2 July 1881 - 'How to Improve One's Education' Part One

The numerous readers of THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER must vary so much in age, position, and education, that it is not possible to write on such a subject as we have chosen exactly in the way that will give most satisfaction to everyone. Nevertheless we will undertake to say that no girl who carefully reads what follows on the question of self-improvement will regret having done so; on the contrary, it is hoped that each one will be either refreshed, or encouraged, or stimulated to adopt at once one of the methods here suggested for increasing her own usefulness.

The subject of "Finishing Schools" will be a familiar one to many. In all probability some who read this will already have left such an establishment, with a "finished" education; it is hoped to attract and rouse these to the reality that as long as we live we shall find something to learn, and that our life and our education must terminate at the same time.

There are also probably many amongst our readers who regret that they have not been able to enjoy the privileges that a dear friend has enjoyed, so far as early teaching is concerned. More than this, that circumstances have arisen to cause a gap in educational work just at a time when the mind is most ripe to receive instruction. Perhaps, too, during this unfortunate period much with which one was one familiar has been lost, hopelessly lost, it seems. Let these remember that it is never too late to learn, and that much can be done in the way of making up deficiencies in early education by patient and persevering study. One's own desire and strength of purpose are large factors in such work: we hope to guide the way and encourage those who are patiently plodding on.

Another class of readers, possibly not a very small one, if one could hear the silent assent which follows the reading of the remark, may include those who, having been provided with the best means of obtaining instruction, have not felt a sufficiently strong desire to learn much. They have done what was absolutely necessary to be done at school, but were glad when the time came to leave school. Let us hope that at least these also fall within the number of those who are really desirous to do something for self-improvement.

Though it would be possible to select other classes of readers, we will rest satisfied for the present with asking (1) all those who think they know all that it is necessary for them to know; (2) all those, who from a variety of circumstances apart from themselves, have been unable to receive a good education; and (3) all those who, having had the opportunity of good teaching, have not been able to appreciate it, and so have lost much from their own want of wisdom, to spend a quiet half hour with us.

The question now occurs, What is a good education? Opinions vary very much as to what standard should be acknowledged as the test of a good education, but no one will dispute the point, that position in life must always be an element in determining this. For instance, the education which one would call goods  for the upper classes in a Board school, would not be entitled to the same epithets in the upper classes of our middle class and high schools; and what would be a good education  for the housemaid could not be considered in the same light when speaking of the ladies of the house. In every grade and rank of life however, the intelligence which is given to us has to be cultivated, and it behoves each one to do the best that is possible to improve and elevate the mind. It has been said that "the best part of one's education is that which one gives to one's self," If this be realised, then there can be no stronger inducement necessary to urge forward those who have hitherto thought to impossible to teach one's self.

Begin to study at once. As soon as the effort is made much pleasure and a good deal of knowledge will be sure to follow. We shall not now expect to be met with the remark, "Yes, some people are clever, and can work alone;" only believe that all people can work alone, and do very much real good to themselves, if they will not e faint-hearted, and give up in despair at the first difficulty which presents itself.

But we have not yet fixed our standard of what we ought to know. Let us adopt then as our motto the well known words of a well-educated man who decided that we ought to know "something of everything, and everything of something." Let us also remember with this the French proverb, "Les demi-connaissances sont plus dangereuses que l'ignorance."

The field is wide when we feel that we must know something of everything, but then we have made up our minds and we shall not readily be turned aside by difficulties. We already, too, have a foundation of general education to work upon, and the whole of our life may be devoted to the perfecting of our mind. The question now is, How are we to work?

Well, one has to find out what one already knows, and this may be done by testing one's self by getting copies of questions given at a general examination, say the College of Preceptors, for instance, and answering these questions. Of course one must be very strict with one's self with regard to keeping the rules and correcting the papers when done; no fault must be allowed to pass unnoticed, and one must answer the questions at once – that is at sight; no looking up of little points must be allowed when once the questions have been read, and everything must be done in the given time.

It would be well, if not very advanced, or not in the habit of working examination questions, to test one's self first with the third class papers, then with the second, and so on. When finished the answers may be compared with a book on the subject and all mistakes marked. Something is now accomplished. The difference between real and fancied knowledge has been made plain, and knowing now what you do not know helps to fix for you what you want to know Now take a schedule of some examination, or form a definite plan of work, fixing the subject, or subjects of study, and the time to be devoted to it, taking care to keep most steadily to the plan laid down. Make it a duty and remember that "England expects that every man will do his duty," and every girl too!

Before saying more on the details of study we will consider a few points of general interest. They will not be exhaustive, neither will they be new to all our readers, but they will, it is to be hoped, open out some new veins of thought to many minds. To those who are very anxious to work we say –

1. Do not attempt too many subjects of study at once if you are much occupied with household duties or engaged in teaching. Remember that regular and systematic study spread over a period of time, even though the time be in half-hours, will enable one to store up a good deal of knowledge in the course of a few years. To those who think differently let me say very earnestly try it.

2. Make an effort to surround yourself with useful books. Many girls find in their homes wonderful stores of books; they know the book-cases, but are often astounded when an occasional visitor tells them that the information they seek is in such and such a book, on such and such a shelf in a particular bookcase in their own home! Besides having books, know what is inside them, examine and criticise them as you do your acquaintances, and be able to give the good and bad points in them. Make them your friends and companions. You will seldom have time to feel dull. With many, however, the case is different, and it is not easy always to get books. One good plan to adopt is to keep a list of books by you that you really want, and when asked by friends what you would like for a birthday present, Christmas present &c., to name one or two of your long-desired friends.

3. Cultivate the friendship of those who are better informed than yourself take every opportunity, without of course being tedious, of talking with well-read people, listening with the utmost attention, and asking for explanations when you do not understand. Much help and guidance in the choice of books may be obtained from these people.

4. Read carefully and thoughtfully. The habit of reading man story books and missing over the "dry" parts is very unhealthy, and is by no means a good preparation for study. Nothing can make up  for the want of regular and careful reading. "Reading," as Bacon tells us, "maketh a full man;" he also gives us a very good piece of advice on reading, "Read not to contradict nor to believe, but to weigh and consider," preparing us  for the fact that much that we read must be questioned and tested before we are to accept it as fact, and this throws us back on the judgment of those who are wiser than ourselves and who best know what books we should read. The same great writer tells us further that "some books are to be tasted, and then to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested."

5. In order to be quite sure of the real benefit derived from reading it is necessary to examine one's self from time to time and recapitulate and summarise what has been done. Another good plan is to keep a book for extracts.

The following is a good introduction to such a book:-

"In reading authors, when you find
Bright passages that strike your mind
And which perhaps you may have reason
To think of at another season,
Be not contented with the sight,
But take them down in black and white;
Such a respect is wisely shown,
It makes another's sense one's own."

6. It is also a good plan to write short essays on subjects that have been read. This will help wonderfully in giving readiness and precision in expressing one's thoughts, and it is also a guarantee that one knows a subject. It is not possible to write clearly upon a subject of which one is altogether ignorant.

7. Where possible it is also a good plan to discuss certain points in reading. It is an advantage to acquire the habit of good speaking. Many people speak indistinctly or incoherently, who are of necessity obliged to speak in public. This would not happen if the art of speaking or debating were more usually adopted. A few girls, sisters and their friends, might have weekly, fortnightly, or monthly meetings, choose a president or umpire, and speak on a given subject, say for five or ten minutes each, with very great advantage. Of course it is hardly necessary here to suggest that the subject should be prepared, and that there should be no gossip and no temper admitted into these little societies. An afternoon tea would be a genial close.

8. Another very interesting mode of self-improvement, known and practised possibly by many readers of this paper, is that of forming a kind of literary society, or club, the members of which write papers on given or self-chosen subjects, to be read and remarked on in writing, by each member of the club. The prize schemes of THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER are a public form of this method; an appreciated one also.

9. Among girls, too, it is very customary to have Dorcas meetings. It is a good plan here for one to read aloud. A lighter kind of literature, or poetry, will form a pleasant and healthy recreation here, as well as at the evening needlework, where fathers and brothers join the circle, and sometimes become the reader.

Many more points occur as showing their advantages, but doubtless our readers have already framed some additional ones of their own; if so, our object in this respect is already gained.

In gathering up in conclusion the thoughts put forward here, our readers will readily agree that our centre of observation is on the choice, accumulation and use of books. THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER has already shown "how to form a small library." Of books not to be found in this library, and not included in the list of gift books spoken of, and yet needed, the lending library, of which nothing has been said, will supply the place. There are students' lending libraries, as well as circulating libraries, which contain little but novels. Books then are within reach, and we hope also that every girl has some one to guide her in the choice of books; may she use them well when she has the! She will not regret the work when she has acquired the knowledge which gives pleasure in its search, enjoyment in the possession and satisfaction in its distribution; which makes her a happier, more intelligent, and more useful member of society, and a help-meet  for the best of men.

19 March 1881 - 'Mourning Attire' by S.F.A. Caulfield

The outward symbol of affliction has been dignified with the name of the reality which it so feebly portrays. In the reality, and in its external shadow, I find a rather extensive subject for our consideration.

It has been a necessity of our pour human nature to give vent to feelings of distress in some manner from the earliest period of the world's history, ever since the day that sin "brought death into the world, and all our woe." And in the history of nations - as in those of each individual being, from the cradle to the bier - various in character have been the expressions of mortal anguish when "it must have way."

It is my intention to take a three-fold view of the subject: historical, sentimental (in the best sense of the term) and practical, and further, to consider the case of those who find satisfaction in wearing black garments; those who find none in so doing; and those who, desiring to wear mourning, have not the means to purchase it.

