Chapter XIII: Part III: Association (4)

A highly developed material luxury, such as that which fills our modern universal exhibitions and is the great pride of our age, has in itself so much the appearance of absolute civilization that any proposal to do without it may seem like a return to savagery; and Bohemianism is exposed to the accusation of discouraging arts and manufactures. There is a physical side to Bohemianism to be considered later; and there may, indeed, be some connection between Bohemianism and the life of a red Indian who roams in his woods and contents himself with a low standard of physical well-being. The fair statement of the case between Bohemianism and the civilization of arts and manufactures is as follows: the intelligent Bohemian does not despise them; on the contrary, when he can afford it, he encourages them and often surrounds himself with beautiful things; but he will not barter his mental liberty in exchange for them, as the Philistine does so readily. If the Bohemian simply prefers sordid idleness to the comfort which is the reward of industry, he has no part in the higher Bohemianism, but combines the Philistine fault of intellectual apathy with the Bohemian fault of standing aloof from industrial civilization. If a man abstains from furthering the industrial civilization of his country he is only excusable if he pursues some object of at least equal importance. Intellectual civilization really is such an object, and the noble Bohemianism is excusable for serving it rather than that other civilization of arts and manufactures which has such numerous servants of its own. If the Bohemian does not redeem his negligence of material things by superior intellectual brightness, he is half a Philistine, he is destitute of what is best in Bohemianism (I had nearly written of all that is worth having in it), and his contempt for material perfection has no longer any charm, because it is not the sacrifice of a lower merit to a higher, but the blank absence of the lower merit not compensated or condoned by the presence of anything nobler or better.

Bohemianism and Philistinism are alike in combining self-indulgence with asceticism, but they are ascetic or self-indulgent in opposite directions. Bohemianism includes a certain self-indulgence, on the intellectual side, in the pleasures of thought and observation and in the exercise of the imaginative faculties, combining this with a certain degree of asceticism on the physical side, not a severe religious asceticism, but a disposition, like that of a thorough soldier or traveller, to do without luxury and comfort, and take the absence of them gayly when they are not to be had. The self-indulgence of Philistinism is in bodily comfort, of which it has never enough; its asceticism consists in denying itself leisure to read and think, and opportunities for observation.

The best way of describing the two principles will be to give an account of two human lives that exemplified them. These shall not be described from imagination, but from accurate memory; and I will not have recourse to the easy artifice of selecting an unfavorable example of the class with which I happen to have a minor degree of personal sympathy. My Philistine shall be one whom I sincerely loved and heartily respected. He was an admirable example of everything that is best and most worthy in the Philistine civilization; and I believe that nobody who ever came into contact with him, or had dealings with him, received any other impression than this, that he had a natural right to the perfect respect which surrounded him. The younger son of a poor gentleman, he began life with narrow means, and followed a profession in a small provincial town. By close attention and industry he saved a considerable sum of money, which he lost entirely through the dishonesty of a trusted but untrustworthy acquaintance. He had other mishaps, which but little disturbed his serenity, and he patiently amassed enough to make himself independent. In every relation of life he was not only above reproach, he was much more than that: he was a model of what men ought to be, yet seldom are, in their conduct towards others. He was kind to every one, generous to those who needed his generosity, and, though strict with himself, tolerant towards aberrations that must have seemed to him strangely unreasonable. He had great natural dignity, and was a gentleman in all his ways, with an old-fashioned grace and courtesy. He had no vanity; there may have been some pride as an ingredient in his character, but if so it was of a kind that could hurt nobody, for he was as simple and straightforward in his intercourse with the poor as he was at ease with the rich.

After this description (which is so far from being overcharged that I have omitted, for the sake of brevity, many admirable characteristics), the reader may ask in what could possibly consist the Philistinism of a nature that had attained such excellence. The answer is that it consisted in the perfect willingness with which he remained outside of every intellectual movement, and in the restriction of his mental activity to riches and religion. He used to say that "a man must be contentedly ignorant of many things," and he lived in this contented ignorance. He knew nothing of the subjects that awaken the passionate interest of intellectual men. He knew no language but his own, bought no books, knew nothing about the fine arts, never travelled, and remained satisfied with the life of his little provincial town. Totally ignorant of all foreign literatures, ancient or modern, he was at the same time so slightly acquainted with that of his own country that he had not read, and scarcely even knew by name, the most famous authors of his own generation. His little bookcase was filled almost exclusively with evangelical sermons and commentaries. This is Philistinism on the intellectual side, the mental inertness that remains "contentedly ignorant" of almost everything that a superior intellect cares for. But, besides this, there is also a Philistinism on the physical side, a physical inertness; and in this, too, my friend was a real Philistine. In spite of great natural strength, he remained inexpert in all manly exercises, and so had not enjoyed life on that side as he might have done, and as the Bohemian generally contrives to do. He belonged to that class of men who, as soon as they reach middle age, are scarcely more active than the chairs they sit upon, the men who would fall from a horse if it were lively, upset a boat if it were light, and be drowned if they fell into the water. Such men can walk a little on a road, or they can sit in a carriage and be dragged about by horses. By this physical inertia my friend was deprived of one set of impressions, as he was deprived by his intellectual inertia of another. He could not enjoy that close intimacy with nature which a Bohemian generally finds to be an important part of existence.

