserved she should be particularly careful if she is young and pretty not to allow strange men to scrape an acquaintance with her if a stranger happens to offer to open a window for her or get her a chair on the observation platform it does not give him the right to more than a civil thank you from her if in spite of etiquette she should on a long journey drift into conversation with an obviously well-behaved youth she should remember that talking with him at all is contrary to the priorities and that she must be doubly careful to keep him at a formal distance there is little harm in talking of utterly impersonal subjects but she should avoid giving him information that is personal every guardian should also warn a young girl that if when she alights at her destination her friends fail to meet her she should on no account accept a stranger's offer than to drive her to her destination the safest thing to do is to walk if it is too far and there is no official taxi cab agent belonging to the railroad company she should go to the ticket seller or someone wearing the railroad uniform and ask him to select a vehicle for her she should never above all in a strange city where she does not even know her direction she should take a taxi on the street registering in a hotel a gentleman writes in the hotel register John Smith New York under no circumstances Mr. or Honourable if he is alone but if his wife is with him the prefix to their joint names is correct Mr. and Mrs. John Smith New York he never enters his street and house number neither John Smith and wife nor John Smith and family are good form if he does not like the Mr. before his name he can sign his own without on one line and then write Mrs. Smith on the one below the whole family should be registered John T. Smith New York Mrs. Smith and Maid if she has brought one Miss Margaret Smith John T. Smith Jr Baby and Nurse or if the children are young he writes Mr. and Mrs. John T. Smith New York three children and nurse a lady never signed her name without Miss or Mrs. in a hotel register Miss Abigail T. is correct or Mrs. John Smith never Sarah Smith ladies alone in American hotels if you have never been in a hotel alone but you are of sufficient years well behaved and dignified in appearance you need have no fear as to the treatment you will receive but you should write to the hotel in advance whether here or in Europe in this country you register in the office and are shown to your room or rooms by a bell boy in some hotels by a bell boy and a maid one piece of advice you will not get good service unless you tip generously if you do not care for elaborate meals that is nothing to your discredit but you should not go to an expensive hotel hold a table that would otherwise be occupied by others who might order a long dinner and expect your waiter to be contented with a tip of fifteen cents for your dollar supper the rule is ten percent beginning with a meal costing about three or four dollars a quarter is the smallest possible tip in a first class hotel if your meal costs a quarter you should give the waiter a quarter if it costs two dollars or more than two dollars you give thirty or thirty five cents and ten percent on a bigger amount in smaller hotels tips are less in proportion tipping is undoubtedly a bad system to be in force and that being the case travelers have to pay their share of it if they like the way made smooth and comfortable a lady travelling alone with her maid, or without one of necessity has her meals alone in her own sitting-room if she has one if she goes to the dining-room she usually takes a book because hotel service seems endless to meals at home and nothing is duller than to sit long alone with nothing to do but look at the tablecloth which is scarcely diverting or at other people which is impolite on the steamer in the days when our great grandparents went to Europe on a clipper ship carrying at most a score of voyagers and taking a month perhaps those who sat day after day together and evening after evening around the cabin lamp became necessarily friendly and in many instances not only for the duration of the voyage but for life more often than not those who had endured the rigours of the Atlantic together joined forces in engaging the courier who was, in those days, indispensable and set out on their continental travels in company dashing to Europe and back was scarcely to be imagined and travellers who had ventured such a distance stayed at least a year or more also in those slower days of crawling across the earth's surface by post-chase and diligence and horseback travellers meeting in Inns and elsewhere fell literally on each other's neck at the sound of an American accent and each retailed to the other his news of home to which was added the news of all whom they had encountered it is also from these travelling ancestors that families inherit their continental visiting lists friends they made in Europe in turn gave letters of introduction to friends coming later to America and to them again their American hosts sent letters by later American friends but today when going to Europe is of scarcely greater importance than going into another state and when the passenger list numbers hundreds making friends with strangers is the last thing the great-grandchildren of those earlier travellers would think of it may be pretty accurately said that the faster and bigger the ship the less likely one is to speak to strangers and yet, as always circumstances alter cases because the worldlies the old names the eminence all those who are innately exclusive never pick up acquaintances on