entirely different individuals, one of whom is
actuated simply by the desire to "get on,"
while the other has set before himself the
arduous task of being—a gentleman. With this
preliminary remark, we proceed to report
progress on a very important branch of our subject:
OUR POLITENESS.

If a man were to appear without a coat in
Persian society, it would be the idiom of the
Persian tongue to say that he wore the coat "of
absence;" and really I sometimes think when
watching our present social customs that our
manners may almost be said to be characterised
by the politeness "of absence."

If I were called upon to give advice to a young
man who had passed his social examination,
whose desire was simply to get on, and the
motto on whose shield was "Parvenir," I should
caution him, above all things, against being civil
to anybody; I should urge him never by any
means to try to be agreeable; I should
recommend him to be cold, critical, contradictory—
three words all easy to remember, as beginning
with the same letter—and to be, generally and
always, as impudent and as rude as he could
possibly manage to make himself:—supposing
that he really required to cultivate those precious
qualities, and did not find himself already
sufficiently endowed with them by Bounteous
Nature.

A gentleman—gentle man! Heaven help
any one who finds himself in such a plight as
that. Why, if a man were to be gentle in
these days he would be crushed, overwhelmed,
trampled upon, gored to death, by those who
understand the manners of the day, and practise
as well as understand. Gentle? Oh miserable
man, I counsel you in police parlance to "come
out of that" with all the speed you can, or you
are lost. Where have you been all your life?
You must have imbibed some of the opinions of
your great-grandfather, and which are as well
adapted to the habit of this age as his black
silk stockings and shorts would be. You must
have formed your notion on some old book on
manners. You have read, for instance, in some
such work, that in passing through a doorway
you should yield the pas to your neighbour, and
let him go first. Do nothing of the kind, I
entreat you; on the contrary, elbow your neighbour
aside, or, better still, ignore him; forget
his existence; forget all existences but your
own.

And what else have you been told to do by
these luminaries of the old régime? You have
been told, I think, to assert your opinions with
modesty, not to be obstinate in entertaining
them; if some one in company commences speaking
as you do, to yield him the preference. If
you do any of these things now, you are lost. The
sooner such trumpery old fallacies as these are
exposed, the better for everybody. What you
are to do is simply this. Talk everybody down.
If you have naturally a loud voice, thank your
stars, and make the most of it. If, on the other
hand, your organ is a weak one, cultivate it. Go
to Professor Lowder, and study a clamorous
intonation, in which to enunciate your views; with
these by all means interrupt anybody who is
going to speak, choosing, however, your man
carefully, for he must not be too rich or successful,
talk him down, interrupt him—and, above
all things, NEVER LISTEN.

"A bon ecouteur salut!" says a great French
author. Hail to the good listener! Let no
one ever hail you in that capacity. Never listen,
or at least never seem to listen. It may be
well really to listen occasionally, in order to get
new matter with which to impress some future
audience. But you must never show that you
are listening. This is a distinction well understood
by most of our greatest social professors.
I know a professed teller of good stories,
and consummate master of manners, who has
never got the slightest symptom of amusement
or encouragement with which to greet
your story, and who never indicates by the
movement of a muscle, that he has even heard
a word of it, and who yet goes away and relates
that story to another audience, correct in every
particular. Or the more learned talker, who
does not deal in stories—when he puts you
down with "a fact that was mentioned to him
the other day," how did he get that fact unless
he listened? He does listen, and so does the
other, and so may you, but you must not appear
to do so.

You have been told, again, doubtless, by some
of these old-world fogies not to turn your back
upon people if you can possibly help it. Despicable
delusion! Prize your back above all things.
It is an invaluable possession. You may edge
people away from fires, and out of groups of
which they formed part, with your back; you
may turn it suddenly upon some unwary person
who was just going to offer you his hand; you
may effect these achievements, and many others,
with immense success, simply with the aid of
your back; and may back yourself into a very
good position in society with, comparatively
speaking, but little labour. There is a very
ingenious method of interposing your body
between the gentleman next you and the master of
the house, which you may practise with effect
when the ladies have left the dinner-table. To
achieve this you have only to place the elbow,
which is nearest to the person you wish to
extinguish, on the table, and squeezing yourself
well round, address your host on the particular
subject which you have been coaching up earlier
in the day.

Of course you have little or no veneration in
your nature. If, however, there should be any
lurking tendency in your mind to respect
anything or anybody, you must get rid of such
deplorable weakness with all possible speed and
promptitude. It is possible that in the event of
your being invited to meet some person who has
distinguished himself, who has done something
for society which it recognises gratefully—a man
full of knowledge and power—it is just possible
that even you may feel some slight diffidence and
sense of partial inferiority—because, you know,