I wonder if it ever occurred to him to reflect, in the tedious hours of too tranquil age, how much of what is best in the world had been simply _missed_ by him; how he had missed all the variety and interest of travel, the charm of intellectual society, the influences of genius, and even the physical excitements of healthy out-door amusements. When I think what a magnificent world it is that we inhabit, how much natural beauty there is in it, how much admirable human work in literature and the fine arts, how many living men and women there are in each generation whose acquaintance a wise man would travel far to seek, and value infinitely when he had found it, I cannot avoid the conclusion that my friend might have lived as he did in a planet far less richly endowed than ours, and that after a long life he went out of the world without having really known it.

I have said that the intelligent Bohemian is generally a man of small or moderate means, whose object is to enjoy the _best_ advantages (not the most visible) of riches. In his view these advantages are leisure, travel, reading, and conversation. His estimate is different from that of the Philistine, who sets his heart on the lower advantages of riches, sacrificing leisure, travel, reading, and conversation, in order to have a larger house and more servants. But how, without riches, is the Bohemian to secure the advantages that he desires, for they also belong to riches? There lies the difficulty, and the Bohemian's way of overcoming it constitutes the romance of his existence. In absolute destitution the intelligent Bohemian life is not possible. A little money is necessary for it, and the art and craft of Bohemianism is to get for that small amount of money such an amount of leisure, reading, travel, and good conversation as may suffice to make life interesting. The way in which an old-fashioned Bohemian usually set about it was this: he treated material comfort and outward appearances as matters of no consequence, accepting them when they came in his way, but enduring the privation of them gayly. He learned the art of living on a little.

"Je suis pauvre, très pauvre, et vis pourtant fort bien
C'est parce que je vis comme les gens de rien."[26]

He spent the little that he had, first for what was really necessary, and next for what really gave him pleasure, but he spent hardly anything in deference to the usages of society. In this way he got what he wanted. His books were second-hand and ill bound, but he _had_ books and read them; his clothes were shabby, yet still they kept him warm; he travelled in all sorts of cheap ways and frequently on foot; he lived a good deal in some unfashionable quarters in a capital city, and saw much of art, nature, and humanity.

To exemplify the true theory of Bohemianism let me describe from memory two rooms, one of them inhabited by an English lady, not at all Bohemian, the other by a German of the coarser sex who was essentially and thoroughly Bohemian. The lady's room was not a drawing-room, being a reasonable sort of sitting-room without any exasperating inutilities, but it was extremely, excessively comfortable. Half hidden amongst its material comforts might be found a little rosewood bookcase containing a number of pretty volumes in purple morocco that were seldom, if ever, opened. My German Bohemian was a steady reader in six languages; and if he had seen such a room as that he would probably have criticised it as follows. He would have said, "It is rich in superfluities, but has not what is necessary. The carpet is superfluous; plain boards are quite comfortable enough. One or two cheap chairs and tables might replace this costly furniture. That pretty rosewood bookcase holds the smallest number of books at the greatest cost, and is therefore contrary to true economy; give me, rather, a sufficiency of long deal shelves all innocent of paint. What is the use of fine bindings and gilt edges? This little library is miserably poor. It is all in one language, and does not represent even English literature adequately; there are a few novels, books of poems, and travels, but I find neither science nor philosophy. Such a room as that, with all its comfort, would seem to me like a prison. My mind needs wider pastures." I remember his own room, a place to make a rich Englishman shudder. One climbed up to it by a stone corkscrew-stair, half-ruinous, in an old mediæval house. It was a large room, with a bed in one corner, and it was wholly destitute of anything resembling a carpet or a curtain. The remaining furniture consisted of two or three rush-bottomed chairs, one large cheap lounging-chair, and two large plain tables. There were plenty of shelves (common deal, unpainted), and on them an immense litter of books in different languages, most of them in paper covers, and bought second-hand, but in readable editions. In the way of material luxury there was a pot of tobacco; and if a friend dropped in for an evening a jug of ale would make its appearance. My Bohemian was shabby in his dress, and unfashionable; but he had seen more, read more, and passed more hours in intelligent conversation than many who considered themselves his superiors. The entire material side of life had been systematically neglected, in his case, in order that the intellectual side might flourish. It is hardly necessary to observe that any attempt at luxury or visible comfort, any conformity to fashion, would have been incompatible, on small means, with the intellectual existence that this German scholar enjoyed.