ship-board it does not follow that no fashionable and well-born people ever drift into acquaintanceship on European American steamers of today but they are at least not apt to do so many in fact take the ocean crossing as a rest cure and stay in their cabins the whole voyage the worldlies always have their meals served in their own drawing-room and have their deck-chairs placed so that no one is very near them and keep to themselves they invite friends of their own to play bridge or to take dinner or lunch with them but, because the worldlies and the eminence and the snobs-nifts who copy them stay in their cabins, sit in segregated chairs and speak to no one except the handful of their personal friends or acquaintances who happen to be on board it does not follow that the smiths, joneses and robinsons are charging their acquaintance with every revolution of the screws and if you happen to like being talked to by strangers and if they in turn like to talk to you it cannot be said that there is any rule of etiquette against it Dining saloon etiquette very fashionable people as a rule travel a great deal which means that they are known very well to the head steward who serves a table or they engage a table for themselves when they get their tickets Mr. and Mrs. Gilding for instance if they know that friends of theirs are sailing on the same steamer ask them to sit at their table and ask for a sufficiently large table on purpose or if they are travelling alone they arrange to have one of the small tables for two to themselves people of wide acquaintance in big cities are sure to find friends on board with whom they can arrange if they choose to sit on deck or in the dining saloon but most people unless really intimate friends are on board sit wherever the head steward puts them after a meal or two people always speak to those sitting next to them none but the rudest snobs would sit through meal after meal without ever addressing a word to their table-companions well-bred people are always courteous but that does not mean that they establish friendships with any strangers who happen to be placed next to them in crossing the Pacific people are more generally friendly because the voyage is so much longer and on the other long voyages such as those to India and South Africa the higher ships company become almost as intimate as in the old clipper days the tactics of the climber there are certain constant travellers who, it is said count on a European voyage to increase their social acquaintance by just so much each trip Rich and Vulgar, for instance has his same a special table every time he crosses which is four times a year walking through a steamer train he sees a celebrity a brilliant, let's say but unworldly man Vulgar annexes him by saying, casually have you a seat at table better sit with me I always have the table by the door it's easy to get in and out the celebrity accepts since there is no evidence that he is to be featured and the chances are that he remains unconscious to the end of time that he served as a decoy boarding the steamer Vulgar sees the love joys and pounces you must sit at my table celebrity and I are crossing together he is the most delightful man I want you to sit next to him they think celebrity sounds very interesting so, not having engaged a table for themselves they say they will be delighted on the deck the smartlies appear and ask the love joys to sit with them Vulgar, who is standing by he is always standing by breaks in and even without an introduction says Mr. and Mrs. Lovejoy and celebrity are sitting at my table won't you sit with me also if the smartlies protest they have a table he is generally insistent and momentarily overpowering enough to make them join forces with him as the smartlies particularly want to sit next to the love joys and also like the idea of meeting celebrity it ends in Vulgar's table being a collection of fashionables whom he could not possibly have gotten together without just such a manoeuvre the question what he gets out of it is puzzling since with each hour the really well-bred people dislike him more and more intensely and at the end of a day or so his tables company are all eating on deck to avoid him perhaps there is some recompense that does not appear on the surface but to the casual observer the satisfaction of telling the others that the smartlies, love joys and well-borns sat at his table would scarcely seem worth the effort those acquisitive of acquaintance there is another type of steamer passenger and hotel guest who may or may not be a climber this one searches out potential acquaintances on the passenger list and hotel register with the avidity of a bird searching for worms you have scarcely found your own stateroom and had your deck-chair placed when one of them swoops upon you I don't know whether you remember me I met you in 192 at Countless Della Robiers in Florence your memory being woefully incomplete there is nothing for you to say except how do you do if a few minutes of conversation which should be sufficient proves her to be a lady you talk to her now and again throughout the voyage and may end by liking her very much if, however her speech breaks into expressions which prove her not a lady you become engrossed in your book or conversation with another when she approaches often these over-friendly people are grasping calculating and objectionable but sometimes like Ricky Tickey Tavi they are merely obsessed with a mania to run about and see what is going on in the world for instance Miss Spinster is one of the best-bred best-informed most charming ladies imaginable but her mania