The Autocrat of the Breakfast-table said in one of his books that if he heard a woman pronounce the word “How,” he learned more about her in an instant than a third person could tell him in an hour. If she called it “haow,” she revealed herself as belonging to the uncultured classes.
In the same way, if a girl were to say “I met a fellow yesterday,” she would unconsciously make a similar self-revelation. A young man would make an equal mistake if he were to speak of “my sister’s fellow.” But he would be correct enough if he were to say “the fellow my sister’s engaged to.”
“Tweedledum and tweedledee.”
These little nuances of expression remind one of the old rhyme—
“Strange that such difference should be
’Twixt tweedledum and tweedledee.”
Small talk alone will not suffice.
Though small talk is as indispensable in social life as pennies and halfpennies in the transactions of everyday existence, we must also have conversational gold and silver at our command if we wish to be successful. When the preliminaries of acquaintanceship are over there is no necessity to keep up the commonplaces of small talk. To do so is rather insulting to women.
“Talking down” really an insult.
To be “talked down to” is always aggravating, especially when one feels a conviction that the person who is thus affably stooping for one’s benefit belongs in reality to a lower intellectual plane than one’s own.