Long ago I knew an English Bohemian who had a small income that came to him very irregularly. He had begun life in a profession, but had quitted it that he might travel and see the world, which he did in the oddest, most original fashion, often enduring privation, but never ceasing to enjoy life deeply in his own way, and to accumulate a mass of observations which would have been quite invaluable to an author. In him the two activities, physical and mental, were alike so energetic that they might have led to great results had they been consistently directed to some private or public end; but unfortunately he remained satisfied with the existence of an observant wanderer who has no purpose beyond the healthy exercise of his faculties. In usefulness to others he was not to be compared with my good and admirable Philistine, but in the art of getting for himself what is best in the world he was by far the more accomplished of the two. He fully enjoyed both the physical and the intellectual life; he could live almost like a red Indian, and yet at the same time carry in his mind the most recent results of European thought and science. His distinguishing characteristic was a heroic contempt for comfort, in which he rather resembled a soldier in war-time than any self-indulgent civilian. He would sleep anywhere,--in his boat under a sail, in a hayloft, under a hedge if belated, and he would go for days together without any regular meal. He dressed roughly, and his clothes became old before he renewed them. He kept no servant, and lived in cheap lodgings in towns, or hired one or two empty rooms and adorned them with a little portable furniture. In the country he contrived to make very economical arrangements in farmhouses, by which he was fed and lodged quite as well as he ever cared to be. It would be difficult to excel him in simple manliness, in the quiet courage that accepts a disagreeable situation or faces a dangerous one; and he had the manliness of the mind as well as that of the body; he estimated the world for what it is worth, and cared nothing for its transient fashions either in appearances or opinion. I am sorry that he was a useless member of society,--if, indeed, such an eccentric is to be called a member of society at all,--but if uselessness is blamable he shares the blame, or ought in justice to share it, with a multitude of most respectable gentlemen and ladies who receive nothing but approbation from the world.

Except this fault of uselessness there was nothing to blame in this man's manner of life, but his want of purpose and discipline made his fine qualities seem almost without value. And now comes the question whether the fine qualities of the useless Bohemian may not be of some value in a life of a higher kind. I think it is evident that they may, for if the Bohemian can cheerfully sacrifice luxury for some mental gain he has made a great step in the direction of the higher life, and only requires a purpose and a discipline to attain it. Common men are completely enslaved by their love of comfort, and whoever has emancipated himself from this thraldom has gained the first and most necessary victory. The use that he will make of it depends upon himself. If he has high purposes, his Bohemianism will be ennobled by them, and will become a most precious element in his character; and if his purposes are not of the highest, the Bohemian element may still be very valuable if accompanied by self-discipline. Napoleon cannot be said to have had high purposes, but his Bohemianism was admirable. A man who, having attained success, with boundless riches at his disposal, could quit the luxury of his palaces and sleep anywhere, in any poor farmhouse, or under the stars by the fire of a bivouac, and be satisfied with poor meals at the most irregular hours, showed that, however he may have estimated luxury, he was at least entirely independent of it. The model monarch in this respect was Charles XII. of Sweden, who studied his own personal comfort as little as if he had been a private soldier. Some royal commanders have carried luxury into war itself, but not to their advantage. When Napoleon III. went in his carriage to meet his fate at Sedan the roads were so encumbered by wagons belonging to the Imperial household as to impede the movements of the troops.

There is often an element of Bohemianism where we should least expect to find it. There is something of it in our English aristocracy, though it is not _called_ Bohemianism here because it is not accompanied by poverty; but the spirit that sacrifices luxury to rough travelling is, so far, the true Bohemian spirit. In the aristocracy, however, such sacrifices are only temporary; and a rough life accepted for a few weeks or months gives the charm of a restored freshness to luxury on returning to it. The class in which the higher Bohemianism has most steadily flourished is the artistic and literary class, and here it is visible and recognizable because there is often poverty enough to compel the choice between the objects of the intelligent Bohemian and those of ordinary men. The early life of Goldsmith, for example, was that of a genuine Bohemian. He had scarcely any money, and yet he contrived to get for himself what the intelligent Bohemian always desires, namely, leisure to read and think, travel, and interesting conversation. When penniless and unknown he lounged about the world thinking and observing; he travelled in Holland, France, Switzerland, and Italy, not as people do in railway carriages, but in leisurely intercourse with the inhabitants. Notwithstanding his poverty he was received by the learned in different European cities, and, notably, heard Voltaire and Diderot talk till three o'clock in the morning. So long as he remained faithful to the true principles of Bohemianism he was happy in his own strange and eccentric way, and all the anxieties, all the slavery of his later years were due to his apostasy from those principles. He no longer estimated leisure at its true value when he allowed himself to be placed in such a situation that he was compelled to toil like a slave in order to clear off work that had been already paid for, such advances having been rendered necessary by expenditure on Philistine luxuries. He no longer enjoyed humble travel but on his later tour in France with Mrs. Horneck and her two beautiful daughters, instead of enjoying the country in his own old simple innocent way, he allowed his mind to be poisoned with Philistine ideas, and constantly complained of the want of physical comfort, though he lived far more expensively than in his youth. The new apartments, taken on the success of the "Good-natured Man," consisted, says Irving, "of three rooms, which he furnished with mahogany sofas, card-tables, and bookcases; with curtains, mirrors, and Wilton carpets." At the same time he went even beyond the precept of Polonius, for his garments were costlier than his purse could buy, and his entertainments were so extravagant as to give pain to his acquaintances. All this is a desertion of real Bohemian principles. Goldsmith ought to have protected his own leisure, which, from the Bohemian point of view, was incomparably more precious to himself than Wilton carpets and coats "of Tyrian bloom."

