THE passenger in the crowded street railway car is often
disturbed by the conscious absorption of his masculine neighbors in
their newspapers when a woman enters and looks for a seat. If she be
young and pretty, there are apparently seats enough, however great the
crowd, and even if a man is slow to rise, he may yet, with Mr. Readywit,
exhort his son sitting upon his knee to get up and give the lady his
seat. The impatient passenger, in his indignation at the want of
courtesy upon the part of others, sometimes forgets, indeed, to rise
himself. But there is always some Nathan comfortably seated farther away
whose amused look says to the impatient but stationary David, "Thou art
the man."
It would be very unfair to generalize from this frequent situation that
the American is uncourteous. On the contrary, he is the most truly
polite man among men of all nations. Lady Mavourneen, who is familiar
with the society and the manners of many countries, and who has been
always accustomed to hear Americans in Europe described everywhere and
with pungent emphasis as "those Americans," was amazed upon coming here
to find universal courtesy. "In the street or at the railway station,"
she said, "if I ask anybody any question, I receive the most prompt and
polite reply. Everybody is at my service, not with much bowing or
flourishing, but heartily and honestly. I have never seen such universal
courtesy." When she was asked whether she had observed the absorption of
the street-car passengers in their newspapers, she smiled and said that
she had never been obliged to stand, because some one was sure to rise.
But in Paris she said that often as she was passing to a seat Monsieur
Crapeaud, raising his hat politely, and saying, warmly, _Pardon!_
pressed by and secured the seat.
Lady Mavourneen, who tells a little story with great humor, described a
scene in a crowded church in Paris. An apparent lady was disturbing
everybody by pushing along toward a distant chair in the row, when Lady
Mavourneen arose to allow her to pass more easily, and the apparent lady
immediately slipped into my lady's chair, and held it fast, saying only,
in reply to her earnest remonstrance: "Madame, you left the chair; I
took it. You have lost it. Voilà!" A vagabond of this kind took the seat
of a gentleman who had risen to help a lady off a street car. When the
gentleman returned he mentioned to the interloper that it was his seat.
The interloper shrugged his shoulders, remarked that it was an empty
seat when he took it, and that he should continue to occupy it. "If you
don't get out of that seat, I'll take you out," was the rejoinder of the
gentleman, whose shoulders were broad. The squatter scowled and
abdicated.
Lady Mavourneen found, what every lady will find, that she could travel
everywhere in "the States" alone, with entire safety and surrounded by
the utmost courtesy. The word "lady" with which she will be accosted by
hackmen and porters and conductors is spoken with kindly respect, and
even if some person in a lady's garb thrusts herself into the cue of
passengers slowly advancing to the window of the ticket office to buy
tickets, there may be sour looks and amazed stares, but she will
generally have her way. So great is our courtesy that we honor the
counterfeit claim. The source of the most serious objection to the
demand of suffrage for women is the secret apprehension that men will
lose their sincere deference, and treat women as they treat other men,
thus robbing life of the tender romance of chivalric courtesy. Emerson
says of the successful lover and his mistress, "She was heaven, while he
pursued her as a star; can she be heaven if she stoops to such an one as
he?"
Yet, while this feeling is frequent, and seems to many very plausible,
it is the true respect of the American for women which is the real
strength of this very movement. The European sentiment for woman is
still somewhat mediæval. She is still the goddess of the troubadours and
the minnesingers, but a goddess who is treated as the South-sea
Islanders treat their gods, beating them when they are not propitious.
To the American she is Wordsworth's "Phantom of Delight" seen upon
nearer view, and it is idle to prattle about her "sphere," as if she did
not instinctively know it more truly than men. The universal courtesy
which Lady Mavourneen remarked is essential respect and kindliness of
feeling, which no more permits a man to gild his selfishness with a
"Pardon" and a touching of his hat than it permits him to strike a
woman.
Yet although courtesy is essentially in the heart, and is kind feeling
rather than respectful manner, it is not worth while to despise the
manner. If we must choose between the good heart and suavity of address,
between Boythorne and Lovelace, of course we shall choose Boythorne. But
why not both? Why not the _mens sana in corpore sano?_ In "The Iron
Pen," Longfellow says:
"And in words not idle and vain
I shall answer and thank you again
For the gift, and the grace of the gift,
O beautiful Helen of Maine!"
It is not only the gift, it is the grace in giving which completes the
charm.
The young American of to-day puffs his cigarette in the face of his
partner on the balcony, in the boat, or in the wagon, and smiles at the
frilled Lothario of yesterday bowing in his flowered coat and paying
stately compliments as stiff as her brocade to the dame whom he
addresses. The youth is right in saying that the flowered coat and the
stately compliment were the dress and the speech of an old sinner. But
he would be right also if he remembered that familiarity breeds
contempt, and that he may wisely distrust his feeling for any woman who
does not put him upon his good behavior. The courtesy which Lady
Mavourneen observed in the railway station and in the street was plain,
but it was genuine. Respect naturally produces courtesy. Good manners
are the cultivation of natural courtesy: the gift and the grace of the
gift.
This was the chief remembrance, and it was a unique and precious
treasure, which Lady Mavourneen carried back to Europe from America.