Perfect Behavior: A Guide for Ladies and Gentlemen in All Social Crises

Of course, it would never do to carry this series to its conclusion and if no reply is received to this last letter it might be well to call on the gentleman in his place of business— or, possibly, it might even be better to call off the engagement. “None but the brave deserve the fair”— but there is also a line in one of Byron’s poems which goes, I believe, “Here sleep the brave.” LOVE LETTERS A young man corresponding with his fiancée is never, of course, as formal as in his letters to other people. This does not mean, however, that his correspondence should be full of silly meaningless “nothings.” On the contrary, he should aim to instruct and benefit his future spouse as well as convey to her his tokens of affection. The following letter well illustrates the manner in which a young man may write his fiancée a letter which, while it is replete with proper expressions of amatory good will, yet manages to embody a fund of sensible and useful information: A Correct Letter from a Young Man Traveling in Europe to His Fiancée MY DEAREST EDITH: How I long to see you— to hold tight your hand— to look into your eyes. But alas! you are in Toledo and I am in Paris, which, as you know, is situated on the Seine River near the middle of the so-called Paris basin at a height above sea-level varying from 85 feet to 419 feet and extending 7 1/2 miles from W. to E. and 5 1/2 miles from N. to S. But, dearest, I carry your image with me in my heart wherever I go in this vast city with its population (1921) of 2,856,986 and its average mean rainfall Of 2.6 inches, and I wish— oh, how I wish— that you might be here with me. Yesterday, for example, I went to the Père Lachaise cemetery which is the largest (106 acres) and most fashionable cemetery in Paris, its 90,148 (est.) tombs forming a veritable open-air sculpture gallery. And what do you think I found there which made me think of you more than ever? Not the tombs of La Fontaine (d. 1695) and Molière (d. 1673) whose remains, transferred to this cemetery in 1804, constituted the first interments— not the last resting place of Rosa Bonheur (d.