Page:Book of Etiquette, Volume 2, by Lilian Eichler.djvu/26

6 unkind to be overbearing to servants in the presence of guests, or to scold one servant in the presence of another.

Insolence to servants on the part of children is as much a reflection on the manners of the parents, as it is upon the breeding of the children. The child that hears the servants addressed in rude, haughty manner will quite naturally adopt the same manner towards them. And no one, child or adult, can be considered well-bred unless he or she is courteous and kind to everyone, especially to those whose social position is inferior.

In the park, recently, a little tot of six years or thereabouts had a bag of peanuts which she offered to two little playmates and also to their mother who was sitting near by. Seeing that she did not offer her governess some peanuts, the woman inquired, "Why don't you offer Miss Taylor some?" To which the youngster immediately replied, "Oh, she's only my governess."

This is the result of wrong principle in the home. No child is born a snob. No child is born haughty and arrogant. It is the home environment and the precedent of the parents that makes such vain, unkind little children as the one mentioned above. It is actually unfair to the young children in the home to set the wrong example by being discourteous to the servants. They will only have to fight, later, to conquer the petty snobbishness that stands between them and their entrance into good society.

In the sixteenth century French women servants were arrested and placed in prison for wearing clothes similar