The Israelites use dot fast and weep and rend their garments, clothe themselves with sackcloth, hair-cloth, or coarse black or brown cloth. They sat in ashes, threw them on their heads, tore and cut off their hair and their beards, smote on their breasts and tore them, made loud wailing, and went barefoot and bareheaded. All the time of their mourning they sat at home or went to mourn at the grave, and ate whatever they allowed themselves on the ground, their faces being covered. They further gave vent to their misery by leaving their beds unmade, abstaining from the use of a bath, and all the duties of the toilet. It was, of course, impossible to protract a mourning of this description, and the ordinary limit was restricted to a week, but extended to a month on special occasions. Contemporary nations used to "cut themselves with knives and lancets," and gave vent to loud, and what we should regard as extravagant grief; and, as we are informed in a Holy Writ, they "made themselves bald  for the dead" (Jer. XVI, 6, 7).  The mourning by Joseph and the Egyptians for Jacob was of seven days - "a great and very sore lamentation;" and in the Book of Daniel, tenth chapter, three weeks are named as a period for mourning. From what the prophet Zechariah tells us, it would seem that men and women used to part company on such occasions, and give vent to their sorrow. They "put on mourning apparel," and abstained from their "anointing with oil." (See 2 Sam, XIV, 2.) It was also a custom to hire public wailing women to mourn after a complimentary manner, just as we hire "mutes" to wear black, and long black or white bands from their hats, and scarves. See Jer. IX, 17, 18 where "mourning and cunning women" are mentioned; as likewise in the prophecies of Amos V, 16, where persons "skilful in lamentation" are named.

I spoke just now of "the cuttings" made in evidence of grief  for the dead by the ancient Israelites as not being peculiar to them. The custom of self-bleeding obtained amongst the Greeks, and also the Turks, and the cicatrices left  for the remainder of life served as mementoes of the departed. As to the Lacedaeomonians, they used to tear the flesh from each other's foreheads with pins and needles in honour of deceased monarchs. The making bald also was by no means peculiar to the Israelites and their contemporaries,  for the Greeks and Romans cut off their hair, as an offering of what they greatly esteemed, to a deceased relative; and sometimes it was laid upon the grave. The whole Greek army would do the same in honour of a much esteemed general. It was also their habit to retire into solitude, and to throw ashes on their heads, under which circumstances it was well that they did cut off their hair; and as natural also that they wore a veil whenever they appeared in public. Their dress was of black. The early Peruvians had an unpleasant prejudice in favour of pulling out the eyebrows and eyelashes as an offering to the dead; and in savage tribes of modern times the sacrifice of the hair, more or less, much prevails, as amongst the Carib and Dakota tribes of North America. The former sacrifice their long and precious scalplock, which is plaited down their backs, as the utmost expression of their respect and utter distraction; and the latter also cutting short, like their slaves and captives, that in which they glory. I have read of some uncivilised tribes who make their expression of grief a still more unpleasant affair, that of cutting off a joint of a finger. Indeed, the devotion of the Greeks to the memory of their commanders is thrown into the shade by some of these aboriginal tribes, whose magnates gave orders that a hundred fingers should be cut off to do honour to the memory of a chieftain just deceased.

The colours adopted in various parts of the world to express respect  for the dead have been various. We derived our idea from the Romans, who wore a black toga for mourning, and sometimes left it off altogether  for the same purpose. So far as the men were generally concerned, the colour did not change either under the Empire or the Republic, but under the former the women wore white, under the latter dark blue - a colour adopted by some of the men.

The Egyptians, in all probability, gave the custom of hiring "wailing women" to sing and lament, and beat tambourines, divested of the tinkling metal plates, to the Israelites. Two or more were engaged to mourn for an hour at a time. Strange to say, the colour adopted by them for their mourning is yellow.

In Turkey they adopt blue or violet, in China and Japan white, and in Ethiopia brown. In Bokhara they wear purple, as we are informed by Thomas Moore, in "Lalla Rookh."

"Not glittering o'er
With gems and wreaths, such as the others wore,
But in that deep-blue, melancholy dress,
Bokhara's maidens wear in mindfulness
Of friends or kindred - dead, or far away."

But throughout Europe, the United States of America, and our own colonies and dependencies, black is universal for deep mourning; and grey, or black with a little admixture of white, for slight mourning.

I have now reached the second division of my subject - the sentiment, which supplies the origin of all external exhibition of grief, whether of a positive or negative character.

I have related many extraordinary customs very uncongenial to our feelings, but it must not be supposed that hypocrisy was necessarily exhibited; for, custom having prescribed certain observances, to devote time, care, self-mortification, and money to their accomplishment was surely an indication of genuine respect of affection. And, however barbarous the ceremony, it might have indicated as much genuine feeling as the shedding of quiet tears unseen at home. Few of us "creatures of habit," as we are bound by the prejudices of our friends, care to be remarkable, any more than less civilised nations, by acting after a contrary fashion to them.

But, without scandalising them, a considerable amount of personal freedom is conceded to all. And, moreover, "necessity has no law;" and the pecuniary circumstances of one person might permit of much indulgence in the outward expression of distress, while those of another allow of little or none. It is scarcely possible to find two leaves alike on the same tree; and so even among members of the same family features and characters vary too. Therefore as others differ from us in disposition, we must check all unkindly criticism, misjudging of motives and personal vain-glory. There may be no difference whatever in the depth of feeling between the individual who is shrouded in crape, and one who wears but the most trifling expression of mourning; experience continually proves the fact that each alike may -

"...have that within which passeth show."

A strong prejudice against the wearing of black is consistent with great strength of feeling, yet those who entertain it are too often misjudged. In their behalf I would observe that there are no black flowers in Nature, although there are sombre hues. Still there is nothing really black in the beautiful garment with which our world is clothed. Even the firmament above it, though inky-dark at night, is wondrously glorified and gladdened with its stars. I have known a great lover of the beauties of Nature who mourned  for the loss of one beloved for years so acutely that she could scarcely endure to speak of that bereavement, even to the day of her death. And yet she had such an objection to being wrapped in black attire that she omitted to wear it on some occasions when custom required its adoption. A sincere feeling of sorrow was veiled under an ordinary garb, for she wished to look up from the narrow bed, where her dear ones were laid, to their happy place of rest beyond the charnel house, and to shake off as much as possible all depressing influences that her mind might be the more absorbed in thoughts of the beatific vision of the hereafter. In reference to these mourners after a fashion of their own, I may quote the words of one who had studied human nature more closely than most of his fellows -

"'Tis not my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black
That can denote me truly...
These but the trappings and the suits of woe."

At the same time our sympathies may be as tenderly and truly enlisted in behalf of that still larger company feeling a necessity for a vent for grief. Like the outburst of tears and convulsive sobs, that medium  for the relief of the nerves provided for all living, so the adoption of a sable garb supplies something of consolation to mankind in general. And then if some appear to outstep the limits of ordinary custom, in the amount of their crape and the duration of its wear, we must not be censorious, and charge them with affectation nor even with folly. Leave them alone and undisturbed for a season. Let it suffice for you to know that the hand of God is upon them, how heavily, for their state of mind, of health, of nerves, of faith, He only and they themselves can realise. Doctors will sometimes prescribe crying, even aloud, under a certain amount of mental and physical strain. The nerves demand an "opening of the floodgates." The bereaved ones must be left to turn their sad faces to the wall, and to unburden their hearts for awhile unrestrained. "The heart knoweth its own bitterness," God only knows it as well. "In all their affliction He is afflicted," of whom it is recorded, when, in a scene of mourning -

"Jesus wept!"

It is a gracious act of Christian charity to supply those of your poor friends or relatives, lacking the means to purchase them, with a black dress, bonnet, or out-door covering which their position in life would demand on such an occasion. For amongst these indigent persons there are those who would derive much consolation from showing outward marks of respect for their loved and lost; and none are so keenly sensitive, as a general rule, as poor gentlefolks, who struggle to keep up a certain appearance suitable to their birth, both because they wish to associate with their own connections, and because they would rather bravely struggle on under unseen privations, than prove a burden to their relatives, however, unintentionally. "Withhold not thy hand" in such cases as these. Light up the poor wan faces with a gleam somewhat akin to a smile, by helping them to vent their sufferings in some little external exhibition, in harmony with the "shadow of death" brooding within. In Nature the heavier the shower, the sooner the break in the cloud, the clearer the light, and the warmer the sunshine that follows - a meet emblem for that calm that succeeds a stormy grief, in trustful anticipation of the blessed "clear shining after the rain," and that "reaping in joy" of "those that sow in tears" - "sorrowing after a godly sort." Show no impatience. Let them give free vent to their trouble in their own way, having this consummation in view.

I have now arrived at the third and last portion of my subject - the practical part of so-called "mourning." To many a few hints may prove of service.

As to the length of its duration  for the several relationships in life, there can be no fixed and unalterable law. A widow, however, could not, with ordinary propriety, leave off her "weed" under a twelvemonth; nor should deep mourning be left off for a parent under that time. A year is not too long to wear it for a brother or sister; but under any circumstances no change should be made from the first deep crape until six months have elapsed. From three to six months for an uncle or aunt would be within ordinary rules, unless under special circumstances, of early residence under the same roof, or close relations of much affection or obligation. There is a paltry affectation of mourning which is very objectionable for women for a two-fold reason, because, while acknowledging the wearer's feeling of obligation to wear it, the least possible expense and trouble are conceded to that feeling. Better make no sign at all, than one so poor and mean. I allude to the wearing of a band of cloth or crape round one arm, the wearer being otherwise dressed in colours. The second objection to this "freak of fancy" is that it is an aping of a masculine style. In many respects men are allowed more license than women, and often wear a coloured overcoat, if not entire suit, together with crape on the hat alone. Women are hedged about by stricter rules; they are expected to show a greater semblance of grief in family troubles, and to shed tears more freely. Thus, to show any hardness or indifference to the usages of society, is to throw off a certain amount of feminine propriety and tenderness, at once unnatural and repulsive. Wear a black bonnet or hat, and black gloves, in lieu of that strap round one arm; and your ulster, though not a black one, may be worn by as true a mourner, and as true a "lady," as any in the land.

