The Behaviour Book, by Eliza Leslie (Phildadelphia: Willis P. Hazard, 1853)
SUGGESTIONS TO INEXPERIENCED AUTHORS.
There is some economy and much convenience in buying your paper by the ream, (twenty quires,) having first tried a sample. The surface of the paper should be smooth, and somewhat glossy; particularly if you write with metallic pens. That which is soft and spongy, though a little lower in price, wears out the pen so fast that what is saved in paper is lost in pens; also, there is no possibility of writing on it with ease and expedition. You will find it best to use paper ruled in lines. If you write a large hand, take fools-cap; if a small hand, use letter-paper size. But notepaper is too small, when you are writing for the press.
Before you commence your manuscript, take a quire, and prepare each sheet by splitting it all down the folded side, with a sharp paper-cutter, thus dividing it into half-sheets. You can do this better on a flat table than on the slope of a desk. Keep your left hand pressing down hard on the quire, while you are cutting it with your right.
The best paper-cutters are those of real ivory. A handle is of no advantage to them, but rather the contrary. They should be thin, plain, and perfectly
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straight, except being rounded off at the two ends. Ivory paper-knives of this form are generally used by the book-binders, an evidence that they are convenient and expeditious. Those of bone or horn are scarcely worth buying, though but half the price; the edges soon becoming blunt, and therefore useless. Wooden paper-knives are good for nothing. Paper-knives of mother of pearl, and other ornamental substances, are of little utility, being rarely sharp enough, (even when new,) and in a short time becoming quite dull. Also, they break very easily. Avoid cutting a sheet of paper, or the leaves of a book, with scissors; it is comparatively a slow and awkward process; and cannot, even with great care, be effected as smoothly and evenly as with a cutter of ivory.
Before you split or divide the sheet, press the paper-knife all along the fold, so as to flatten the crease, and make it cut evenly and easily. Having split your whole sheets into leaves or half-sheets, take each half-sheet separately, and fold over an inch or more all along the left-hand edge; so as to leave a margin or space for sewing the manuscript when finished. Do this with the paper-knife. Lay a pile of these half-sheets beside you when you sit down to write, and take them as you want them.
Write only on one side of the paper. If written on both sides, it will cause trouble and inconvenience to the printers, by obliging them to turn over at the end of every page. This rule, however, may be dispensed with, when a manuscript is so short that it may be comprised in one sheet, and is to be trans-
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mitted by mail. This may be the more easily managed, by drawing with a pencil or pen a straight perpendicular line down the middle of each page, so as to divide it into columns. When it is finished, enclose it in an envelope, direct, and seal it, and put on a post-office stamp. If the manuscript occupies two or three sheets, put two or three stamps side by side. There are large envelopes that will hold foolscap paper, properly folded.
Do not use blue ink; for if any part of your manuscript should chance to get wet, there is a risk of the blue ink being effaced or obliterated by the damp, so as to render the writing illegible; and this has frequently happened.
Let your writing be large enough, and plain enough to be read with ease, and the compositor will be less likely to make mistakes. Printers, though accustomed to read all sorts of writing, are sometimes completely at a loss in deciphering a very bad hand. There is no excuse for a person in respectable life persisting in writing illegibly, as it is never too late to improve. You have only to take lessons of a good instructor, and apply yourself sedulously to acquiring a new hand, and you will succeed in doing so.
Do not, in writing for the press, affect the crow-quill calligraphy that is fashionable for album verses and complimentary billets. When your manuscript is finished, sew the leaves evenly together, with nothing more than a strong thread; or, if it is very thick, it may be sewed with a fine twine put into a large needle. A handsome cover, daintily fastened with a
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pretty ribbon, is of no account in a printing-office, where the first thing that is done with a manuscript is to remove the cover, and cut the leaves loose from the fastening. The printers will gladly dispense with covers, ribbons, and fairy-like penmanship, in favour of a plain legible hand, pages regularly numbered, and leaves written on one side only.
In commencing a manuscript, write the title or caption in large letters, at some distance from the top of the first page; and if you are not anonymous, put your name a little below the title. Then begin the first line of the first paragraph, several inches distant from the left-hand side, or margin. In this manner commence every paragraph. The length of the paragraphs may be regulated by the time when you think a pause longer than that of a period or full stop may be effective; or to give the reader an opportunity of resting for a minute; or to denote the commencement of another subject.
In writing a dialogue, begin every separate speech with a capital, and commence each speech on a new line, and at some distance from the left-hand margin. Also mark the beginning and end of every speech with double commas. If the names of the speakers are given at the commencement of every speech, write those names in large letters, putting a dot and a dash after them. All these arrangements are the same in writing as in printing.
If you are, unfortunately, not familiar with the rules of punctuation, refresh your memory by referring to them in a grammar-book. They must be
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strictly observed; otherwise your meaning will be unintelligible. Always remember that every period or full stop, and every note of interrogation, or of admiration, must be followed by a capital letter, beginning the next word. Dashes, particularly in a dialogue, add much to the effect, if not used too lavishly.
