sort that is bound up with the general constitution and machinery of the body politic and social.

grace;

hubbub, jostling, and Fine manners require

There is yet another element in modern life which is radically hostile to the cultivation, or even the retention of fine manners. This is its extreme hurry and its constant bustle. Fine manners require calm and calm grace is not easily preserved amid the anxiety of the existence of to-day. time; indeed, they take no note of time. A person of fine manners may himself always be punctual, but he can scarcely preserve his fine manners while laboring to compel other people to do so. Fine manners are absolutely incompatible with fussiness. Fine manners take their time over everything. This is not to say that they are inconsistent with exertion, or even with great energy. But the exertion must be equable; the energy must be uniform, not spasmodic or hysterical.

Many excellent persons, not unnaturally displeased to find that such importance is attached to a quality which seems in no degree to partake of a moral character, labor to argue that the secret of gentlemanliness and fine manners is virtue, generosity, amiability, consideration for others. It seems to me that though the argument may prove that he who employs it has a noble enthusiasm for morality, he allows his worthy partiality to lead him into sophistry, or at least to lose sight of a true distinction, and one that goes to the root of the whole business. I do not think I should be guilty of exaggeration were I to affirm that some persons of the finest manners have been uniformly and systematically selfish, and that it is possible to perform the most ungracious act in the most graceful manner conceivable. Fine manners are paper money, not sterling coin; but they are invaluable as currency, whether they be convertible or not into something more solid. But

surely the severest moralist would not deny that the most abandoned scoundrel may offer you a chair with the finest air of breeding, though he has just with equal grace deprived some one else of it who stood infinitely more in need of it, while a model of virtue and self-sacrifice may hand it you with such awkwardness as to bruise your shins or tear your dress, though he has been standing the whole night and is almost fainting from fatigue. This, no doubt, is an extreme though by no means an uncommon case, but it is a fortunate circumstance that the tradition of fine manners and the resolution not to part with them often compel a thoroughly selfish man to seem to do a generous thing, and in any case to be of use to his neighbor. The worst condition in which we can find ourselves is to be surrounded by people who have neither morals nor manners; who are at one and the same time thoroughly selfish and utterly ill-bred. Society had perhaps better take care lest it fall a victim to the double evil.

A writer in "The Baltimore American," writing upon "The Art of Politeness," says of our youth: The sense of his own superiority, in which 'young America indulges, is apt to cause him to look down with lofty contempt on those old-fashioned ideas of courtesy and good breeding which our fathers bequeathed to us. There is but little now of that infusion into daily life of the law of kindness which was once so conspicuous. Good manners are the equity of benevolence, and in proportion as they decrease men become cold-hearted, suspicious, and uncharitable. True politeness seems to have given place to that imitation of it which leads us to veil our true sentiments under the guise of friendship, while at the same time we take every opportunity of reviling each other to our neighbors. This love for discussing evil has had a demoralizing tendency on the young, causing them to be cynical and to lose all faith in

human virtue and goodness, at an age when the purest sentiment should be allowed free scope, and when every emotion should move only in harmony with good. If more attention were paid to these little details, the way would be prepared for higher moral education, and men and women would become more tender and forgiving to human weakness, and more implacable to those offences which are now condoned, so long as they do not offend the popular idea of what constitutes 'gentility.'

Even those who have been educated to pay but little attention to the seemingly trivial observances which cultivated society uses for protecting the rights of all its members, ought to feel some interest in that philosophy of which Aristippus was professor at Syracuse, in the days of the famous King Dionysius, standing in favor with this king even higher than did Plato himself. The Greek meaning of philosophy is the love of wisdom; and the polite philosophy which Aristippus professed was that sort of wisdom which teaches men to be at peace in themselves, and neither by their words or behavior to disturb the peace of others. Certainly all those who have been subjected to rudenesses arising from the boorishness or bad breeding of others, must admit that the tranquillity of our days depends as much on small things as on great. Some writer has said: It is want of attention, not capacity, which leaves us so many brutes.

'Our follies, when displayed, ourselves affright;
Few are so bad to bear the odious sight.

Mankind, in herds, through force of custom stray,
Mislead each other into error's way.'

Those who feel most deeply the truth of the above quotation will not set themselves up as pedagogues to instruct others when they have occasion to speak or to write upon the subject of manners, but will rather, in the spirit of‘a

schoolfellow playing the master,' keep in mind that precept of Seneca: Hæc aliis dic, ut dum dicis, audias; ipse scribe, ut dum scripseris, legas; Speaking to others, what you dictate, hear; and learn yourself while teaching you appear. This is the spirit in which the compiler of these pages has executed her work.

OBSERVATIONS FROM MULLER'S "CODE DES

BIENSÉANCES."

Après une soirée, un bal, il faut aussi, et dans la huitaine, rendre une visite. Toutefois nous croyons pouvoir affirmer qu'il est bon de laisser écouler deux ou trois jours entre la reception et la visite.

Il est ridicule d'énumérer ses qualités sur une carte de visite; une dame doit faire précéder son nom du titre de madame, et ne jamais mettre son adresse.

Il est admis qu'en beaucoup de circonstances l'envoi d'une carte tient lieu d'une visite personelle. Nous ne partageons pas entièrement cette opinion.

On a prétendu que la carte, en cas de deuil, ne devait pas être bordée en noir. Pourquoi ce qui est permis pour le papier à lettres, ne le serait-il pas ici?

Nous ne dirons qu'un mot des lettres anonymes. Celui qui les écrit est un lâche, car il a généralement peur de nuire, et il se cache, pour accomplir son crime, comme le voleur de grand chemin qui s'aposte la nuit.

CHAPTER IV.

BREAKFASTS

LUNCHES

LUNCHEONS

TEAS KETTLEDRUMS -CURE FOR GOSSIP-SOCIAL PROBLEMS -GOOD SOCIETY BAD SOCIETY-WOMAN'S MISSION.

Sydney Smith liked breakfast parties, because he said, no one was conceited before one o'clock in the day.-Manners of Modern Society.

LUNCH. A slight repast between breakfast and dinner; formerly the same as luncheon. Example: The passengers in the line-ships regularly have their lunch.

LUNCHEON.-A portion of food taken at any time except at a regular meal. Example: I sliced the luncheon from the barley loaf.— Webster's Dictionary.

Since custom is the principal magistrate of human life, let men by all means endeavor to obtain good customs.-Lord Bacon.

Whatever earnestness or strength of character women show in fulfilling their duties, may truly be said to be in spite of their education and of the influence of society.-Emily Shirreff.

Social and moral reformation in the lowest classes, as in the highest, must begin with domestic life.

EATING and drinking are, as we well know, an absolute necessity if we desire to keep life within us; but we should remember if we wish for length of days that we must eat to live, and not live to eat. Seneca tells us that our appetite is dismissed with a small payment if we only give it what we owe it, and not what an ungoverned appetite craves.

Breakfast is a charming meal when the heads of the household know how to make it so. Every year adds