for people cannot fail on occasions to put her in a position to be snubbed never seriously because she is too obviously a lady for that but to see her trotting along the deck and then darting upon a helpless reclining figure is at least an illustration of the way some people make friends it can't be done of course unless you have once known the person you are addressing or unless you have a friend in common who, though absent can serve in making the introduction as said in the instructions introducing oneself is often perfectly correct if you, sharing Miss Spinster's love of people find yourself on a steamer with the intimate friend of a member of your family you may very properly go up and say I am going to speak to you because I am Celia Lovejoy's cousin I am Mrs. Brown and Mrs. Norman who very much like Celia Lovejoy says cordially let him so glad you spoke to me do sit down won't you but to have your next chair neighbor on deck insist on talking to you if you don't want to be talked to is very annoying and it is bad form for her to do so if you are sitting hour after hour doing nothing but idly looking in front of you your neighbor might address a few remarks to you and if you receive them with any degree of enthusiasm your response may be translated into a willingness to talk but if you answer in the nearest monosyllables it should be taken to mean that you prefer to be left to your own diversions even if you are agreeable your neighbor should show tact in not speaking to you when you are reading or writing or show no inclination for conversation the point is really that no one must do anything to interfere with the enjoyment of another whoever is making the advance whether your neighbor or yourself it must never be more than tentative if not at least met half way it must be withdrawn at once that is really the only rule there is it should merely be granted that those who do not care to meet others have just as much right to their seclusion as those who delight in others and have a right to be delighted as long as that delight is unmistakably mutual steamer tips each ordinary first class passenger now as always gives ten shillings two dollars fifty to the room steward or stewardess ten shillings to the dining room steward ten shillings to the deck steward ten shillings to the lounge steward your tip to the head steward and to one of the chefs depends on whether they have done anything special for you if not you do not tip them if you are a bad sailor and have been taking your meals in your room you give twenty shillings five dollars at least to the stewardess or steward if you are a man or if you have eaten your meals on deck you give twenty shillings to the deck steward and ten to his assistant and you give five to the bath steward to any steward who takes pains to please you you show by your manner in thanking him that you appreciate his efforts as well as by giving him a somewhat more generous tip when you leave the ship take your bath at a certain hour you would do well to ask your bath steward for it as soon as you go on board unless you have a private bath of your own since the last persons to speak get the inconvenient hours naturally to many the daily salt bath is the most delightful feature of the trip the water is always wonderfully clear and the towels are heated if you have been ill on the voyage some ships doctors send in a bill others do not in the latter case you are not actually obliged to give them anything but the generously inclined put the amount of an average fee in an envelope and leave it for the doctor at the purser's office dress on the steamer on the deluxe steamers nearly everyone dresses for dinner some actually in ball dresses which is in worst possible taste and like all over dressing in public places indicate that they have no other place to show their finery people of position never put on a formal evening dress on a steamer not even in the a la carte restaurant which is a feature of the deluxe steamer of size in the dining saloon they wear afternoon house dresses without hats for dinner in the restaurant they wear semi dinner dresses some smart men on the ordinary steamers put on a dark sack suit for dinner after wearing country clothes all day but in the deluxe restaurant they wear tuxedo coats no gentleman wears a coat on chipboard under any circumstances whatsoever end of chapter thirty-seven part one chapter thirty-seven part two of etiquette this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Emily Post etiquette in society in business in politics and at home by Emily Post chapter thirty-seven traveling at home and abroad part two traveling abroad just as one discordant note makes more impression than all the others that are correctly played in an entire symphony so does a discordant incident stand out and dominate a hundred others that are above criticism and therefore unnoticed in every country of Europe and Asia are Americans who combine the brilliancy which none can deny is the birthright of the newer world with the cultivation and good breeding of the old these Americans of the best type go all over the world fitting in so perfectly with their background that not even the inhabitants notice they are strangers in other words they achieve the highest accomplishment possible but in contrast to these the numberless discordant ones are only too familiar one sees them swarming over Europe in bunches sometimes in hordes on regular professionally run tours this of course does not mean that all personally conducted tourists are anything like them the objectionables are loud of voice loud in manner they always