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Title: Manners and Social Usages

 

Author: Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood

 

Release Date: June, 2005 [EBook #8399]

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[This file was first posted on July 7, 2003]

 

Edition: 10

 

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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MANNERS AND SOCIAL USAGES ***

 

Produced by Holly Ingraham.

 

[frontispiece]THE MODERN DINNER-TABLE.

 

MANNERS

AND

SOCIAL USAGES

BY

MRS. JOHN SHERWOOD M.E.W.

 

AUTHOR OF “A TRANSPLANTED ROSE”

 

“Manners are the shadows of great virtues.”—Whateley

 

“Solid Fashion is funded politeness.”—Emerson

 

NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION, REVISED BY THE AUTHOR

 

JUN 11 1887

 

PG TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

 

This etiquette manual was probably originally a series of columns

in a newspaper or a magazine like Harper’s, as the chapters on

weddings in the different seasons refer to how the fashions have

changed since the last one—by the original copyright, 1884,

though the book version appeared in 1887. Notable features among

the usual: how to dance the German, or Cotillon; remarks and four

chapters on English, French, or others in contrast to American

customs, making it a guide to European manners; proper behavior

for the single woman past girlhood; appropriate costumes for many

occasions; three chapters on staff and servants.

 

PREFACE.

 

There is no country where there are so many people asking what is

“proper to do,” or, indeed, where there are so many genuinely

anxious to do the proper thing, as in the vast conglomerate which

we call the United States of America. The newness of our country

is perpetually renewed by the sudden making of fortunes, and by

the absence of a hereditary, reigning set. There is no aristocracy

here which has the right and title to set the fashions.

 

But a “reigning set,” whether it depend upon hereditary right or

adventitious wealth, if it be possessed of a desire to lead and a

disposition to hospitality, becomes for a period the dictator of

fashion to a large number of lookers-on. The travelling world,

living far from great centres, goes to Newport, Saratoga, New

York, Washington, Philadelphia, Boston, and gazes on what is

called the latest American fashion. This, though exploited by what

we may call for the sake of distinction the “newer set,” is

influenced and shaped in some degree by people of native

refinement and taste, and that wide experience which is gained by

travel and association with broad and cultivated minds. They

counteract the tendency to vulgarity, which is the great danger of

a newly launched society, so that our social condition improves,

rather than retrogrades, with every decade.

 

There may be many social purists who will disagree with us in this

statement. Men and women educated in the creeds of the Old World,

with the good blood of a long ancestry of quiet ladies and

gentlemen, find modern American society, particularly in New York

and at Newport, fast, furious, and vulgar. There are, of course,

excesses committed everywhere in the name of fashion; but we

cannot see that they are peculiar to America. We can only answer

that the creed of fashion is one of perpetual change. There is a

Council of Trent, we may say, every five years, perhaps even every

two years, in our new and changeful country, and we learn that,

follow as we may either the grand old etiquette of England or the

more gay and shifting social code of France, we still must make an

original etiquette of our own. Our political system alone, where

the lowest may rise to the highest preferment, upsets in a measure

all that the Old World insists upon in matters of precedence and

formality. Certain immutable principles remain common to all

elegant people who assume to gather society about them, and who

wish to enter its portals; the absent-minded scholar from his

library should not ignore them, the fresh young farmer from the

countryside feels and recognizes their importance. If we are to

live together in unity we must make society a pleasant thing, we

must obey certain formal rules, and these rules must conform to

the fashion of the period.

 

And it is in no way derogatory to a new country like our own if on

some minor points of etiquette we presume to differ from the older

world. We must fit our garments to the climate, our manners to our

fortunes and to our daily lives. There are, however, faults and

inelegancies of which foreigners accuse us which we may do well to

consider. One of these is the greater freedom allowed in the

manners of our young women a freedom which, as our New World fills

up with people of foreign birth, cannot but lead to social

disturbances. Other national faults, which English writers and

critics kindly point out, are our bumptiousness, our spread-eagleism, and our too great familiarity and lack of dignity, etc.

