The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1899-12-27

tA@A&E AA o0(-tt-
siderable amount of attention., and NUM-
erous are the remedies put forth for its
improyements One humorous writer takes
a pessimistic view of the possibilities
of any revival. and suggests as the only,
practical remedy, that the word CONVEX
sation. ssbefng now like patriotism and
some other words,s' misleading should be
allowed to disapper from the ina
Iish dictionary. This IS not a very en-
couraging solution of the problem, but
not more depressing than the suggestion
made by another writer that conversa-
ton should be treated IN a similar fash
ion tosthe culinary entertainment prepared
for the guests, and be inscribed upon a
menu Of which every guest would par
take. SO TO speak. This is OF course by
no means a novel idea. Everyone remem-
bers those su~per-cultured inner partiesin
Mr.. Mallock's brilliant book, during which
the witty and cynical and polished guests
discussed the programme laid down by
the hostess. But life does not happen to
be precisely like arts, which can round
and finish and embelaish; and a dinner
party which presented a set Of guests each
one OF whom possessed some special gift
of urbanity, beauty, charm, esprit. or
scholarship is hardly TO be looked Tor out
side the pages of a Disraeli or Mallock-
If. then we may safety assume that the
majority of persons 10 pc fsnnd in any
s.cias assemblage are neither very pro-
found, nor sparkling, nor humorous. nor
original, we may be equally certain thai
any form Of intellectual gymnastics which
makes a demand upon these qualities will
operate. not in the direction Of success.
but of disaster. Ordinary persons who
find themselves compelled to say some
thing new, or startling, or diyerting will
inevitably fall between two stools. They
viii say something inconceivably stupid
or banai. or, what is still worse, some
thing that is stilted. artificial, or even
false; something that they may remember
at second hand. and that in no way repre-
sents their individual ideas and senti-
merlts. But let the conversation be nat
ural. easy, spontaneous and familiar,
about things that persons Of ordinary in
telligence have had thoughts and expert
ence Of; let the conditions be favorable,
and it is surprising how much sense, apt
ness and briskness may be shown in the
interchange of ideas. We say let the con-
ditions be favorable, and we shall now
proceed to show what we mean by this
proposition.
The conditions are not favorable when
ffty-two persons who have never before
set eyes upon one another meet in a
d-rawing-room. no matter whether the
apartment be furnished with the most
exquisite upholstery and the hostess be
faultiessly appareled and hammered. Con-
versation is impossible. There viii pc
chatter, polite questions about the
weather. the theatres. the health Of the
hostess. her children and dogs: refresh
ments. often at these crowded functions
of a very inferior Kind. a constant APP
pearance of the maids and dosing of
doors, but nothing that with any truth
fulness can be called conversation II,
then, you are determined to have all the
world at your afternoon tea party, be
SURE that you will have to sacrifice con-
versation as 1t was formerly under
stood-that easy, delightful interchange
of ideas and sentiments which can only
exist between persons who are intimately
acquainted and drawn together, not by
social ambition or conventionality, but
by liking and sympathy.
There are other conditions quite as
unfacorable to conversation as numbers.
There is the person who has had in
fuenza six times, with different symp-
toms and medical attendants upon each
occasion. There Is no more fatal subject
than influenza in arresting anything that
may be called conversation. The visitors
vie with one another in their records
of aches and pains and temperatures and
remedies, n If there happens to be that
ubiquitous person, the female amateur
doctor present, there win be 10 peace
Tor you till you have indiscreetly reveal
ed your own experiences, and ave been
urged to try her own pet medical man, ,
who has a monopoly of wisdom and
genius. Neuralgia acts in a similar fash
ion, but it has the advantage, as a gem :,
eral rule, of having no association with
funerals, and If there must be a COM
plant discussed at feminine afternoon
tea parties, neuralgia is safer than any
other.
If it is easy to point out the conditions
that are not favorable to conversation,
it is not quite so easy an affair to pre-
sent those that are ideal In the first
place, it would be necessary for a fash
ionable hostess to ave two completely
different kinds of social intercourse. She
would have dinners and at homes once
or twice a year, to which she could in
vite her 800 acquaintance at the same
time. and frequent little reunions all
through the year, when the simplest and
most informal hospitality prevails, to
which she would bid her few real n
intimate friends. Upon these occasions
and in these little circles, drawn around
the hostess from sympathy of tastes and
friendship, there would be a chance for
conversation to spring up again and
flourish. A hostess of this kind, instead
of having the ~humiliating reflection that
persons patronize her big dinners and
functions on account of her money and
furniture and table and her acquaint-
anceship with other persons with money
and mansions, would nave the pleasant
consciousness that her friends came be-
cause they liked her. because they liked
one another and because they obtained
at her house one OF the most agreeable
pleasures of INSTRUMENTATION of an in
innate and satisfying kind.
The fan Is one Of the most important
features of the feminine dress toilet. A
pretty woman must have a fan no matter
where she lives; from the piquant Yum
Yums of far-away Japland to the languid
senoritas OF Mexico femininity is not her
self unless armed with the festive little