attract as much attention as possible to themselves and wave American flags on all occasions the American flag is the most wonderful emblem in the whole world and ours is the most glorious country too but that does not mean that it is good taste to wave our flag for no reason whatsoever at a parade or on a special day when other people are wearing flags then let us wave ours by all means but not otherwise it does not dignify our flag to make it an object of ridicule to others and that is exactly the result of the ceaseless flaunting of it by a group of people who talk at the top of their voices who deliberately assume that the atmosphere belongs to them and who behave like noisy untrained savages trying to show off in hotels on excursions, steamers and trains they insist on talking to everyone whether everyone wants to talk or not they are all over the place there is no other way to express it and they allow privacy to no one if they can help it numberless cultivated Americans traveling in Europe never by any chance speak English or carry English books on railroad trains the only way to avoid unwelcome importunities is literally to take refuge in assuming another nationality strangely enough these irrepressibles are seldom encountered at home they seem to develop on the steamer and burst into full bloom only on the beaten tourist trails they seem to develop on the steamer and burst into full bloom only on the beaten tourist trails which is a pity because if they only developed at home instead we might be intensely annoyed but at least we should not be mortified before our own citizens about our other fellow citizens but to a sensitive American it is far from pleasant to have the country he loves represented by a table full of vulgarians noisily attracting the attention of a whole dining room and to have a European say mockingly ah and those are your compatriots some years ago a Russian grand duke sitting next to mrs. old name at a luncheon in a Monte Carlo restaurant said to her your country puzzles me how can it be possible that it holds without explosion such antagonistic types as the many charming Americans we are constantly meeting and at the same time looking at a group who are actually singing and beating time on their glasses with knives and forks woes a French officer's comment to an American officer with whom he was talking in a club in Paris quite unconsciously tells the same tale you are a liaison officer I suppose with the Americans but may I be permitted to ask why you wear the uniform the other smiled I am an American you? an American? impossible why you speak French like a Parisian you have the manner of a great gentleman which would indicate that the average American does not speak perfect French nor have beautiful manners such excuse for not speaking foreign languages but there is no excuse whatever for having offensive manners and riding roughshod over people who own the land not we who seem to think we do as for souvenir hunters perhaps they can explain wherein their pilfering of another's property differs from petty thieving a distinction which the owner scarcely be expected to understand those who write their names defacing objects of beauty with their vain glorious smudges and scribblings are scarcely less culpable in France in Spain in Italy grace and politeness of manner is as essential to merest decency as being clothed in the hotels that are used to us as something of a commentary our lack of politeness is tolerated but don't think for a moment it is not paid for the officer referred to above who had the advantage of summer after summer spent in Europe as a boy was charged just about half what another must pay who has the rudeness of a savage but good manners are good manners everywhere except that in Latin and Asiatic countries we must as it seemed to us exaggerate politeness we must in France and Italy bow smilingly we must in Spain and the East bow gravely but in any event it is necessary everywhere except under the American and British flags to bow though your bow is often little more than a slight impression of the head and a smile and to show some ceremony in addressing people when you go into a shop in France or Italy you must smile and bow and say good morning, madame or good morning, monsieur and until we meet again when you leave if you can't say au revoir say good afternoon in English say something in a polite tone of voice which is much more important than the words themselves to be civilly polite is not difficult it is simply a matter of remembering to fail to say good morning to a concierge a chambermaid or a small tradesman in France treating him or her as though he did not exist is not evidence of your grandeur of your ignorance a French duchess would not think of entering the littlest store without saying good morning, madame to its proprietress and if she is known to her at all without making inquiries concerning the health of the various members of her family nor would she fail to say good morning, August or Marie to her own servants one flattering opinion of us for years we Americans have swarmed over the face of the world taking it for granted that the earth's surface belongs to us because we can pay for it and it is rather worse than ever since the war when the advantages of exchange add bitterness to irritation and yet there are many who are highly indignant when told that as a type we are not at all admired abroad instead of being indignant how much simpler and better it would be to make ourselves admirable especially since it is those who most lack cultivation who are most indignant the very well-bred may be