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The Ladies' Book of Etiquette, and Manual of Politeness
·
Florence Hartley
102
To
some,
who,
with
hearts
desolated
by
the
separation
from
the
home
circle,
could
read,
with
an
eager
interest,
volumes
of
the
most
common-place,
trivial
incidents,
if
only
connected
with
the
loved
ones
there,
will
come
pages,
from
the
pen
of
the
dearest
relative,
full
of
learning,
wit,
and
wisdom,
wholly
uninteresting
to
the
receiver.
Why
is
this?
Not
from
any
desire
upon
the
part
of
the
writer
to
display
learning
or
talent,
but
because,
writing
a
letter
being
to
them
a
great
undertaking,
and
the
letter
being
destined
to
go
a
long
distance,
they
look
upon
it
as
an
event
too
unusual
to
be
wasted
in
detailing
the
simple,
every-day
details
of
domestic
life,
and
ransack
memory
and
learning
for
a
subject
worthy
of
the
long
journey
and
unusual
labor.
Others
will
have,
from
mere
acquaintances,
long,
tedious
details
of
uninteresting
trivialities,
and
from
the
near
relatives,
short,
dry
epistles,
which
fall
like
stones
upon
the
heart
longing
for
little,
affectionate
expressions,
and
home
memories.
From
some
letter
writers,
who
are
in
the
midst
of
scenes
and
events
of
the
most
absorbing
interest,
letters
arrive,
only
a
few
lines
long,
without
one
allusion
to
the
interesting
matter
lying
so
profusely
around
them;
while
others,
with
the
scantiest
of
outward
subjects,
will,
from
their
own
teeming
brain,
write
bewitching,
absorbing
epistles,
read
with
eagerness,
laid
aside
with
the
echo
of
Oliver
Twist's
petition
in
a
sigh;
the
reader
longing
for
"more."
It
is,
of
course,
impossible
to
lay
down
any
distinct
rule
for
the
style
of
letter
writing.
Embracing,
as
it
does,
all
subjects
and
all
classes,
all
countries
and
associations,
and
every
relation
in
which
one
person
can
stand
to
another,
what
would
be
an
imperative
rule
in
some
cases,
becomes
positive
absurdity
in
others.
Every
letter
will
vary
from
others
written
before,
in
either
its
subject,
the
person
addressed,
or
the
circumstances
which
make
it
necessary
to
write
it.
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