Errors of orthography are rarely committed by any one who presumes to write for the press. It is scarcely possible for a person who reads much to spell incorrectly, as the appearance of the printed words becomes insensibly and indelibly fixed in the mind. Still it may be well to write with a dictionary on your table, in case you should have any doubt as to the proper spelling and meaning of a word with which you may not be very familiar.
Keep also a grammar on your table. Grammatical errors are annoying to the reader, and disgraceful to the writer, unless it is well known that she has not had the advantage of an education, even at a common school. Then she is to be pitied. But it is never too late to study grammar, and she had best do so before she ventures to write for the public. If she writes ungrammatically, how must she talk! In a work of fiction it is shocking to have lords and ladies, or the noble and dignified hero, and the elegant and refined heroine, conversing in "bad grammar," because the author knew no better. Yet such books we have seen. There are, luckily, not many of them. But there should be none.
Every morning, previous to commencing your task, revise carefully all that you have written on the pre-
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ceeding day, and correct and alter whatever you may deem susceptible of improvement. Some authors revise every page as soon as they have written it. But, unless you are much pressed for time, it is best to do this next morning, when your perceptions are fresh and clear. In crossing or blotting out, do it effectually, so that the original words may not appear through, and remain still legible. If you find that you have omitted a word, or if you wish to change one word for another, interline it; inserting the new word just above the line to which it belongs, and placing this mark ^ below. Lay aside each page as you finish it. Be particular in numbering every page; and it is best to do this before you begin, placing the number near the top of the right-hand corner. Let not your lines be too close, or there will not be space enough for legible interlining.
If the publisher lives in your own town, it will be sufficient to roll up the manuscript in clean white paper, twisted at each end, and wafered in the middle. But however short the distance, write on the outside of the paper the full direction of the publishing office; that, in case of its being dropped in the street, any person finding it may know exactly where to take it.
In putting up a large manuscript, in a packet for transmission to a distant place, use strong nankeen paper for the cover, and secure it with wafers, or paste, if it is to go a voyage in a steamer, as a wax seal may be melted by the heat of the fire. If it will reach its destination in a few hours, you may seal it with wax, having tied red tape about. Do not use
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twine, as that may cut the paper. Newspapers are generally put up in a brownish paper cover, pasted at the side and bottom, with one end left open.
Postage is now so cheap, that manuscripts had best always be transmitted by mail; putting a sufficient number of stamps on the outside, where they may be used as seals.
Few women can write well enough for publication, without going twice over the subject; first in what is called the rough copy, and then making a fair copy with all the original errors corrected, and all proper alterations inserted. If you have time, make two fair copies; one for the printer, and one to keep for yourself, in case the other should be accidentally destroyed or lost--retaining it till after the work is actually in print. Much postage is wasted, and much annoyance is given to the editors of periodicals, by applications for the restoration of unpublished verses, and other "Rejected Addresses," consisting, perhaps, of a sheet of poetry, or a few pages of prose, of which it would have been very easy to have made another copy for the author's keeping.
In writing articles for Annuals, let it be remembered that the printing of these books is always completed some months before they are published or announced for sale. Therefore, all contributions should be sent to the publisher before February, or March at farthest. For a magazine, they should be transmitted at least two months in advance. For a weekly paper, two weeks ahead.
Those who write for periodicals should remember
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that it is the custom to address all letters on compensations, copies of work, &c. to the publisher; and not to the editor, who seldom has any concern in the pecuniary affairs, his business being solely to receive, and read the manuscripts, to accept or reject them, and to arrange them for the press. It is not usual for the compensation to be paid till after the book is published. Some publishers send to every contributor one copy of the work. Others do not present a copy when the article is very short--for instance, a few stanzas of verse. Prose obtains a higher price than poetry, of which there is always a superabundance in the market. Much poetry is published without any pay at all; the writers being contented with seeing their effusions in print. No good author has any occasion to write gratuitously. A "merely passable" or "just tolerable" writer of poetry or fiction, should give up the inventive line, and try something else--something for which genius is not indispensable; and from which, by patience and industry, a sort of living may be wrought out.
In composing poetry, a common, but unpardonable fault is that of introducing a lame or halting line--a line with one syllable too many, or too few. And if the author does not understand that it is an intolerable blemish, and sends it uncorrected to the press, she is unworthy of being called a poetess. We are inclined to believe that no person devoid of an ear for music, can write poetry deserving of the name. The ideas may be good, but the lines will have no melody, an4 will move harshly and ruggedly, very much like rough prose.
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Some writers seem to think that blank verse is nothing but prose with a capital at the beginning of each line; never having learnt or remembered that though the lines do not rhyme, they must all comprise ten syllables, (syllables, not words,) otherwise the effect when read, will, to even a tolerable ear, be absolutely painful. We saw a play, (the first attempt of a since distinguished dramatist,) the dialogue of which was unintelligible to the audience, and nearly impracticable to the actors, who found it absolutely beyond their skill to enunciate; or rather beneath it. We afterward heard the manager of the Chestnut-street Theatre explain, that the difficulty, both with the speakers and the hearers, was the execrable blank verse in which the play was written; some of the lines containing but seven or eight syllables, (instead of ten,) and some twelve or fourteen. A very few English authors write irregular blank verse; but we are sorry to say that a great many Americans do not seem to understand the process, simple as it is, of confining themselves to ten syllables only,--neither more nor less. Can they have read Shakspeare?