All mourning should be plain, without ornamental trimmings. A widow's dress may be nearly or altogether covered with crape. Paramatta and crape-cloth are suitable for widows, and these, with cashmere, grenadine, camel's hair cloth, and barathea may be worn in mourning for other connections; white for slighter mourning, whether of widows or others. Plain black lustreless silk may be worn trimmed with crape. Plain grey stuff trimmed with black are suitable for slight mourning; also crepe lisse collars, serge, nuns' cloth, and mohair. For inexpensive mourning cashmerette and alpaca can be worn. Even in deep and expensive styles a slight introduction of white may be permitted; and, for economy's sake, widows may cover their white cuffs with single crape, to keep them clean. Satin, lace, and fringe must be excluded from the black dress worn as deep mourning, either for a husband or very near relative.

The only material exclusively appropriated to mourning is crape, and this is a most expensive item. Only the best in quality is worth purchase, as the inferior kinds wear badly. The former may be renovated. To persons to whom a certain amount of economy is an object, I advise that crape should be reserved for a best dress, and for out-of-door wear; and that a perfectly plain dull black material should be adopted for home wear, and for an ordinary walking costume. French people do not wear crape, except for bonnet and veil. They consider that a plain black crape-cloth which may be sent to a laundress  for the common washing, a black woollen shawl, and black woollen gloves - not kid - are full mourning. I also recommend all those who are not wealthy, and who feel themselves under weightier personal obligations than those of "encouraging trade," to have one black dress always on the list of their wardrobe, which will be ready on any emergency, and save some outlay when, perhaps, their purses may ill afford to make it. Such a dress might be worn with equal propriety out of mourning, as it has of late years been so much disassociated with it, if only worn with some coloured article.

And while on the subject of crape I should not omit to tell you that, since it has been known that arsenic is employed in the dyeing of this material, people are less disposed to wear it constantly, and some even send it to go through the process of renovation when quite new, as by this means all that is injurious is abstracted: and it is, moreover, rendered impervious to damp. A crape bonnet no longer new may be restored to its original condition, without being taken off the frame, nor even removed from a silk lining. But were the latter of any other material, the removal would be necessary. If a warmer material than cashmere be desired, merino may be a good substitute. Sealskin fur, black lynx, or sable jackets and cloaks, muffs, and collars may be worn in the very deepest black with perfect consistency, but not as mere trimmings; and chinchilla is a good selection for a slighter degree of mourning, but where not very deep, any fur may be worn the price of which may render it suitable  for the means of the wearer.

This last observation reminds me to add a few words for those of my readers whose slender resources preclude their indulgence in what would be to them so great a solace in their affliction. Genuine grief will make itself quite apparent without intentional effort, or any external exhibition in the colour of the dress, at least, to all those whose intimacy, or near relationship would make that sorrow a matter of any interest. Thus no disrespect to the dead will be charged by them to the amount of your coloured dress. And if to add a few black ribbons to your bonnet - in lieu of some faded trimming of a different hue - and one dark outer covering, be all the attempt within your power to make, to conceal your ordinary dress when out of doors, do not fret over your inability to do more. That poor black ribbon tells as much on behalf of your loving remembrance, as the costly and elegant costume a wealthy neighbour may purchase, who consoles herself by the greatest outlay her ample means may afford. Think of it as the utmost that the wise providence of God permits you to do. He who regarded the widow's mite as more than all that of the rich, of their abundance, had cast into the treasury, because it was "all that she had." Could your lost ones revisit your dwelling, they would but say approvingly, "She hath done what she could." Besides, as a matter of principle, it is wrong to purchase mourning when the money is due for rent, taxes, or other responsibilities, or when required for outlay on clothing essential for warmth, or for suitable food for yourself, or your family.

I have now no more to say on the question which we have under consideration, unless it be to remind you of the somewhat remarkable example left us by David, when he lost his child. While he yet lingered in life, the King fasted and wept and prayed; but when God took him, he "washed his face and anointed his head," and, laying aside all external expression of grief, he resumed his public duties. Few could act thus; yet the example is worthy of consideration, as well as that recorded in the sixtieth chapter of the prophecies of Isaiah, twentieth verse, referring to that blessed hereafter, when -

"The days of thy mourning shall be ended."

12 February 1881 - 'Dinners in Society' by S.F.A. Caulfield

Perpetual solicitations on the part of the correspondents of this magazine to be further instructed in the  usages of "polite society" must plead my excuse  for the revival of a subject so trite and uninteresting to those no longer "girls."

Without further introduction, I will suppose that you are engaged to dine out, to meet a considerable assemblage of friends. Commence your preparations in good time, and let your dressing be completed a few minutes before the carriage is announced. To keep your elders waiting is most disrespectful; they have to choose between leaving you behind, or keeping your hosts and others waiting - spoiling their dinner, and perhaps of giving the horses cold also.

On being announced by one of the men-servants at the door of the vestibule or anti-room, you will find that your hostess awaits you, close at hand, within. Look at no one else, supposing that she had moved further into the drawing-room to lead some guest to a seat. Make a very slight curtsey as you give her your hand, a little act of politeness always observed in the upper ranks of society on formal occasions, and which needs to be practised, as it should be naturally and gracefully done. If not directed to a place, select one as little conspicuous as possible; not on a sofa, nor a large arm chair, unless desired to do so.

In ordinary society the ten minutes preceding the announcement of dinner are found to hang somewhat heavily on hand. Hungry, chilly, and possibly shy, or else naturally dull and uninteresting, people often appear to have nothing to say. I am, however, only writing for girls, who are not the proper leaders of general conversation. But they may speak to a next young neighbour without an introduction. After dinner you may assist your hostess in entertaining fellow-guests, though careful not to put yourself forward ostentatiously, so as to attract notice. Nothing could be in worse taste than to appear as if "doing the honours" (as people call it) of another person's house; instead of merely acting as a helper to her. Offer your small services, and follow her directions. I have seen young girls running about all over the room in a most forward and unseemly manner, taking the entire direction of the entertainment without the excuse of being daughters of the house.

But much may be gracefully and effectually done in a gentle, quiet way. Collect your thoughts before any kind of reunion, and be prepared with any little subjects of interest to form topics of pleasant conversation. Neither receive visitors at home, nor accept the hospitality of others, without making it a point of duty to return their kindness by making yourself agreeable. Do not sit silently scanning the dress of your neighbours, and saying nothing; nor answer in mere monosyllables, nor start when some one addresses you, as if you had just wakened up out of a nap. This is apt to occur in the case of young people who have few opportunities of mixing in society. Keep your hands still; do not move uneasily in your chair when first addressed, nor fiddle with the buttons of your gloves. Buttoned once they do not require to be touched again. Apart from any other objections to tricks like these, your awkward shyness presents a painful spectacle.

The dinner is now announced, and as the lady of the house has already signified to each of the gentlemen to whom he should offer his escort, and introduced to each other the pairs hitherto unacquainted, they all proceed to the dining-room according to the order of their respective precedence. With this matter - if ever a hostel yourself - you will have to make yourself thoroughly acquainted. Where there is no rank of birth nor professional position, age will always be your guide, which should never be overlooked.

I may here observe that "the girls" seem strangely solicitous about "which arm" a gentleman should present to the lady whom he conducts to the dining-room. Why they should feel so distracted about it I am at a loss to divine. One rule is enough for you - whichever arm your cavalier presents, accept it. Circumstances must guide him. Englishmen generally give the right, and foreigners the left. Where large entertainments are given the stairs are broad, as in our old country seats and stately town mansions. But in the humble dwellings of poor gentlemen and professionals, the narrow stairs have often an awkward turning at a sharp angle, leaving scarcely a ledge whereon to place the foot. Let the young man having a lady under his charge take due note of the stairs, and act accordingly.

You are now seated at table. Immediately after "grace" has been said, unfold your dinner-napkin, lay it across your lap, and remove both your gloves. Put the latter in your pocket, because if they fell from your lap under the table, your companion would have to dive under it to recover them on your rising to leave the room.

If you take soup do not crumble nor break your bread into it, except in the privacy of home, where a small dinner might be thus supplemented. Fried toast will be served with it if suitable. Take the soup from the side of the spoon - do not turn round the point to your mouth; make no noise in drawing in the liquid, nor in the act of swallowing it. If this offer you any difficulty practise the art at home. Lastly, do not hold up the plate on one side, nor make a scraping with the spoon; you can finish the soup easily without raising the plate.

Fish will next be handed round. Be careful in removing the bones with your fish-knife and fork, because a choking fit at dinner would not be an agreeable diversion to your neighbours; and to remove anything objectionable from your mouth at any time, whether of bone or gristle, is by no means a pretty exhibition. So put nothing in that is to come out, however cleverly and privately contrived. At small dinners given by persons of limited means, who may have no silver fish knives, you must only take your fork in your right hand and a small wedge-like crust of bread in the left, with which to assist the fork. Again, I must impress on you the impropriety of making a noise when eating, showing what is in your mouth by keeping your lips apart; and drinking before you have swallowed what you have been eating, or without wiping your mouth both before and afterwards.

Various courses follow that of the fish. Should curry chance to be one of the dishes, use both fork and spoon, but not your knife; and if helped to a tart containing stone fruit, remove the stones neatly from the plums with your fork. It is quite unnecessary to perform that operation in your mouth.

