ith a tap on your elbow your
smiling hostess introduces you and, having spoiled your afternoon, flits
off in search of other prey.

The question of introductions is one on which it is impossible to lay
down any fixed rules. There must constantly occur situations where one's
acts must depend upon a kindly consideration for other people's feelings,
which after all, is only another name for tact. Nothing so plainly shows
the breeding of a man or woman as skill in solving problems of this kind
without giving offence.

Foreigners, with their greater knowledge of the world, rarely fall into
the error of indiscriminate introducing, appreciating what a presentation
means and what obligations it entails. The English fall into exactly the
contrary error from ours, and carry it to absurd lengths. Starting with
the assumption that everybody knows everybody, and being aware of the
general dread of meeting "detrimentals," they avoid the difficulty by
making no introductions. This may work well among themselves, but it is
trying to a stranger whom they have been good enough to ask to their
tables, to sit out the meal between two people who ignore his presence
and converse across him; for an Englishman will expire sooner than speak
to a person to whom he has not been introduced.

The French, with the marvellous tact that has for centuries made them the
law-givers on all subjects of etiquette and breeding, have another way of
avoiding useless introductions. They assume that two people meeting in a
drawing-room belong to the same world and so chat pleasantly with those
around them. On leaving the _salon_ the acquaintance is supposed to end,
and a gentleman who should at another time or place bow or speak to the
lady who had offered him a cup of tea and talked pleasantly to him over
it at a friend's reception, would commit a gross breach of etiquette.

I was once present at a large dinner given in Cologne to the American
Geographical Society. No sooner was I seated than my two neighbors
turned towards me mentioning their names and waiting for me to do the
same. After that the conversation flowed on as among friends. This
custom struck me as exceedingly well-bred and calculated to make a
foreigner feel at his ease.

Among other curious types, there are people so constituted that they are
unhappy if a single person can be found in the room to whom they have not
been introduced. It does not matter who the stranger may be or wh