There is no blank verse in French poetry. That language seems incapable of it.
If you are writing for a periodical, and are desirous of ascertaining before-hand how many pages your manuscript will make when printed, take, at random, any printed page of the work, and copy it in your usual hand, and on a sheet of the same paper you intend using throughout. You will thus, by comparison, be able to judge with tolerable accuracy,
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now much of your writing will make a page when printed.
Keep a memorandum-book for the express purpose of setting down whatever relates to your literary affairs. Insert the day when you commenced a manuscript, the day when you finished it, and the day on which it went to the publisher. Also, the whole number of its pages. When you see it in print, put down the number of its printed pages. In this book, set down, immediately on receiving them, whatever sums are paid to you for your writings.
If you are a writer of fiction, have a large book for memorandums, of any amusing or remarkable things you may chance to hear, and which you may turn to account afterward. If you write truth only, keep a book for the reception of useful or interesting facts. A written book of names, alphabetically arranged, (surnames and christian names,) will be of great advantage in selecting appellations for your characters. Do not give elegant names to your common people; or to your patrician characters names that are coarse and vulgar. A fault in Dickens is that nearly all his names are rugged, uncouth, and ill-sounding, and seldom characteristic. Why should a very excellent and generous brother and sister be called Toin Pinch and Ruth Pinch. What did they pinch?
There is a proof-reader in every printing-office, but after he has done, the proofs are generally sent to the author for farther revisal.
In correcting proof-sheets, first see that they are quite dry. Draw your pen through any word you
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desire to change, and then write the new word on the margin, placing it even with the line of the rejected word. When you alter the punctuation, converting a comma into a semicolon, or a period into a note of admiration, make a slight mark on the margin of that line, that the printer may not overlook it. If you have occasion to change a whole sentence, cross it out, and put the new sentence on the margin at the bottom of the page.
If the printer's boy can wait, you had best correct the proofs while he stays.
CHILDREN.
Miss Edgworth says that the education of a child begins at three months old. It is true that both bad and good habits may seem to commence at this early age; but we do not believe that in so slight a soil they take a very deep root, or that what is called a cross baby is sure to grow up an ill-tempered adult. Infants, when they are not really sick, frequently cry from some incidental annoyance, and not from a fretful disposition. If they feel comfortably they will usually be good-humoured and pleasant. Much of their comfort is sacrificed to the vanity of the mother in dressing them fashionably and expensively. We knew a baby that was very good in the morning, but very cross in the afternoon, or when dressed for show. And no wonder, for in her show-costume she was tortured with necklace, sleeve- loops, and bracelets of fine branchy, or rather briary coral, scratching and irritating her delicate skin, and leaving the print in red marks. On our representing this to the mother as the probable cause of the baby's fretfulness, the thorny ornaments were left off, and the child became amiable. Gold chains are also very irritating to the neck and arms of an infant. Coral beads of a smooth round form,
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strung evenly on a simple thread of silk, without any intermingling of gold chain, are, perhaps, the most comfortable necklaces for children, and are also very becoming; but as they are not expensive, they are of course not fashionable.
Fortunately, the days of worked caps are over. Young ladies are no longer expected to cover pieces of cambric with elaborate cotton embroidery for the babies of their married friends, and the tender heads of the babies are no longer chafed with rough needlework rubbing incessantly upon them, or heated with a silk lining to the cambric already thickened all over with close, heavy patterns. We wish also that mothers, generally, were less proud of seeing their babies with "luxuriant heads of hair," which if it has no natural tendency to curl, disfigures the child and gives it a wild, ungenteel look. If it does curl, it still heats the head and neck, and is said to draw away much strength from the system. The most healthy infants we have seen, had very little hair, or it was judiciously kept closely cut. To curl children's hair in papers is barbarous. They pay dearly for the glory of appearing in ringlets during the day, if they are made to pass their nights lying upon a mass of hard, rough bobs, about as pleasant as if they had their heads in a bag of hickory-nuts. But then the mother has the gratification of hearing their curls admired!
Among other sufferings inflicted on babies is that of sending them out in bleak winter days with brimless hats, that, so far from screening their faces from the
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cold wind, do not even afford the slightest shade to their eyes, which are winking and watering all the time from the glare of the sun and snow. We have seen false curls pinned to these babies' hats, and dangling in their eyes.
Another detestable practice is that of making the waists of children's frocks ridiculously long and pain fully tight; particularly over the chest and body, which are thus pressed flat, to the utter ruin of the figure, and the risk of producing incurable diseases--such as consumption of the lungs, and projection of the spine; to say nothing of the various complaints connected with the stomach, which is thus squeezed into half its natural compass. Also, the sleeve-holes are so small and tight as to push up the shoulders. Then the hips are pressed downward far below their proper place, and the legs are consequently in danger of becoming short and bandy. Is it possible this vile fashion can continue much longer!--and are "the rising generation" really to grow up with high shoulders, round backs, flat chests, bodies that seem longer than their legs, and hips almost where their knees ought to be.