Possibly, at a private dinner, a hostess may press a guest to try some viand which she does not like. Of course the obligations on a hostess are even more strict than those on a guest, simply because the latter is dependent on her wishes; and so long as she remains under her roof, her comfort and feelings, in every way, should be consulted. Thus, to press her to eat or drink after she has declined, is an act of ill-breeding. At the same time it would be gross rudeness to show a distaste for any dish laid before you, or to persist in refusing it, were it pressed upon you. Self-denial is a Christian grace. Amongst half-civilised nations it is a mark of distinction conferred on any guest for a chief to roll up some morsel of food in his hands, and insert the greasy pellet with his own unassisted fingers into the mouth of the visitor. To decline it - because by no means an appetising morsel - would be a reflection on the good taste of the host, and an evidence of ingratitude for the distinction intended. Moreover, your rejection of the bonne bouche might cost you your head, or purchase the novelty of a javelin through your heart!

Apropos of controlling your fancies at table or elsewhere, rather than cast a reflection on one who wishes to please you, I will mention a little incident told me long ago by one to whom I owe much of my own early training in the usages of society. Now a very aged and venerable man, his parents had lived much about the Court of the old King George III, having been honoured with his personal intimacy He himself had lived and visited amongst the grandees of the Court of the Prince, as Regent and King, and was regarded as a man of most accomplished manners. Thus, I have no hesitation in giving my young readers advice derived from such competent authority.

The Prince Regent was styled "the first gentleman in England," for, like our own Prince of Wales, few had so keen an intuitive perception of the principles that govern all rules of good breeding. On one occasion he had indulged in taking snuff, and turning to a lady beside him, he presented his open box and invited her to take a pinch likewise. Alas! The good woman was not equal to the occasion; she was not in the habit of taking snuff - perhaps she disliked it; in fact, she had not learnt her less in good manners. So she thanked him and declined. Of course he felt as if charged with an indiscretion; but, always self-possessed and dignified, he simply turned to another lady and made her the same offer. This time he had met with a woman who was not out of her place in a palace. She thanked him graciously for so distinguishing her, and took the snuff, just sufficient of course to smell, but not to produce a sneeze. Her act justified that of the Prince, who was only testing her good manners, and he showed his recognition of her conduct by presenting her with the beautiful jewelled box, as a memento of the occasion.

Again I must conduct you back to the dining-room. Observe how highly-bred people eat asparagus. They feel with the knife where the soft part ends, and dividing the stems, they eat with the fork. It is a disgusting spectacle to see people draw out a mangled end from their mouths reduced to a ragged fringe. Never eat peas with a spoon. You may change the fork into your right hand and use it as one, or you may press the peas with it - still in the right hand - making them adhere conveniently together. Excepting at a private dinner, where little variety if any is provided, never ask for a second help from the same dish.

Take care to keep your hands off the table. Never fiddle with the salt, nor the spoon, knife and fork, and make no crumbs with your bread. Avoid coughing, and the use of your handkerchief; having a cold you should remain at home. If disposed to sneeze, from pepper or mustard, contrive to hold your nose with your handkerchief for a moment, to stop it in time, but do so unobserved if possible. After the game, cheese is carried round, and its usual accompaniments of butter and biscuits, &c. If you take butter, do not scrape off a piece against the rim of your plate, turning the face of the knife downwards, as if you were cleaning a putty-knife on the edge of a piece of glass. Contrive to loosen the butter, so as to place it fairly in the plate at one side. Should you also take cheese, butter a small piece of bread or biscuit, place a piece of cheese upon it, and convey it to your mouth in this way. To do so with the blade of a knife is highly objectionable, and contrary to all rules that obtain in the upper ranks of society, though many, otherwise well-bred people, may be seen careless in this respect in private, and elderly people also allow themselves much license in trifling matters, which they do not mean to form an example to younger people. Such little infringements of the orthodox rules should not be criticised by young people. Advancing life sometimes brings lassitude and indifference about them; and, moreover, what would evidence much selfishness and greediness in youth, is only to be regarded as the consent of an infirm person with a poor appetite, to be suitably nursed and provided for.

Dessert is now served, and the finger-glasses and d'oyleys are removed from all the plates by their respective owners. Fruit often presents difficulties to the consumers; what with the stones, skins, shells, or rind; it is not always easy to eat in a delicate and refined manner. Half-bred people may be seen inserting pieces of orange into their mouths and drawing out the peel again, showing the remains of the pulp on their plates. Pomegranates present some difficulty amongst other fruits. They are full of juice, and equally so of stones, too large to be swallowed wholesale. Cut one in two, and with the spoon press the stones within, as in a cup, extracting and taking up the juice with it.

Having taken what fruit they require, each lad dips her fingers in the finger-glass, and touches her lips also with the water, dries them, and puts on her gloves. She then lays the napkin on the seat of her chair. The lady of the house watches to attract the notice of the chief guest, seated at her husband's right hand, and smiles and bows to her, and they rise simultaneously, followed by all. The host opens the door, the chief lady walks out first, the rest according to their respective precedence, and the gentlemen stand until all have retired to the drawing-room.

In conclusion, I have a word of advice to offer on the subject of dinners at home, or after a homely fashion. Observe what dishes are being used, and those on which there appears to be a kind of "run," and never ask for that of which there is little, to the deprivation of any one yet unhelped. When there is a tart or pie uncut, there being sufficient of some other dish, show some little consideration for your hostess. The expenses and difficulties of housekeeping in families of small means are great. Keep your eyes about you. Remember the invalids, or those advanced in years Some small delicacy at the table may perhaps have been prepared for them. Try also to supplement the efforts of your hostess. However hospitable, and ready to give you anything you would like, she would appreciate a thoughtfulness on your part, that would leave something nice for one who is always last helped, or would spare an unbroken dish  for the following day, without making the reason too apparent. Would you wish her to replace a sort of wreckage of all in her small larder in return for her kindness to you?

8 January 1881 - 'French School-Girls'

The newspapers recently had many comments on the opening of a young ladies' college at Castle-Sarrasin, between Toulouse and Bordeaux, the first of many similar institutions to supplement if not displace the convent schools, where girls of the upper and middle classes could alone get education. Mr. G.A. Sala, in an article in a daily paper, had some interesting statements about "the French school-girl." French married ladies enjoy a surprising amount of freedom, which, it is to be hoped, they invariably turn to the best of uses; but French unmarried girls cannot be said to enjoy any freedom at all. They are not maltreated, for, although the French do not outrageously spoil their children as the Americans do, they treat them, as a rule, with unvarying kindness and tenderness, and consort with them on terms of much greater familiarity than is customary in children-loving but austere England. French fathers and mothers are petite pere and petite mere to their youngest children, who are accustomed to "thee" and "thou" them from infancy, and are not taught to dread them. On the other hand, they venerate them, and a grey-bearded Frenchman of fifty does not think it derogatory to his dignity, when writing to his mother, to subscribe himself ton fils soumis et obeisant.

But the French girl, until she be marriageable, is kept in the strict seclusion. She may not walk out alone, or even in the company of her sister. She is never left alone with an unmarried gentleman. She may not write to a gentleman under sixty, unless he be of kindred to her. She is debarred from indulging in a hundred harmless pastimes and frolics in which English girls habitually indulge, and the enthusiasm which Frenchmen are wont to express for les charmantes jeunes Meeses Anglaises may be to a great extent explained by the fact that they very rarely have a chance to freely communing with unmarried young ladies of their own nation. Married women, and not girls, are usually the heroines of French novels of society, and when the novelist does incidentally allude to a young girl of gentle nurture he generally dismisses her as a jeune fille reveuse. The truth is, that the author has so few opportunities of speaking to her that he has no experience to guide him in picturing to himself what she may be dreaming about. Precluded by the Median and Persian laws of la famille from describing female character in the upper and middle ranks of society, the romance-writers fly in despair to the foyer of the actress, the boudoir of the cocotte, or the garret of the ouvriere. There they are able to find an abundance of models and a plenitude of opportunities  for the observation and analysis of social characteristics. La famille has concerned itself very little with female Bohemia, who have not by any means been kept in seclusion in their girlhood.

That the segregation of unmarried girls from general society in France has been concurrently attended by very imperfect educational training is undeniable. Were it not that the French are a naturally witty, shrewd, and self-possessed people, a French girl of the upper middle classes might appear to an English or American young lady to be a lamentably ignorant specimen of "femininity." She may have picked up a few scraps of English in her pensionnat, but she is never taught even the rudiments of Latin; she would think it unpatriotic to speak German; her knowledge of the history and literature of her own country is limited, and that of the history and literature of other countries usually nil. A little linear drawing constitutes the sum of her acquaintance with mathematics, and she may be deemed fortunate if she has managed to gather a slight smattering of physical science, and that not of a very accurate kind, from the writings of M. Jules Verne. If she has been educated in a convent, the good nuns have probably taught her that three-fourths of the things which she will enjoy with such eager zest when she is married and free are essentially wicked, and it is not at all improbable that if she has been brought up in a nunnery in the provinces, her clerical instructors have instilled into her such ideas on politics as to make her regard the existing Government of her country with horror and aversion.

