The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1901-01-29
THE RAD OLD TINES.
How English Manners and Morals,
Customs and Costumes Improved.

IL
From the London News.
Another way in which the arts ocracy
has been affected by the progress of the
century has been not precisely in man
ners or morals as in that intermediate
country which lies on the border line be-
tween manners and morals. Manners,
strictly speaking, have perhaps rather
suffered in being demoralized. The state
ly bowings and curtseyings of the old
school and the elaborate modes of speech
which appear in the novels of the day
have disappeared. In 1901 a gentleman
never walked with a lady without giving
her his arm. An amusing caricature
shows dandy under these circumstances
returning from the great review in Hyde
Park that year. There is a downpour of
big as small tent, supported by a long
pole, in two hands, while two nymphs in
what we should now call evening dress
one with plume of ostrich feathers and
the other with an elaborate kind of tur-
ban on their heads. while their white
stockings and sandals or pumps are be-
dabbied with mud, each holding up the
skirt of her dress on the left arm, hang
with the right arm with full weight, one
on each arm of the beau. But though
manners were elaborate they were by no
means refined
The Prince Regent, with his eighteen
mistresses,' five of them famous. is OF
course no real criterion of the morals OF
manners of the age. Kings and heirs APP
parent have always been recognized 10
he Ian &c
rality as those of grammar. Except I'M
der female sovereign a mora; court has
Deen unknown. There is, however, no
doubt that the puD.ic standard of moral
ity among the upper ten has been raised
curing the century. it was the fashion
of the Wings and Fox to sneer at Pitt
because he did not run after his neigh
bor's wife nor away with his neighbor'
daughter. Yet even Pitt, when Prime
Minister, in his place in the House of
Commons, is reported to have addressed
the Speaker In the plural, because he saw
not one Mr.. Speaker. but two; and, after
cracking bottle of port in his own house,
cracked two more with the treasurer OF
the navy in Be.lamys the refreshment
room of the House of Commons; while
one of his chief oratorical efforts was
made in the interval of paroxysms sucn
as now produced by a Channel steamer
In choppy sea. 1t is a noted story how
Pitt, with the Lord Chancellor and the
treasurer of the navy returning home aft
er dinner, and finding a tollgate open,
galloped through without paying toll, and
the turnpike keeper fired his blunderbuss
dinner was then an afternoon function)
at them. And the tale was told:
How as Pitt wandered daIkling DER the
plain,
His reason drowned in Jenkinson's cham
payne,
A rusdcs hand (but righteous fate with.
stood
Had shed Premier's for a robbers blood.
The French war, by closing the country
TO claret and substituting the heavy and
drugged doses of port, made a three
bottle man i'm 1901 a more formidable hero
than the statesman who when Fox was
young, SAILED on seas of claret from
one comfortable official haven 10 anoth-
er,' as govt carried off their predeces-
sors. And Fanny Burney reports how the
Duke of Clarence, having dined with the
King on his birthday, came ana looked
in on the ladies of the household having
their dinner, and asked If they had drunk
the Kings health, and, being answered.
mo, but he might make Them" he ex-
claimed: "Oh, by God, / will Here, you
90 the footman), bring champagne. I'll
drink the Kings health again, IL / die
for It. Yes, / have done pretty well al
ready. So has the King l promise you. I
believe His Majesty was never taken
such good care of before. We have kept
up his spirits, l promise you. We have
enabled him to go through the fatigues;
and / should have done more still bur
for the ball and Mary. / have promised
to dance with Mary. / must keep sober,
for Mary" But he did not keep sober,
for Mary, who was his sister. coming out
that night. and when the lady presiding
told him not to drink any more, he kiss
cd her. told her, to shut her potato
trap" and finally had TO be put TO bed
instead OF dancing with Mary But at
East the ladies did not roll drunk al the
Princes feet as did the Court ladies Of
James lis time. And now Il would be
hard 10 find any one. even in a pothouse
on Mafeking night. TO behave as the
First Gentleman in Europe did habituaIly.
-s-~-s-
You may not like our metropolis at
first" said the Chicagoan. "bht you must
admit after you've been here awhile Il
grows on you"
Il wouldn't say that" replied the East