mortified and abashed but they can't be indignant except with their fellow countrymen who by their shocking behavior make Europe's criticism just understanding of and kind-hearted consideration for the feelings of others are the basic attributes of good manners without observation understanding is impossible even in our own country where the attitude of our neighbors is much the same as our own it is not hard to appreciate therefore that to understand the point of view of people entirely foreign to ourselves requires intuitive perception as well as cultivation in a very high degree Americans in European society it is only in musical comedy that one can go into a strange city and be picked out of the crowd and invited to the tables of the high of the land one looks as though one might be agreeable to see anything of society in the actual world it is necessary to have friends either Americans living or stationed or married abroad or to take letters of introduction taking letters of introduction should never be done carelessly because of the obligation that they impose but to go to a strange country and see nothing of social life is like a blind person going to the theater and the only way a stranger can know people is through the letters he brings under ordinary circumstances no knowledge whatsoever beyond the social amenities the world over are necessary a dinner abroad is exactly the same as one here you enter a room you bow, you shake hands you say how do you do you sit at table you talk of impersonal things say good-bye and thank you to your hostess and you leave the matter of addressing people of title correctly is of little importance the beautiful lady old world who was Alice Town was asked one day by a fellow countryman what she called this person of title into that one and she replied no, why should I call them at all? which was a perfectly sensible answer one never says anything but you to the person spoken to and it might be an excellent thing not to know how to speak about anyone with a title as it would prevent ones mentioning them having gone into the subject thus far however it may be added that if at dinner you are put next to a duke if it is necessary to call him anything except you, you would say duke unless you are waiting on the table instead of sitting at it you would not say your grace and not even then my lord duke neither unless you are a valet or chambermaid would you say your lordship to an earl if you are a lady you call him lord Arlington if you know him really well you can call him Arlington to a night you say Sir Arthur which sounds familiar but there is nothing else you can call him in England a stranger is not supposed to introduce anyone so that titles of address are not necessary then either but if you happen to be the hostess and French or Americans are present who like introductions you introduce Sir Arthur to the duke and Duchess of over there or to Prince and Princess Capri in talking to her the latter would be called Princess and her husband Prince Capri or Prince or by those who know him well Capri presentation at court frequently American men are presented at the British court at levies held by the king for the purpose such men are of course distinguished citizens who have been in some branch of public service or who have contributed something to art, science history or progress an American lady to be eligible for presentation at a foreign court should be either the wife or daughter of a distinguished American citizen or be herself notable in some branch of learning or accomplishment it is absolutely necessary that such a candidate take letters of introduction to the American ambassador or ministry if in a country where we have a legation instead of an embassy she would enclose her letters in a note to the ambassadors asking that her name be put on the list for presentation the propriety of this request is a very difficult subject to advise upon in that it is better that the suggestion come from the ambassador rather than from oneself it is however perfectly permissible for one whose presentation is appropriate but who may perhaps not know the ambassador or his wife personally to do as suggested above it must also be remembered that rarely more than three or perhaps five persons are invited at any one time so that the difficulty of obtaining a place on the list is obvious in South America alone where out of courtesy to those who also consider themselves Americans the embassies and legations of our country are known as those of the United States of America but in all other countries of the world we are known simply as Americans for the name we have we are not United Statesers or United Statesians there is not even a word to apply to us to speak of the American minister to this country or that and of the American embassy in Paris for instance is entirely correct an American lady is presented by the American ambassador or the wife of the American minister or by the wife of the embassy affairs if the ambassadors be absent or occasionally by the doyen of the diplomatic corps at the request of the American embassy it would be futile to attempt giving details of full court dress or special details of etiquette as those vary not alone with countries but with time if you are about to be presented you will surely be told all that is necessary representing you these details after all merely comprise the exact length of train or other particulars of dress the hour you are to be at such and such a door where you are to stand and how many curtsies or boughs you are to make in all other and essential particulars you behave as you