er, I look upon as an omen
of your being well received everywhere else; for to tell you the truth,
it was the place that I distrusted the most in that particular. But there
is a certain conduct, there are certaines 'manieres' that will, and must
get the better of all difficulties of that kind; it is to acquire them
that you still continue abroad, and go from court to court; they are
personal, local, and temporal; they are modes which vary, and owe their
existence to accidents, whim, and humor; all the sense and reason in the
world would never point them out; nothing but experience, observation,
and what is called knowledge of the world, can possibly teach them. For
example, it is respectful to bow to the King of England, it is
disrespectful to bow to the King of France; it is the rule to courtesy to
the Emperor; and the prostration of the whole body is required by eastern
monarchs. These are established ceremonies, and must be complied with:
but why thev were established, I defy sense and reason to tell us. It is
the same among all ranks, where certain customs are received, and must
necessarily be complied with, though by no means the result of sense and
reason. As for instance, the very absurd, though almost universal custom
of drinking people's healths. Can there be anything in the world less
relative to any other man's health, than my drinking a glass of wine?
Common sense certainly never pointed it out; but yet common sense tells
me I must conform to it. Good sense bids one be civil and endeavor to
please; though nothing but experience and observation can teach one the
means, properly adapted to time, place, and persons. This knowledge is
the true object of a gentleman's traveling, if he travels as he ought to
do. By frequenting good company in every country, he himself becomes of
every country; he is no longer an Englishman, a Frenchman, or an Italian;
but he is an European; he adopts, respectively, the best manners of every
country; and is a Frenchman at Paris, an Italian at Rome, an Englishman
at London.

This advantage, I must confess, very seldom accrues to my countrymen from
their traveling; as they have neither the desire nor the means of getting
into good company abroad; for, in the first place, they are confoundedly
bashful; and, in the next place, they either speak no foreign language at
all, or if they do, it is barbarously. You possess all the advantages
that they want; you know the languages in perfectio