Corot, the French landscape-painter, was a model of consistent Bohemianism of the best kind. When his father said, "You shall have £80 a year, your plate at my table, and be a painter; or you shall have £4,000 to start with if you will be a shop-keeper," his choice was made at once. He remained always faithful to true Bohemian principles, fully understanding the value of leisure, and protecting his artistic independence by the extreme simplicity of his living. He never gave way to the modern rage for luxuries, but in his latter years, when enriched by tardy professional success and hereditary fortune, he employed his money in acts of fraternal generosity to enable others to lead the intelligent Bohemian life.

Wordsworth had in him a very strong element of Bohemianism. His long pedestrian rambles, his interest in humble life and familiar intercourse with the poor, his passion for wild nature, and preference of natural beauty to fine society, his simple and economical habits, are enough to reveal the tendency. His "plain living and high thinking" is a thoroughly Bohemian idea, in striking opposition to the Philistine passion for rich living and low thinking. There is a story that he was seen at a breakfast-table to cut open a new volume with a greasy butter-knife. To every lover of books this must seem horribly barbarous, yet at the same time it was Bohemian, in that Wordsworth valued the thought only and cared nothing for the material condition of the volume. I have observed a like indifference to the material condition of books in other Bohemians, who took the most lively interest in their contents. I have also seen "bibliophiles" who had beautiful libraries in excellent preservation, and who loved to fondle fine copies of books that they never read. That is Philistine, it is the preference of material perfection to intellectual values.

The reader is, I hope, fully persuaded by this time that the higher Bohemianism is compatible with every quality that deserves respect, and that it is not of necessity connected with any fault or failing. I may therefore mention as an example of it one of the purest and best characters whom it was ever my happiness to know. There was a strong element of noble Bohemianism in Samuel Palmer, the landscape-painter. "From time to time," according to his son, "he forsook his easel, and travelled far away from London smoke to cull the beauties of some favorite country side. His painting apparatus was complete, but singularly simple, his dress and other bodily requirements simpler still; so he could walk from village to hamlet easily carrying all he wanted, and utterly indifferent to luxury. With a good constitution it mattered little to him how humble were his quarters or how remote from so-called civilization. 'In exploring wild country,' he writes, 'I have been for a fortnight together, uncertain each day whether I should get a bed under cover at night; and about midsummer I have repeatedly been walking all night to watch the mystic phenomena of the silent hours.' He enjoyed to the full this rough but not uncomfortable mode of travelling, and was better pleased to take his place, after a hard day's work, in some old chimney corner--joining on equal terms the village gossip--than to mope in the dull grandeur of a private room."

Here are two of my Bohemian elements,--the love of travel and the love of conversation. As for the other element,--the love of leisure to think and read,--it is not visible in this extract (though the kind of travel described is leisurely), but it was always present in the man. During the quiet, solitary progress by day and night there were ample opportunities for thinking, and as for reading we know that Palmer never stirred without a favorite author in his pocket, most frequently Milton or Virgil. To complete the Bohemian we only require one other characteristic,--contentment with a simple material existence; and we are told that "the painting apparatus was singularly simple, the dress and other bodily requirements simpler still." So here we have the intelligent Bohemian in his perfection.

All this is the exact opposite of Philistine "common sense." A Philistine would not have exposed himself, voluntarily, to the certainty of poor accommodation. A Philistine would not have remained out all night "to watch the mystic phenomena of the silent hours." In the absence of a railway he would have hired a carriage, and got through the wild country rapidly to arrive at a good dinner. Lastly, a Philistine would not have carried either Milton or Virgil in his pocket; he would have had a newspaper.

Some practical experience of the higher Bohemianism is a valuable part of education. It enables us to estimate things at their true worth, and to extract happiness from situations in which the Philistine is both dull and miserable. A true Bohemian, of the best kind, knows the value of mere shelter, of food enough to satisfy hunger, of plain clothes that will keep him sufficiently warm; and in the things of the mind he values the liberty to use his own faculties as a kind of happiness in itself. His philosophy leads him to take an interest in talking with human beings of all sorts and conditions, and in different countries. He does not despise the poor, for, whether poor or rich in his own person, he understands simplicity of life, and if the poor man lives in a small cottage, he, too, has probably been lodged less spaciously still in some small hut or tent. He has lived often, in rough travel, as the poor live every day. I maintain that such tastes and experiences are valuable both in prosperity and in adversity. If we are prosperous they enhance our appreciation of the things around us, and yet at the same time make us really know that they are not indispensable, as so many believe them to be; if we fall into adversity they prepare us to accept lightly and cheerfully what would be depressing privations to others. I know a painter who in consequence of some change in the public taste fell into adversity at a time when he had every reason to hope for increased success. Very fortunately for him, he had been a Bohemian in early life,--a respectable Bohemian, be it understood,--and a great traveller, so that he could easily dispense with luxuries. "To be still permitted to follow art is enough," he said; so he reduced his expenses to the very lowest scale consistent with that pursuit, and lived as he had done before in the old Bohemian times. He made his old clothes last on, he slung a hammock in a very simple painting-room, and cooked his own dinner on the stove. With the canvas on his easel and a few books on a shelf he found that if existence was no longer luxurious it had not yet ceased to be interesting.

