Manners and Social Usages - Mrs John M. E. W. Sherwood (mobile ebook reader TXT) 📗

bouquets and boutonnieres, such as rosettes,

miniature flags, artificial butterflies, badges, sashes, bonbons,

little bells (the latter being attached to small pieces of ribbon

and pinned to the coat or dress), scarf-pins, bangles, fans, caps,

imitation antique coins, breastpins, lace pins, lockets; and even

gifts of great value, such as shawls, scarfs, vases,

picture-frames, writing-desks, and chairs (represented, of course,

by tickets) have been this winter introduced in the german. But

the cheap, light, fantastic things are the best, and contribute

more to the amusement of the company.

 

Some of the figures of the German border on the romp. One of these

is called La Corde. A rope is stretched by the leading couple

across the room, and the gentlemen jump over it to reach their

partners. Much amusement is occasioned by the tripping of

gentlemen who are thrown by the intentional raising of the rope.

After all have reached their partners they perform a _tour de

valse_, and regain their seats. This is a figure not to be

commended. Still less is the figure called Les Masques. The

gentlemen put on masques resembling “Bully Bottom” and other

grotesque faces and heads of animals. They raise these heads above

a screen, the ladies choosing partners without knowing them; the

gentlemen remain en masque until the termination of the _tour de

valse_. This figure was danced at Delmonico’s and at the Brunswick

last winter, and the mammas complained that the fun grew rather

too fast and furious. Les Rubans is a very pretty figure. Six

ribbons, each about a yard in length, and of various colors, are

attached to one end of a stick about twenty-four inches in length,

also a duplicate set of ribbons, attached to another stick, must

be in readiness. The first couple perform a tour de valse, then

separate; the gentleman takes one set of ribbons, and stops

successively in front of the ladies whom he desires to select to

take part in the figure; each of these ladies rises and takes hold

of the loose end of the ribbon; the first lady takes the other set

of ribbons, bringing forward the six gentlemen in the same manner.

The first couple conduct the ladies and gentlemen towards each

other, and each gentleman dances with the lady holding the ribbon

duplicate of his own; the first gentleman dances with his partner.

 

We might go on indefinitely with these figures, but have no more

space. The position of a dancer should be learned with the aid of

a teacher. The upper part of the body should be quiet; the head

held in a natural position, neither turned to one side nor the

other; the eyes neither cast down nor up. The gentleman should put

his arm firmly around a lady’s waist, not holding her too close,

but firmly holding her right hand with his left one; the lady

turns the palm of her right hand downward; her right arm should be

nearly straight, but not stiff. The gentleman’s left arm should be

slightly bent, his elbow inclined slightly backward. It is very

inelegant, however—indeed, vulgar—to place the joined hands

against the gentleman’s side or hip; they should be kept clear of

the body. The step should be in unison; if the gentleman bends his

right elbow too much, he draws the lady’s left shoulder against

his right, thereby drawing the lady too close. The gentleman’s

right shoulder and the lady’s left should be as far apart as the

other shoulders. If a gentleman does not hold his partner

properly, thereby causing her either to struggle to be free or

else to dance wildly for want of proper support, if he permits

himself and partner to collide with other couples, he cannot be

considered a good dancer.

 

CHAPTER XVII.

LETTERS AND LETTER-WRITING.

 

The person who can write a graceful note is always spoken of with

phrases of commendation. The epistolary art is said to be

especially feminine, and the novelists and essayists are full of

compliments to the sex, which is alternately praised and

objurgated, as man feels well or ill. Bulwer says: “A woman is the

genius of epistolary communication. Even men write better to a

woman than to one of their own sex. No doubt they conjure up,

while writing, the loving, listening face, the tender, pardoning

heart, the ready tear of sympathy, and passionate confidences of

heart and brain flow rapidly from the pen.” But there is no such

thing now as an “epistolary style.” Our immediate ancestors wrote

better and longer letters than we do. They covered three pages of

large letter-paper with crow-quill handwriting, folded the paper

neatly, tucked one edge beneath the other (for there were no

envelopes), and then sealed it with a wafer or with sealing-wax.

To send one of these epistles was expensive—twenty-five cents

from New York to Boston. However, the electric telegraph and cheap

postage and postal-cards may have been said, in a way, to have

ruined correspondence in the old sense; lovers and fond mothers

doubtless still write long letters, but the business of the

letter-writer proper is at an end. The writing of notes has,

however, correspondingly increased; and the last ten years have

seen a profuse introduction of emblazoned crest and cipher,

pictorial design, and elaborate monogram in the corners of

ordinary notepaper. The old illuminated missal of the monks, the

fancy of the Japanese, the ever-ready taste of the French, all

have been exhausted to satisfy that always hungry caprice which

calls for something new.

 

The frequency with which notes upon business and pleasure must fly

across a city and a continent has done away, also, with the

sealing-wax, whose definite, red, clear, oval was a fixture with

our grandfathers, and which is still the only elegant, formal, and

ceremonious way acknowledged in England, of sealing a letter.