Also, these limbs must suffer from cold in winter with no other covering than cotton stockings, the skirts of the dress scarcely reaching to the knees--the little boys disfigured with the ugliest of all garments, short knee-breeches.
Add to all the rest of these abominations, tight boots with peaked toes, and can we wonder that children, even beyond the period of infancy, should, at
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times, be cross, irritable, and unamiable. How can they be otherwise, when they seldom feel comfortably? Then, if the parents can afford it, (or whether or not,) the unhappy children are bedizened with all manner of expensive finery, and interdicted from romping, lest they should injure it. But, what matter if the children suffer--the mother's vanity must be gratified, and she must have the delight of seeing that her boys and girls are as fashionably dressed as the little Thomsons and Wilsons and Jacksons.
We look back with regret to the days when little girls, as well as boys, wore their hair closely cropped; convenient and cool, and showing to advantage the form of the head, till they were twelve or thirteen--and they wore only washable dresses, descending far below the knees, and with pantalets down to their ankles. In summer their frocks, had short wide sleeves, and were not close up to the throat. The bodies were of a natural length, the outside gathered full upon a moderately tight lining. If there is no lining to a full frock-body it will puff out at the back and front, and give the waist a look of deformity before and behind. Then the little girls went out in close cottage-bonnets of straw in summer, and beaver in winter--shading and screening their faces--and were kept warm when out of doors with long wide cloaks or coats of cloth or merino, instead of the fantastic short things now worn, with open sleeves and open fronts. Then, when at home, how innocent and childlike they looked in their long-sleeved convenient bib-aprons!--so much better than the short silk ones now worn,
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trimmed and bordered and ribboned, and rendered so fine that the children are expected to be as careful of injuring their showy aprons as of soiling their showy frocks.
Formerly, children learned to play various amusing games, such as "Hot buttered beans," "Blind-man's buff," &c. Now their play is chiefly running and squeeling, and chasing each other about, without any definite object, except that of making a noise. Then, at a juvenile party, the amusement was chiefly in the varieties of these entertaining games. Now it is dancing--for as many as can find places to dance--and nothing at all for those who cannot, but to grow tired and sleepy. In former times, children's parties commenced at two o'clock in the afternoon in winter, and at four in summer. They played till they were summoned to a large and well-supplied tea-table, and were sent for to come home by eight o'clock, being then quite tired enough to go to bed and sleep soundly, and waken with pleasant recollections of yesterday. If the party was very large, the elder children sat round the room, and tea, &c. was handed to them, while the little ones were accommodated at a table where the hostess presided. The children of that time really enjoyed these parties, and so would those of the present time, if they could have such. The juvenile-party dress was then but a simple white muslin frock with a ribbon sash. We have since seen little girls at a summer party stedfastly refuse strawberries and cream, in obedience to the interdiction of their mothers; who had enjoined them to do so, lest
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they should stain or otherwise injure their elegant silk dresses.
Fortunately, it is no longer fashionable for mothers to take their children with them on morning visits. On these occasions small children rarely behave well. They soon grow tired, and restless, and begin teazing to go somewhere else. Their presence is (or ought to be) a restraint on conversation, as much may be said during a visit that is not well for them to hear. They comprehend certain things far more easily than is supposed. Great mischief has ensued from allowing children to sit and listen; and there is no dependence on their discretion or secrecy.
It is not well to put a small child "through its facings," by trying to make it exhibit any of its little feats before strangers. They are generally very reluctant to make this exhibition. Sometimes they are bashful, sometimes perverse; but if the mother persists in her attempt to show them off, it will probably prove a complete failure, and end in a cry, or that outbreak usually called a tantrum. By-the-bye, there is no better way of stopping a tantrum than quietly to divert the child's attention to something else.
Beware of trusting an infant, too confidingly, to an European nurse; and when she carries out the baby, it would be well if an older sister or the mother herself could go along. Instead of carrying it to one of the public squares, or to some other place where there is air and shade, she may take it into dirty alleys, on a visit to some of her own relations, perhaps newly
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arrived in an emigrant ship, with the filth and diseases of a steerage passage still about them. This we know to have been done, and the child has in consequence taken a disgusting disease. Or, believing it a meritorious act, an Irish nurse may secretly carry the infant to a priest, and have it baptized in the Catholic church, herself standing godmother. Of this there have been numerous instances. Young children frequently acquire, from being too much with ignorant and vulgar nurses, bad habits of talking that are exceedingly difficult to eradicate--so lasting are early impressions. We have heard an Irish brogue from infantine lips; and the letter H sadly misused by the American nursing of a low Englishwoman. Above all, do not permit your own children to play with the children of their nurse. No good ever accrues from it.
Children should not be brought to table till they are able to feed themselves, first with a spoon, and next with a fork. And not then, unless they can be depended on to keep quiet, and not talk. The chattering of children all dinner-time is a great annoyance to grown people. The shrill voice of a child can be distinguished annoyingly amid those of a whole company. They should be made to understand that if they talk at table, they are to be immediately taken away to finish their dinner in the nursery. On no consideration should they be admitted to table when there is a dinner-party. The foolish custom of having all the children dressed for the purpose, and brought in with the dessert, is now obsolete. It never was very prevalent, except in England.
