"Independence" is an excellent thing; but it becomes peculiarly rude when it takes the form of refusing all trifling favors. It is often the greatest wisdom as well as kindness, to allow some one to do us a favor. Enemies have been transformed into friends by this tactful process; for, as one always hates one whom he has injured, so, on the reverse, he cannot help feeling an increased glow of kindliness toward one whom he has benefited.
When some unsophisticated person innocently offers a gift that strict conventionality would forbid one to accept, it is sometimes better to suspend the rules and accept the token, than by refusal to hurt the feelings of one who has perhaps offended the letter, but not the spirit, of the law.
Gifts of flowers to the convalescent—tokens that the busy outside world has not forgotten him—are among the most graceful expressions of courteous interest. Any one—even a total stranger—may send these, if "the spirit moves," and the circumstances are such that the act could bear no possible misinterpretation.
GALLANTRY AND COQUETRY
That a man enjoys the society of a charming woman, that a woman delights in the conversation of a brilliant man, is no sign that either of them is a flirt.
Few things are more vulgar than the readiness to infer a flirtation from every case of marked mutual interest between a man and a woman. The interchange of bright ideas, interspersed with the spontaneous sallies of gallantry and the instinctive repartee of innocent coquetry—an archery of wit and humor, grave and gay,—this is one of the salient features of civilized social life. It has nothing in common with the shallow travesty of sentiment that characterizes a pointless flirtation. The latter is bad form whenever and wherever existing. A sincere sentiment is not reduced to the straits of expressing itself in such uncertain language. It is fair to conclude that some insincerity, or some lack of a correct basis for sentiment, is betrayed in every pointless flirtation. It is hopelessly bad form. Young people who gratify vanity by idle "conquests," so called, make a sufficiently conspicuous show of ill-breeding; but a married flirt is worse than vulgar.
A woman may accept every tribute that a chivalrous man may offer to her talent or wit, so long as it is expressed in a hearty spirit of good comradeship, and with a clear and unmistakable deference to her self-respecting dignity; but a well-bred woman will resent as an insult to her womanhood any quasi-sentimental overtures from a man who has not the right to make them.
Etiquette requires that the association of men and women in refined circles shall be frank without freedom, friendly without familiarity. "Flirting" is a plebeian diversion. Every well-bred woman is a queen, for whose sake every well-bred man will hold a lance in rets.
IN CONCLUSION
Since censoriousness is a quality utterly antagonistic to good manners, it is well to reflect that, while etiquette lays down many laws, it also indulgently grants generous absolution. While we decide that certain forms and methods of action are correct and good form, we must remember that all people, ourselves included, are liable to be occasionally remiss in little things, and that we must not too hastily decide a man's status on the score of breeding by his punctilious observance of conventional laws. There are some requirements of etiquette that have their foundation in the idea of convenience or feasibility; others that are essentially requisite as the exponent of decency. A man may easily be far from perfect in details of the former class, and yet be a refined gentleman; but he cannot offend in the latter class of instances without being a boor. Something worse than eating with his knife must ostracize a man, and something no greater than spitting on the sidewalk should accomplish the feat at one fell stroke.