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MANNERS FOR MEN

Manners
FOR MEN

BY MRS. HUMPHRY
(“MADGE” OF “TRUTH”)

London
JAMES BOWDEN
10, HENRIETTA STREET
COVENT GARDEN, W.C.
1897


MANNERS FOR MEN.

CONTENTS.

MANNERS FOR MEN.

WOMAN’S IDEAL MAN.

Like every other woman, I have my ideal of manhood. The difficulty is to describe it. First of all, he must be a gentleman; but that means so much that it, in its turn, requires explanation. Gentleness and moral strength combined must be the salient characteristics of the “gentleman,” together with that polish that is never acquired but in one way: constant association with those so happily placed that they have enjoyed the influences of education and refinement all through their lives. He must be thoughtful for others, kind to women and children and all helpless things, tender-hearted to the old and the poor and the unhappy, but never foolishly weak in giving where gifts do

harm instead of good—his brain must be as fine as his heart, in fact. There are few such men; but they do exist. I know one or two. Reliable as rocks, judicious in every action, dependable in trifles as well as the large affairs of life, full of mercy and kindness to others, affectionate and well-loved in their homes, their lives are pure and kindly.

It was once said by a clever man that no one could be a gentleman all round who had not

knocked about the world and associated with all sorts and conditions of men, high and low, rich and poor, good and bad. Experiences like these are like the processes for refining gold. The man who emerges unharmed from the fire of poverty and its associations, and who retains his independent manliness in relations with those high-placed, must have within him a fibre of strength that is the true essence of manliness. So many, alas! go down, down, when “puirtith cauld” touches them with her terrible, chilly finger. And so many become obsequious and subservient, false to themselves, in dealings with those above them.

Well! my ideal does neither. He is always true to himself, and “cannot then be false to any man.” And he must have a sense of humour, too, otherwise he would be far

from perfect. How life is brightened by a sense of fun! Think of what breakfast, lunch, and dinner would be if all were to be as solemn and as serious as some folk would have it!

If good manners are not practised at home, but are allowed to lie by until occasion calls upon their wearer to assume them, they are

sure to be a bad fit when donned. It may be a trifle of the smallest to acquire a habit of saying “if you please” and “thank you” readily, but it is no trifling defect in a young man to fail to do so. If he does not jump up to open the door for his mother or sister, he may omit to do so some day when the neglect will tell against him in the estimation of those to please whom he would gladly give much. Carelessness in dress and personal appearance amount to bad manners. In the home there is sometimes a disagreeable negligence in this respect. At the breakfast-table unkempt hair, untended finger-nails, and a far from immaculate collar are occasionally to be seen, especially on late-comers who do not practise the ingratiating politeness of punctuality. Lounging, untidy habits are another form of bad manners. The ill-bred young man smokes

all over the house, upstairs and downstairs, and even in his mother’s drawing-room. He may be traced from room to room by the litter of newspapers and magazines he leaves behind him. The present fashion of taking one’s reading in pills, so to speak, snatching it in scrappy paragraphs from weekly miscellanies, is but too favourable to this lack of order. In this young man’s own room there is chaos. The maids have endless trouble in clearing up after him. His tobacco is spilled over tables, chairs, and carpets. His handkerchiefs, ties, socks, and collars are lying about in every corner of the room. He is too indolent even to put his boots outside the door at night that they may be cleaned in the morning. To save himself trouble he bangs all the doors instead of gently latching them. And yet, perhaps, if he could but realise that all this is “bad manners,” he would become as neat as he is now the reverse, and would be as decorative at table as he is, at the present moment, unornamental.

It is not only young men whose standard of behaviour in the home is a low one. Masters of the

house, fathers of families, men of middle age, who are terribly put out if any one fails in duty to them, are sometimes conspicuously ill-bred in everyday matters. They are late for every meal, to the discomfort of the other members of the family and the great inconvenience of the servants. Polite to the world outside, they are brusque and disagreeable in their manner at home: rough to the servants, rude to their wives, and irritable with their children. Sometimes a good heart and considerable family affection are hidden away behind all this, but the families of such men would be very glad to compound for a little less affection and hidden goodness and rather more gentleness and outward polish.