ESSAY XXII.

OF COURTESY IN EPISTOLARY COMMUNICATION.

The universal principle of courtesy is that the courteous person manifests a disposition to sacrifice something in favor of the person whom he desires to honor; the opposite principle shows itself in a disposition to regard our own convenience as paramount over every other consideration.

Courtesy lives by a multitude of little sacrifices, not by sacrifices of sufficient importance to impose any burdensome sense of obligation. These little sacrifices may be both of time and money, but more of time, and the money sacrifice should be just perceptible, never ostentatious.

The tendency of a hurried age, in which men undertake more work or more pleasure (hardest work of all!) than they are able properly to accomplish, is to abridge all forms of courtesy because they take time, and to replace them by forms, if any forms survive, which cost as little time as possible. This wounds and injures courtesy itself in its most vital part, for the essence of it is the willingness to incur that very sacrifice which modern hurry avoids.

The first courtesy in epistolary communication is the mere writing of the letter. Except in cases where the letter itself is an offence or an intrusion, the mere making of it is an act of courtesy towards the receiver. The writer sacrifices his time and a trifle of money in order that the receiver may have some kind of news.

It has ever been the custom to commence a letter with some expression of respect, affection, or good will. This is graceful in itself, and reasonable, being nothing more than the salutation with which a man enters the house of his friend, or his more ceremonious act of deference in entering that of a stranger or a superior. In times and seasons where courtesy has not given way to hurry, or a selfish dread of unnecessary exertion, the opening form is maintained with a certain amplitude, and the substance of the letter is not reached in the first lines, which gently induce the reader to proceed. Afterwards these forms are felt to involve an inconvenient sacrifice of time, and are ruthlessly docked.

In justice to modern poverty in forms it is fair to take into consideration the simple truth, so easily overlooked, that we have to write thirty letters where our ancestors wrote one; but the principle of sacrifice in courtesy always remains essentially the same; and if of our more precious and more occupied time we consecrate a smaller portion to forms, it is still essential that there should be no appearance of a desire to escape from the kind of obligation which we acknowledge.

The most essentially modern element of courtesy in letter-writing is the promptitude of our replies. This promptitude was not only unknown to our remote ancestors, but even to our immediate predecessors. They would postpone answering a letter for days or weeks, in the pure spirit of procrastination, when they already possessed all the materials necessary for the answer. Such a habit would try our patience very severely, but our fathers seem to have considered it a part of their dignity to move slowly in correspondence. This temper even yet survives in official correspondence between sovereigns, who still notify to each other their domestic events long after the publication of them in the newspapers.

A prompt answer equally serves the purpose of the sender and the receiver. It is a great economy of time to answer promptly, because the receiver of the letter is so much gratified by the promptitude itself that he readily pardons brevity in consideration of it. An extremely short but prompt letter, that would look curt without its promptitude, is more polite than a much longer one written a few days later.

Prompt correspondents save all the time that others waste in excuses. I remember an author and editor whose system imposed upon him the tax of perpetual apologizing. He always postponed writing until the delay had put his correspondent out of temper, so that when at last he _did_ write, which somehow happened ultimately, the first page was entirely occupied with apologies for his delay, as he felt that the necessity had arisen for soothing the ruffled feelings of his friend. It never occurred to him that the same amount of pen work which these apologies cost him would, if given earlier, have sufficed for a complete answer. A letter-writer of this sort must naturally be a bad man of business, and this gentleman was so, though he had excellent qualities of another order.

I remember receiving a most extraordinary answer from a correspondent of this stamp. I wrote to him about a matter which was causing me some anxiety, and did not receive an answer for several weeks. At last the reply came, with the strange excuse that as he knew I had guests in my house he had delayed writing from a belief that I should not be able to attend to anything until after their departure. If such were always the effect of entertaining friends, what incalculable perturbation would be caused by hospitality in all private and public affairs!

The reader may, perhaps, have met with a collection of letters called the "Plumpton Correspondence," which was published by the Camden Society in 1839. I have always been interested in this for family reasons, and also because the manuscript volume was found in the neighborhood where I lived in youth;[27] but it does not require any blood connection with the now extinct house of Plumpton of Plumpton to take an interest in a collection of letters which gives so clear an insight into the epistolary customs of England in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The first peculiarity that strikes the modern reader is the extreme care of almost all the writers, even when near relations, to avoid a curt and dry style, destitute of the ambages which were in those days esteemed an essential part of politeness. The only exception is a plain, straightforward gentleman, William Gascoyne, who heads his letters, "To my Uncle Plumpton be these delivered," or "To my Uncle Plumpton this letter be delivered in hast." He begins, "Uncle Plumpton, I recommend me unto you," and finishes, "Your nephew," simply, or still more laconically, "Your." Such plainness is strikingly rare. The rule was, to be deliberately perfect in all epistolary observances, however near the relationship. Not that the forms used were hard forms, entirely fixed by usage and devoid of personal feeling and individuality. They appear to have been more flexible and living than our own, as they were more frequently varied according to the taste and sentiment of the writers. Sometimes, of course, they were perfunctory, but often they have an original and very graceful turn. One letter, which I will quote at length, contains curious evidence of the courtesy and discourtesy of those days. The forms used in the letter itself are perfect, but the writer complains that other letters have not been answered.

