'చెస్టర్‌ఫీల్డ్ సలహాలు '- AWKWARDNESS

 

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AWKWARDNESS

OF DIFFERENT KINDS

MANY very worthy and sensible people have certain odd tricks, ill habits, and awkwardness in their behaviour, which excite a disgust to and dislike of their persons, that cannot be removed or overcome by any other valuable endowment or merit which they may possess.

Now awkwardness can proceed but from two causes, either from not having kept good company, or from not having attended to it.

When an awkward fellow first comes into a room, it is highly probable that his sword gets between his legs and throws him down, or makes him stumble, at least. When he has recovered this accident, he goes and places himself in the very place of the whole room where he should not; there he soon lets his hat fall down, and, in taking it up again, throws down his cane; in recovering his cane, his hat falls the second time; so that he is a quarter of a hour before he is in order again. If he drinks tea or coffee, he certainly scalds his mouth, and lets either the cup or the saucer fall, and spills the tea or coffee in his breeches. At dinner his awkwardness distinguishes itself particularly, as he has more to do: there he holds his knife, fork, and spoon, differently from other people; eats with his knife, to the great danger of his mouth, picks his teeth with his fork, and puts his spoon, which has been in his throat twenty times, into the dishes again. If he is to carve, he can never hit the joint; but, in his vain efforts to cut through the bone, scatters the sauce in everybody's face. He generally daubs himself with soup and grease, though his napkin is commonly stuck through a button-hole, and tickles his chin. When he drinks, he infallibly coughs in his glass, and besprinkles the company. Besides all this, he has strange tricks and gestures; such as snuffing up his nose, making faces, putting his finger in his nose, or blowing it, and looking afterwards in his handkerchief, so as to make the company sick. His hands are troublesome to him when he has not something in them; and he does not know where to put them: but they are in perpetual motion between his bosom and his breeches. He does not wear his clothes, and, in short, does nothing, like other people. All this, I own, is not in any degree criminal; but it is highly disagreeable and ridiculous in company, and ought most carefully to be avoided by whoever desires to please.

From this account of what you should not do, you may easily judge what you should do; and a due attention to the manners of people of fashion, who have seen the world, will make it habitual and familiar to you.

There is, likewise, an awkwardness of expression and words most carefully to be avoided; such as false English, bad pronunciation, old sayings, and common proverbs; which are so many proofs of having kept bad and low company. For example: if, instead of saying, that “tastes are different, and that every man has his own peculiar one,” you should let off a proverb, and say, that “what is one man's meat is another man's poison;” or else, “Every one as they like, as the good man said when he kissed his cow;” everybody would be persuaded that you had never kept company with anybody above footmen and housemaids.

There is likewise an awkwardness of the mind, that ought to be, and with care may be, avoided; as, for instance, to mistake or forget names. To speak of Mr. What-d'ye-call-Him, or Mrs. Thingum or How-d'ye-call-Her is excessively awkward and ordinary. To call people by improper titles and appellations is so too; as “My Lord,” for “Sir;” and “Sir,” for “My Lord.” To begin a story or narration when you are not perfect in it, and cannot go through with it, but are forced, possibly, to say in the middle of it, " I have forgot the rest," is very unpleasant and bungling. One must be extremely exact, clear, and perspicuous in everything one says; otherwise instead of entertaining or informing others, one only tires and puzzles them.

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