who come down here every summer with nothing in them but sincere friendship and go home full of victuals. I wish you would put into it some way a piece that says I do not regard a Christmas present of a chalk meershum pipe, with a red celluloid stem, as an offset against a summer's board of a family that has more malaria than good manners. Slap that in, in your genial way, so as not to give offense, and whenever you visit your old birthplace, and want to just let go all holts and have a good time, come right to our house. I have lathed and plastered the cook-room and fitted it up as a kind of Inebriates' Home, and I would feel tickled to death to have you come and see what you think of it.
P. S. Again. If you print this letter, Slocum would be a good fictitious name to sign to it, and I would want an extra copy of the paper also.
T.
Reply.
Sir: Will you allow me to say that I think it is such letters as the above that create ill-feeling between the people of the country and the people of the city, and cause the relations to be strained, especially those relations that live in the country. Although you are not altogether in the wrong, Eben, and although country people, who live near to nature's heart, have certain inalienable rights which should be respected, yet there is no work on etiquette which covers the case you allude to.
It would be very difficult for me to write out a code of ethics for the government of your relative while in the country, and from the description you give of him I judge that we could not enforce it anyway without calling out the State troops.
I take him to belong to that class of New York business men who are so active doing nothing every day, that in order to impress people with their importance, they are in the habit of pushing a woman or two off the Brooklyn bridge in their wild struggle to get over into the City Hall park and sit down. I presume that he is that kind of a man here, and so we think you ought to get along with him through July and August if we take him for the rest of the year.
He is the kind that would knock down an old woman in the morning, in his efforts to get the first possible elevated train, and then do nothing else all day but try to recover from the shock. I wouldn't be surprised if he ultimately wrote a book on etiquette, which will inform a countryman how to conduct himself while he is in town. Maybe he is writing it now.
I can imagine, Eben, what sad havoc the son of such a man would create in your quiet Piscataquis home. In my mind's eye I can see him trying to carry out his father's lofty notions of refinement and courtesy. I can see his bright smile as he lands at your door and begins to insert himself into your home life, to breathe resinous air of the piney woods, and to pour kerosene into the sugar bowl, to chase the gaudy decalcomanie butterfly, and put angle worms in the churn.
In this man's book on etiquette he will, doubtless, say that should you have occasion while at table to use a toothpick, you should hold a napkin before your mouth while doing so, in order to avoid giving offense to those who are at table. It is not necessary for you to crawl under the table to pick your teeth, or to go out behind the barn, for by throwing a large napkin over your head you can pick your teeth with impunity though you should not use a fork, as it does not look well and it might put out your eye.
Nothing is more disgusting to a refined mind than to see a man at table holding one of his eyes on a fork and scrutinizing it with the other.
In calling on a lady who is away from home leave your card. If the visit is intended for two or three ladies at the house, leave two or three cards, but do not turn down the corner of the card as that custom is now exploded except in three card monte circles and even then it is regarded with suspicion.
All these things, however, are for the guidance of people who come to town, and those who go into the country are left practically without any suitable book to guide them.
I do not know of any better way for you to do, Eben, than to write a polite note to your relatives asking them if they contemplate paying you a visit this summer, and if so at what time, and whether they will bring Henry or not. Use plain white unruled note paper and write only on one side, unless you are a Mugwump in which case you might write on both sides.
Then if they write that they do so contemplate paying you a visit without paying anything else, I do not know of anything for you to do but to go away somewhere for the summer, leaving your house fully insured and in the hands of a reliable incendiary.
Write again, Eben, and feel perfectly free to come and lean on me in all matters of etiquette. Do not come to town without hunting me up. You will find me at the Post-Office forenoons and in the pest-house during the afternoon. Yours, with kind regards.
MEN ARE OFTEN MISUNDERSTOOD
They may be rough on the exterior but they can love Oh, so earnestly, so warmly, so truly, so deeply, so intensely, so yearningly, so fondly, and so universally!
CHESTNUT-BURR VII – BILL NYE IN THE ROLE OF AN UTE INDIAN JENKINS
Personal Gossip Designed to Interest the Indian Society People – Remarkable Toilets Seen on the Reservation – A Novel Aboriginal Dinner Menu – Points for Society Reporters – Eager to Make Their Mark.
The following Ute society gossip is full of interest to those who have personal acquaintances and friends, among that set. I have only just received them, and hasten to give them as early as possible, knowing that the readers of The World will all feel an interest in what is going on in and about the reservation:
The season at White River will be unusually gay this winter, and soon there will be one continuous round of hilarity, indigestion, mirth, colic and social hatred, Red Horse, the smoke-tanned horse-fiddle maestro, will play and call off again this winter for germans, grub dances and jack-rabbit gorges as usual.
The Ouray War Club will give a series of hops in November under its own auspices, and in December it will hold two Germans. In going through these Germans no favors will be shown by the club.
Mr. and Mrs. Mexican-Hairless-Dog-upon-whom-there-are-no-Flies have been spending the summer at their delightful hostile home near White River. They have just returned for the winter, beautifully bronzed by the elements, and report one of the most exhilarating outbreaks they ever were to.
Lop-Ear-Son-of-the-Cyclone received a cablegram last week, on his return from the war-path, offering him a princely salary to come to London, and assist in robbing the Deadwood coach. He says the legitimate drama is certainly making wonderful strides. He has heard the American Opera Company in "Hero," and says that no one who has lived on the reservation all his life can have any idea of the strides that are being made on the stage. He has not decided whether to accept the offer or not, but says that if the stage they are going to rob is the operatic stage he will not assist at any price. He says he knows what it is to suffer for clothes himself.
The members of the Chipeta Canoeing Club have just returned from a summer jaunt, and are in good spirits. They report that a good time was had and health greatly improved. The club will give a sociable and gastric recital at its grounds next week. The proceeds will go toward beautifying the grounds of the club and promoting a general good feeling. Each member is permitted to bring one cash friend.
Tail-Man-Who-Toys with-the-Thunderbolts will start to-morrow for the home of the Great White Father, at Washington. He goes to make a treaty or two and be awed by the surplus in the treasury. He will make as many treaties as possible, after which he will invite the Great White Father to visit our young and growing reservation, enjoy our crude hospitality and cultivate the Ute vote.
A select scalp-dance and rum sociable will take place at the foot of the gulch, at the middle of the present moon, after which there