An English school-girl happily knows much more about hardbake and almond rock than she does about Conservatism or Liberalism; and from the age of sixteen to twenty she is too much occupied with matters of dress and amusement and affairs of the heart to trouble herself about which political party is in office, or which is in opposition. If she has any politics at all they are "papa's"; unhappily, as French society is at present constituted, the politics of a French young lady are in most cases directly the reverse of those of her papa. They are mamma's, and mamma's politics are those of M. Le Cure. The only wonder is that, educationally hampered and restricted at every turn, incessantly watched by the Argus eyes of parents and priests, the young Frenchwoman, when she has passed through the probationary stages of a school-girl and a demoiselle a marier should bear herself with the confident aplomb and hold her own in the brilliantly self-assured manner customary with her after marriage. The formalities at the Mairie and the ceremonial of the nuptial benediction at the church seem instantaneously to have transformed her into another personage, and she takes her place, be it in society or behind the comptoir of her husband's shop or cafe, with a perfectly easy, self-reliant, and satisfied air. Yesterday she was all timidity and taciturnity. Today she would confront M. Le Prefet without hesitation, and is loquacious even to garrulity. She is free; and that may have something to do with the rapidity and the completeness of the metamorphosis.

Whether increased educational facilities by means of public school or collegiate training of a liberal and secular kind will exercise a favourable influence on the character of the always fascinating but often uneducated young Frenchwoman remains to be seen. The progress of the experiment at Castel-Sarrasin will be watched with much interest on both sides of the Channel, but the gibers and jokers must hold their hands for a time, and refrain from prematurely sarcastic disparagement of a new generation of les femmes savants.

3 July 1880 - 'How Girls are Presented at Court' by Ardern Holt

For a story about presentation at court written by one such girl from her own perspective, please click here for part one and here for part two. And because Tumblr has eaten the scans of the illustrations from La Petite's first-hand account of presentation, I have re-scanned and added them here. :) Although as an edit to the edit on one of those pages - I'm now not certain whether the illustration is of La Petite, as the description of the dress doesn't match (it's lilacs instead of La Petite's lilys of the valley). But it's still a good depiction of the general costume mandated. 

 

Her Majesty generally holds four Drawing-rooms in the course of the year; two before Easter, two after, and seldom later than the month of May. As a rule, young ladies are presented by their mothers. Even if they are only presented themselves  for the first time the same day as their daughters, it is still en regle that they should make the presentation. But it is necessary - absolutely necessary - that the lady who undertakes the duty shall be present at the same Drawing-room, though she may not even see the young girl, and, except in the case of relatives, they rarely go together, and do not for a moment think of passing the Royal presence together. In asking any lady to make a presentation to Her Majesty it must be recognised as a great kindness and favour, for she is personally responsible. Unmarried ladies do not exercise the privilege of making presentations.

As soon as it is determined at which Drawing-room the young lady is to make her debut, the mode of proceeding is as follows. A card is sent in to the Chamberlain's office, Stable Yard, St. James's, on which is written the name of the person to be presented and the person presenting, thus: 'Miss Smith, by her mother, Mrs. Smith," accompanied by a letter from Mrs. Smith giving necessary particulars as to address, etc., and saying that it is her intention to be present at the Drawing-room of the date fixed. This must be done two clear days at least before the Drawing-room. The names having been submitted for Her Majesty's approval, on application at the same office, two pink presentation cards will be given, on which must be most legibly written, as before, "Miss Smith by her mother, Mrs. Smith," and these must be taken to the palace. One will be given to the page-in-waiting on first arriving at the top of the stairs, and the other handed to the Lord Chamberlain, who stands beside Her Majesty, when the Royal presence is reached, and from this he will read, in a loud, clear voice, the names to the Queen.

The proper Court dress is the next important consideration. A young girl, on her presentation, wears white, and every lady attending the court must have a train, lappets, Court plumes, and a really low dress. So strict are the laws with regard to this, that people are appointed to prevent ladies passing who fall short in any of these requirements. I was myself accompanied to a Drawing-room two or three years ago by a friend who had had her dress from Paris. It proved too high on her shoulders for regulation; moreover, she had only one small piece of tulle in lieu of lappets, and before entering the presence of Her Majesty she was compelled to tear some tulle trimmings from her dress and pin this on as another lappet, and to have the bodice cut down on the shoulders and turned in. These lappets may be either really lace or blonde, with the ends hanging at the back, or two pieces of tulle, which young ladies find more becoming. The width is mostly split in half, one end gathered on a thread, and so pinned on. White plumes are essential - three for married, two for unmarried women - placed in such a manner that they can be distinctly seen in front. The train must be at least three yards long, and is generally four. It is sometimes cut in one with the bodice, sometimes attached by braces to the shoulders, sometimes plaited on the shoulders, but young ladies generally have it sewn on at the waist. Just now white satin and brocade is most used, with tulle skirts and a profusion of white flowers. Pearls are considered the most appropriate ornaments for a debutante. The dress must be well made and all the details well carried out. Many-buttoned gloves are worn, but when presented, before appearing in the Queen's presence, the right hand one must be removed, and this is generally simplified by not being put on at all. Having a handkerchief, a fan, the one glove, and the card to hold, it is far better not to carry a bouquet, especially as the end of the train, neatly folded, has to be borne on the left arm.

The mode of proceeding at a Drawing-room is as follows; - The palace doors generally open at two, the Queen entering the Throne-room at three. Of late years Her Majesty's health has not permitted her to remain throughout the reception. Therefore, in order to pass before her, it is well to go early, especially when presented, as it is only in a case of presentation that the Queen's hand is kissed,  and this ceremony is not gone through if the Princess of Wales or any of the Royal Princesses have taken her place. Then you merely pass courtseying low, as you would if you were only attending a Drawing-room, though the presentation thus made is in every respect equivalent to actual presentation to the Sovereign. But being an event that will hardly happen more than twice in a woman's life, it is advisable to do it thoroughly. Once presented, you can annually attend one Drawing-room  for the future, and will only require to be re-presented when you marry, or you attain some title. People anxious to arrive early leave homes mostly at half-past twelve to one, being content to wait patiently in the line of carriages down the Mall or Buckingham Palace-road, and endure the eager inspection of a dense crowd, who, wet or fine, line the roadway, peer into the carriages,  and often laugh and make audible remarks about the inmates. There is, however, no lack of amusement. The beefeaters, in their quaint scarlet Tudor dresses, bedizened with gold, their ruffs, and low-crowned hats, encircled with red, white and blue ribbon, march, halberds in hand, to Buckingham Palace to take up their stations along the corridors and staircases. The Gentlemen-at-Arms troop in by twos and twos, in scarlet uniform, gold helmets, and white, waving plumes. They are also on duty within the palace. You see them in each room guarding the barriers, and preventing the entrance of more people than will comfortably fill them.

In the room adjoining the Throne-room, they stand in a line ready to act as a veritable body-guard to the Royal Family if required, and another line divides off the lower end of the picture gallery, forming a sort of corridor to the Throne-room. There is no better place for seeing the dresses. I always make a rule of getting close behind these Gentlemen-at-Arms, as soon as I have passed the Royal presence, and so, peering between their shoulders, see the rest of the company pass in single file, their trains flowing behind them. One or more of the Household Troops are on duty in the Court-yard, and act as escort to the Royal personages who attend the Drawing-room, and it is a very pretty sight to see the bandmen in their gold coats march through St. James's Park, to take up their position and play throughout the reception. I have never myself heard them in the palace, but in some of the rooms you can and when "God Save the Queen" is played, you know that Her Majesty has entered the Presence Chamber. The equipages of ambassadors, ministers, and other distinguished people also flit to and fro, but they do not fall into the line, having the privilege of the entree which entitles them to enter the palace by a special entrance to occupy the first Drawing-room, next to the Throne-room, and to pass before the Queen first.

At last, after a long waiting, the line of carriages begins to move slowly, and in time you pass through the fine gateway into the inner quadrangle, and alight at the steps of the grand entrance. Here you will see some few scarlet-coated servants and officials, and much crimson carpeting. You cross the really magnificent hall, paved with variegated marble, the ceiling supported by white marble columns, with Corinthian capitals of mosaic and gold, and up a few steps reach a dining-room, where cloaks and wraps are left. Leaving this, you ascend the staircase, enter the picture gallery, leave one of the two cards with which you are provided with the page-in-waiting, who stands by a raised crimson-coloured desk, and then hurry on through the concert-room into the furthest of the suite of drawing-rooms not yet filled. There is the Blue Drawing-room, hung with blue silk panelled in gold, with Winterhalter's portraits of the Queen and Prince Consort; the Dark Blue Drawing-room and the Red and Yellow Drawing-rooms; they all command a view of the beautiful gardens of Buckingham Palace, where the fountains are generally set playing. They are filled with rows of chairs and as soon as these are occupied the Gentlemen-at-Arms cross their halberds, an no more are admitted, and so on till all the rooms are filled. People sit chatting to their friends, and thus while the time away. There are only a few gentlemen present, and they must be in attendance on ladies, and do not generally pass the Royal presence, but are nevertheless occasionally presented with their wives.

After a time there is a rustle and a rush. The "Entree" has passed the Queen, and the rest of the world are about to do so in turn; the stream moves through the suite of rooms in single file, until they reach the end of the picture gallery, lined with the Gentlemen-at-Arms. Here the Queen's pages remove the train from the right arm, spread it on the ground, and thus you walk across the gallery to the Throne-room. The door on the left-hand side is glass, and scarcely any one passes it without looking how her trains set. When you enter the Presence Chamber you find a narrow half-circular alley left, down which you are to proceed. Quite in the background is the Throne and its canopy. IN front of it are the ladies and gentlemen in attendance on the Queen and other Royal personages, and in front of them are the Royal Family. Near the doorway next the Queen is the Lord Chamberlain, then Her Majesty, the Princess of Wales, and the other Princesses, and then the Princes. The general circle fills the rest of the room. Just in front of you will be the end of the train of the lady passing next before you. In case of mother and daughter the mother would go first. You have no longer to think about your own train; your glove, fan, and handkerchief hold in your left hand, your card in your right. As you pass through the doorway give this to the Lord Chamberlain. You will find his hand ready to receive it. As soon as he mentions the word "presentation" the Queen will put out her right hand, then courtesy very low, place your own right hand beneath it, and bend and kiss it. When you rise courtesy low to each member of the Royal Family, and walk along this semi-circular alley sideways, being careful on no account to turn your back; but by the time you have well passed the Royalties, you will find your train being placed on your arm, and, the crowd intervening, you leave the room by the centre doorway without any necessity for further backing. You make your way at once to the picture gallery, which is now thronged. You can look at the pictures which are worth seeing, including gems of Greuze, Wilkie, Maas and others. But the beautiful people and beautiful dresses will distract your attention. By-and-bye you will proceed to the great entrance hall, and, having obtain your cloaks, wait there until your carriage is called, a tedious process, for if it happens to come up before you are ready, it goes to the very end of the rank.

