Manners and Social Customs

When the lady at the other end of the table proffers you a second piece of pie, if you want it, say so. It is the least compliment you can pay her for giving you a seat at her table. Don’t keep on in the old New England fashion of saying “No,” with a tone and glance which convey the unmistakable gloss, “Yes, but I wan’t a little urging.

Perhaps it is the highest test of good breeding to be able to accept and bear an unusual load of obligation without allowing the friend who confers the favor to think you feel overburdened. Ill-bred people who are ill at ease in their company manners, generally meet all proffered courtesies at first as though they could on no account think of accepting them. Thus, when the gentleman who carves the chicken asks you which bit you prefer, believe that he asks because he would be pleased to know, and tell him, instead of saying what is obviously a what-d’-ye call-it, that it makes not the slightest difference: and when the lady at the other end of the table proffers you a second piece of pie, if you want it, say so. It is the least compliment you can pay her for giving you a seat at her table. Don’t keep on in the old New England fashion of saying “No,” with a tone and glance which convey the unmistakable gloss, “ Yes, but I wan’t a little urging.”— By Joaquin Miller for the Boston Transcript, 1874

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