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We have seen children so well and so early trained that they could be trusted to come to table every day without the least fear of their misbehaving by talking or otherwise. They sat quietly, asked for nothing, took contentedly whatever was put on their plates, made no attempt at helping themselves, and neither greased nor slopped the table-cloth; and when done, wiped their mouths and hands on their napkins, before they quitted their chairs, which they did at a sign from their mother; going out without noise, and neither leaving the door open nor slamming it hard. It is very easy to accustom children to these observances. Also, they may be taught very early, how to behave to visiters. For instance, not to pass between them and the fire, not to hang on the back of a lady's chair; or to squeeze close to her; or to get on her lap; or to finger her dress; or to search her reticule, or her pocket; or to ask a stranger for pennies or sixpences; or to tell her that she is not pretty; or to enquire "why she wears such an ugly bonnet?"
We have known a fine little boy, not three years old, who, on the entrance of a friend of his mother's, would haul up a chair for her, and invite her to a seat near the fire, place a footstool at her feet, ask her to let him take her bonnet, and invite her to stay to dinner, to stay all day, and to "stay for ever," adding, "I try to be polite."
There are very little girls who, if their mother is from home, can do the honours in her place; seat the visiter on the sofa, and press her to stay till their mother comes in; and if the lady declines doing so,
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they will ask her at least to stay awhile, and rest herself, and have a glass of cool water; and while she stays, they will do their best to entertain her. Such children always grow up with polished manners, if not removed from the influence that made them so in early life.
Children should be early taught not to repeat the conversation of grown persons, and never to tell the servants any thing they have heard in the parlour. When they come home from school, they ought not to be encouraged in telling school-tales. If they dine out, never question them concerning what they had for dinner. Forbid their relating any circumstances concerning the domestic economy of the house at which they have been entertained.
If a child purloins cakes or sweetmeats, punish him by giving him none the next time they are on table.
At four years of age, a beginning should be made in teaching them to read, by hearing them the alphabet every day till they have learned it perfectly; and afterwards the first spelling-tables. With a quarter of an hour's daily instruction, a child of common capacity will, in six months, be able to spell in two or three syllables, and to read short easy stories with the syllables divided. At the end of the year, if her lessons are regular, and not so long as to tire her, she will, in all probability, take pleasure in reading to herself, when her lessons are over. Were they taught out of story-books only, there are few children that at the age of six years would find any difficulty
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in reading fluently. If very intelligent, they often can read well at five. When they can once read, encourage them in the love of books; but do not set them at any other branch of education till they are eight. Then, their hands being strong enough to guide the pen firmly, they may commence writing copies. They should be supplied with slates and pencils at three years old. If they have any dormant talent for drawing, this will call it out. Little girls may begin to sew at four or five, but only as an amusement, not as a task. The best and most satisfactory dolls for young children are those of linen or rag, made very substantially. Much money is wasted in toys that afford them no amusement whatever; and toys that, being merely to look at, they grow tired of immediately, and delight in breaking to pieces.
Never give an infant a book to play with. He will most assuredly tear it; that being the only amusement it can afford him. It is possible at a very early age to teach a tractable female child such a respect for books that she will never attempt to injure them. When they are old enough to take pleasure in looking at the pictures, it is easy to accustom them to be always satisfied with the books being shown to them in the hands of grown persons. Do not buy those books that have absurd and revolting prints of people with gigantic heads and diminutive bodies. Children always dislike them, and so they ought.
Rejoice when a little girl shews a fondness for reading, and by all means encourage it. Keep her well supplied with good and entertaining books, and
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you will have little trouble with her. Do not needlessly interrupt, and call her off--but let her read in peace. It will do her more good than any thing else, and lay the foundation of an intelligent mind. A taste for reading, if not formed in early childhood, may perhaps never come at all. And then what a solace it is in bodily illness! How patiently a reading child, whose mind is stored with "pleasant memories," can bear pain, and submit to the confinement of a sick-bed. We have known more than one instance of the illness of a reading child taking a turn for the better, from the time she was indulged with an amusing and interesting book.
There is no place in which children appear to greater disadvantage or are less ungovernable than at hotels or boarding-houses. We are always sorry when the circumstances of parents oblige them permanently to live thus in public, with their young families, who are consequently brought up in a manner which cannot but have an unfavourable effect in forming the characters of the future men and women. By way of variety, and that they may not always be confined up-stairs, the children are encouraged, or at least permitted by their mothers, to spend much of their time in the drawing-room, regardless of the annoyance which their noise and romping never fails to inflict upon the legitimate occupants of that apartment. The parents, loving their children too much to be incommoded themselves by any thing that their offspring can say or do, seem not aware that they can possibly interrupt or trouble the rest of the company. Or else,
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conscious of their own inability to control them, they are afraid to check the children lest they should turn restive, rebel, or break out into a tantrum. "Any thing for the sake of peace," is a very foolish maxim where juveniles are concerned. By being firm once or twice, and dismissing them from the room when they deserve it, you may have peace ever after. The noisiest and most inconvenient time to have children in a public parlour is in the interval between their tea and their bed-time. Some children have no bed-time. And when they are tired of scampering and shouting, they lie about sleeping on the sofas, and cry if they are finally wakened, to go up with their mother when she retires for the night.