I should advise all young girls about to be presented to rehearse the actual ceremony well beforehand, for I notice at many drawing-rooms how badly it is done. It is necessary to remember that courtesies made to Royalty must be very low. Avoid, above all things, "fluster," and do not be alarmed at the idea of having to walk backwards with your train on the ground. You really hardly have to do this at all, it is a crab-like sideway movement you have to execute. The important points to bear in mind are - to have your hand ungloved, to place it beneath the Queen's, and to make separate and distinct courtesies to every Royal person in the circle.

3 April 1880 - 'Etiquette for Ladies and Girls' by Ardern Holt

 If "manners make the man" they even more decidedly make the woman, and few gifts ensure greater happiness and affection to their possessor than a good manner.

Now, while all good manners are the offshoot of a good heart, and while kindly courteousness and thought for others are the very kernel of the matter, still there are certain laws laid down which it is necessary to thoroughly understand, and I purpose to set these before my readers. For etiquette and good breeding are not identical though they are twin sisters; for example, it is possible for a  foreigner to be perfectly well bred and yet show an ignorance of some details of etiquette.

All the niceties of personal behaviour in regard to eating, drinking, and cleanly habits are learned imperceptibly by children from their parents and guardians, hence it is most necessary that mothers who are unable to have their children constantly with them should ensure innate refinement in the teachers and attendants who surround them.

It is when a girl is old enough to "come out" as the phrase is, and to take a recognised position in the social world, that a knowledge of the code that rules good society becomes necessary. For there is but one recognised code in really good society, although some old-fashioned modes may prevail in other places, and, with old-fashioned people. "Coming out" means introduction to society either at a party at home or by being presented at her Majesty's Drawing-room, or by merely accepting the invitations of friends. When a young lady is "out" her name appears on her mother's visiting card, immediately below her mother's name; or with those of her sister's as one of the Misses _____. An unmarried lad, unless she has arrived at a certain age, does not have a card of her own, nor does she make calls on her own account, as she should certainly not have acquaintances who are unknown to her parents.

Visiting cards should be printed on thin unglazed cards, in as plain letterings as possible in text hand, with no flourishes or any remarkable style of printing, the gentlemen's about half the depth of the ladies' but in cases where there is no mother the daughters have their father's name printed on cards of the usual ladies' size, with their own beneath. Some ladies put their husband's name on their cards as well as their daughters, Mr and Mrs S____ in one line. This is not a solecism, but is somewhat old-fashioned.

The plan of card-leaving is regulated by very plainly-defined laws of etiquette. Cards were originally introduced so that people on whom the calls were made might be aware of the fact even should the servant be forgetful, and when a personal call is made they are never sent in, excepting in cases of business visits where there is no acquaintance, as, for example, in calling  for the character of a servant.

If an acquaintance is not at home when she calls, a lady leaves her own card with the names of her daughters upon it, and two of her husband's cards, one  for the master and one  for the mistress, with occasionally an additional one  for the sons If the mistress is at home, on leaving she deposits two of her husband's cards on the hall table. She must neither give them to the servant nor to the hostess. As a rule, the wives do the card-leaving for married men, who rarely call in person.

The right-hand corner of a lady's card turned down means that she intends the call to be on the young ladies as well as their mother. Cards should bear the prefix of their owner - Mrs, Miss, Lady (if a knight or baronet's wife), Countess, or any other title. The only one never used on a card is "Honourable". The Christian name without a prefix is simply a barbarism unheard of in good society, such as "Jane Brown", though young gentlemen, at college and elsewhere, put the name without a Mr".

With card-leaving comes the question of calling. Calling hours are from three to six. First calls should be returned within the week. Calls should be made also within the week after every entertainment, whether it be a dinner, or an "At Home", held either in the evening or afternoon, always assuming that the "At Home' is a party for which invitations have been issued. Many people in London, and large towns, though not, perhaps, the ultra fashionable people of London, have certain days in the week on which they receive their friends, and as the friends who put in an appearance are in fact paying a call, a subsequent call in consequence of being present at such an "At Home" is therefore unnecessary. After a dinner-party it is best to go in if the lady is at home, leaving cards, if preferred after other entertainments Most people on coming to town call on all their friends by merely leaving cards; it is etiquette for those who come to town to take the initiative for, of course, it would be almost impossible for their acquaintance to ascertain when they came. If, when a call is made simply cards are left at the door and there is no inquiry as to whether the mistress is at home, the same plan should be adopted in returning the call. Servants should be trained to remember the distinction. It is a vulgarity under any circumstances whatever to send visiting cards by post. If after an entertainment the distance is too great for a call, it would be best, if you are very punctilious, to write a polite note; but to send cards by post to save the trouble of calling is a breach of good manners.

On leaving a neighbourhood, and sometimes at the end of the season, or going abroad, cards are left with P.P.C., viz., pour prendre conge, or pour dire adieu, written upon them. If young ladies are away from home, and have been accepting hospitalities in the way of dinners and other parties their names should be written in pencil on the card of their chaperone.

in the country old residents call on new-comers, but in London and in towns generally this plan does not hold good, and an introduction is necessary before a call is made. When a call has been made the receivers can continue the acquaintance or not as they please, but first calls are generally followed by invitations from those who make them. Cards left in the case of illness should have the words "to inquire" in pencil on the top. To very young ladies a morning call is often an ordeal they would fain avoid; but this should not e encouraged. If admitted, they, with their mother, would be announced by the servant, and should take a part in the conversation without in any way monopolising it. Supposing other callers were present the can, if they please, enter into conversation with them; their so doing does not require an introduction nor necessitate an acquaintance. A quarter  of an hour is enough for a ceremonious call. Neither when other visitors come or go do those present rise; they can, if they please, bend slightly, but that is not necessary.

If the call is made about five o'clock, tea is generally served, and, as a rule, poured out by the lady of the house without ceremony.

When calls are received at home more devolves upon the young ladies of the house; then they are expected to help their mothers in the conversation and in dispensing tea, etc. They can, if they please, receive lady visitors in their mother's absence, but it depends on her approval whether gentlemen are admitted and this is not often allowed if there is but one daughter.

A young lady visiting at a house must use her discretion with regard to remaining in the room when visitors call. It depends whether she thinks her hostess would wish her to do so, and unless she happens to be herself acquainted with the people who come, it would be better, after a short interval, to retire. If visitors call upon her who are unknown to the hostess, as a young lady it would be right for her to introduce them, her chaperone taking the place of her mother  for the time being.

A young girl with all the freshness of her youth and the sweet dignity of womanhood has a sure passport into society which secured her a warmth of welcome; it depends on herself whether this grows or is early nipped in the bud.

Fastness and prim sedateness are equally to be avoided; a calm, frank, unembarrassed manner, a sympathetic interest in and thought for others, a habit of saying the right thing in the right place, the power of being a good listener, and of letting the conversation take any turn most agreeable to the speaker, these are some of the component parts of good and pleasing manners. The fault of the age rather runs towards young people assuming too much, being too confident and self-assertive, and too thoughtless with regard to their elders - all essentially bad manners.

People who have at all a large acquaintance should keep a visiting book with the names and addresses of those on whom they are on visiting terms, and a correct alphabetical list of the several members of the family who, in case of an entertainment being given, would be invited. Without this a hostess is apt to forget the number of sons or daughters. A supplementary list in a small note-book kept in or with the card-case saves a great deal of trouble when visits are paid.

Twice a year as a broad rule is sufficient number of times to call on acquaintances, unless they have given entertainments which necessitate card-leaving.

On hearing of the death of an acquaintance, cards should be at once left at the house, and when the relatives feel able to see their friends again they send by hand or post either specially printed cards or their own "with thanks for kind enquiries", which are acknowledged by a call.

Ladies, do not leave cards on gentlemen, unless they have been entertained. After a dinner given to ladies by a bachelor a wife would leave her card with her husband's. Common sense should be exercised in all these matters. The wife of a naval officer would hardly leave her husband's cards on mutual acquaintances when he was at war.

A NOTE FROM THE EDITOR OF 'THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER':

The importance of attention to rules of etiquette will be admitted even by those whose pressing duties or higher avocations hinder from rigid observance of them. For example, no one would expect the ceremonies of formal visiting from hospital nurses, though some of these are of high and noble families. They are better employed. No one is surprised at their disregard of etiquette, any more than at their now wearing gloves, which they never do. Such exceptions are very different from those made without excuse of duty. We have known good people who, from ignorance, or neglect of rules and usages of social life, cause religion itself to be evil spoken of. They think such things to be "conformity to the world". But the true principle is to be in the world, yet not of the world. The Christian precept, "Be courteous" covers all the innocent usages of society in our time, as it did in the days when Divine illustrations were drawn from the usages of the Jews in their feasts and marriages and other social institutions.

