Try to discover some subject in which your companion is interested, and get him to talking. Then show yourself a good listener. A woman may get the reputation of being bright and clever if she will simply show herself a good listener. To do this, she must give her attention to the person who is talking. She must seem interested. Her eyes must not wander around the room; she must not take up picture or book and glance over it; her questions must be intelligent and to the point. Then, unless the speaker is a well-known bore, she need never suffer under the imputation of being neglected in society, and she will be thought courteous and intelligent.
Discourtesies.—To interrupt a speaker, to take the words out of his mouth and finish the sentence for him, to broach a new topic, irrelevant to that in hand, unless the latter is in danger of leading to thin conversational ice,—all these are discourtesies.
To yawn while listening to anyone; to show lack of interest in a story or anecdote that is being told, or let the attention wander, is marked impoliteness. We are not to remind a speaker that his story is an old one, or that he has told it before.
Some Things to Avoid.—A man should avoid raving over the perfections, the beauty or chic of one woman to another. He shouldn't talk golf to one who doesn't know the language of the game, nor discourse on music to the unmusical. Above all, he shouldn't undertake to entertain the whole company, nor introduce a topic in which he only is interested or informed. The more serious questions of life are barred in society; people wish to be amused, not instructed. An inveterate talker, especially one of a didactic turn, is a bore. So is the man who puts a hobby through its paces. Avoid exaggerations in conversation, also extravagances, such as "beastly this" or "awfully that," also avoid over emphasis. Don't talk in italics.
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The Speaking Voice.—A clear, distinct enunciation should be cultivated. The voice need not—should not—be raised above the ordinary conversational level to make one perfectly understood, if only one speaks clearly. This is something that can be cultivated. So also a discrimination in the use of words, so that which most nearly expresses the meaning of the speaker comes to him readily.
A pleasant voice is a charm, either in man or woman. A noted teacher of singing once remarked that the cultivation of the speaking voice is a positive duty, and possible to almost everyone. Certainly a harsh, squeaky, shrill or affected tone of voice may be improved by care and endeavor.
CHURCH ETIQUETTE.
Surely the church is the place where one day's truce ought to be allowed to the vanities, the dissensions and animosities of mankind.—Burke.
The church is sometimes sarcastically referred to as "the social stepping-stone." It is a fact that the newly made rich and the vulgar often choose a church attended by the people of fashion whose acquaintance they most desire, rent a high-priced pew, and become prominent through their benefactions and their services in church work. They are "taken up," after a time, in a fashion, and unless too socially impossible through lack of good breeding, may, from "fringers," become "climbers." "I might go to that church for a hundred years and no one would notice me," bitterly complained a woman who had undertaken the social uplift via the church. The woman in question defeated her own object. She dressed in the extreme of style; she always came in late, with much rustle of silk and rattle of bangles; her hair was "touched up" and her face rouged. The well-bred and refined members condemned her on these grounds. Nevertheless, where a stranger comes who bears the hall-mark of culture and refinement, the church connection is often an aid to social habilitation, though it should never be sought as such.