_From my own Apartment in Channel-Row, March 5_.
Those inferior duties of life which the French call _les petites
morales,_ or the smaller morals, are with us distinguished by the name of
good manners,[4] or breeding. This I look upon, in the general notion of
it, to be a sort of artificial good sense, adapted to the meanest
capacities, and introduced to make mankind easy in their commerce
with each other. Low and little understandings, without some rules of
this kind, would be perpetually wandering into a thousand indecencies and
irregularities in behaviour, and in their ordinary conversation fall into
the same boisterous familiarities that one observes amongst them, when a
debauch has quite taken away the use of their reason. In other instances,
it is odd to consider, that for want of common discretion the very end of
good breeding is wholly perverted, and civility, intended to make us
easy, is employed in laying chains and fetters upon us, in debarring us
of our wishes, and in crossing our most reasonable desires and
inclinations. This abuse reigns chiefly in the country, as I found to my
vexation, when I was last there, in a visit I made to a neighbour about
two miles from my cousin. As soon as I entered the parlour, they forced
me into the great chair that stood close by a huge fire, and kept me
there by force till I was almost stifled. Then a boy came in great hurry
to pull off my boots, which I in vain opposed, urging that I must return
soon after dinner. In the mean time the good lady whispered her eldest
daughter, and slipped a key into her hand. She returned instantly with
a beer glass half full of _aqua mirabilis_ and syrup of gillyflowers.
I took as much as I had a mind for; but Madam vowed I should drink it
off, (for she was sure it would do me good after coming out of the cold
air) and I was forced to obey, which absolutely took away my stomach.
When dinner came in, I had a mind to sit at a distance from the fire; but
they told me, it was as much as my life was worth, and set me with my
back just against it. Though my appetite was quite gone, I resolved to
force down as much as I could, and desired the leg of a pullet. "Indeed,
Mr. Bickerstaff," says the lady, "you must eat a wing to oblige me," and
so put a couple upon my plate. I was persecuted at this rate during the
whole meal. As often as I called for small beer, the master tipped the
wink, and the servant brought me a brimmer of October. Some time after
dinner, I ordered my cousin's man who came with me to get ready the
horses; but it was resolved I should not stir that night; and when I
seemed pretty much bent upon going, they ordered the stable door to be
locked, and the children hid away my cloak and boots. The next question
was, what I would have for supper? I said I never eat anything at
night, but was at last in my own defence obliged to name the first thing
that came into my head. After three hours spent chiefly in apology for my
entertainment, insinuating to me, "That this was the worst time of the
year for provisions, that they were at a great distance from any market,
that they were afraid I should be starved, and they knew they kept me to
my loss," the lady went, and left me to her husband (for they took
special care I should never be alone.) As soon as her back was turned,
the little misses ran backwards and forwards every moment; and constantly
as they came in or went out, made a curtsy directly at me, which in good
manners I was forced to return with a bow, and "Your humble servant
pretty Miss." Exactly at eight the mother came up, and discovered by the
redness of her face, that supper was not far off. It was twice as large
as the dinner, and my persecution doubled in proportion. I desired at
my usual hour to go to my repose, and was conducted to my chamber by the
gentleman, his lady, and the whole train of children. They importuned me
to drink something before I went to bed, and upon my refusing, at last
left a bottle of stingo, as they called it, for fear I should wake and be
thirsty in the night. I was forced in the morning to rise and dress
myself in the dark, because they would not suffer my kinsman's servant to
disturb me at the hour I had desired to be called. I was now resolved to
break through all measures to get away, and after sitting down to a
monstrous breakfast of cold beef, mutton, neats'-tongues, venison-pasty,
and stale beer, took leave of the family; but the gentleman would needs
see me part of my way, and carry me a short cut through his own grounds,
which he told me would save half a mile's riding. This last piece of
civility had like to have cost me dear, being once or twice in danger of
my neck, by leaping over his ditches, and at last forced to alight in the
dirt, when my horse, having slipped his bridle, ran away, and took us up
more than an hour to recover him again.
It is evident that none of the absurdities I met with in this visit
proceeded from an ill intention, but from a wrong judgment of
complaisance, and a misapplication of the rules of it. I cannot so easily
excuse the more refined critics upon behaviour, who having professed no
other study, are yet infinitely defective in the most material parts of
it. Ned Fashion has been bred all his life about Court, and understands
to a tittle all the punctilios of a drawing-room. He visits most of the
fine women near St. James's, and upon all occasions says the civilest and
softest things to them of any man breathing. To Mr. Isaac[5] he owes an
easy slide in his bow, and a graceful manner of coming into a room. But
in some other cases he is very far from being a well-bred person: He
laughs at men of far superior understanding to his own, for not being as
well dressed as himself, despises all his acquaintance that are not
quality, and in public places has on that account often avoided taking
notice of some of the best speakers in the House of Commons. He rails
strenuously at both Universities before the members of either, and never
is heard to swear an oath, or break in upon morality or religion, but in
the company of divines. On the other hand, a man of right sense has all
the essentials of good breeding, though he may be wanting in the forms of
it. Horatio has spent most of his time at Oxford. He has a great deal of
learning, an agreeable wit, and as much modesty as serves to adorn
without concealing his other good qualities. In that retired way of
living, he seems to have formed a notion of human nature, as he has found
it described in the writings of the greatest men, not as he is like to
meet with it in the common course of life. Hence it is, that he gives no
offence, that he converses with great deference, candour, and humanity.
His bow, I must confess, is somewhat awkward; but then he has an
extensive, universal, and unaffected knowledge, which makes some amends
for it. He would make no extraordinary figure at a ball; but I can
assure the ladies in his behalf, and for their own consolation, that he
has writ better verses on the sex than any man now living, and is
preparing such a poem for the press as will transmit their praises and
his own to many generations.
[Footnote 1: In the reprint of "The Tatler," volume v., this number was
called No. 20. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 2: _Epist. ex Ponto_, II. ix. 47-48.
"An understanding in the liberal arts
Softens men's manners."
[T.S.]]
[Footnote 3: _I.e._ 1710-11. [T.S.]]
[Footnote 4: Compare Swift's "Treatise on Good Manners and Good
Breeding." [T.S.]]
[Footnote 5: A famous dancing-master in those days. [FAULKNER.] He died
in 1740. [T.S.]]