Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 131.djvu/389

Rh dinner, and had taken his siesta; after which he commenced ruminating over the events of the day, and then at last thought of his prisoner! He returned to the Abbey at some inconvenience, and set him free with many apologies. Dr. Rimbault's ardor to be shut up in a muniment-room had then quite cooled.

 

 From The Pall Mall Gazette.

Philadelphia, Sept. 4. peculiarity of life at Cape May and Long Branch — and these places may be taken as illustrations of nearly all American resorts except Newport — is the general absence of even those slight distinctions which mark the various circles of society in the home cities of this country. This to a stranger is one of the most curious phases of summer life in America, and it cannot be understood by the application of any rules known to the society of England or the Continent. It is made possible by a single unwritten law of the American social code, which is universally recognized, and the authority of which is rarefy, if ever questioned. An acquaintance formed at a watering-place involves no obligation of any kind after the end of the season. A lady may dance with a new acquaintance every evening for six weeks at Long Branch, and a slight passing bow in the street is all that the most stringent etiquette requires of her in New York or Philadelphia during the following winter. Even this is given more from that kindness on which all courtesy is based than because it is demanded by etiquette; and a gentleman is expected, like the ballroom acquaintance of a single evening in England, to await his recognition from the lady. This rule is so well established here that even such people as would like to disobey it and take advantage of an acquaintance formed at a summer resort are entirely overruled, and seem to be perfectly harmless. Under this law of the Medes and Persians — for such it has become — the most careful father or mother sees no danger in the formation of "promiscuous" acquaintances during the summer, so far as mere social entanglements are concerned. The only serious danger is of the kind which the otherwise harmless "detrimental" introduces into English society. A daughter may find herself interested in a young man of pleasing address and unexceptionable manners, whose character and resources are such that he would be anything but a desirable son-in-law. By the word "resources" is meant, in this connection and in this country, his ability to work successfully in business or a profession rather than the present possession of property. This danger, however, is one which is cheerfully and rather recklessly encountered. American parents seem indifferent, as a general rule, to the ancestral antecedents of their sons' or their daughters' future companions, and they are singularly ready to run grave risks, to say the least, as to their personal qualifications. There is little restriction, therefore, in the formation of new acquaintances at the summer resorts, and nearly any young gentleman of good manners appearing at one of them is taken up and utilized for the temporary uses of the dance and flirtation. In ninety-nine cases in a hundred he is laid aside again at the end of the season with quite as little ceremony. This process is constantly going on at all the seaside and mountain resorts. A stranger would hardly notice it at such crowded centres as Cape May and Long Branch. He would find many secluded circles, too, among the throngs at these places in which very "strict" ideas prevail. But these are mere eddies in the general current of American society. They represent no important class, and may be regarded as individuals only. At either of these resorts the stranger sees the result; he sees a great conglomerate social mass; but he would be confused if he attempted to learn how people have become acquainted with each other who had never met before; how the most intimate social relations have come to exist among utter strangers of the previous week. Let him go to the Delaware Water Gap, or Spring Lake, or Brynmaur, or any of the minor resorts within equally easy reach of Philadelphia, and he will understand the process in a day. He will see a young man arrive, for instance, at a small hotel in the afternoon, well dressed and of good manners. The new visitor will smoke a cigar, offer another gentleman a light, exchange a few words, drop into a chat — play a game of billiards, perhaps. There is dancing-music in the drawing-room during the evening. There are two, perhaps three, ladies for every gentleman. Sets are to be formed for a quadrille. The ladies' curiosity has already been piqued as to who the young stranger is, and what he is like. His cigar-acquaintance approaches him: "Dance? — good. By 