would in any and every circumstance of formality in general outline however it would be safe to say that on the day of the ceremony you drive to the palace at a specified hour wearing specified clothes and carrying your card of invitation in your hand your wraps are left in the carriage or motor car you enter the palace and are shown into a room where you wait and wait and wait until at last you are admitted in the audience chamber where you approach the receiving royalties you curtsy deeply before them and then back out or else you stand on an assigned spot while the king or queen or both make the tour of those waiting who curtsy or bow deeply at their approach and again at their withdrawal if you are spoken to at length either as under any other circumstances exactly as a polite child answers his elders you do not speak unless spoken to if your answer is long you need to say nothing except the answer if short you add sir to the king and madam to the queen this seemingly democratic title is as a matter of fact the correct one for all royalty yes sir very much indeed madam I think so madam foreign languages in the latin countries grace and facility of speech is an object of life long cultivation and no one is considered an educated person who cannot speak several languages well those who speak many fluently by the way are seldom those who constantly interlard their own tongue with words from another not to understand any foreign languages would be a decided handicap in European society where conversation is very apt to turn polyglot beginning in one tongue and going on in a second and ending in a third so that one who knows only English is often in the position of a deaf person even though Europeans are invariably polite and never let a conversation run long in a language which all those present do not understand it might easily happen that a French lady and an American neither understanding the tongue of the other meet at the house of an Italian where there is also an Italian monolinguist so the hostess has to talk in three languages at once it is unreasonable to expect the average American to be a linguist we are too far removed from foreign countries as a matter of fact if you would make yourself agreeable it is much better unless your facility was acquired as a child or you have a talent amounting to genius for accent and construction to make it a rule when you lunch or dine with Europeans to talk English since all Latins acutely suffer at hearing their language distorted English on the other hand is not beautiful in sound to the foreign ear it is a series of S's and shushes lumped with consonants like an iron wheeled cart bumping over a cobblestone street the Latins accent in English is annoying even to us at times but the English accent Italian or Spanish is murderous furthermore the Latin passionately loves his language in the way the Westerner loves his city he simply cannot endure to have it abused and he execrates the person who does so and proportionally he loves the few who prove they share his love by speaking it creditably if you want to improve your accent nothing can so help you as going to the theater abroad until your ears literally absorb the sounds all people are imitative there are few who do not gradually lose the purity of a good foreign accent when long away from Europe and all speak more fluently when their ears become accustomed to the sound the theater is not only the best possible place to hear correctly enunciated speech but a play of contemporary life is equally valuable as a study in manners there is also a suavity of grace in the way Europeans bow and stand and sit and in the way they speak that is unconsciously imitated these manners need not in fact should not be gushing or mincing but you gradually perceive that jerking Vamrod motions and stalking into a drawing room like a grenadier are less impressive than awkward the spoiled American girl the subject of American manners as they appear to Europeans cannot be dismissed without comment on a reprehensible type of American girl who flourishes on ship board on tours and in public places generally but most particularly in the large and expensive hotels of continental resorts if she and her family have a home they are never in it and if they have any object in life other than letting her follow her own unhampered inclinations it is not apparent to the ordinary observer such a girl is always overdressed she wears every fashion in an extremist exaggeration she sparkles with jewelry and reeks of scent she switches herself this way and that and is always posing in public view and playing to the public gallery she generally has a small brother who refuses to go to bed at night or to stop making the piazza chairs into a train of cars or to use the public halls as a skating rink when he is not making a noise he is eating and his elegant sister looks upon him with disdain sister meanwhile jingling with chains and bangles decked in scarfs and tool and earrings leans on or against whatever happens to be convenient flirting with any casual stranger who comes along she invariably goes to her meals alone evidently thinking her parents should be kept apart from her she is never away from the courthouse or the casino abroad or the hotel lobby in America she is nearly always alone and the book she is perpetually reading is always opened at the same page and she is sure to look up as you pass she is very ready to be picked up and to confide her life's history past, present and future to any stranger especially a young one of the opposite sex she is rude only to her mother and father she is also