Tactless Man

( Originally Published 1892 )

The man who flatters every woman he meets, and has ready-made, shop-worn compliments in store, is by far more excusable than the man who cannot pay a merited compliment, and who says unflattering and blunt things with an idea that he is being frank and honest.

It is a man's duty to be gallant to women so long as she is womanly. Be she old or young, married or single, she appreciates refined gallantry from a boy or man, and misses the absence of it. No amount of strength or power on the part of a man compensates for utter lack of taste in his deportment toward her.

I was passing out of my door one day with -a young lady guest, when we encountered on the steps a young gentleman who was about to ring the bell.

"Oh, are you still here?" he said, with evident pleasure in his voice. "I supposed you had gone."

What could have been more tactless and blundering? Why did he not say:

"I feared you might have gone! How fortunate I am to find you still here!"

He was really pleased to see her. His face and voice showed that. But his unfortunate phrase told her bluntly that his call was not intended for her.

Another young lady guest of mine was requested to lead a german with a gentleman at whose home a pretty girl was visiting. The day after the german took place the gentleman was calling, and I said: "I was surprised to find that Miss A, your mother's guest, does not dance."

"Yes," he replied, "it was a great disappointment to me."

Of course my friend, who had danced with him and had felt complimented at his choice of her as a partner, at once realized that she had served as a substitute because the lady he preferred could not dance. How easily he could have concealed his disappointment.

The man who compliments one lady at the cost of another, is an unfortunate sort of being.

I was once in a small company of people where the hostess found it necessary to request a moment's assistance of one of her men guests. The young man had been sitting on a divan for a considerable time chatting with a bright, talkative woman. "Mr. A., may I ask you to excuse yourself for a moment," said the hostess, "and come over here?"

"With great pleasure," cried the thoughtless, well-meaning fellow, as he sprang to his hostess' side.

"If I had known it would be such a pleasure to you I would have excused you long ago," said the woman with whom he had been chatting.

"I really think she was provoked at my leaving her so abruptly," said the stupid fellow when refering to the matter, "but how could I do otherwise when my hostess called me?"

A man like that should live apart from women, and confine his society to his own sex.

Some one chances to mention the hour in the hearing of a gifted and educated gentleman one day, who had been conversing for some time with his hostess.

"What, so early still! " he exclaimed. "I had an idea it was much later."

"I am sorry you find the time so long in my house," said the hostess coldly, as she moved away and left her guest to his merited discomfort. Talent and learning are ill bestowed upon a man with no more refinement or taste than his remark betrayed.

Even the fellow who tells you that he is surprised you take sugar in your coffee, and says "sweets to the sweet" when offering you bon-bons, is to be tolerated in preference. One can only bore you at most, while the others affront and wound.

There is a fine line between gallantry and flattery which some people do not understand. No man need be a brute to avoid being a fulsome flats terer, and no man need flatter to avoid being rude.

I know a man who tells every woman he sees in evening dress that she has the lost arms of the Venus de Milo. I heard him say it to a pudgy woman who weighed 200, and within an hour repeat it to a human skeleton. Both women were offended, and thought the man was making sport of their misfortune, when in fact he was trying to be agreeable.

The pudgy woman possessed fine teeth, and the skeleton fine eyes! A man with more brain who desired to pay a compliment, would have observed these points, but this fellow had made it a habit to compliment arms, and he was no respecter of persons.

The man who is not born with tact, and who has never studied women, needs training by some wise dame before he attempts compliments.

"That hat becomes you much more than your hats usually do," I heard a man remark to a lady one day, and the lady was highly indignant, as she well might be. He had no business to speak of her costume at all if he could not turn a more pleasing phrase than that, with a less unfortunate interpretation.