In the reign of Henry VII. Sir Robert Plumpton had a daughter, Dorothy, who was in the household of Lady Darcy (probably as a sort of maid of honor to her ladyship), but was not quite pleased with her position, and wanted to go home to Plumpton. She had written to her father several times, but had received no answer, so she now writes again to him in these terms. The date of the letter is not fully given, as the year is wanting; but her parents were married in 1477, and her father died in 1523, at the age of seventy, after a life of strange vicissitudes. The reader will observe two leading characteristics in this letter,--that it is as courteous as if the writer were not related to the receiver, and as affectionate as if no forms had been observed. As was the custom in those days, the young lady gives her parents their titles of worldly honor, but she always adds to them the most affectionate filial expressions:

_To the right worshipfull and my most entyerly beloved, good, kind
father, Sir Robart Plompton, knyght, lying at Plompton in Yorkshire,
be thes delivered in hast._

Ryght worshipfull father, in the most humble manner that I can I
recommend me to you, and to my lady my mother, and to all my brethren
and sistren, whom I besech almyghtie God to mayntayne and preserve in
prosperus health and encrese of worship, entyerly requiering you of
your daly blessing; letting you wyt that I send to you mesuage, be
Wryghame of Knarsbrugh, of my mynd, and how that he should desire you
in my name to send for me to come home to you, and as yet I had no
answere agane, the which desire my lady hath gotten knowledg.
Wherefore, she is to me more better lady than ever she was before,
insomuch that she hath promysed me hir good ladyship as long as ever
she shall lyve; and if she or ye can fynd athing meyter for me in this
parties or any other, she will helpe to promoote me to the uttermost
of her puyssaunce. Wherefore, I humbly besech you to be so good and
kind father unto me as to let me know your pleasure, how that ye will
have me ordred, as shortly as it shall like you. And wryt to my lady,
thanking hir good ladyship of hir so loving and tender kyndnesse
shewed unto me, beseching hir ladyship of good contynewance thereof.
And therefore I besech you to send a servant of yours to my lady and
to me, and show now by your fatherly kyndnesse that I am your child;
for I have sent you dyverse messuages and wryttings, and I had never
answere againe. Wherefore yt is thought in this parties, by those
persones that list better to say ill than good, that ye have litle
favor unto me; the which error ye may now quench yf yt will like you
to be so good and kynd father unto me. Also I besech you to send me a
fine hatt and some good cloth to make me some kevercheffes. And thus I
besech _Jesu_ to have you in his blessed keeping to his pleasure, and
your harts desire and comforth. Wryten at the Hirste, the xviii day of
Maye.

By your loving daughter,
DORYTHE PLOMPTON.

It may be worth while, for the sake of contrast, and that we may the better perceive the lost fragrance of the antique courtesy, to put the substance of this letter into the style of the present day. A modern young lady would probably write as follows:--

HIRST, _May 18_.

DEAR PAPA,--Lady Darcy has found out that I want to leave her, but she
has kindly promised to do what she can to find something else for me.
I wish you would say what you think, and it would be as well, perhaps,
if you would be so good as to drop a line to her ladyship to thank
her. I have written to you several times, but got no answer, so people
here say that you don't care very much for me. Would you please send
me a handsome bonnet and some handkerchiefs? Best love to mamma and
all at home.

Your affectionate daughter,
DOROTHY PLUMPTON.

This, I think, is not an unfair specimen of a modern letter.[28] The expressions of worship, of humble respect, have disappeared, and so far it may be thought that there is improvement, yet that respect was not incompatible with tender feeling; on the contrary, it was closely associated with it, and expressions of sentiment have lost strength and vitality along with expressions of respect. Tenderness may be sometimes shown in modern letters, but it is rare; and when it occurs it is generally accompanied by a degree of familiarity which our ancestors would have considered in bad taste. Dorothy Plumpton's own letter is far richer in the expression of tender feeling than any modern letter of the courteous and ceremonious kind, or than any of those pale and commonplace communications from which deep respect and strong affection are almost equally excluded. Please observe, moreover, that the young lady had reason to be dissatisfied with her father for his neglect, which does not in the least diminish the filial courtesy of her style, but she chides him in the sweetest fashion,--"_Show now by your fatherly kindness that I am your child_." Could anything be prettier than that, though the reproach contained in it is really one of some severity?