Still worse is the practice that prevails in some hotels and boarding-houses, of the mothers sending the nurse-maids with the babies, to sit in the drawing-room among the ladies; who are thus liable to have a vulgar and obtrusive servant-girl, most probably "from the old country," boldly taking her seat in the midst of them, or conspicuously occupying one of the front-windows; either keeping up a perpetual undercurrent of fulsome, foolish talk to the baby, or listening eagerly to the conversation around her, and, perhaps, repeating it invidiously as soon as she gets an opportunity. If one lady sends her nurse-maid to sit in the drawing-room with the child, all the other mothers of babies immediately follow suit, and the drawing-room becomes a mere nursery.
Every hotel should have a commodious and airy parlour set apart entirely for the children and nurses.
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The proprietors could easily afford to keep one good room for that purpose, if they would expend a little less on the finery of the parlours, &c. We have heard of an embroidered piano-cover, in a great hotel, costing fourteen hundred dollars, and the children pulling it down and dragging it about the floor. With a piano-cover of the usual cost, and other things less ostentatious, a children's parlour might well have been afforded in this very establishment.
At a hotel, if the children come to the ladies' table, they are always in danger of eating food that is highly improper for them, and they very soon learn to help themselves to much more than they want, and to eat voraciously, in their desire to "have something of every thing." There is always a table purposely for those children whose parents pay half-price for them; and at which the housekeeper presides. However good this table may be, and though the pies and puddings may be excellent, the mothers are frequently [d]issatisfied with the absence of ice-cream, blanc-mange, charlotte-russe, &c., though certainly, were they in houses of their own, they would not have such things every day. Therefore, though it is "not in the bond," the mothers carry away from the table saucers of these delicacies, and the children learn to expect a daily supply of them from the ladies' dining-room. This, we must say, is a mean practice. We have, however, known some mothers, who, really being "honourable women," sent every day to a confectioner's to buy ice-cream for their children.
There is danger at a hotel of little boys loitering
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about the bar or office, encouraged by unthinking young men, who give them "tastes of drink," and even amuse themselves by teaching them to smoke segars.
And no children, either boys or girls, can live at a public house without hearing and seeing much that it is best they should not know. The English travellers deprecate the American practice of bringing up young people in hotels or boarding-houses. And they are right.
DECORUM IN CHURCH.
We wish it were less customary to go to church in gay and costly habiliments, converting its sacred precincts into a place for the display of finery, and of rivalry to your equally bedizened neighbours. In many Catholic countries,* a peculiar costume is universally adopted for visiting a place of worship--a very plain gown of entire black, with a long, black cloak, and a black hood finished with a veil that shades the face. This dress is kept for the purpose of wearing at church. We highly approve the custom, and wish that something similar could be introduced into the United States--particularly on the solemn occasions of taking the communion, or being confirmed as a christian member. We have known young ladies to have elegant dresses made on purpose, and to get their hair dressed by a barber when preparing for confirmation.
In a Sacred Melody of Moore's, St. Jerome tells us--
"Yet worldly is that heart at best,
Which beats beneath a broider'd veil;
And she who comes in glittering vest
To mourn her frailty--still is frail."
* The author is a Protestant.
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Endeavour always to be in your pew before the service commences, and do not hurry out of it, hastily, the moment the benediction is finished; or begin visibly to prepare for departure as soon as it commences. Stay quietly till the mass of the crowd has gone.
If you go into a strange church, or rather into a church where you are a stranger, wait in the vestibule till you see the sexton; and then request him to show you to a vacant seat, or rather to one which he believes will be that day unoccupied--for instance, if the family owning it is out of town. This is far better than to wander about the aisles alone, or to intrude yourself into a pew where you may cause inconvenience to its owners. If you see that a pew is full, you know, of course, that you cannot obtain a seat in it without dislodging somebody.
Yet we have seen many a lady, on entering a church in which she was a stranger, walk boldly up the middle aisle to one of the best pews near the pulpit, and pertinaciously stand there, looking steadfastly at its rightful occupants, till one of them quitted his own seat, and gave it up to her, seeking for himself another place wherever he could find one. Those who go to strange churches should be contented with seats near the door; or at the lower end of the side-aisles; or up in the gallery.
If a family invites you to go to church with them, or to come thither, and have a seat in their pew, do not take the liberty of asking a friend of your own to accompany you; and above all, do not bring a child with you.
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Should you (having a pew of your own) ask another lady to go with you, call for her in due time; and she ought to be quite ready. Place her in a corner-seat, (it being the most comfortable,) and see that she is accommodated with a foot-stool; and be assiduous in finding the places for her in the prayer-book, or hymn-book.
In American churches there is much civility to strangers. We have often seen, when a person of respectable appearance was in quest of a seat, the doors of half a dozen pews kindly opened to admit him, and, as soon as he entered, a prayer-book offered to him open at the proper place.