Apart from faults of temper, men fall into careless habits of speech and manner at home, and one form of this, viz., habitually using strong language in the presence

of women and children, is particularly offensive. Besides, it defeats itself; for if the forcible expressions are intended to express disapprobation, they soon become weak and powerless to do so, because they are used on every possible occasion. After a time they lose all meaning.

I know a family where there are sons and daughters, the latter charming and in every respect young gentlewomen. But the sons fall far below their level.

They come to the door with thundering knocks that make every one in the house start disagreeably with surprise, walk through the hall without introducing their muddy boots to either scraper or doormat, sit down to meals without the usual preliminary of hand-washing and hair-brushing, and are altogether rough and unpresentable. If friends call at the house these young men rush away from the chance of encountering them; or, if they cannot help meeting them, they blush scarlet, look very gauche and uncomfortable, and feel miserable. They knock things over out of pure awkwardness, and never realise that the secret of the whole matter is the want of self-training.

Girls are animated by a greater wish to please, an amiable desire that need not be confounded with vanity, and this wish has led the sisters of these young men to practise those small acts of daily self-denial which after awhile produce the highest self-culture so far as manners go.

What is habitual neatness but constant coercion of human nature’s innate indolence? What is politeness in the home but the outcome of affection and self-respect, and the suppression of all those natural instincts of self-seeking that, allowed their way, produce the worst manners in the world?

If any young man desires to be a perfect gentleman, he must begin in his own home.

It is delightful to see some young men unobtrusively attentive to their sisters, watchful of every need of their father and mother, cheerful and pleasant in their manner, full of fun and brightness, yet never losing the gentleness that denotes the fine nature, and so beloved in the home for all these endearing qualities, that when they leave it they are sadly missed. The father misses them for the pleasant companionship; the sisters miss them for the boyish spirits and the exuberant fun that never exceeds the bounds of good taste and refinement; and the mother misses them more than any one else, for no one better than she knows how many times a day her boys have set aside their own wishes in deference to hers, quietly, silently, unostentatiously—in a word, out of pure good manners, in the deepest, highest, truest sense of the words.

Such gentle, virile natures look out at the world through the countenance, which is a letter of recommendation to them wherever they go.

I have but faintly sketched my ideal. The following pages may fill in the remaining touches.

Many men who go out into the world while still very young to earn their living have few opportunities of acquiring a knowledge of social observances.

Leaving home when boys, at an age when they are utterly careless of such things as etiquette and the “nice conduct of a cane,” they live in lodgings or at boarding-houses of the cheaper sort, where the amenities of existence have to yield to its practicalities.

Meals are served in a fashion that means despatch rather than elegance, economy rather than taste, and very few hints can be picked up for the guidance of young fellows when they enter the homes of friends and acquaintances.

Their anxiety to fall in accurately and easily with the observances of those they meet on such occasions is as great as it is natural. They know well that to fail in these trifling acts of omission and commission is tacitly to acknowledge that they are unversed in the ways of good society.

There is not necessarily any snobbishness in this. A man may be perfectly manly and yet most unwilling to show himself inferior in any way to others of the class to which he belongs by birth and education. Even should those with whom he occasionally associates be his superiors, is he not right to try to rise?

Culture may mean little or nothing to the uncultured. Polish may be an empty word to the unpolished. But they are realities, and go far to produce an inward and corresponding refinement of mind and spirit.

There are thousands of young men in London alone at this very moment who are longing to acquire the ease and aplomb of good society.

The desire is worthy of all encouragement. Only those with real good in them can feel it. The men who are destitute of it are those who associate with their inferiors, contentedly accept a low moral standard, adopt a mode of speech and action that is coarse and rough, and finally let themselves down to the frequenting of public-houses and places of amusement, where the entertainment has been carefully planned to suit the uneducated, the low-born, and others whose vitiated taste leads them to dislike what is lovely and of good report, and to revel in the reverse.

