STANDARD OF MANNERS.

Timaru Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 2813, 28 September 1883, Page 3

STANDARD OF MANNERS.

I Nation (New York). A correspondent asks us to publish, as r a complete reply to tlio question, What is t a gentleman? the following definition, s which, ho says, was first published some ( years ago m a New York newspaper : — f "The gentleman is distinguished from a him who is not a gentleman by moral qualities which havo justly won tho highest placo m the respect and admiration of tho world. Tho gentleman restrains hia passions and subdues his selfishness ; he considers tho comfort of others bi.foro hia own ; ho respects tho ° personality of those with whom ho is s brought m contact ; ho nevor takes an ' unfair advantage ; ho ia scrupulously ° regardful of his own honor, doubly scru- " pulons if tho honorof others bo committed c to his keeping ; ho may lack mental " culture, but ho is never without a moral refinement ;he may havo an unpolished ' exterior, but never a base nature ; ? courage he has, but shows it less m J facing danger than m meeting rcspnnsibility ; if not always sincere, ho is always a reliable ; and to him may bo safely committed all that others hold most dear, m ' simplo reliance upon his honor ; lie is a c man whoso manly traits are penetrated ? and modified by tho gentleness of a ! woman's nature, and who still preserves and endeavors to constantly act upon the a manliest of instincts — magnanimity." * Tho view of tho subject on which this definition is founded is a very old one. ' Thackeray and Dickens wero both " very fond of it, and both made . uso of it m their different ways £ —Thackeray chiefly by drawing a k gentleman, setting him on hia legs, and c making him so real that we feol as if wo ? had known Colonel Nowcome m tho flesh; j Dickens by exposing tho odious selfishness and want of magnanimity and con- j; sidcration for others which ho thought ' tho distinguishing marks of the people 1 of tho so-called polite world. Accord- v ing to their theory a true gentleman is a c synonym for a polite Christian, but noithor of them ever pointed out, as tho (l author of tho foregoing extract does, that m the type, sincerity must bo sacrificed t to " reliability." What this means, wo presume, is that complete consideration " for others requires us often to dissemble c our actual feelings, as m tho mut attribu- fi ted to tho Due do Morny, himself a. l polito and at tho saino time bad man — •= that tho mo3t perfect illustration of good I breeding 13 furnished by a man who listens c with interest to things he knows all about, c when they aro told by a porson who Icnowa { nothing about them. The difficulty with ' this theory is, that when thoso who up- ' hold it aro called upon to give an illus- : tration of tho type, they always refer us j to some character m fiction, or to some person long sine© dead, of tho details of wh.030 life little has been preserved except some signal act of generosity liko that of Sidney's cup of water, which has evidently been handed down to us because it struck Sidney's contemporaries just ns it does us, as a wonderful piece of miselfishnoss, not to be expected from anyone. A lady dying on the field of battle might do such a thing as a matter of course — provided that tho soldier was not of her own sex ; but beautiful as the story is, as a test of good breeding it is plainly ridiculous. Thackeray doliverod a lecturo to show that Georgo IV. was no gentleman, because ho was a cruel, selfish debauchee ; yet his contemporaries novor seem to have thought that this affected the question at all. Thero is no doubt, howover, that the modern notion of a gentleman has beon considerably affected by the hold this view of the subject has secured m literature, and this is one of the reasons why it is becoming increasingly difficult to make out what people mean whon they speak of a gentleman, or indeed, for that matter, of a lady. It is certainly dreadful to think what the consequences would be if wo actually should attempt to apply tho standard of refinement of fooling, and consideration for others to society, which m theory ought to consist only of ladies and gontlomon. It would exclude from society somo of its host, most energetic and progressive* members. No one, for instance, would bo m society who made himself agreeablo to Mrs Jones by dcclariug to her, as we ro often hear people do, that Mrs Brown is the handsomest (or the cleverest, or tho best dressed) woman he ever saw. Consideration for tho feelings of others clearly requires us to say " one of tho handsomest," us this is tho only way to leave a loophole for Mrs Brown's vanity. So wo should bid a long farewell to those of our companions who address peoplo by the wrong name — often by tho wife's name, or a married woman by her maiden name ; who habitually mispronounce and misspell names, who tell a friend that they have mistaken him or her for another person— for m nine cases out of ten to say " You resemble so and bo," hurts the feelings of the person to whom the remark is addressed. Wo should no longer bo entertained with critical remarks upon our clothes, looks, or ways. We should no longer hear that wo " hive no appotite "or " eat nothing." On tho \ other hand, we should be deprived of tho I satisfaction of making ourselves the great

topic of conversation, especially our personal hnbitß, our daily bath, shirts, b.iotß, hals, and, worse than nil, our ailments. Wo should havo to avoid the fascinating occupation of digging up the past and talking about " old times " — a kind of excavation that disagrees terribly with some people. We Bhould not bo able to ask people what waives they pay their servants, or to laud to the skies absent friends of whom thoso preBent know nothing, or to describe with entirely incommunicablerapture places they havo nover .seen. The old rule that politics and religion aro not good subjects for general conversation, because they lead to quarrelling, would havo to bo revived. ■ Wo should not even bo able to turn up our friend's dinner-plates to find out the value of his china, nor ask him where ho got his chnirs. Questions of this kind, which wore formorly considered m very bad taste furnish ono of tho great staples of modern conversation, and tho friendly curiosity which has broken down the barriers that formerly surrounded furniture, pictures, and plato is rapidly becoming regarded as legitimate m matters of dress, many women liking apparently to be asked where they got iind what they pay for their clothes. Systematic questioning of any kind was once universally considered bad manners— a fact recognised m tho old story of tho London alderman's remonstrance, " Sir, with your interesting questions you've inado mo (itvallow a piece of green fat without tasting it ;" for it is not only our finer feelings that an ideal code requires others to respect. What do wo think of a dinner party where tho men aro all m full dress, but tho women " go-as-you-please 1" What is to bo said about tho almost universal practice of indiscriminate introductions of people to one another without any inquiry as to whether they wish to know each other or not > Dropping 6>io title " Mr " altogether on short acquaintance, nnd calling people by their laot names, was formerly considered as insulting. But this sort of familiarity has now becomo complimentary, and the almost universal use of nicknames by men and women makes it look as if the change wero founded upon some deep-rooted modern tendency. Brummel is said to havo once rebuked a lady sevorely for using the expression " take tea," saying, " Madam, b vulgar man can tako liberties but ono drinks tea" — an anecdote which not only shows how completely usoless the learning of Brummel's day actually is, but also that Brummel, wero ho alive now, would not bo likely to succeed as a man of fnahinn, for there is one kind of consideration for tho feelings of others that may nowadays bo regarded as a sine <jua non — that which always teaches us to refrain from rebuking tho vulgar for their vulgarity. Their numbers are so great as to make it very unsafe.