 

There were, however, serious objections to the use of wax in this

country, which were discovered during the early voyages to

California. The intense heat of the Isthmus of Panama melted the

wax, and letters were irretrievably glued together, to the loss of

the address and the confusion of the postmaster. So the glued

envelope—common, cheap, and necessary—became the almost

prevailing fashion for all notes as well as letters.

 

The taste for colored notepaper with flowers in the corner was

common among the belles of thirty years ago—the “rose-colored

and scented billet-doux” is often referred to in the novels of

that period. But colored notepaper fell into disuse long ago, and

for the last few years we have not seen the heavy tints. A few

pale greens, grays, blues, and lilacs have, indeed, found a place

in fashionable stationery, and a deep coffee-colored, heavy paper

had a little run about three years ago; but at the present moment

no color that is appreciable is considered stylish, unless it be

�cru, which is only a creamy white.

 

A long truce is at last bidden to the fanciful, emblazoned, and

colored monogram; the crest and cipher are laid on the shelf, and

ladies have simply the address of their city residence, or the

name of their country place, printed in one corner (generally in

color), or, latest device of fashion, a fac-simile of their

initials, carefully engraved, and dashed across the corner of the

notepaper. The day of the week, also copied from their own

handwriting, is often impressed upon the square cards now so much

in use for short notes, or on the notepaper.

 

There is one fashion which has never changed, and will never

change, which is always in good taste, and which, perhaps, would

be to-day the most perfect of all styles, and that is, good,

plain, thick, English notepaper, folded square, put in a square

envelope, and sealed with red sealing-wax which bears the imprint

of the writer’s coat of arms. No one can make any mistake who uses

such stationery as this in any part of the world. On such paper

and in such form are ambassadors’ notes written; on such paper and

in such style would the Princess Louise write her notes.

 

However, there is no law against the monogram. Many ladies still

prefer it, and always use the paper which has become familiar to

their friends. It is, however, a past rather than a present

fashion.

 

The plan of having all the notepaper marked with the address is

an admirable one, for it effectually reminds the person who

receives the note where the answer should be sent—information of

which some ladies forget the importance, and which should always

be written, if not printed, at the head of a letter. It also gives

a stylish finish to the appearance of the notepaper, is simple,

unpretending, and useful.

 

The ink should invariably be black. From the very superior,

lasting qualities of a certain purple fluid, which never became

thick in the inkstand, certain ladies, a few years ago, used the

purple and lilac inks very much. But they are not elegant; they

are not in fashion; the best note-writers do not use them. The

plain black ink, which gives the written characters great

distinctness, is the only fashionable medium.

 

Every lady should study to acquire an elegant, free, and educated

hand; there is nothing so useful, so sure to commend the writer

everywhere, as such a chirography; while a cramped, poor,

slovenly, uneducated, unformed handwriting is sure to produce the

impression upon the reader that those qualities are more or less

indicative of the writer’s character. The angular English hand is

at present the fashion, although less legible and not more

beautiful than the round hand. We cannot enter into that great

question as to whether or not handwriting is indicative of

character; but we hold that a person’s notes are generally

characteristic, and that a neat, flowing, graceful hand, and a

clean sheet, free from blots, are always agreeable to the eye. The

writer of notes, also, must carefully discriminate between the

familiar note and the note of ceremony, and should learn how to

write both.

 

Custom demands that we begin all notes in the first person, with

the formula of “My dear Mrs. Smith,” and that we close with the

expressions, “Yours cordially,” “Yours with much regard,” etc. The

laws of etiquette do not permit us to use numerals, as 3, 4, 5,

but demand that we write out three, four, five. No abbreviations

are allowed in a note to a friend, as, “Sd be glad to see you;” one

must write out, “I should be glad to see you.” The older

letter-writers were punctilious about writing the first word of

the page below the last line of the page preceding it. The date

should follow the signing of the name.

 

A great and very common mistake existing among careless

letter-writers is the confusion of the first and third persons; as

a child would write, “Miss Lucy Clark will be happy to come to

dinner, but I am going somewhere else.” This is, of course, wildly

ignorant and improper.

 

A note in answer to an invitation should be written in the third

person, if the invitation be in the third person. No

abbreviations, no visible hurry, but an elaborate and finished

ceremony should mark such epistles. For instance, an acceptance of

a dinner invitation must be written in this form:

 

_Mr. and Mrs. Cadogan

have great pleasure in accepting the polite

invitation of

Mr. and Mrs. Sutherland

for dinner on the seventeenth inst., at seven o’clock.

18 Lombard Square.

July sixth._

 

One lady in New York was known to answer a dinner invitation

simply with the words, “Come with pleasure.” It is unnecessary to

add that she was never invited again.

 

It is impossible to give persons minute directions as to the style

of a note, for that must be the outgrowth of years