While searching google books I came across the following chapter comparing French and English manners. I think it is quite interesting and worth sharing.



FRENCH AND ENGLISH MANNERS.

Writings By Thomas De Quincey 1866

Pg 187-197



AN impression prevails pretty generally that the manners of our French neighbors are more polished than our own, and by most people this is assumed as a thing admitted even amongst ourselves, who are the persons most interested in denying it. A concession, however, made in ignorance, avails nothing. Such a concession argues the candor of the conceding party, but not therefore the truth of the charge; We English are ready enough to tax our countrymen with such vices of deportment or habits as are flagrantly obtrusive ; and sometimes even with such as are altogether imaginary.* A fault is not necessarily a real one, because it happens to be denounced by English people as an English fault; nor, if it were BO, ought we to lay any great stress upon it, so long as it is demonstrable that these same English accusers have overlooked the counterbalancing fault in the particular nation with which they are comparing us We, for our part, cannot afford to be so candid as all (hat. Candor is a very costly virtue — it costs us a most distressing effort of mind to confess anything, however true, against ourselves or against our country, unless when we have a " consideration" for doing so. In the present case, we shall find this consideration in the power of retaliation upon the French by means of corresponding exceptions to their manners. Luckily, if we offend in one way, they offend not less conspicuously in another. Having this set-off against our ancient enemy, we are not indisposed to admit the truth against ourselves, which else it would have been quite out of the question to expect of us.

* Witness the malicious charge against all of as English, so car- rent in the mouths of both Frenchmen and the English themselves, that from aristocratic jealousies as to the rank and pretensions of parties not personally known and guaranteed to us, we avoid on the continent beyond all other society that of our own countrymen. If this were even true, there might be alleged some reasons for it not altogether illiberal. Meantime it happens that the very contradictory charge to this exists as a standing reproach to the English in our own literature. From Lord Chesterfield's days downwards to this present era, it has been made an argument of our national absurdity, that we English herd only with our own countrymen ; that we do not virtually quit England ; and that

The idea involved in what we call manners is a very complex one ; and in some of its elements, as we may have occasion to show further on, it represents qualities of character (as also of temperament) that are perfectly neutral as regards the social expression of manners. This social expression, which is the chief thing that men think of when describing manners as good or bad, lies in two capital features:

in this way we only, of all European nations, fail to improve by travel, refusing, in fact, to benefit by that extended experience which originally had been the ostensible object of our travels. Malignant calumniator, whether foreign or (as too often happens) native English, reconcile these charges, if you can 1

first of all, in respect to others; secondly, in self- respect. Now, the English fail too often in the first, the French in the second. There is the balance. The French reason to have MS as regards the first; we them as regards the second.

The term "respect for others " may seem too strong for the case. Respect, in its graver expressions, may have no opening for itself in casual intercourse with strangers. But simple decency of appearance, and decorum of manner, warrant that limited mode of respect which expresses itself by courtesy and affability. You listen to the stranger with complaisance ; you answer him with cheerfulness. So much of attention might be justified in the most aristocratic country by a decent exterior, by a demeanor not brutal, and by a style of conversation not absolutely repulsive. Here it is, and in all cases where the relation between strangers rests upon the simple footing of their common humanity, that the Frenchman has so great an advantage over the Englishman. Every Frenchman has been trained from his infancy to recognize in all human beings an indefeasible claim upon his civility. To listen without visible impatience upon being asked by a stranger for information, to answer without abruptness or marked expression of hurry, he considers a mere debt to the universal rights of human nature ; and to refuse the payment of a debt so easily settled he would regard as a dishonor to himself. The Englishman, on the other hand, in the same circumstances, is too often morose and churlish; he answers fretfully, hurriedly, and briefly, as to one who is interrupting him unseasonably, or even robbing him of his time; and at any rate it is rare that

he answers as if he had a pleasure in giving the information asked. This tone of harshness and incivility it is that constantly deters people of quick sensibility from addressing themselves at random, in any case of difficulty, to the street-passengers in London. Often have we observed timid or nervous people drawing up into a corner, and anxiously reviewing' the stream of passing faces, in order to select one that might promise patience enough and kindness for enduring the interruption. This repulsive aspect of British manners wears even an exaggerated shape in Scotland. London is not half so uncivilized in this respect as some of our Lowland Scottish cities. Ask a question of ten successive passengers, and nine of the answers will give you reason to wish that yon had held your tongue. Even sexual gallantry avails not always to prompt courtesy. A handsome young lady from the northern Highlands of Scotland, used to the courtesy of her Celtic countrymen (for the Scotch Highlanders have no resemblance in this point to the Lowland Scotch), told us, that on her first visit southwards, happening to inquire her way of a working-man, instead of any direction whatever, she received a lecture for her presumption in supposing that " folk " had nothing else to do but to answer idle people's questions. This was her first application Her second was less mortifying, but equally unprofitable. The man in that second case uttered no word at all, civil or uncivil; but, with a semicircular wave backwards of his right arm, jerked his right thumb over his right shoulder, after which ho .repeated the same manoeuvre with his left arm, left thumb, and left shoulder,—leaving the young Inverness-shire lady utterly mystified by his hieroglyphics, which to this hour she has not solved, still thankful that he had forborne to lecture her.

