Delaware City press. (Delaware City, Del.) 1913-19??, 1913-08-01
HALF HOLIDAY OLD HOW TO Be GENTLE.
Vulgar Familiarity Never in
Good Form.
Old EnaiIshman's Advice and Warning
Against Calling Men and Women
by Christian Names on Short
Acquaintance.

When our forefathers spoke OF
mans address" they meant his whole |
social bearing. Nor was 1t by mere
freak or accident of language that the |
word thus exchanged a narrower for a |
wider Significance. A mans way of
accosting a stranger. or even an ac-
quaintance, or even friend, reveals
good deal of his character and goes
long way toward distinguishing a |
gentleman from boor. Good man
ners are easy and free, but free and |
easy" manner is an abomination. My |
attention. says writer in the Man.
chester (England) Guardian, is invited
to the subject by one of those young |
inquirers who writes as follows:
Il attached no particular Importance
to the questions until few weeks ago.
And now would ask what ex-
perience has taught you. Is one to
call every Tom, Dick and Harry by his
Christian name, or plain Brown, Jones
and Robinson. preflxed with Mr. ac-
cording to age? Is one to call every
Joan. Jane and Betsy by her Christian
name, or merely Miss So-and-So?"
must not indicate my correspond
ent by the name of the place In which
he dwells, SO for the nonce he shall
be Tom Fytton." named after very
attractive hero who suffered from rath-
er similar embarrassments; and to my
friend Tom l would at the outset i'm
part salutary warning which l re-
ceived very early In life.
when you once are on terms to call
Christian names. you are on terms to
quarrel" This somber truth, even IL 1t
stood alone, should be deterrent from
premature and needless intimacies. |
| fancy that Cowper. who had the double
sensitiveness of the gentleman and tn
poet, must have been smarting frorI
some experiences of this sort when h~
wrote his stanzas on Friendship:
The man who halls you Tom or Jack.
| And proves by thumps upon your back
| How he esteems your merit,
| Is such a friend that one had need
| Be very much his friend indeed.
| To pardon or to bear It,
And the odd thing Is that the men
who are thus extensively friendly al
ways seem to imagine that they are
making themselves extremely pleas
ant; they are too blind to see the an
noyance which they cause and too
thick headed to feel that their clumsi-
ness Is resented. Warned by their ex-
ample. let Tom Fytton confine him
self to surnames until he is really sure
of his ground; and then, when ac-
ouaIntance has led to intimacy. he Will
find that the Christian name slips In
sensibly and inevitably, into Its place.
!, There is no greater error than TO
mistake vulgar familiarity for gentle.
manlike ease," but there is a familiar.
! ity which is not the least vulgar, and
"gentlemanly" has no necessary con-
nection with social rank Some of the
truest gentlemen | have ever known
have been miners. and have seen ag-
ricuItural laborers whose manners no
instruction could have mended.
Is Tom to call Joan, Jane and Betsy
! by their Christian names? No. ! can
, not say it too often or too plainly. To
man, every woman should be a d.
vinity; and the slightest touch OF ia
miliarity or free and easiness is In.
consistent with that reverence which
should be his instructive attitude. II
is true that my favorite heroine, Die
Vernon. encouraged Frank Osbaldison
} to set convention at defiance. Call
t me Tom Vernon, IL you have a mind.
but speak to me as you would friend
J and companion" But then Die, with
/ all her charms, was bit of a holden.
/ and had learnt her manners from her
t brutal cousins. Frank. who was gem
e tleman. as well as a good fellow, de-
+ clIned to take her at her word, and at
their final parting las 1t seemed) she
l. was still to him Miss Vernon"
). If a forward or concelted youth pre-
d sumes to be free and easy with what
r he will probably call a "gurl," he is
It likely to receive snub which will
o abide with him. to his great advantage
e all his life long. So direct familiarity
8 is difficult and dangerous and the
n bounder generally has sense enough
g to avoid it, But he compensates him
y self indirectly by speaking of girls
e behind their backs. by their Christian
names, though he knows full we'll thai
v he dare not so call them to their faces
Q There he shows himself coward at
+ we'll az a cad. and Tom Fytton will
e perhaps find an opportunity of telling
" him so.