TRUE POLITENESS

New Zealand Tablet, 16 January 1913, Page 62

TRUE POLITENESS

A country gentleman, happening to put Peter the Great of Russia under an obligation, was invited by the King to dine at the palace. Of course, his unrefined country manners did not pass unnoticed among the courtiers, and when he finally poured his tea into a saucer to cool it they openly expressed their mirth, forgetting that by so acting they forfeited their claim to the title of gentlemen far more than the poor man, who, merely through ignorance, violated the arbitrary conventionalities of society. The king, however, with the true instinct of a gentleman, immediately poured his own tea into a saucer, seeking thereby both to put his guest at ease and to reprove his courtiers’ discourtesy.