Worldly Ways and Byways , livre ebook

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116 pages

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pubOne.info thank you for your continued support and wish to present you this new edition. THERE existed formerly, in diplomatic circles, a curious custom, since fallen into disuse, entitled the Pele Mele, contrived doubtless by some distracted Master of Ceremonies to quell the endless jealousies and quarrels for precedence between courtiers and diplomatists of contending pretensions. Under this rule no rank was recognized, each person being allowed at banquet, fete, or other public ceremony only such place as he had been ingenious or fortunate enough to obtain.

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Publié par	Pub One Info
Date de parution	23 octobre 2010
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9782819917663
Langue	English

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Introduction - To the Reader
THERE existed formerly, in diplomatic circles, acurious custom, since fallen into disuse, entitled the Pele Mele,contrived doubtless by some distracted Master of Ceremonies toquell the endless jealousies and quarrels for precedence betweencourtiers and diplomatists of contending pretensions. Under thisrule no rank was recognized, each person being allowed at banquet,fete, or other public ceremony only such place as he had beeningenious or fortunate enough to obtain.
Any one wishing to form an idea of the confusionthat ensued, of the intrigues and expedients resorted to, not onlyin procuring prominent places, but also in ensuring the integrityof the Pele Mele, should glance over the amusing memoirs of M. deSegur.
The aspiring nobles and ambassadors, harassed bythis constant preoccupation, had little time or inclination leftfor any serious pursuit, since, to take a moment's repose or anhour's breathing space was to risk falling behind in the endlessand aimless race. Strange as it may appear, the knowledge that theyowed place and preferment more to chance or intrigue than to anypersonal merit or inherited right, instead of lessening the valueof the prizes for which all were striving, seemed only to enhancethem in the eyes of the competitors.
Success was the unique standard by which they gaugedtheir fellows. Those who succeeded revelled in the adulation oftheir friends, but when any one failed, the fickle crowd passed himby to bow at more fortunate feet.
No better picture could be found of the "world" ofto-day, a perpetual Pele Mele, where such advantages only areconceded as we have been sufficiently enterprising to obtain, andare strong or clever enough to keep - a constant competition, adaily steeplechase, favorable to daring spirits and personalinitiative but with the defect of keeping frail humanity ever onthe qui vive.
Philosophers tell us, that we should seek happinessonly in the calm of our own minds, not allowing external conditionsor the opinions of others to influence our ways. This loftydetachment from environment is achieved by very few. Indeed, thephilosophers themselves (who may be said to have invented the artof "posing") were generally as vain as peacocks, profoundlypre-occupied with the verdict of their contemporaries and theirposition as regards posterity.
Man is born gregarious and remains all his life aherding animal. As one keen observer has written, "So great isman's horror of being alone that he will seek the society of thosehe neither likes nor respects sooner than be left to his own." Thelaws and conventions that govern men's intercourse have, therefore,formed a tempting subject for the writers of all ages. Some havelabored hoping to reform their generation, others have written tooffer solutions for life's many problems.
Beaumarchais, whose penetrating wit left fewsubjects untouched, makes his Figaro put the subject aside with "Jeme presse de rire de tout, de peur d'etre oblige d'en pleurer."
The author of this little volume pretends to settleno disputes, aims at inaugurating no reforms. He has lightlytouched on passing topics and jotted down, "to point a moral oradorn a tale," some of the more obvious foibles and inconsistenciesof our American ways. If a stray bit of philosophy has here andthere slipped in between the lines, it is mostly of the laughing"school," and used more in banter than in blame.
This much abused "world" is a fairly agreeable placeif you do not take it seriously. Meet it with a friendly face andit will smile gayly back at you, but do not ask of it what itcannot give, or attribute to its verdicts more importance than theydeserve.
ELIOT GREGORY
Newport, November first, 1897
CHAPTER 1 - Charm
WOMEN endowed by nature with the indescribablequality we call "charm" (for want of a better word), are thesupreme development of a perfected race, the last word, as it were,of civilization; the flower of their kind, crowning centuries ofgrowing refinement and cultivation. Other women may unite athousand brilliant qualities, and attractive attributes, may bebeautiful as Astarte or witty as Madame de Montespan, those endowedwith the power of charm, have in all ages and under every sky, heldundisputed rule over the hearts of their generation.