10 October 1889 - 'Schoolgirl Troubles and How to Deal with Them' by Nanette Mason - Part 1 'Home-sick and Desponding'

Many a schoolgirl would give a good deal for one of the magic carpets of the fairy tale books, on which she would have but to sit and wish, and so go flying through the air to home again. And we can hardly wonder at it. To be turned out of the parental nest at an early age to pick up education at a boarding-school, surrounded by strange faces and governed by unfamiliar and unwelcome rules, is a heavy trial to a sensitive nature. Happy are the girls whose people live in large educational centres, and who need never experience homesickness, because they can find what is needed in the way of learning in the next street.

Annie is not one of that lucky number. After every holiday, when she returns to school, she weeps all the way to the train. Ethel, too, not only does the same, but lets her tears flow for days - last term it was a full fortnight - after her arrival. Winnie weeps when she gets a letter from home, and when she gets a letter that isn't from home, for no other reason than because it isn't, she weeps again. And when you speak  about home, tears are in the eyes of all three; just as if they were grown-up people listening to the familiar strains of "Auld Lang Syne".

Some girls are more prone than others to home-sickness, much in the same way that some are more liable than their neighbours to attacks of measles and scarlet fever. A girl of resolute temper can hardly even realise what it means. When she leaves home there are tears in her eyes, maybe, but she brushes them away and calls in philosophy to fight against what she looks on as a weakness. It is like Eve leaving Paradise, "Some natural tears she dropped, but wiped them soon". Her grief never lasts beyond the first few miles, not that she does not love home, but because "what can't be cured must be endured", and it is her nature always to make the best of things. She is not without feeling, but she has learned early one of the most important lessons for our comfortable passage through the world, that "the art of life consists in not being overset by trifles".

Not a few girls, however, are naturally disposed to gloom, and when clouds come along they pay attention only to the dark side. One would think it was they whom the poet had in view when he wrote, "There's nought in this life sweet, if men were wise to see't, but only melancholy. Oh, sweetest melancholy". They are sometimes so in love with depression that to cheer them up looks like robbing them of their joy.

If a girl of this sort goes to school she is sure to do so with a heart overflowing with grief, and it is hard to feel much sympathy with her. She looks so like crying to indulge a caprice and to illustrate the old proverb that "It's no more pity to see a woman weep than to see a goose go barefoot". If you say to her, "Mary" - or whatever her name is - "why are you looking so glum?" she can give no reasonable reply. Some tears would move a stone to pity, but hers are not of that sort.

A girl, however, one has deep feeling for is the timid and retiring character, afraid of strangers and so shy perhaps as to be startled by the sound of her own voice, who goes to school like a girl driven into banishment. Her hankering after the home with which she is familiar, and the friends with whom she is intimate, mounts to the height of passion, and to be in exile and to have exchanged it, it may be, perfect liberty for constant restraint are felt by her as great afflictions.

She has not yet had the experience which shows that, whether we like it or not, separation is an incident which we must all learn to put up with. As we make our progress through the world, we find that life is made up of partings, and that we must steel our hearts to face what is inevitable.

Fortunately, the tears of youth do not as a rule last long, and in the first stages of existence the heart has a great capacity for getting over depressing events. For a day or two a girl may resemble the character in the story whose heart was so heavy that the chair broke down under her, but she quickly becomes volatile enough for anything. And curiously enough, she who has suffered from the greatest depressions of melancholy is often seen to rise afterwards to the greatest elevations of cheerfulness and mirth.

A good cry once in a while is not an entirely useless performance. It relieves the mind and only becomes foolish when indulged in to extravagance, and as if one were sent to school merely to conjugate the verb to weep.

There is an art of transforming all things - even trouble - into gold, and of making them the sources of no end of mental wealth and improvement. Home-sickness may be made a blessing if it teaches us to value aright the firesides we have left. We best see things as they really are by being removed from them, and a mother's tender care and the wise counsels of a father's are never appreciated half so much as when we are no longer sheltered by the roof under which we were born.

The rule is not infallible, but you may gain a good deal of information about a girl's home from the way in which she takes absence from it. No one is home-sick whose coming to school is a welcome relief from the irrational and uncomfortable life that prevails in some houses, where everything is at sixes and sevens, children being in the way of their parents, and parents in that of their children. It is the happy homes that send out more or less home-sick daughters.

There is this, at least, in common between us and cats, that we are disinclined to change our locality, and grow attached to a thousand and one little things for no other reason than that we happen to live amongst them. To remain constantly in one place is not, however, good for us. There is health in change, both mental and physical. "Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits," is a saying with a good deal of truth in it.

It is wholesome discipline to be thrown on one's own resources, and many a schoolgirl which she says good-bye to her people at the railway station, may be thankful at being forced to shift for herself. She may be nervous and diffident at first; but that wears off after a little, and the result is sometimes surprising. We have seen girls go off to school,  for the first time, mere ciphers and intellectual jelly-fish and, after a year or two, there they were quite new creatures, with bright intellects and full of life and self-possession.

To go alone anywhere is not to be reckoned a hardship, loneliness being a condition of humanity of which our hermit spirits should try to make a wise and profitable use.

"Why should we faint and fear to live alone,
Since all alone, so heaven has willed, we die?
Not e'en the tenderest heart and next our own
Knows half the reasons why we smile and sigh."
A pleasant reflection that we are enduring separation  for the sake of learning, and with a view to becoming a credit to all who are dear to us. There is a saying that women in all ages have taken more pains to adorn the outside than the inside of their heads; but in these days this truth is going out of date. The pursuit of learning, when followed up with diligence, does a great deal to prevent the feelings of home-sickness. The sovereign cure for grief of any kind is occupation. Melancholy is a nightmare; be busy about something, and it is already ended, for we cannot be sad and interested at the same time. The reason why many girls are home-sick is simply because they do not keep their eyes about them, and their attention at the proper time fixed on those lessons to learn which they were sent to school.

A great consolation in home-sickness is the thought of meeting our loved ones again, when we are sure to find that absence has made the heart grow fonder, and that home is dearer to it than ever. Meetings are made all the brighter because of partings, and of all innocent pleasures give us that of recounting to a fireside circle the experiences we have gained when separated from them. Time hurries fast when one keeps busy, and whilst to the melancholy idler a term appears an age, the industrious girl sees it go by with such rapidity that is quite a surprise when the end comes, and she finds herself free to fly off to her father's house, like a bird escaped out of a cage.

10 December 1881 - 'The Habits of Polite Society' by S.F.A. Caulfield.

I imagined all of this being read in the voice of Maggie Smith as the Countess Dowager. 

In the first part of the series of notes indicated in the above title I promised to supply, as one time amongst many, some directions on “complimentary” and “family mourning”.  So, before entering upon a consideration of a very miscellaneous collection of rules, the former subject shall be made my opening topic, premising that the statements given emanate from the highest authority. 

In giving any such directions, however, it must be remembered that special cases must not be met with any conventional hard and fast rules.  Circumstances of great personal attachment, respect or obligation; or of a residence in the house with relatives who may be in the deepest affliction, may each render a greater depth and duration of the external “trappings of woe” a matter of imperative duty.  At Courts, where the interests of trade, the obligations of State display, and brilliancy of costume, are matters demanding consideration – utterly precluding any long-continued dreariness of appearance – the wearing of mourning is of very brief duration.  Thus persons in high society, whose personal connection with Court, or with relatives who must be in frequent attendance there, cannot act altogether independently of those customs and fashions, which are obligatory under such circumstances.  At the same time, the existence of these rules amongst the elite will hold all other persons free from blame who are pleased to decide on their adoption.

Let us give to the subject of “Family Mourning” the precedence, beginning with that obligatory on a widow.  For the first twelve months she may wear deep crape and a suitable cap, and no invitations during this period – out of the circle of her own immediate family, or incognito with a very intimate friend – should be accepted.  Some change in the style of her dress is allowed on entering the second year of widowhood, when she may exchange her crape-trimmed barathea, or such like material, to a widow’s silk dress, deeply trimmed with crape, and continue to wear it for a period of six months.  After this time the crape may be reduced, and jet trimmings employed during the next six months, when a two years’ mourning will have been completed, and the crape should be altogether removed.  For the first six months of the third year she may wear grey and lavender-coloured dresses and trimmings, and then colours, like other people.

For a father, mother or child the present mourning lasts for one year.  For three months the deepest black; for the second three months, silk and crape; for the third quarter, black and jet trimmings, without crape; for the fourth, black and white, the ornaments permitted being diamonds and pearls, and grey gloves instead of black (or, at Court, white).  But while giving you the rule now obtaining, as regards the mourning for such near relatives, amongst persons going out into society amongst the aristocracy, I by no means wish my readers to understand that even persons of the same position in life, who do not go into the society of Courts, restrict the marks of love and respect for parents or children to limits so scanty as those i have described.  A year’s crape, lightened a little at the end of the first six months, and slight mourning for the first quarter of the second year, is the old-fashioned custom, still kept up by all those to whom the outward semblance of grief is a true index of the heart’s affliction.  But this can only be provided that they possess the requisite means so to vent their own feelings, and are not thwarted by the exactions of the position they hold, and the society in which they live.

For grandparents, the modern rule is to wear silk and crape for three months; plain black for three more; and black and grey or lavender for the last three, so reducing the mourning to nine months.

For a brother or sister, society prescribes only three months of crape, two of black, and one of half mourning.

For an uncle, aunt, nephew, or niece, two months of crape and one of black.

For a great uncle or aunt, two months in black, and one in half mourning.

For a first cousin, three weeks in black and three in half mourning.

For a second cousin or first once removed, three weeks in black.

And here attention must again be drawn to the exception which I have taken to the brief duration, and slight character of the mourning described as sufficient only “in society” of a certain class, for parents, and apply my observation to the rules given respecting brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts, and nephews and sisters.  For persons who are free from the cold and artificial influences of a Court and its hard exactions, and who occupy a place in what may be described as private society, who may render ungrudgingly the outward expression of respect or sorrow for those who shared the same blood with themselves – for these persons six months of the deepest crape would seem but too little for a brother or sister, or even in many cases for an uncle, aunt, nephew or niece.

