Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1913-08-29
CLASSES IN ETIQUETTE.
The London University Shows For
eigners English Ways.


The peculiarities of English etiquette
and the stiff formality Of English man
ners and customs are so puzzling to for
eigners accustomed to- behaving like RAJ
tional human beings, instead of like a
lot of automatons, putting on morning
coats and top hats by clockwork and
saying ''Sorryp at regular intervals,
that the University of London has es-
for the benefit of foreigners. There are
now 25O members of the class, repre-
senting seventeen nationalities,
The thing that foreigners find most
difficult to understand is the rule of
English dress. There are few men from
beyond the sea who can comprehend
why top hat and morning coat are in
dispensable at Lords for the Oxford
Cambridge cricket match and at Good
wood for the races, but tabooed at Hen
ley, which is quite as fashionable an oc-
casion. Nor can they understand the
rule that requires man to wear a pair
of yellow leather puttees with his pat
ent leather shoes and lounge suit on Sat
urdays, even if he is going no further
from home than the tobacco shop at the
corner There is another rule that
tweeds and Norfolk jacket may be
worn from Friday afternoon to Monday
morning, but at no other time during
the week, unless one is really and truly
going to the country.
Then there is the rule that requires
the stick to be carried only in the right
hand and calls for a straight stick with
morning coat and allows crooked ham
died stick only with the lounge suit.
There is the rule which demands that
the hat shall be worn on the back of the
head-whateVer the style of hat-and
calls for the facial expression to be Of
the utmost vacuity.
There is the rule that requires the
brim of a saft hat to be turned down,
like sou'wester indicating that one is
not really in the city, but is just return
ing from weekend in the country.
There is the rule that requires white
flannel trousers, white canvas shoes,
white socks and a straw hat when one
approaches within four miles of the river
even though one may have to wear fur
oyercoat at the same time for warmth.
And there is the rule that permits ten
mis- in shirtsleeves but orders coat for
golf
All these rules are set down in alpha
betical order at the University of Lon
don and carefully classified and indexed.
But even that great institution cannot
undertake to explain them or give a
reason for their existence. All it can
do is to drill them into the unfortunate
foreigner, make him learn them so that
he can begin anywhere on the list and
say them backwards or forwards, by
syncopation or simple time, and impress
upon him that he will be the talk of all
the clubs in ST. James and probably be
ostracized from society's favor if he in
fringes even the slightest of them.
For these rules are the breath of life
in the Englishman's nostrils. They are
the marks by which he knows that he is
a gentleman If it were not for them
he could not tell whether he was gen
tleman or only clerk in the city. This
is the only country in the world where
a gentleman has to wear a label. In all
other countries mans behavior. stamps
him as a gentleman or otherwise.-Lon-
don Correspondence, New York Tribune.