gave the eater
one wish. The first asked for money, the second for beauty, the third for
the good-will of old women. The third proved to be the successful one.

If a fairy godmother offered you one gift, what would you choose? I am not
sure that you would not do well to imitate that shrewd young prince! It is
old ladies who can teach you knowledge of the world, and whose good-will
gets you the most desirable invitations! However, you can easily gain
their good-will without any apple, so that, on the whole, I should advise
a princess to choose the gift of being a good Talker--or rather one who
produces good Talk.

A woman Macaulay, even with brilliant flashes of silence, is not loved:
you do not want a hostess who "holds forth," but one who sets her guests
talking; and every woman is the hostess when she is talking to a man, or
to any one younger or shyer than herself. You should make people go away
with a regretful feeling that they missed a great deal by having talked so
much themselves that they heard very little from you.

Do you think it is easy to listen--that it means mere silence? I assure
you it means nothing of the sort; it means listening with all your heart
and soul and mind, and making the speaker feel, by your way of listening,
that you _have_ a heart and a soul and a mind. There could not well be
anything further from the person who makes him feel that there is a mere
dead wall of silence before him _at_ which he is talking.

Listening is a fine art and requires great tact and a peculiar delicate
perception of the shades that are passing over the speaker's mind, and
dictating (often unconsciously) the words he says--words which in
themselves do not convey his mind, unless you are of the family of the
Interpreter in Bunyan, and know by instinct what he feels.

Only a large heart of quick understanding has this gift; but we help our
heart wonderfully by keeping our mind keen. The heart is apt to be very
blundering and stupid by itself; just as the mind is very apt to go off on
a wrong scent about people, unless you have a warm heart to throw true
light on their motives.

A _quick-witted heart_ is what I should put as the first requisite for a
good talker; and next a _noble heart_--a heart that cares for the best
side of things and people, a heart which brings out the bearable side of
circumstances, and the nobler side of people, and the interesting side of
subjects.

Some people are like Kay, in Ander