1 remarked, for she had heard him ordering his morning

bath at the hotel, and he had also been polite to her under vexation." This remark, recorded by Mr. Meredith, serves to remind us that gentlemanliness in its origin, and on a superficial view of it still, is but obedience to such ceremonial customs as our particular tribe may impose on its persons of quality. Not to know or not to practise the customs is to be convicted of ill-breeding. It may be a mere matter of a meal ; yet the French pretender who eats his olives with a fork when custom prescribes fingers will be without reprieve and quite justly condemned as an impostor. Regulations, however, as to the gentlemanlike hour for a bath or the decent way of eating liars crceuvre will vary from country to country, and in the same country from year to year; nay, such unwritten laws may be varied of set pur- pose; in one London season " g " shall be discharged from the termination of all words as an unnecessary letter ; in another a single adverb or adjective shall be told off to express every sort and every shade of emotion; for these are badges and pass-words indicating that those who use them move in a certain class of society, and are still members of it in this year of grace. But shibboleths throw no light on the inner qualities of those who use them. Is there not some temper of mind, some way of looking at things, some constant characteristics beneath the variety of manners, such as being polite under vexation, which may be predicated of gentlemen in all civilised countries ? "It may not be like a gentleman, though it may be genteel." It is Boswell who so distinguishes, and Boswell was an unequalled observer.

A friend of the present writer who lives in the country resents nothing so much as the attempt made every now and then by literary persons to analyse out this precious essence. He never forgave Thackeray for his "Book of Snobs." or Louis Steven- son for a certain article he wrote in Scribner. In his view, a gentleman occupies the same sort of position as the wise man of the Stoic philosophy. He can do nothing wrong, and no one else can do anything right. We have heard our friend condemn Rossetti's pictures en bloc because they made him laugh, and no picture that made a gentleman laugh could be good art. On the other hand, no joke that did not make him laugh could be a good joke: The gentleman, in short, as such, is sole arbiter of all the elegances of life. The theory was plausible and convenient, and only broke down when our gentleman left the country fastness where his word was law, on a visit to the Metropolis, and was forced to bear the contradiction of other gentlemen at his club. It is, of course, the fact, and so much may be conceded to our friend's point of view, that a gentleman, like a poet, is born, and not made ; and not even men of letters, with all their intrepidity, would attempt to furnish a recipe for the manu- facture of either article ; but the vision of the inexpressible, ever-elusive idea is the Fata Morgana of literature, and the longing it inspires deserves not contempt but pity. Other great names may be alleged in support of those mentioned

:Painters" upon "Vulgarity," and Cardinal Newman, in the lectures upon "The Idea of a University," gave his view with his accustomed lucidity.

He says :—" It is almost the definition of a gentleman to say he is one who never inflicts pain He has his eyes on all his company; he is tender towards the bashful, .gentle towards the distant, and merciful towards the absurd ; he can recollect to whom he is speaking; he guards against 'unseasonable allusions or topics which may irritate; he is seldom prominent in conversation, and never wearisome. He makes light of favours while he does them, and seems to be receiving when he is conferring. He never speaks of himself except when compelled, never defends himself by a mere retort: he has no care for slander or gossip, is scrupulous in imputing motives to those who interfere with him, and interprets everything for the best. He is never mean or little in his disputes, never takes unfair advantage, never mistakes personalities or sharp sayings for arguments, or insinuates evil which he dare not say out." One objection to this definition of Newman's, if it be an objection, is that it would rule out all schoolmasters, heads of Colleges and Halls, Bishops, and Magistrates. The point might to argued whether these officers do not in the interest of the community make a sacrifice of gentlemanliness within the limits of their profession. We might adduce such anecdotes as that of Dr. Busby, of Westminster, who walked before his Sovereign without removing his hat; and experience would suggest that in certain cases the whole nature had become subdued to what it works in. There are worthy people who take all the world for their College or their Diocese, and go into society with the intention of putting everybody right. A more serious objection to Newman's view

is that it makes gentlemanliness consist in a regard to what is due to others instead of in a regard to what is due to oneself. The principle of gentlemanliness is noblesse oblige. The sphere

of its exercise must, of course, lie in the world of human relations, but the constraining motive is much less an interest in the objects of its attention than a sense of what conduct is becoming. And in regard to some of its deepest instincts, such as bravery and truthfulness, the thought of others does not come into consideration at all. The sense of personal dignity is no less plainly the motive for self-restraint and reserve in circumstances that to the mere child of Nature would seem to justify effusion. Marvell, in his ode to Crom- well, noted with satisfaction that Charles L died like a gentleman :— "He nothing common did nor mean

Upon that memorable scene,

But with his keener eye

The axe's edge did try :

Nor called the gods, with vulgar spite, To vindicate his helpless right ; But bowed his comely head Down, as upon a bed."

It is interesting also to remark how critically the polished gentlemen of the last century scanned the behaviour at their trial and on the scaffold of the rebel lords who suffered for

A further objection to Newman's definition might well he that it makes gentlemanliness too much a matter of words. This is a, natural fault in a man of letters, and we find it in others besides Newman. Steele uses the phrase "a man of conversation" as an alternative to " gentleman" ; and the defect of Stevenson's brilliant essay is that his conception is just a thought too histrionic, and makes wit almost an essential element in the character. The gentlemen he calls attention to occupy a public stage and make epigrams. Now the English variety of the breed is not much given to epigram. The English gentleman who is not at the same time a scholar

is apt, in the matter of repartee, to restrict himself to the customary phrases of club or drawing-room, and the im- mortelles of wit. Not unfrequently he is brusque; at the best his conversational graces are negative. His good breeding is far more likely to display itself by action than by word, and it will not be forgotten that generosity, which may take innumerable forms, is etymologically but a synonym for good breeding. It is one of the many wise remarks of the late Master of Balliol, quoted in his biography, that there will always be great need of an aristocracy in this country to An interesting question concerning gentlemanliness is it relation to morality. Chaucer makes his wife of Bath roundl) assert their identity :— ‘g Look who that is most virtuous alway Prive and apert, and most entendeth ay To do the gentle deedes that he can, And take him for the greatest gentleman."

Certainly the two; resemble each other in the respect that each prescribes a code of conduct, the one appealing to the point of conscience, the other to the point of honour; and

in many matters their judgments will agree. Social com- plaisance may have its root in the Christian virtue of for- bearance (brteixues), and Cardinal Newman's description

quoted above is evidently so coloured. Again, Christian morality recognises that a man has a duty to himself, though the fact has been obscured in our Church Catechism. A false step in morals is often at the same time a lapse in dignity, and any conduct that can be censured as selfish would be no less reproached as ungentlemanlike.

But the world's code and the Church's do not altogether coincide. In the eighteenth century it was no disgrace to a gentleman to get drunk, though it was admittedly immoral; and it is still no disgrace to gamble. It should be the aim of moralists to bring the lower ideal into ever closer approxima- tion with their own by getting more and more vices condemned as bad form.

TRITE LIVES OF ANIMALS.