Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 39, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 June 1878 — COURTESY AT HOME. [ARTICLE]

COURTESY AT HOME.

There is an element about most exoties which is more or less displeasing. They Are surrounded by an atmosphere which impresses the observer with associations of restraint and artifice. This is certainly true of exotic courtesy, which is the direct opposite of the virtue of which we now "have to speak. Courtesy which is not home-bred may seem, like a house-plant, from the tropics, to bo very fully developed, very luxuriant and almost ovcrpoweringly pungent; but take away its artificial adjuncts, expose it to the rough weather of every-day life, and it withers away, just as a gorgeous and expensive stove plant, when banished from the conservatory and exposed to the frosty air, becomes ugly and repulsive in comparison with the commonest field flower. By courtesy at home we do not mean the courtesy which is shown at home to guests, but that which is exhibited to the inmates of home in every-day life. On the- other hand, in speaking of exotic courtesy, we mean that form of civility which is rather an occasional effort than an habitual custom. It is not a pleasant trait in people’s characters that they should treat their acquaintances with less and less deference as they become more and more familiar with them, decreasing their courtesy in proportion to the increase of their intimacy; but unfortunately this is too commonly the case. It is usually assumed that a true gentleman is always courteous at home, ut this assumption can only be accepted with certain reservations. We have known men perfectly unimpeachable in the matters of education, culture and refinement, whose manners, though most charming on first acquaintance, relapsed on intimacy into absolute unpleasantness. We admit that nobody whose apparent courteousness to strangers is only on the surface, and who thus seems to be that which ho is not, can be a perfect gentleman in the highest sense of the word; but, taking the expression in its ordinary social acceptation, we fear it must be granted that, in the matter of courtesy, a great many gentlemen do occasionally seem to be that which they are not. These refined beings do not perhaps .relapse into absolute rudeness among their relatives and intimates; but they replace their attractive manners by icy sarcasms, taciturnity and irritability, which exceed the border line of courtesy. They seem to take a pleasure in demonstrating the unhappy fact that the refinement of the agreeable has its counterpart in the refinement of the disagreeable. We sometimes hear people comparing the manners of the present generation very unfavorable with those of its predecessors, and they do this with considerable justice; but we have known gentlemen of the old school, as it is termed, who, though very courteous in female society, were accustomed to use some very ugly words in the company of their own sex. Perhaps they could quote poetry far more readily than some of their* de-. scendants, and they were always pared with a line from Homer or Virgil to suit the occasion; but. for all that, their mental daily bread, especially after dinner, consisted of a very coarse kind of food, and their anecdotes would scarcely be tolerated in the club smoking-rooms of the present day. There are a few specimens of this school still left, and they are generally ostentatiously polite in society. Their drawing-room manners toward ladies are almost too fine, but their elderly spinster daughters, who have to attend upon them at home, especially in their gouty moments, could testify that they are not always so affable. We have in our minds old military men, but there is a more solemn class of ancients who enjoy an equal reputation for courtesy. We refer to the race of old-fashioned college dons. These worthies could be the best hosts in the world, and nothing could exceed the charms of their chastened bonhomie; but we recollect the time when we used to compare the suavity which they annually exhibited to their, visitors at Commemoration with their conduct toward ourselves during the rest of the year. The breakfast and luncheons in “gaudy week” were all very well, but the private interviews at other times in the Dean’s study were by no means feasts of courtesy.

Although we cherish a conservative respect for the old-fashioned polished gentleman, we have a lurking suspicion that he was sometimes a rather artificial creature. Polished he certainly was, but with a polish that wore off with very little rough usage, and which but tninly glossed over an inner man almost guiltless of refinement. He could be very polite, but he could also be very blasphemous; and, if he was occasionally poetical, he was often indecent. We are far from maintaining that some past periods of English history have not been more distinguished for courtesy than our' own; but when we hear people talk of the times of George IV. and Beau Brummel as the millennium of British polilesse, we feel that either their memory or their judgment must be greatly at fault. There are other epochs which might claim, at the very least, an equal distinction. In these days it is unfortunately true that, even in the highest society, there is too little courtesy either At home or away from it; but that does not prove the early part of the present century tc have been the golden age of English manners. Our own is an age of moderation. We are expected to be moderate fn religion, in politics, and in everything else; and we have a noble example of moderation set us by the youth of the present day in the indulgence of courtesy. A very courteous man is now considered a bore in gay, and a humbug in grave, society. What ft miserable thing is civility in oom-

