Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1886-10-28
ON POLITE SOCIETY.
Mrs. Howe's Keen ScaIpeI of Satire
Cutting Shoddy GrossnesS.


us polite society polite:'' is the oues-
ton Mrs. Julia Ward Howe is asking AS
she makes a tour West to attend the com
ing 'WOmap's Rights Convention" at
Kansas City. She recently put this ques-
ton in Cleveland, Ohio, and pictured the
homely and hOpelike comfort OF house
in which kindred spirits like Margaret
Fuller, Ralph Waldo Emerson and others
used to meet. Its frugal banquet was
contrasted with the cOntectioner's ava
lanche, "c0ld. costly and cOmfOrtless,"
which burdens its table TODAY. Beneath
the smile of Its specifically polite puest
can be read the palpahle remark What
pity your father sold his real estate be-
fore the rise In the market"
Another guest snakes your hand. hCt
one can read In his face: "HGW do you
happen to be here among such rIch PEG
pie, and so well dressed, too? Have Won
any source OF income about which l do
not know
Mrs. Howe scored the soft-t0ned fat
terer whose voice, little too soft, utters
sickening platitudes for those who need
them least. She declared that it would
not he unjust TO issue a prohibition
against the flatterer, The person who,
grown rich, is made harG-hearted, forget
full of old friends and poor relations and
who nevertheless poses as a mem Der OF po-
lite society, was condemned.
81 have beard that people OF wealth in
our large cities have deposited their par
ents in asylums, where they may have
all that money can buy but nothing that
gratitude can give" said Mrs. Howe, who
when told of reading her lecture in New
England town where a young man heard
it and afterward confessed that he had put
his brother in the poor house and bad
no
wrong.
The foolish eXcluslyeness of the sh0ddy
aristocrat who fears that if he receives
many at his house people will cease to
think it a great privilege to be received
there was discussed. The eager struggle
of one class TO get into s0-called good So
ciety and the harsh crOwding OF those in
the charmed circle to keep out new can
didates were very nicely hit of and the
matter illustrated by quotation from
Thackeray's Newcomers. The aged
grandmother replies when asked by her
children:
"WbO then are OF good family"
"Well, my child, mostly no one"
81" said Mrs. Howe, "wOuld have re.
piled Mostly everyone"
''Those who inherit or marry money
and this is especially true of women, are
allowed by so-called polite society to
pIaco themselves ABOVE J0Use VINO earn
livelihood. The woman whose trustee
has lost her money-he usually does
is in need of some apology because she
works for a living. In my mind tn e
idleness of rich wonderland there 9
nothing more Acknowledgements apol-
ogy."
There was the keenest irony in Mrs.
HOwe's words about the system OF caste
In English society.
''In one OF those volumes with which
Queen Victoria has Illuminated the
world, she mas said that the graduation OF
society from the throne all the way down
TO the PEASANTS cottage is so carefully
made that there is no break"
LOngfellow and Emerson were men
toned AS men in whose presence it was
impossible TO be impolite. The young
persons Of to-day, however, are more in
clined TO worship such percentages as the
Vanderbilt and AstOrs.
Mrs. Howe arriagned the inscriptions
rudeness of impolIte newspapers. she
said that while women are doing bright
newspaper work, some OF the meanest
work in the newspapers is being done by
them. Some OF these ambitious female
correspondents gain ingress into house
as a guest and then send out tlippant crit
icisms as to the entertainment. Newspa-
per people, however, are confused in dis
tinguIshing between those VINO, althouz
pretending desire for privacy, are
eager for notoriety and those who really
desire IT,