At first sight, then, it may be easily imagined how- fascinating * is the aspect of a society moulded by French courtesy, coming in direct succession to that harsher form which society wears in the streets of this island. And yet even this French courtesy has been the object of suspicion in reference to its real origin. Mr. Scott, of Aberdeen, a celebrated man in his day, was assured during one of his French tours, and not by any envious foreigner, but by a discerning Frenchman, that the true ground of French affability was, not any superior kindness of heart disposable for petty occasions, but the national love of talking. A French woman comes out of her road, or leaves, her shop, in order to finish her instructions as to your proper route, so that mistake shall be impossible. She does this with an empressement that seems truly amiable, because apparently altogether disinterested. " By no means," said her cynical countryman to Mr. Scott, " not at all disinterested. What she seeks to gratify is far less any temper of general kindliness than the furious passion for hearing herself talk. Garrulity is what you gentlemen from England have mistaken for diffusive courtesy." There is so far a foundation for this caustic remark, that undoubtedly the French are the most garrulous people upon earth. Look into the novels of Eugene Sue and of Dumas, which reflect pretty accurately the external features of Parisian society, and you will perceive how indispensable to the daily comfort of the general population is copious talking, and unlimited indulgence of petty personal curiosity. These habits naturally support and strengthen the auxiliary habit of cheerful politeness. To tempt others into the spirit of communicativeness, it is indispensable to open their hearts by courteous and genial treatment. But, allowing for this undoubted national infirmity,— namely, the intense predisposition to gossiping and commerage,— it still remains undeniable that the French, with less of a profound or impassioned benignity than some of their neighbors, have more by a great deal of that light-hearted, surface goodnature, which applies itself to trivial and uncostly services.

* A Scotchman, who published an account of his tour to Paris some ten or twelve years ago, furnishes a memorable illustration of the profound impression made on him by a sudden transition from his native country to France. He professes himself a rigid Presbyterian, and everywhere shows a bigoted hatred of Popery, which at times expresses itself most indecorously; yet such was his astonishment at the general courtesy amongst the French, and such his sense of the public peace produced by this courtesy, combined with general sobriety, that he seriously propounds the question, — whether even the sacrifice of Protestant purity, and the adoption of Popery, would not be a cheap price to pay, if by such changes it were possible to purchase these French advantages of quiet and refinement.

The garrulity of the French temperament, therefore, if it mingles a little as a selfish element in the French affability, is yet so far valuable as it offers a collateral pledge for its continuance. This demur, therefore, will not seriously disturb the pretensions of the French to the most amiable form of national politeness that has ever descended deeply amongst the body of the people. But another demur there is, not suggested by any countryman of their own, but irresistibly forced upon the notice of us islanders by the clamorous contrast with our own manners, which does undoubtedly probe the value of their refinement in a way painfully humiliating. Ask any candid and observing tourist in Prance for the result of his experience, and he will agree that generally at the table d'hote, and especially when the company is composed chiefly of flying travellers, the French manifest a selfishness and an exclusiveness of attention to their own comfort, which is shocking to a native of this country. In thorough contradiction to the prevailing notions of this country, which on such subjects are almost uniformly unsound, the French nationally are great eaters. They and the Germans are the two most gormandizing races in Europe. This gratification is not for a moment laid under any restraint by the verbal sacrifices to civility. The dishes are rifled of their best luxuries in the same unblushing spirit of selfishness which would govern most of us in escaping from a burning theatre. Of course no individual experience is sufficient for sustaining this as a national charge ; but we have heard concurrent testimonies from many travellers to the same effect, all tending to show a general selfishness amongst the French in any similar case of competition, which the cloak of external and verbal politeness does but the more powerfully expose. Such an exposure, if true and unexaggerated, stands out in violent contrast to all that we have ourselves observed of British life. Through a course of many years' familiarity with our own mails, and other superior public cap riages, we never once witnessed a dinner at which the spirit of mutual attention and self-sacrifice did not preside.

