Page:Advice to young ladies on their duties and conduct in life - Arthur - 1849.djvu/148

140 felt as no compliment. It may be, that her companion is not able to talk about any thing more sensible; if that be the case, the quicker he seek to entertain those like him, the better, and a young lady of good sense will think stooping to gossip with him too dear a price to pay for his favorable opinion.

Never converse with young men about your own private and personal matters, nor of the concerns of your family. They are merely your acquaintances, not your confidential friends, and never should be admitted to that distinction. Some young men will take a dishonorable advantage of such things, and repeat what you have said in order to make it appear that you entertain for them a particular preference. If what you have really said be not sufficient to give that construction to it, they will add a little coloring, so as to make it suit their purpose. Many a young lady, could she hear her own words repeated, with a certain construction placed upon them by young men, would weep with shame and mortification. It is impossible for you to be too guarded in this particular. If you could but once hear, as the writer has dozens of times heard, young men, after spending an evening in free, social intercourse with young ladies, relate what this, that, and the other one