we know but Europe doesn't a perfectly good girl her lack of etiquette is shocking but her morals are above reproach she does not even mean to be rude to her parents and she has no idea that the things she does are exactly those which condemn her in the opinion of strangers if she were constantly with and obviously devoted to her mother she would make an infinitely better impression both as to good form and as to heart then by segregating herself so that she can be joined by any haphazard youth who strolls into view and thereby cheapening not only herself but the name of the American girl in general curiously enough if she marries in Europe she is apt to settle down and become an altogether admirable example of American European womanhood because she is sound fruit at heart merely wrapped in tawdry guilt paper trimming by her adoring but ignorantly unwise parents who in their effort to show her off disguise the very qualities which should have been accentuated ladies traveling alone in Europe Europeans cannot possibly understand how any lady of social position can be without a maid a lady traveling alone therefore has this trifling handicap to start with it is a very snobbish opinion and one who has the temerity to attempt traveling all by herself has undoubtedly the ability to see it through she need after all merely to behave with extreme quietness and dignity and she can go from one end of the world to the other without molestation or even difficulty especially if she is anything of a linguist in going from one place to another it is wiser to write as long as possible ahead for accommodations possibly giving the name of the one if any who recommended the hotel but in going far off into Asia or other difficult countries she would better join friends or at least a personally conducted tour unless she has the metal of a burton or a stanley motoring in Europe motoring in Europe is perfectly feasible and easy a car has to be put in a crate to cross the ocean but in crossing the channel between England and France no difficulty whatever is experienced all information necessary can be had at any of the automobile clubs and in going from one country to another you have merely to show your passports at the border properly vis-aid and pay a deposit to ensure you're not selling the car out of the country which is refunded when you come back garage charges are reasonable but gasoline is high roads are beautiful and travelling once you have your car is much cheaper than by train once off the beaten track a tourist who has not a working knowledge of the language of the country he is driving through is at a disadvantage but plenty of people constantly do it so it is at least not insurmountable with English you can go to most places with English and French nearly everywhere the Michelin guide shows you in the little drawing exactly the type of hotels you will find in each approaching town and the price of accommodation so that you can choose your own shopping places accordingly and etiquette you ask there is no etiquette of motoring that differs from all other etiquette except of course not to be a roadhog or a road pig people who take up the entire road are not half the offenders that others are who picnic along the side of it and leave their old papers and food all over everywhere for that matter anyone gives himself forward in any position in life he who pushes past bumping into you walking over you in order to get a first seat on the train or to be the first off a boat anyone who pushes himself out of his turn or takes more than his share anywhere or of anything is precisely that sort of an animal on a continental train Europeans usually prefer to ride backwards and as an American prefers to face the engine it works out beautifully it is not etiquette to talk with fellow passengers in fact it is very middle class if you are in a smoking carriage all European carriages are smoking unless marked ladies alone or no smoking and ladies are present it is polite to ask if you may smoke language is not necessary as you need merely to look at your cigar and bow with an interrogatory expression where upon your fellow passengers bow ascent and you smoke the perfect traveler one might say the perfect traveler is one whose digestion is perfect whose disposition is cheerful who can be enthusiastic under the most discouraging circumstances to whom discomfort is of no moment and who possesses at least a sense of the ridiculous if not a real sense of humor the perfect traveler furthermore is one who possesses the virtue of punctuality one who has not forgotten something at the last minute and whose bags are all packed and down at the hour for the start those who fuss and flurry about being ready or those whose disposition is easily upset or who are inclined to be gloomy should not travel unless they go alone nothing can spoil a journey more than someone who is easily put out of temper and who always wants to do something the others do not whether traveling with your family or with comparative strangers you must realize that your personal likes and dislikes have at least on occasion to be subordinated to the likes and dislikes of others nor can you always be comfortable or have good weather or make perfect connections or find everything to your personal satisfaction and you only add to your own discomfort and chagrin as well as to the discomfort of everyone else to be philosophical those who are bad sailors should not go on yachting parties they are always abjectly wretched and are of no use to themselves or anyone else those who hate walking should not start out on a trap that is