But, unfortunately, many a good fellow has been driven to seek companionship with those beneath him by the very difficulty he experiences in getting on in society.

He fancies that his small solecisms are the subject of observation and comment, and he suffers agonies of mauvaise honte.

Girls often laugh very unkindly at shy youths, when they might find opportunities of acting the good angel to them, and by the exercise of tact screening from observation those failures in good manners which are inevitable to the inexperienced. When he finds himself the butt of a few giggling girls, a young man feels miserably uncomfortable and humiliated, and he vows to himself that he will never again put himself in the way of such annoyance. Consequently he cuts good society, not realising that he would very soon overcome these initial difficulties and feel at home in it.

He must find amusement somewhere. It is only natural to youth to crave it. At first his taste is jarred by those inferior to him, and his fastidiousness offended by their manners.

But, such is the fatal adaptability of human nature to what is bad for it, he soon becomes accustomed to all that he at first objected to, and even forgets that he had ever found anything disagreeable in it. After a few months his speech begins to assimilate the errors of those about him in his leisure hours. He uses the very expressions that jarred upon him at first. His dress and carriage deteriorate, and he is well on his way downhill in life long before he realises that he has quitted his own level, probably for ever.

And if only he had held his own at a few gatherings, and acquired experience, even at the cost of a little present pain and mortification, he would in the same interval of time be enjoying society, educating himself in its customs, and acquiring that exterior polish which comes of intimate acquaintance with its rules and ease in practising them.

Should this little manual of manners be of use to any such in enabling them to master the theory, as it were, of social customs in the educated classes, it will have attained its aim.

I have always felt the greatest compassion for young men when first introduced, after school and college life, to the routine of dinner, dance, and ball.

I have not forgotten the days when shyness made my own heart sink at the prospect of a dinner-party and when the hardest task on earth was the finding of nothings to say to a partner at a ball. It is a miserable feeling of confusion and gaucherie, and if I can in any way avert it from others it will be a source of great gratification to me.

IN THE STREET.

In crowded streets he may often have to fall behind, but he should never allow any one to interpose between her and him. Should the pressure from the crowd become extreme, his duty is to protect her from it as much as possible, but never by putting his arm round her waist. A hand on either side the lady’s shoulders is usually sufficient.

In meeting acquaintances a nod is sufficient for a male friend, unless his age or position is such as to render it advisable to raise the hat. Should a lady be with the acquaintance, any man meeting them must raise his hat. So must the individual walking with the lady. The etiquette of bowing is a simple one.

Male acquaintances always wait for acknowledgement on the part of female, as well as from those men who are their superiors in age or position. But this does not mean that they are shyly to look away from them and to ignore them. On the contrary, they must show clearly by their manner that they are on the look-out for some sign of recognition and are ready to reply to it.

Shyness often interferes with this and makes a young man look away, and this is occasionally misconstrued as indifference and resented as such. The calm, quiet, collected expression of face that suits the occasion is not achieved at once. Sometimes the over-anxiety to make a good impression defeats itself, producing a blushing eagerness better suited to a girlish than a manly countenance. This, however, is a youthful fault that is not without its ingratiating side, though young men view it in themselves and in each other with unbounded scorn.

This sentiment of self-contempt is a frequent one in young people of both sexes. Their valuation of themselves varies as much as the barometer, and is as much affected by outward causes. After a “snub,” real or fancied, it goes down to zero, but as a rule it speedily recovers itself, and in most young men enjoys an agreeable thermometer of 85° or so in the shade!

The well-mannered man never puts out his hand in greeting until a lady extends hers.

This is a test of good breeding that is constantly applied. To those uninitiated in the ways of society, it would naturally appear the right thing to give as cordial a greeting as possible. Therefore the hand is held out, even on introduction to a perfect stranger. This is wrong. The first move in the direction of cordiality must come from the lady, the whole code of behaviour being based on the assumption that she is the social superior. The same holds good with elders and men of higher rank. When a man is introduced to these he raises his hat and bows, though slightly. It is only to kings and princes that a low bow is made, or to those whose character and eminent position render an introduction to them a very high honour.