Dorothy's father, Sir Robert, puts the following superscription on a letter to his wife, "To my entyrely and right hartily beloved wife, Dame Agnes Plumpton, be this Letter delivered." He begins his letter thus, "My deare hart, in my most hartily wyse, I recommend mee unto you;" and he ends tenderly, "By your owne lover, Robert Plumpton, Kt." She, on the contrary, though a faithful and brave wife, doing her best for her husband in a time of great trial, and enjoying his full confidence, begins her letters, "Right worshipful Sir," and ends simply, "By your wife, Dame Agnes Plumpton." She is so much absorbed by business that her expressions of feeling are rare and brief. "Sir, I am in good health, and all your children prays for your daly blessing. And all your servants is in good health and prays diligently for your good speed in your matters."

The generally courteous tone of the letters of those days may be judged of by the following example. The reader will observe how small a space is occupied with the substance of the letter in comparison with the expressions of pure courtesy, and how simply and handsomely regret for the trespass is expressed:--

_To his worshipful Cosin, Sir Robart Plompton, Kt._

Right reverend and worshipful Cosin, I commend me unto you as hertyly
as I can, evermore desiring to heare of your welfare, the which I
besech _Jesu_ to continew to his pleasure, and your herts desire.
Cosin, please you witt that I am enformed, that a poor man somtyme
belonging to mee, called Umfrey Bell, hath trespased to a servant of
youres, which I am sory for. Wherefore, Cosin, I desire and hartily
pray you to take upp the matter into your own hands for my sake, and
rewle him as it please you; and therein you wil do, as I may do that
may be plesur to you, and my contry, the which I shalbe redy too, by
the grace of God, who preserve you.

By your own kynsman,
ROBART WARCOPP, of Warcoppe.

The reader has no doubt by this time enough of these old letters, which are not likely to possess much charm for him unless, like the present writer, he is rather of an antiquarian turn.[29]

The quotations are enough to show some of the forms used in correspondence by our forefathers, forms that were right in their own day, when the state of society was more ceremonious and deferential, but no one would propose to revive them. We may, however, still value and cultivate the beautifully courteous spirit that our ancestors possessed and express it in our own modern ways.

I have already observed that the essentially modern form of courtesy is the rapidity of our replies. This, at least, is a virtue that we can resolutely cultivate and maintain. In some countries it is pushed so far that telegrams are very frequently sent when there is no need to employ the telegraph. The Arabs of Algeria are extremely fond of telegraphing for its own sake: the notion of its rapidity pleases and amuses them; they like to wield a power so wonderful. It is said that the Americans constantly employ the telegraph on very trivial occasions, and the habit is increasing in England and France. The secret desire of the present age is to find a plausible excuse for excessive brevity in correspondence, and this is supplied by the comparative costliness of telegraphing. It is a comfort that it allows you to send a single word. I have heard of a letter from a son to a father consisting of the Latin word _Ibo_, and of a still briefer one from the father to the son confined entirely to the imperative _I_. These miracles of brevity are only possible in letters between the most intimate friends or relations, but in telegraphy they are common.

It is very difficult for courtesy to survive this modern passion for brevity, and we see it more and more openly cast aside. All the long phrases of politeness have been abandoned in English correspondence for a generation, except in formal letters to official or very dignified personages; and the little that remains is reduced to a mere shred of courteous or affectionate expression. We have not, it is true, the detestable habit of abridging words, as our ancestors often did, but we cut our phrases short, and sometimes even words of courtesy are abridged in an unbecoming manner. Men will write Dr. Sir for Dear Sir. If I am dear enough to these correspondents for their sentiments of affection to be worth uttering at all, why should they be so chary of expressing them that they omit two letters from the very word which is intended to affect my feelings?

"If I be dear, if I be dear,"

as the poet says, why should my correspondent begrudge me the four letters of so brief an adjective?

The long French and Italian forms of ceremony at the close of letters are felt to be burdensome in the present day, and are gradually giving place to briefer ones; but it is the very length of them, and the time and trouble they cost to write, that make them so courteous, and no brief form can ever be an effective substitute in that respect.

I was once placed in the rather embarrassing position of having suddenly to send telegrams in my own name, containing a request, to two high foreign authorities in a corps where punctilious ceremony is very strictly observed. My solution of the difficulty was to write two full ceremonious letters, with all the formal expressions unabridged, and then have these letters telegraphed _in extenso_. This was the only possible solution, as an ordinary telegram would have been entirely out of the question. It being rather expensive to telegraph a very formal letter, the cost added to the appearance of deference, so I had the curious but very real advantage on my side that I made a telegram seem even more deferential than a letter.