We have now arrived at the second part of my subject, viz., the rules obtaining in reference to “complimentary mourning”.  It is worn by a second wife for the near relatives of her predecessor; by a mother for the parents of a son or daughter-in-law, and for their brothers and sisters, for a period of six weeks.  But this should consist of black only, not in combination with crape.  For a friend black may reasonably be worn for a month or six weeks; and for the head of your family (if a peer) a month.

Having already given an entire article on the subject of “mourning” to which the reader is referred p.398, vol.ii., I hope that the information with which I have now supplemented my views on a much vexed question will prove of some use to those who are troubled by any doubts with reference to it. 

And now from the etiquette of these black habiliments I pass on to give a few hints on suitability of dress in general.

Nothing could look more vulgar than to be over-dressed in the street.  A handsome costume of bright colour, suitable for a dinner-party, might likewise be worn at a flower-show, a concert, or a garden-party; but very bright colours, in rich silks, satin or velvet materials, are quite unsuitable for afternoon visiting.  To wear such, even if driving, to make calls on friends and acquaintances, would be to make yourself an object of very unfavourable criticism, and stamp you as one who was ignorant of the habits of society.  The kindest of the observations made would be “What a pity that poor Miss So-and-So should not know better than to go out of an afternoon dressed like that!”

Some description of white dress is to be worn at “confirmation” and a white cap.  But the precise character of the dress – respecting which continual inquiries are made – should depend, not on personal fancy, but on what has been arranged for the occasion in each respective parish.  It is in better taste to be dressed as much like the other persons of your own position, and as nearly in harmony with the rector’s wishes as possible, all appearance of display being carefully avoided.  Humility should then pre-eminently mark your whole deportment, and the absence of desire to attract attention.

In reference to visiting or afternoon walking costumes, they may be handsome, but the colours should never be brilliant, nor the style and designs remarkable.  Your carriage and deportment at all times, especially out of doors, should be a more distinguishing characteristic than the clothing with which you are covered.

There is also a distinction to be made between the style of your dress in the country and that in the town.  For example – you may take a country walk in an “ulster” at any time of the day; but, excepting in bad weather, justifying the wearing of wraps, persons in the upper classes restrict their wear to the forenoon if in a large city.  In the same way bonnets are more suitable to persons of middle age than hats, especially in the afternoon; except it be in the garden or to take a country walk, when a wide brim may be an object for the shade it affords, rather than for its youthfulness of style.

There should always be some change made in your dress in the evening.  An old summer dress may look well by candlelight which is past wear by day; and thus, if an object, economy may be as much studied as good taste by such a use of it.  If unable to afford, or in travelling to carry, an evening dress, a fresh bodice might be worn, or a change of collar and cuffs made, or a fichu, or arrangement of lace to put on round the neck, to give an appearance of change of costume; which, according to the most commonly known rules of society, is regarded as a mark of respect to those with whom you dine or spend the evening.  But of course the observance of this “habit” must depend on the circumstances of the individual; and much that I am now writing is obviously for those of my young friends in the “upper classes”.

Now that short dresses are worn out of doors, my next caution is scarcely called for at present; but should they return to fashion pray bear in mind the annoyance to others occasioned by allowing the skirt to touch the ground, as well as the uncleanliness of the practice, your own interest alone considered. If you imagine that to fasten up your long dress, so as to clear the ground, looks ungraceful, you may feel quite persuaded that you would look far worse, personally, if your dress were used as a scavenger's street broom; and, worse, morally, showing you to be so indifferent to the comfort of others who follow you on the same footway, and whom you smother with the dust raised by your dirty and loathsome skirt.

Enough of these obligations on the subject of dress, so many, and so diverse, are the little rules yet to be given on other points, and which cannot find a place within the limits of this article, excepting after a somewhat disjointed fashion.

We will suppose you are paying an afternoon visit. Do not send up your card, but give the servant your name very distinctly, and leave your umbrella or wraps in the hall, especially if they be damp. One of the menservants (in any great house) will take them from you. If the reception-room be empty, remain standing until one of the family shall appear; or, if you be fatigued and sit down, at least be careful to rise before she enters the room. Do not swing your parasol, nor hold the handle to your mouth - a trick as silly-looking as it is useless - nor gripe the hand offered you, so as to drive into your friend's fingers all the rings worn. In fact, you should not even press the hand of a superior, but leave your passively, though closely, inserted in theirs. Never give the tips of your fingers, not present two only; nor ever the left hand, which is regarded as a great impoliteness. The ungracious character of the significance attached to it may be understood, through that implied by a "left-handed compliment". This idea has descended to us from the ancient Romans, with whom the right was esteemed to represent good fortune, and the left bad, according to the teaching of their augurs. Thus also "Morganatic marriages" are called "left-handed marriages", the left hand being given on such occasions, instead of the right, by the husband.

When shaking hands with an equal, do not give one great jerk downwards, as if you were pulling a stiff bell-rope, nor saw your hand up and down half a dozen times. One little kindly shake - your hand well locked in theirs - with a slight pressure, is amply sufficient to represent the cordial nature of the greeting. Keep yoru feet and hands still, and neither fiddle with anything, nor make any rapping. Do not forget yourself so much as to tilt up the back legs of your chair, nor sit either on its edge, or on one side, so as to look as if you were going to slip off on the floor. Even if there be a rocking-chair in the room, it would be an act of intrusive familiarity to swing yourself in it, unless invited to do so. Avoid the frequent repetition of anyone's name when in conversation with them. "Yes, Mrs So-and-so", "I do not know, Mrs So-and-so", is a style of speaking as irritating as it is vulgar, and very common amongst half-bred people and little school-girls. The name should be sparingly used; and you should always avoid answering any question in monosyllables. A short blunt manner is always impolite.

But "The Habits of Polite Society" are not restricted to intercourse with friends outside the precincts of home; they are observed by all who are truly "well-bred" in the family circle. Yet there are those who could not be guilty of a rude or unkindly action at any time, nor of a vulgar one outside that circle, who are most careless and self-indulgent within it. For example, I have seen such persons perform duties of the toilet in the drawing or dining-room, such as the cutting and regulation of the nails, and employment of a tooth-pick; the trick of what is called "smiling", and the noisy use of a handkerchief; or they have indulged in coughing loudly, as though everyone else were deaf. In a church coughing loudly is most ill-bred, and, worse than that, it prevents others from hearing either the prayers or preaching. It is most revolting to see low-bred men paring their nails even in a public railway carriage, and indulging in a still more disgusting habit induced by smoking. The impoliteness of standing to windward of a lady, and so allowing the smoke to be blown into her face, is a liberty that needs no comment.

One trick of very common occurrence I advise my young friends to watch against - it is the habit of putting their hands to their face and their hair, and pulling at and rearranging any short locks. Keep your hands away from your head, loose hair may fall about, and your hands should be washed after such employment. The cracking of the finger-joints, the wriggling inside your clothes from the irritation produced by their extreme tightness, as well as every description of trick, are to be avoided. As to biting the nails, it is simply a disgusting exhibition destructive to the teeth as well as nails, and producing a most painful impression on all who see the results.

Before winding up this brief collection of hints, let me add a word or two on the subject of your conduct at meals. Help no one on your own plate, though clean, unless there be no other; always procure a fresh one. When offered a second help, either accept or decline it; do not say "I have not finished what I have" because the helper must t[ wait your convenience, and be interrupted a second time in his own meal to supply you; besides, whoever has the charge of a dish must mentally "count heads" and be guided in the helping by the numbers to be supplied. Thus, your giving so uncertain an answer leaves him in perplexity, and may deprive him of a help altogether, having had to wait for a definitive reply.

It is the custom for a servant to lay the letters come by the morning post on the breakfast-table; if they do not arrive in the post-bag, which is the case in country places, they are placed by the plate of each person to whom they severally belong. No one else should touch them. Yet I have often seen people (members of the same family, more or less  nearly connected with the owner of the letter) take up a letter, turn it round and round, endeavour to decipher the various post-marks and to guess at the name of the writer. My young readers must not miscalculate the limits of my reprobation of such vulgar and dishonourable prying, which comes under the denunciation addressed to "busybodies in other men's matters". Let them bear in mind that the young, while minors under their parents' roof and guardianship, must by no means resent such an action, in reference to themselves, by those parents who have their interests at heart. At the same time I should strongly recommend parents, who have no reason to distrust their children, when arrived at the age of seventeen or eighteen, not by any means to act so as to give them the shadow of an impression that they are regarded with doubt, if not positive suspicion. Let them invite a willing and freely-given confidence, and raise their child's own feeling of self-respect, as a grand safeguard against all conduct of an unworthy and clandestine character.

But not only should you refrain from examining another person's closed letter, but you should carefully avoid casting glances at what they may be themselves writing, and of walking behind them while so engaged. I heard of a gentleman who was once writing a letter in some reading-room, and who was annoyed by the fact that a man stood behind his chair, he could not tell whether reading over his shoulder, or looking elsewhere; but it so disturbed him, that he tried the experiment of writing as follows:-

"I cannot continue my letter, as there is a vulgar fellow looking over my shoulder and reading all that I write."

Thrown off his guard by his surprise at the statement made, the man immediately exclaimed:-

"I'm not reading your letter!  What do you say that for?"

"Celui qui s'excuse, s'accuse."

And now, my young friends, I must conclude; promising that, should any further rules occur to me, anent the "Habits of Polite Society", I shall gladly give you the benefit of them on some future occasion.