Even in respect for others, therefore, where generally the French so much excel ourselves, yet when a selfish interest thwarts the natural tendency of their manners, this tendency appears to give way. But it is in self-respect that the French most of all betray their" inferiority, and here it is the countervailing excellence of British manners asserts itself. The stern and too often surly Briton, whether Englishman or Scotchman, is saved by this very form of un- amiableness from the pettiness of garrulity. If sometimes he is disagreeable, at least he is not undignified ; if he presents an unattractive phasis to society, at any rate he is not unmanly. Now, of all unmanli- ness, intellectually though not. morally speaking, the habits of gossip and loquaciousness are about the most degrading.

Yet gossiping and garrulity are not the most prominent infirmities by which the French betray their deficient self-respect. Gesticulation, as an inseparable organ of French conversation, is even more immediately disfiguring to the ideal of personal dignity. A gesticulating nation cannot be a dignified nation. A running accompaniment of pantomime may be picturesque, and in harmony with the general vivacity amongst harlequins and columbines, but cannot for a moment reconcile itself with any authentic standard of human dignity. The French have been notorious through generations for their puerile affeet-' ation of Roman forms, models, and historic precedents ; and yet, beyond all other races known to history, the Roman is that which it would be most difficult to represent as expressing the grandeur of its purposes by gesticulation or histrionic pantomime.

This feature of French manners, and the essential degradation which cleaves to it, ought to be kept before the public eye at this moment, when not only the increasing intercourse with France, but also the insensible contagion from our own popular novels, too often written by those who are semi-denizens of Paris, violently tend to the transfiguration of our own ideals, so greatly superior in this particular to those of France. In many of these novels we have it said, as a matter of course, that A or B " shrugged his shoulders." But what Englishman, unless ridiculously metamorphosed by Paris, so as absolutely to have forgotten his own native usages, ever uses this odious gesture, or could use it with any hope of not disgusting his audience ? not to mention other forms of pantomime still more degrading. Though countenanced by good society in Paris (such, for example, as the application of the finger to the side of the nostrils, together with an accompanying advancement of the face, by way of expressing a signal of knowingness or insinuation of secret understanding), even the words and phrases imported by our novels, and which are already settling into vernacular use, are sometimes fitted to import also the vulgar sentiment which they embody. Twenty-five years ago the vile ejaculation "Bah!" was utterly unknown to the English public. Now, and entirely through the currency given to it by our own novels, it has become the most popular expression for dismissing with contempt any opinion or suggestion of the person with whom you are conversing. Anything more brutal or more insolent, in the way of summary contempt, cannot be imagined. To reject your companion's thoughts may sometimes be requisite in mere sincerity ; but to do so with this plebeian want of consideration, leaving behind it the same sense of a stinging insult as would follow the act of puffing the smoke from a tobacco-pipe into your face, is a striking instance of the real coarseness which often crept amongst the refinements of the French.

This instance, by the way, illustrates also the fact that the French swerve at times from the law of respect to others not less grossly (though less frequently) than from the law of self-respect; and it is worthy of remark that they swerve uniformly from the proper tone of respect for others, when it happens that this respect is precluded from expressing itself (as between equals it does) by means of kindness and courtesy. Thus, in the intercourse between master and servant the French always hold a false tone, whether in real life, or in the imitations of the drama. The French master is never dignified, though he may chance to be tyrannical; and the French servant, without meaning to be so, is always disrespectfully familiar. The late Lady Blessington well illustrated the difference between a French and an English footman. "If," said she, "I ask my English servant any question about the residence and occupation of a petitioner who may have called to solicit charity, he answers rigorously to the particular questions I put; not by one hair's-breadth does he allow himself to wander into circumstances about which I have not questioned him. But the Frenchman fancies himself called upon to give his opinion upon every point, however remotely connected with my inquiries. He loses himself in volumes of garrulity ; and, without designing any disrespect, practically by his voluble manner forgets that he is speaking to his mistress."

To the manners of a nation belong also its usages, and some of these amongst the French are essentially vulgar. That field would lead us too far. But, in the mean time, when peace and the increasing facilities of locomotion are annually bringing us more and more within French influence, it may have a seasonable use to direct the thoughts upon the current prejudice that French manners furnish any absolute model — to separate that which is really good and beautiful from that which rests upon false foundations — and, by suggesting a spirit of jealous discrimination in relation to foreign manners, eventually to warn us against exotic forms of coxcombry, and sometimes against exotic forms of sheer slang and brutality.



MarzJul 1, 2009 @ 01:47