The convenience of the letter-writer is consulted in inverse ratio to the appearances of courtesy. In the matter of sealing, for example, that seems so slight and indifferent a concern, a question of ceremony and courtesy is involved. The old-fashioned custom of a large seal with the sender's arms or cipher added to the importance of the contents both by strictly guarding the privacy of the communication and by the dignified assertion of the writer's rank. Besides this, the time that it costs to take a proper impression of a seal shows the absence of hurry and the disposition to sacrifice which are a part of all noble courtesy; whilst the act of rapidly licking the gum on the inside of an envelope and then giving it a thump with your fist to make it stick is neither dignified nor elegant. There were certain beautiful associations with the act of sealing. There was the taper that had to be lighted, and that had its own little candlestick of chased or gilded silver, or delicately painted porcelain; there was the polished and graven stone of the seal, itself more or less precious, and enhanced in value by an art of high antiquity and noble associations, and this graven signet-stone was set in massive gold. The act of sealing was deliberate, to secure a fair impression, and as the wax caught flame and melted it disengaged a delicate perfume. These little things may be laughed at by a generation of practical men of business who know the value of every second, but they had their importance, and have it still, amongst those who possess any delicacy of perception.[30] The reader will remember the sealing of Nelson's letter to the Crown Prince of Denmark during the battle of Copenhagen. "A wafer was given him," says Southey, "but he ordered a candle to be brought from the cockpit, and sealed the letter with wax, _affixing a larger seal than he ordinarily used_. 'This,' said he, 'is no time to appear hurried and informal.'" The story is usually told as a striking example of Nelson's coolness in a time of intense excitement, but it might be told with equal effect as a proof of his knowledge of mankind and of the trifles which have a powerful effect on human intercourse. The preference of wax to a wafer, and especially the deliberate choice of a larger seal as more ceremonious and important, are clear evidence of diplomatic skill. No doubt, too, the impression of Nelson's arms was very careful and clear.

In writing to French Ministers of State it is a traditional custom to employ a certain paper called "papier ministre," which is very much larger than that sent to ordinary mortals. Paper is by no means a matter of indifference. It is the material costume under which we present ourselves to persons removed from us by distance; and as a man pays a call in handsome clothes as a sign of respect to others, and also of self-respect, so he sends a piece of handsome paper to be the bearer of his salutation. Besides, a letter is in itself a gift, though a small one, and however trifling a gift may be it must never be shabby. The English understand this art of choosing good-looking letter-paper, and are remarkable for using it of a thickness rare in other nations. French love of elegance has led to charming inventions of tint and texture, particularly in delicate gray tints, and these papers are now often decorated with embossed initials of heraldic devices on a large scale, but that is carrying prettiness too far. The common American habit of writing letters on ruled paper is not to be recommended, as the ruling reminds us of copy-books and account-books, and has a mechanical appearance that greatly detracts from what ought to be the purely personal air of an autograph.

Modern love of despatch has led to the invention of the post-card, which, from our present point of view, that of courtesy, deserves unhesitating condemnation. To use a post-card is as much as to say to your correspondent, "In order to save for myself a very little money and a very little time, I will expose the subject of our correspondence to the eyes of any clerk, postman, or servant, who feels the slightest curiosity about it; and I take this small piece of card, of which I am allowed to use one side only, in order to relieve myself from the obligation, and spare myself the trouble, of writing a letter." To make the convenience absolutely perfect, it is customary in England to omit the opening and concluding salutations on post-cards, so that they are the _ne plus ultra_, I will not say of positive rudeness, but of that negative rudeness which is not exactly the opposite of courtesy, but its absence. Here again, however, comes the modern principle; and promptitude and frequency of communication may be accepted as a compensation for the sacrifice of formality. It may be argued, and with reason, that when a man of our own day sends a post-card his ancestors would have been still more laconic, for they would have sent nothing at all, and that there are a thousand circumstances in which a post-card may be written when it is not possible to write a letter. A husband on his travels has a supply of such cards in a pocket-book. With these, and his pencil, he writes a line once or twice a day in train or steamboat, or at table between two dishes, or on the windy platform of a railway station, or in the street when he sees a letter-box. He sends fifty such communications where his father would have written three letters, and his grandfather one slowly composed and slowly travelling epistle.

Many modern correspondents appreciate the convenience of the post-card, but their conscience, as that of well-bred people, cannot get over the fault of its publicity. For these the stationers have devised several different substitutes. There is the French plan of what is called "Un Mot à la Poste," a piece of paper with a single fold, gummed round the other three edges, and perforated like postage-stamps for the facility of the opener.[31] There is the miniature sheet of paper that you have not to fold, and there is the card that you enclose in an envelope, and that prepares the reader for a very brief communication. Here, again, is a very curious illustration of the sacrificial nature of courtesy. A card is sent; why a card? Why not a piece of paper of the same size which would hold as many words? The answer is that a card is handsomer and more costly, and from its stiffness a little easier to take out of the envelope, and pleasanter to hold whilst reading, so that a small sacrifice is made to the pleasure and convenience of the receiver, which is the essence of courtesy in letter-writing. All this brief correspondence is the offspring of the electric telegraph. Our forefathers were not used to it, and would have regarded it as an offence. Even at the present date (1884) it is not quite safe to write in our brief modern way to persons who came to maturity before the electric telegraph was in use.

There is a wide distinction between brevity and hurry; in fact, brevity, if of the intelligent kind, is the best preservative against hurry. Some men write short letters, but are very careful to observe all the forms; and they have the great advantage that the apparent importance of the formal expressions is enhanced by the shortness of the letter itself. This is the case in Robert Warcopp's letter to Sir Robert Plumpton.