In introducing two men to each other the name of the inferior is mentioned first. By the inferior I mean the younger, the less important, or of lower rank. Suppose one of the two to be a familiar friend, and another a comparatively new acquaintance, then formality requires that the familiar friend shall be introduced to the other, being named first. The reason for this is that one naturally stands more on ceremony with the man one knows least. There may be counteracting circumstances, however, which would tend to reverse this order of things, but as a general rule, the social rank of both being equal, the above holds good.

Never introduce a lady to a gentleman; but always the gentleman to the lady. That is, mention the man’s name first, addressing yourself to the woman—thus: “Allow me to introduce my friend Mr. Smith, Miss Jones.” And follow this up immediately by saying, “Miss Jones,” addressing Mr. Smith as you do so. It is a grave solecism to begin by introducing the lady. Tyros very naturally conclude that the lady’s name should be first mentioned; but on thinking it over they will soon perceive that to do so would infer that she is the lesser consideration of the two.

It must always be borne in mind that the assumption of woman’s social superiority lies at the root of these rules of conduct.

It is bad manners to introduce people without permission.

Nor must this permission be asked in the hearing of the second party. If Mr. A. wishes to know Miss B., the lady’s leave must be obtained before he can be presented to her. The only exception to this rule is at a dance or ball, where introductions need not be regarded as leading to acquaintanceship. They are only for the dance, and may be ignored next day.

Here, again, it is the lady’s privilege to ignore her partner, if she choose. But if she should bow to him he must raise his hat, whether he desires to follow up the acquaintanceship or not. Objections more frequently arise on the woman’s side; but should a man prefer to drop the matter he can manage to convey in his manner a disinclination to do so, and yet behave with perfect politeness. A man I knew was once introduced at a ball to a girl, with whom he had danced two or three times. Before he met her again he heard that she had been actively concerned in circulating a slander about another girl whom circumstances had misrepresented. I happened to see the next meeting between the two.

The girl bowed, smiled, and showed some sign of an intention to stop and talk. The man raised his hat, looked extremely solemn and unsociable, and passed on. It was enough. The girl understood that he did not wish to resume the ball-room acquaintanceship, and very probably guessed why. He did it beautifully.

Before leaving the subject of the promenade, I must clearly explain that the hat must be raised even in saluting a very familiar friend, if (a) that friend is accompanied by a lady, and (b) when one is oneself accompanied by a lady, even if she be only a mother or sister. It is one of the signs of caste that a man is equally polite to his relatives as he is to the relatives of others.

We all know what to think of a man who omits small social duties where his wife is concerned. Even when he proves by paying them duly to other women that he is aware of what he ought to do, he is at once set down as ill-bred—a “cad,” in fact.

I once saw a Lord Mayor of London enter his carriage before his wife, who scrambled in after him as though well accustomed to do so. One does not expect the refinement of good manners from civic dignitaries, as a rule, but this little action told the spectators more about the man than they would ever have found out in the newspapers. They at once perceived that he was unversed in the ways of good society.

But some one may suggest that this may have been on some state occasion, when his mayoral dignity obliged him to precede his wife.

No. It was after a wedding. And besides, can any one fancy the Prince of Wales in any circumstances entering his carriage without having previously handed in the Princess, should she be his companion?

If accompanied by a dog, or dogs, their owner must hold himself responsible for their good behaviour. If his pets trespass in any way he must apologise for them, and do his best to repair any damage they have done. Should one of his dogs jump on a lady and make her gown muddy, he must offer his services and endeavour to get rid of the traces of the accident, if the lady wishes. Should she show a disinclination to accept his aid, he must at once withdraw, raising his hat as he does so. Should his dog attack another dog he must immediately call him off, administer correction, and apologise to the owner of the dog assaulted. I saw a young man once, in these circumstances, beat the other dog, after his own had jumped on it and bitten its ear! He was dressed like a gentleman, but his behaviour gave a truer indication of him than did his garments.