parison with the charms of chaff, and how insincere is he who treats ladies with deferential politeness! Such appears to be the current creed, though there may bo a certain number of nonconformists. In our opinion' -the best test of the difference between courtesy and humbug will be found in the observation of home life. Humbug may assume the form of courtesy, but it cannot stand the strain of continual use; whereas thie courtesy becomes more developed by constant habit, and thrives best in its native soil. People often confuse courtesy with humbug, because they imagino that it necessarily implies personal esteem and respect. Where, therefore, they observe a deferential manner in the absence of personal esteem and respect, they immediately suspect humbug. In this they are mistaken. A Judge may bo perfectly courteous to the murderer whom he is sentencing to be hanged, and the head master of a public school may show formal politeness to his pupils in the disciplinary interviews which he has with them “ after school;” but neither functionary would thereby lay himself open to the charge of being a humbug. Then there are persons who are so utterly devoid of any innate courtesy that they are incredulous of its existence in others; and, when they meet with it, they mistake it for humbug. It must be admitted, however, that there are occasions when skepticism is quite legitimate. For instance, when we see ostentatious displays of affection and respect on the part of husbands toward their wives, or parents toward their children, in public, we are apt to form our own opinion of their private life, shrewdly suspecting that this profusion of good things is not an everyday affair. We recommend to the clergy “Rude Papas” as a subject for a course of sermons. “Nagging Mammas” might form a second series. To treat your children like servants or retrievers, whose highest duty is to fetch and carry, is not the surest means of indoctrinating them with the virtue of courtesy. It may be considered a superannuated idea that husbands and wives ought to treat each other with any semblance of ceremony; but we are old-fashioned enougli to fancy that the opposite tendency is carried rather to an excess just at present. It may be a prejudice to think that there can possibly be anything objectionable in smoking cigarettes in ladies’ drawing-rooms ana boudoirs; but there always will be some people who lag behind their times. There is surely a sufflciently wide margin between treating a husband as an utter stranger and calling him a beast; but it seems too narrow for some ladies to discover. Among brothers and sisters a little harmless banter is perfectly admissible, and even perhaps desirable; but a family whose members are always snapping at each other in the style at present approved as clever, both in fiction and in reality, can scarcely be upheld as a model of courtesy at home. Both among brothers and sisters and husbands and wives, a great deal of talk which begins with chaff ends in rudeness. In society, conventional politeness sets certain limits to repartee, but at home there are no such barriers. In private life, when the more refined weapons of conversational dispute fail, the combatants are apt to resort to vulgar personal abuse. Servants could sometimes tell curious stories about the courtesy of their employers at home, or rather their want of it. There are ladies, renowned for their charming manners in society, who use their maids as safety-valves for the innate rudeness which they contrive to repress and conceal in public. Doubtless they are hurt when, in dressing their heads, their maids drag the hair with the brush; but that is no excuse for pretty months permitting ugly words to escape from them. The master may be very fond of his horse, but, after speaking to the animal in tones of the gentlest affection, it is scarcely the sign of a courteous gentleman to swear at the groom because his stirrup-leathers are too short.

Courtesy at home, like other virtues, cannot be practiced too constantly, or be too well fortified by undeviating fijabit. Even where a man is alone, it “not well to throw aside too freely the restraints and observances of social usage. We do not hesitate to say that no one can, when alone, discard all customary forms and ceremonies in dress, meals or the like, without incurring danger of self-degradation. A man who neglects his toilet when he is going to spend the evening in his own society is decidedly wanting in self-respect, and the bachelor who only makes his rooms comfortable and attractive when he expects visitors, must be pronounced unworthy of promotion to the more dignified state of life to which all bachelors presumably aspire.— London Saturday Review.