 

Instead of growing angry over these criticisms, perhaps we might

as well look into the matter dispassionately, and see if we cannot

turn the advice in some degree to our advantage. We can, however,

decide for ourselves on certain points of etiquette which we

borrow from nobody; they are a part of our great nation, of our

republican institutions, and of that continental hospitality which

gives a home to the Russian, the German, the Frenchman, the

Irishman, man, and the “heathen Chinee.” A somewhat wide and

elastic code, as boundless as the prairies, can alone meet the

needs of these different citizens. The old traditions of stately

manners, so common to the Washington and Jefferson days, have

almost died out here, as similar manners have died out all over

the world. The war of 1861 swept away what little was left of that

once important American fact—a grandfather. We began all over

again; and now there comes up from this newer world a flood of

questions: How shall we manage all this? How shall we use a fork?

When wear a dress-coat? How and when and on whom shall we leave

our cards? How long and for whom shall we wear mourning? What is

the etiquette of a wedding? How shall we give a dinner-party?

The young housekeeper of Kansas writes as to the manners she shall

teach to her children; the miner’s wife, having become rich, asks

how she shall arrange her house, call on her neighbors, write her

letters? Many an anxious girl writes as to the propriety of

“driving out with a gentleman,” etc. In fact, there is one great

universal question, What is the etiquette of good society?

 

Not a few people have tried to answer these questions, and have

broken down in the attempt. Many have made valuable manuals, as

far as they went; but writers on etiquette commonly fail, for one

or two different reasons. Many attempt to write who know nothing

of good society by experience, and their books are full of

ludicrous errors. Others have had the disadvantage of knowing too

much, of ignoring the beginning of things, of supposing that the

person who reads will take much for granted. For a person who has

an intuitive knowledge of etiquette, who has been brought up from

his mother’s knee in the best society, has always known what to

do, how to dress, to whom to bow, to write in the simplest way

about etiquette would be impossible; he would never know how

little the reader, to whose edification he was addressing himself,

knew of the matter.

 

If, however, an anxious inquirer should write and ask if “mashed

potato must be eaten with a knife or a fork,” or if “napkins and

finger bowls can be used at breakfast,” those questions he can

answer.

 

It is with an effort to answer thousands of these questions,

written in good faith to Harper’s Bazar, that this book is

undertaken. The simplicity, the directness, and the evident desire

“to improve,” which characterize these anonymous letters, are all

much to be commended. Many people have found themselves suddenly

conquerors of material wealth, the most successful colonists in

the world, the heirs of a great inheritance, the builders of a new

empire. There is a true refinement manifested in their questions.

Not only do men and women like to behave properly themselves, but

all desire to know what is the best school of manners, that they

may educate their children therein. Such minds are the best

conservators of law and order. It is not a communistic spirit that

asks, “How can I do this thing in a better way?” It is that wise

and liberal conservatism which includes reverence for law, respect

for age, belief in religion, and a desire for a refined society. A

book on etiquette, however patiently considered and honestly

written, must have many shortcomings, and contain disputed

testimony. All we can do is endeavor to mention those fashions and

customs which we believe to be the best, remembering always, as we

have said, that the great law of change goes on forever, that our

stately grandfathers had fashions which we should now consider

gross and unbecoming, while we have customs, particularly of

speech, which would have shocked them. This law of change is not

only one which time modifies, but with us the South, the North,

the East, and the West differ as to certain points of etiquette.

All, however, agree in saying that there is a good society in

America whose mandates are supreme. All feel that the well-bred

man or woman is a “recognized institution.” Everybody laughed at

the mistakes of Daisy Miller, and saw wherein she and her mother

were wrong. Independent American girls may still choose to travel

without a chaperon, but they must be prepared to fight a

well-founded prejudice if they do. There is a recognition of the

necessity of good manners, and a profound conviction, let us hope,

that a graceful manner is the outcropping of a well-regulated mind

and of a good heart.

 

CONTENTS.

 

CHAPTER … PAGE

I. Women as Leaders … 13

II. Optional Civilities … 29

III. Good and Bad Society … 36

IV. On Introducing People … 44

V. Visiting … 58

VI. Invitations, Acceptances, and Regrets … 66

VII. Cards of Compliment, Courtesy, Condolence, and Congratulation

… 74

VIII. The Etiquette of Weddings … 82

IX. Who Pays for the Cards … 94

X. Weddings after Easter … 102

XI. Summer Weddings … 110