No good can result from taking children to church when they are too young to read, or to understand. They are always eager to go, because they like to go everywhere; but when once seated in the pew, they soon become tired and restless, and frequently there is no way to keep them quiet, but to let them go to sleep in the lap of the mother or elder sister. And then they are apt to cry whenever they waken. If there are two little boys, they are prone to get to playing, or what is far worse, quarrelling. And then if they make a noise, some elder member of the family is subjected to the mortification of conveying them out of church--perhaps by desire of the minister audibly expressed from the pulpit. We know clergymen who do not permit their children to be taken to church till they can read--convinced that if their first recollections of a place of worship are rather painful than pleasant, they are the less likely to grow up with a
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due regard for religion--that is, for religion of the heart--the spirit, and not merely the letter.
We are sorry to see young ladies, on their way to church, laughing and talking loudly, and flirting with the beaux that are gallanting them thither. It is too probable that these beaux will occupy a large share of their thoughts during the hours of worship. Nay, there are some so irreverent, and so regardless of the sanctity of the place, as to indulge in frequent whispers to those near them, or to their friends in the adjoining pews.
A lady of high fashion and fortune, formerly a resident of Philadelphia, was noted for the scandalous lightness and levity of her behaviour in church--laughing and talking, in more than whispers, nearly all the time, to the idle young men whom she always brought with her, and who, to do them justice, sometimes seemed rather ashamed of her conduct. Her pew was directly in front of the pulpit. One Sunday morning, Bishop White gave her a severe and merited rebuke, by Stopping in his sermon, fixing his eyes sadly upon her, and bowing to her, as an intimation that till she had ceased he could not go on. We are sorry to add that the reproof had no other effect than to excite her anger, and caused her immediately to go out of church, highly exasperated. That lady went to live in Europe, and has not yet become a good woman, but greatly the contrary.
"The Lord is in his holy temple; let all the earth keep silence before him," was the solemn and
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impressive inscription over the altar of St. Augustine's church in Philadelphia.
In visiting a church of a different denomination from your own, comply, as far as you can, with all the ceremonies observed by the congregation, particularly if you are in a foreign country. Even if some of these observances are not the least in conformity with your own opinions and feelings, remember that you are there as a guest, and have no right to offend or give displeasure to your hosts by evincing a marked disapprobation of their mode of worship. If you find it very irksome to refrain, (which it should not be,) you need not go a second time. Every religious sect believes its own faith to be the best; but God only knows which really is Christ has said, "By their fruits ye shall know them."
MISCELLANIES.
It may be well to caution our young friends against certain bad practices, easily contracted, but sometimes difficult to relinquish. The following are things not to be done:--Biting your nails. Slipping a ring up and down your finger. Sitting cross-kneed, and jogging your feet. Drumming on the table with your knuckles; or, still worse, tinking on a piano with your fore-finger only. Humming a tune before strangers. Singing as you go up and down stairs. Putting your arm round the neck of another young girl, or promenading the room with arms encircling waists. Holding the hand of a friend all the time she sits beside you; or kissing and fondling her before company. Sitting too closely.
Slapping a gentleman with your handkerchief; or tapping him with your fan. Allowing him to take a ring off your finger, to look at it. Permitting him to unclasp your bracelet, or, still worse, to inspect your brooch. When these ornaments are to be shown to another person, always take them off for the purpose. Pulling at your own ringlets, or your own ear-rings--or fingering your neck ribbon. Suffering a gentl-
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man to touch your curls. Reading with a gentleman off the same book or newspaper. Looking over the shoulder of any person who is reading or writing. Taking up a written paper from the table, and examining it.
To listen at door-cracks, and peep through key-holes, is vulgar and contemptible. So it is to ask children questions concerning their parents, though such things are still done.
If you mean that you were angry, do not say you were "mad."--"It made me so mad"--"I was quite mad at her," are phrases not to be used by people considering themselves genteel. Anger and madness are not the same, or should not be; though it is true that ungoverned rage, is, sometimes, carried so far as to seem like insanity.
Enter into no freaks of fashion that are silly, unmeaning, and unlady-like; even if they have been introduced by a belle, and followed by other belles. Commit no absurdity because a public singer or dancer has done so in her ignorance of good behaviour. During the Jenny Lind fever, there were young ladies who affected to skuttle into a drawing-room all of a sudden, somewhat as the fair Swede came skuttling in upon the concert stage, because in reality she knew not how to make her entrance gracefully. Other demoiselles twined and waved about, with body, head, and eyes, never a moment quiet. This squirming (as it was called) originated in a very bad imitation of Fanny Elssler's dancing motions. At one time there were girls at parties, who stood on
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one foot, and with the other kicked up their dresses behind, while talking to gentlemen. This fashion began with a celebrated beauty who "dared do any thing." Luckily, these "whims and oddities" are always of short duration, and are never adopted by young ladies of good taste and refinement.
Do not nod your head, or beat time with fan or foot while listening to music.
Never at a party consent to accompany another lady in a duet, unless you are accustomed to singing with her. Still worse--do not volunteer to "assist" her in a song that is not a duet. Each voice will interrupt and spoil the other. A lady who sings by ear only, cannot accompany one that sings by note.