much too far for them and expect others to turn back when they get tired they need not start to begin with but having one started through there is no greater test of a man's or a woman's wearing qualities than traveling with him he who is always keen and ready for anything delighted with every amusing incident willing to overlook shortcomings and apparently oblivious of discomfort is needless to say the one first included on the next trip End of Chapter 37 Part 2 Chapter 38 of etiquette this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recorded by Larry Ann Walden etiquette in society in business in politics and at home by Emily Post Chapter 38 the growth of good taste in America good taste or bad is revealed in everything we are do have our speech, manners, dress and household goods and even our friends are evidences of the propriety of our taste and all these have been the subject of this book rules of etiquette are nothing more than signposts by which we are guided to the goal of good taste whether we Americans are drifting toward or from finer perceptions both mental and spiritual is too profound a subject to be taken up except on a broader scope than that of the present volume yet it is a common place remark that older people invariably feel that the younger generation is speeding swiftly on the road to perdition but whether the present younger generation is really any nearer to that frightful end than any previous one is a question that we of the present older generation are scarcely qualified to answer to be sure manners seem to have grown lax and many of the amenities apparently have vanished but do these things merely seem so to us because young men of fashion do not pay party calls nowadays and the young woman of fashion is informal it is difficult to maintain that youth today is so very different from what it has been in other periods of the country's history especially as the capriciousness of beauty the heartlessness and carelessness of youth are charges of a too suspiciously bromidic flavor to carry conviction the present generation is at least ahead of some of its very proper predecessors in that weddings do not have to be set for noon because a bridegroom sobriety is not to be counted on later in the day that young people of today prefer games to conversation scarcely proves to generation that they wear very few clothes is not a symptom of decline there have always been recurring cycles of undress followed by muffling from shoe soles to chin we have not yet reached the undress of Pauline Bonaparte so the muffling period may not be due however leaving out the mooted question whether etiquette may not soon be a subject for an obituary rather than a guidebook one thing is certain we have advanced prodigiously in aesthetic taste never in the recollection of anyone now living has it been so easy to surround oneself with lovely belongings each year's achievement seems to stride away from that of the year before in producing woodwork, ironwork glass, stone, print paint and textile that is lovelier and lovelier one cannot go into the shops or pass their windows on the streets without being impressed with the ever-growing taste of their display nor can one look into the magazines devoted to gardens and houses and house furnishings and fail to appreciate the increasing wealth of the beautiful in environment that such exquisite best as America possessed in her colonial houses and gardens and furnishings should ever have been discarded for the atrocities of the period after the Civil War is comparable to nothing but Titania's Midsummer Night's dream madness to believe in assets features more beautiful than those of Apollo happily however since we never do things by haves we are studying and cultivating and buying and making and trying to forget and overcome that terrible marriage of our beautiful colonial ancestors with the dark wooded plush draped jigsawed upstart of vulgarity and ignorance in another country her type would be lost in his forever but in a country that sent million soldiers across 3,000 miles of ocean in spite of every obstacle and in the twinkling of an eye why even comment that good taste is pouring over our land as fast as periodicals, books and manufacturers can take it 3,000 miles east and west 2,000 miles north and south white tiled bathrooms have sprung like mushrooms seemingly in a single night charming houses, enchanting gardens beautiful cities, cultivated people created in thousands upon thousands of instances in the short span of one generation certain great houses abroad have consummate quality it is true but for every one of these there are a thousand that are mediocre even offensive in our own country beautiful houses and appointments flourish like field flowers in summer not merely in the occasional gardens of the very rich but everywhere and all this means merely one more incident added to the many great facts that prove us a wonderful nation but this is an aside merely and not to be talked about to anyone except just ourselves at the same time it is no idle boast that the world is at present looking toward America and whatever we become is bound to lower or raise the standards of life the other countries are old we are youth personified we have all youths glorious beauty youth and vitality and courage if we can keep these attributes and add finish and understanding and perfect taste in living and thinking we need not dwell on the golden age that is past but believe in the golden age that is sure to be end of chapter thirty-eight this concludes etiquette in society in business in politics and at home by Emily Post