Whistling and singing are incompatible with the conduct of a gentleman in the street, though this by no means applies to a quiet country road, where ceremonious bearing is not required.

Nor is it permitted to wear the hands in the pockets when walking in the Park, or the streets of a town or city. This is probably one of the reasons that the cane or stick is still carried, though the original cause, that of self-defence in an age that was destitute of law and order, fortunately exists no longer. There are men who would not know what to do with their hands if they had not a cane or umbrella.

This is partly the fault of those who have charge of boys when they are growing and who allow them to lounge about in slovenly attitudes with their hands for ever in their pockets. Then when they begin to enter society they are quite at a loss.

At schools where boys are regularly drilled the whole effect of the drilling is done away with by the way in which the boys are allowed to sit and stand in the most remarkable attitudes of slouching awkwardness. It is only when they are at drill or out walking with the masters that any notice is taken of their carriage. And yet it is an important point with regard to health that the shoulders should be held well back, the chest forward, and the head up.

Should a man be so fortunate as to be of some service to any lady in the street, such as picking up a parcel or sunshade she may have dropped, or helping her out of any small difficulty, he must raise his hat and withdraw at once. Such trifling acts as these do not by any means constitute an acquaintanceship, and to remain by her side when the incident is over would look like presuming on what he had done, as though it gave him a right to her continued acknowledgments. This would be ungentlemanly.

At the same time, these occurrences are sometimes deliberately planned by girls and women with a direct view to scraping acquaintance with young men.

It is scarcely necessary to say that girls who stoop to this kind of manœuvring are hardly ever gentlewomen. Members of good families have been known to do such things in the wild exuberance of youth and high spirits, but they cannot hope to retain the respect of those who know them when they deliberately lower themselves in such ways as these.

Picking up promiscuous male acquaintances is a practice fraught with danger. It cannot be denied that girls of the lower middle classes are often prone to it; and there are thousands of young men who have no feminine belongings in the great towns and cities where they live, and who are found responsive to this indiscriminating mode of making acquaintances.

But they must often hesitate before choosing as wife a girl who shows so little discretion as to walk and talk with young men of whom she knows nothing beyond what they choose to tell her.

The seaside season is prolific in these chance acquaintanceships—“flirtations,” as they may perhaps be called. Bicycling is well known to favour them. But as they are far removed from the practices of the class of society to which belong those gentlemen of whom this little book treats, they may be dismissed with a few words of advice. Should any young man become acquainted with a girl in this manner, let him show his innate chivalry by treating her in every way as he would wish his own sister to be treated in similar circumstances.

If he becomes attached to her, let him first find out all about her that he possibly can, and should what he hears be encouraging, then let him ask her to introduce him to her family as a suitor for her hand. Should the girl fall in love with him, let him protect her against herself like a preux chevalier, like an honourable and high-minded English gentleman.

If he feels that he cannot reciprocate her sentiment, he should give up seeing her. Should she, as some girls of the kind have been known to do, pursue him with letters making appointments, she makes his task of renunciation a difficult one, but he should fulfil it nevertheless.

It is difficult in this way. Suppose a girl writes to a young man: “Meet me at the tea-rooms, No. 440, Bond Street, to-morrow afternoon.” There is no chance of replying in time to prevent her going there, and to absent himself would be to administer a severe snub to a girl whom he likes very well, and who has flattered his self-love in many ways during their acquaintanceship. What can he do?

It is a point that he must decide for himself, taking all the circumstances into consideration, and not forgetting to regard her ultimate welfare in the matter at least as much as his own actual wishes.

This may seem to some young men a very “high-falutin’” view to take of such a small matter as meeting a young woman and having tea together. Most of them, finding that a girl was growing fond of them, would encourage the feeling by every means in their power, regardless of whether it could ever end in marriage, and careless of everything beyond the gratification of their own vanity.