d to the sound.

The theater is not only the best possible place to hear correctly
enunciated speech, but a play of contemporary life is equally valuable as
a study in manners. There is also a suavity of grace in the way Europeans
bow and stand and sit, and in the way they speak, that is unconsciously
imitated. These "manners" need not--in fact, should not--be gushing or
mincing, but you gradually perceive that jerking ramrod motions and
stalking into a drawing-room like a grenadier are less impressive than
awkward.

=THE SPOILED AMERICAN GIRL=

The subject of American manners, as they appear to Europeans, cannot be
dismissed without comment on a reprehensible type of American girl who
flourishes on shipboard, on tours, and in public places generally--but
most particularly in the large and expensive hotels of Continental
resorts.

If she and her family have a "home," they are never in it, and if they
have any object in life other than letting her follow her own unhampered
inclinations, it is not apparent to the ordinary observer. Such a girl is
always over-dressed, she wears every fashion in its extremest
exaggeration, she sparkles with jewelry, and reeks of scent, she switches
herself this way and that, and is always posing in public view and playing
to the public gallery. She generally has a small brother who refuses to go
to bed at night, or to stop making the piazza chairs into a train of cars,
or to use the public halls as a skating rink. When he is not making a
noise, he is eating. And his "elegant" sister looks upon him with disdain.

Sister, meanwhile, jingling with chains and bangles, decked in scarfs and
tulle and earrings, leans on or against whatever happens to be convenient,
flirting with any casual stranger who comes along. She invariably goes to
her meals alone--evidently thinking her parents should be kept apart from
her. She is never away from the Kurhaus or Casino, abroad or the hotel
lobby in America. She is nearly always alone, and the book she is
perpetually reading is always opened at the same page, and she is sure to
look up as you pass. She is very ready to be "picked up" and to confide
her life's history, past, present and future, to any stranger, especially
a young one of the opposite sex. She is rude only to her mother and
father. She is also (we know, but Europe doesn't) a perfectly "good" girl.
Her lack of etiquette is shocking, but her morals are above reproach. She
does not even mea