Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1924-11-27
Speaking of Charming Manners

/ contention is that politeness is based
on reality.
Custom is bugaboo to most of u.s.
1t is easier for us, to follow the mob
| no matter how silly it is, than to be a
bit conspicuous behaving properly ac-
cording to cur own light.
| Then there is the Pardon my glove
pest. Yes, he still exists. Where he
comes from the railroads alone can
| tell, but there are still some of him.
Somewhere he has heard or read that
! it is irnpolite to shake hands with his
glove on
So you stand curiouslywatching
him while he postpones the impulsive
or nothing gesture of the handclasp
by struggling to peel off his skintight
glove Those pardon-my- gloves are al
ways skintight' When at last it is
off you have lost any slight desire
you may have had to shake his hand
AS a matter of fact, you would prob
ably have preferred the esser personal
contact of the glove.
There is a certain class of people
who would heatedly resent being told
that they were i'll hammered, when all
the world could see that their man,
ners were improbable toward those
whom they considered their equals.
But toward those unfortunates who
were their financial or social interiors
they were invariably uncivil. Those
people of noble raiment and special
manners deserve sabotage they
merit the premeditated and unlaved
thumb in their pottage. And to be adj
vised of it afterwards.
| have found that you quite often
though not alWays-get just about
what you are looking. for. If you ex-
pect politeness you find lot Of it,
it you are looking for rudeness you
will certainly have it handed to you
lin chunks This is of course child
ishly obvious to anyone but mater
ialist.
What minor emotions sway YOU
when you see an undergraduate stand
ing on a windy corner in January talk
ing for a quarter of an hour with hat
in hand to a lady?
This spurious courtesy is making
great progress in this country and as
the majority do not think at all, be-
fore we know we will have a perfect
code of insincere manners like that of
Europe. American women abroad fall
flat and hard for those lovely man.
ners that exquisite polish of the con-
tinental. 1t impresses them so that
they draw invidious comparisons in
yolving their own males manners-or
lack of them.
1t would not astonish me in the /
future to see boiled eggs on the
breakfast table peel off their own
shirts and murmur Pardon my
shell!' as lovely Miranda reaches her
manicured fingers for them
It would be well not to forget that
the same exquisite gentleman of /
France, who would beg lady with a
daily dozen sort of bow to give her
self the trouble of accepting his seat
would step on that same lady's deli
cate fingers if they interfered with
his getting up ladder in front of her
in bazaar fire!
Even in recent issue of a metro
polian newspaper serious controver-
sy has been carried on, whether it is
more correct for gentleman to pre-
cede lady ascending a staircase
and follow her in descending, or vice
versa. And one of the reasons for it
being more proper for the gent to
precede the lady going up was be-
cause it would lessen her embarrass-
ment Can you beat that?
Embarrassment over what? Surely
not legs, unless she was deformed!
That is really too archaic. / haven't
seen the slightest embarrassment
displayed by woman of any age
with any kind of legs since 1914!-
James Montgomery Flagg in Col
lege Humor"