A lady or gentleman should finish their
toilet before entering the room for dancing, as it is indecorous in
either to be drawing on their gloves, or brushing their hair. Finish
your toilet in the dressing rooms.
Always recognize the lady or gentleman, or the director of
ceremonies with becoming politeness: a salute or bow is sufficient.
A lady should always have an easy, becoming and graceful movement
while engaged in a quadrille or promenade. It is more pleasing to
the gentleman.
A lady should never engage herself for more than the following set,
unless by the consent of the gentleman who accompanies her. It is
very impolite and insulting in either lady or gentleman while
dancing in quadrille, to mar the pleasure of others by galloping
around or inside the next set.
If a gentleman, without proper introduction, should ask a lady with
whom he is not acquainted to dance or promenade, the lady should
positively refuse.
Recollect, the desire of imparting pleasure, especially to the
ladies, is one of the essential qualifications of a gentleman.
Ladies should not be too hasty in filling their program on their
entrance to the ball room, as they may have cause for regret should
a friend happen to enter.
An introduction in a public ball room must be understood by the
gentleman to be for that evening only, after which the
acquaintanceship ceases, unless the lady chooses to recognize it at
any further time or place.
A lady should not attend a public ball without an escort, nor should
she promenade the ball room alone; in fact, no lady should be left
unattended.
From the Universal Dancing Master
by Lucien O. Carpenter, 1880
**********
Rules for Gentlemen
Awkwardness of attitude betrays a want of
good home training and physical culture. A man should not lounge in
a chair, nurse his leg, caress his foot crossed over his knee or
bite his nails. A gentleman is allowed more freedom than a lady. He
may sit cross-legged if he wish, but should not sit with his knees
far apart, nor with his foot on his knee. In indicating an object,
move the whole hand, or the head, but never point the finger. All
should be quiet and graceful, either in their sitting or standing
position.
Rules of Etiquette and Home
Culture, 1886
**********
Propriety of Movement and General
Demeanor in Company
To look steadily at any one, especially if
you are a lady and are speaking to a gentleman; to turn the head
frequently on one side and the other during conversation; to balance
yourself upon your chair; to bend forward; to strike your hands upon
your knees; to hold one of your knees between your hands locked
together; to cross your legs; to extend your feet on the andirons;
to admire yourself with complacency in a glass; to adjust, in an
affected manner, your cravat, hair, dress, or handkerchief; to
remain without gloves; to fold carefully your shawl, instead of
throwing it with graceful negligence upon a table; to fret about a
hat which you have just left off; to laugh immoderately; to place
your hand upon the person with whom you are conversing; to take him
by the buttons, the collar of his cloak, the cuffs, the waist, and
so forth; to seize any person by the waist or arm, or to touch their
person; to roll the eyes or to raise them with affectation; to take
snuff from the box of your neighbor, or to offer it to strangers,
especially to ladies; to play continually with your chain or fan; to
beat time with the feet and hands; to whirl round a chair with your
hand; to shake with your feet the chair of your neighbor; to rub
your face or your hands; wink your eyes; shrug up your shoulders;
stamp with your feet, and so forth; [P. 88] --all these bad habits,
of which we cannot speak to people, are in the highest degree
displeasing.
The Lady's Guide to Perfect
Gentility, in Manners, Dress, and Conversation, in the Family, in
Company, at the Piano Forte, The Table, in the Street, and in
Gentlemen's Society. By Emily Thornwell (New York: Derby and
Jackson, 1856)
**********
Smoking
If you are so unfortunate as to have
contracted the bad habit of smoking, be careful to practice it under
certain restrictions; at least so long as you are desirous of being
considered fit for civilized society.
The first mark of a gentleman is a sensitive regard for the feelings
of others; therefore, smoke where it is least likely to prove
offensive by making your clothes smell; then wash your mouth and
brush your teeth. What man of delicacy could presume to address a
lady with his breath smelling of onions? Yet tobacco is equally
odious. The tobacco smoker, in public, is the most selfish animal
imaginable; he perseveres in contaminating the pure and fragrant
air, careless whom he annoys, and is but the fitting inmate of a
tavern.
All songs that you may see written in praise of smoking, in
magazines or newspapers, or hear sung upon the stage, are puffs,
paid for by the proprietors of cigar and tobacco shops, to make
their trade popular; therefore, never believe in nor be deluded by
them.
Smoking in the streets, or in a theatre, is only practiced by
shop-boys, pseudo-fashionables, and the “swell mob.”
From The New Letter Writer and
Art of Polite Behavior, 1851
Original Painting
used in graphics by James Jacques Joseph Tissot