One of the most horrible sounds imaginable is that produced by several fine voices all singing different songs. This cats' concert (as school-girls call it) results in a shocking and yet ludicrous discord, equally frightful and laughable. And yet all the performers are singing individually well. Try it.
Raising a window-sash, in cold weather, without first ascertaining if the rest of the company are, like yourself; too warm. Leaving the parlour door open in winter--a perpetual occurrence at hotels and boarding-houses.
Talking so loudly that you can be heard all over the room. Or so low that you cannot be heard at all, even by those who are conversing with you. This last fault is the worst. To talk with one who has a habit of muttering unintelligibly, is like trying to read a letter illegibly written.
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Using too often the word "madam" or "ma'am," which in fact, is now nearly obsolete in familiar conversation. In the old French tragedies the lovers addressed their mistresses as "madam." But then the stage Alexander wore a powdered wig, and a laced coat, knee-breeches, and a long-skirted waistcoat; and Roxana figured in a hoop-petticoat, a brocade gown, a flowered apron, and a towering gauze cap. The frequent use of "sir" is also out of fashion. "Yes, ma'am," "No, ma'am," "Yes, sir"' "No, sir," no longer sounds well, except from children to their elders. If you have not distinctly heard what another lady has just said to you, do not denote it by saying, "Ma'am?" but remark to her, "Excuse me, I did not exactly hear you!"
Never, in a public parlour, place yourself in a position where you can secretly hear conversation that is not intended for you--for instance in a corner behind a pillar. If you hear yourself talked of, it is mean to stay and listen. It is a true adage that "Listeners seldom hear any good of themselves."
However smart and witty you may be considered, do not exercise your wit in rallying and bantering your friends. If you do so, their friendship will soon be worn out, or converted into positive enmity. A jest that carries a sting with it can never give a pleasant sensation to the object. The bite of a musquito is a very little thing, but it leaves pain and inflammation behind it, and the more it is rubbed the longer it rankles in the blood. No one likes to have their foibles or mishaps turned into ridicule--before
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other persons especially. And few can cordially join in a laugh that is raised against themselves.
The slightest jest on the personal defects of those you are conversing with, is an enormity of rudeness and vulgarity. It is, in fact, a sneer at the Creator that made them so. No human creature is accountable for being too small, or too large; for an ill-formed figure, or for ill-shaped limbs; for irregular features, or a bad complexion.
Still worse, to rally any person (especially a woman) on her age, or to ask indirect questions with a view of discovering what her age really is. If we continue to live, we must continue to grow old. We must either advance in age, or we must die. Where then is the shame of surviving our youth? And when youth departs, beauty goes along with it. At least as much beauty as depends on complexion, hair, and teeth. In arriving at middle age, (or a little beyond it,) a lady must compound for the loss of either face or figure. About that period she generally becomes thinner, or fatter. If thin, her features shrink, and her skin shrivels and fades; even though she retains a slender and perhaps a girlish form. If she grows fat, her skin may continue smooth, and her complexion fine, and her neck and arms may be rounder and handsomer than in girlhood; but then symmetry of shape will cease--and she must reconcile herself to the change as best she can. But a woman with a good mind, a good heart, and a good temper, can never at any age grow ugly--for an intelligent and pleasant expression is in itself beauty, and the best sort of beauty.
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Sad indeed is the condition of women in the decline of life when "No lights of age adorn them." When, having neglected in the spring and summer to lay up any stores for the winter that is sure to come, they find themselves left in the season of desolation with nothing to fall back upon--no pleasant recollections of the acquisition of knowledge or the performance of good deeds, and nothing to talk about but the idle gossip of the day--striving painfully to look younger than they really are; still haunting balls and parties, and enduring all the discomforts of crowded watering-places, long after all pleasure in such scenes must have passed away. But then they must linger in public because they are miserable at home, having no resources within themselves, and few enduring friends to enliven them with their society.
The woman that knows how to grow old gracefully, will adapt her dress to her figure and her age, and wear colours that suit her present complexion. If her neck and arms are thin, she will not expose them under anv circumstances. If her hair is grey, she will not decorate it with flowers and flimsy ribbons. If her cheeks are hollow, she will not make her face look still longer and thinner by shadowing it with long ringlets; and setting her head-dress far back--but she will give it as much softness as she can, by a light cap-border tied under her chin. She will not squeeze herself out of all human shape by affecting a long tight corsage; and she will wear no dresses glaring with huge flowers, or loaded with gaudy trimmings. She will allude to her age as a thing of course; she
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will speak without hesitation of former times, though the recollection proves her to be really old. She will be kind and indulgent to the young; and the young will respect and love her, and gladly assemble near her chair, and be amused and unconsciously instructed. As long as she lives and retains her faculties she will endeavour to improve, and to become still a wiser and a better woman; never excusing herself by indolently and obstinately averring that "she is too old to learn" or that she cannot give up her old-fashioned habits. If she finds that those habits are unwarrantable, or that they are annoying to her friends, she ought to relinquish them. No one with a mind unimpaired, and a heart still fresh, is too old to learn.
This book is addressed chiefly to the young; but we shall be much gratified by finding that even old ladies have found in it some advantageous suggestions on points that had hitherto escaped their notice.