When we look at the portraits of the enchantresseswhom history tells us have ruled the world by their charm, andswayed the destinies of empires at their fancy, we are astonishedto find that they have rarely been beautiful. From Cleopatra orMary of Scotland down to Lola Montez, the tell-tale coin or canvasreveals the same marvellous fact. We wonder how these womenattained such influence over the men of their day, their husbandsor lovers. We would do better to look around us, or inward, andobserve what is passing in our own hearts.
Pause, reader mine, a moment and reflect. Who hasheld the first place in your thoughts, filled your soul, andinfluenced your life? Was she the most beautiful of youracquaintances, the radiant vision that dazzled your boyish eyes?Has she not rather been some gentle, quiet woman whom you hardlynoticed the first time your paths crossed, but who gradually grewto be a part of your life - to whom you instinctively turned forconsolation in moments of discouragement, for counsel in yourdifficulties, and whose welcome was the bright moment in your day,looked forward to through long hours of toil and worry?
In the hurly-burly of life we lose sight of so manythings our fathers and mothers clung to, and have drifted so faraway from their gentle customs and simple, home-loving habits, thatone wonders what impression our society would make on a woman of acentury ago, could she by some spell be dropped into the swing ofmodern days. The good soul would be apt to find it rather a far cryfrom the quiet pleasures of her youth, to "a ladies' amateurbicycle race" that formed the attraction recently at a summerresort.
That we should have come to think it natural andproper for a young wife and mother to pass her mornings at golf,lunching at the club- house to "save time," returning home only fora hurried change of toilet to start again on a bicycle or for around of calls, an occupation that will leave her just thehalf-hour necessary to slip into a dinner gown, and then for her topass the evening in dancing or at the card-table, shows, when onetakes the time to think of it, how unconsciously we have changed,and (with all apologies to the gay hostesses and graceful athletesof to-day) not for the better.
It is just in the subtle quality of charm that thewomen of the last ten years have fallen away from their eldersisters. They have been carried along by a love of sport, and bythe set of fashion's tide, not stopping to ask themselves whitherthey are floating. They do not realize all the importance of theiracts nor the true meaning of their metamorphosis.
The dear creatures should be content, for they haveat last escaped from the bondage of ages, have broken their chains,and vaulted over their prison walls. "Lords and masters" havegradually become very humble and obedient servants, and the "love,honour, and obey" of the marriage service might now more logicallybe spoken by the man; on the lips of the women of to-day it is buta graceful "FACON DE PARLER," and holds only those who choose to bebound.
It is not my intention to rail against theshort-comings of the day. That ungrateful task I leave to sternermoralists, and hopeful souls who naively imagine they can stem thecurrent of an epoch with the barrier of their eloquence, or sweepback an ocean of innovations by their logic. I should like,however, to ask my sisters one question: Are they quite sure thatwomen gain by these changes? Do they imagine, these "sporty" youngfemales in short- cut skirts and mannish shirts and ties, that itis seductive to a lover, or a husband to see his idol in a violentperspiration, her draggled hair blowing across a sunburned face,panting up a long hill in front of him on a bicycle, frantic athaving lost her race? Shade of gentle William! who said
A woman moved, is like a fountain troubled, - Muddy,ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty. And while it is so, none sodry or thirsty Will deign to sip or touch one drop of it.
Is the modern girl under the impression that menwill be contented with poor imitations of themselves, to sharetheir homes and be the mothers of their children? She is throwingaway the substance for the shadow!
The moment women step out from the sanctuary oftheir homes, the glamour that girlhood or maternity has thrownaround them cast aside, that moment will they cease to rulemankind. Women may agitate until they have obtained politicalrecognition, but will awake from their foolish dream of power,realizing too late what they have sacrificed to obtain it, that theprice has been very heavy, and the fruit of their struggles bitteron their lips.
There are few men, I imagine, of my generation towhom the words "home" and "mother" have not a penetrating charm,who do not look back with softened heart and tender thoughts tofireside scenes of evening readings and twilight talks at amother's knee, realizing that the best in their natures owes itsgrowth to these influences.
I sometimes look about me and wonder what the word"mother" will mean later, to modern little boys. It will evoke, Ifear, a confused remembrance of some centaur-like being, halfwoman, half wheel, or as it did to neglected little Rawdon Crawley,the vision of a radiant creature in gauze and jewels, driving awayto endless FETES - FETES followed by long mornings, when he wastold not to make any noise, or play too loudly, "as poor mamma isresting." What other memories can the "successful" woman of to-dayhope to leave in the minds of her children? If the child remembershis mother in this way, will not the man who has known and perhapsloved her, feel the same sensation of empty futility when her nameis mentioned?
The woman who