It must be remembered that a gentleman has no right to ask any one who is not really one of his best friends to propose or second him.  It is an awkward thing to refuse in the first place, and in the second it involves considerable effort, and on occasion a great deal of annoyance and trouble.

For example let us suppose that Jim Smartlington asks Donald Lovejoy to propose him and Clubwin Doe to second him.  His name is written in the book kept for the purpose and signed by both proposer and seconder: 

Smartlington, James
Proposer:  Donald Lovejoy
Seconder:  Clubwin Doe

Nothing more is done until the name is posted—­meaning that it appears among a list of names put up on the bulletin-board in the club house.  It is then the duty of Lovejoy and Doe each to write a letter of endorsement to the governors of the club, to be read by them when they hold the meeting at which his name comes up for election.

Example: 

Board of Governors,
The Nearby Club.

    Dear sirs: 

It affords me much pleasure to propose for membership in the Nearby Club Mr. James Smartlington.  I have known Mr. Smartlington for many years and consider him qualified in every way for membership.

He is a graduate of Yalvard, class 1916, rowed on the Varsity
crew, and served in the 180th, as 1st Lieut., overseas during the
war.  He is now in his father’s firm (Jones, Smartlington & Co.).

Yours very truly,
Donald Lovejoy.

Lovejoy must also at once tell Smartlington to ask about six friends who are club-members (but not governors) to write letters endorsing him.  Furthermore, the candidate can not come up for election unless he knows several of the governors personally, who can vouch for him at the meeting.  Therefore Lovejoy and Doe must one or the other take Smartlington to several governors (at their offices generally) and personally present him, or very likely they invite two or three of the governors and Smartlington to lunch.

Even under the best of circumstances it is a nuisance for a busy man to have to make appointments at the offices of other busy men.  And since it is uncertain which of the governors will be present at any particular meeting, it is necessary to introduce the candidate to a sufficient number so that at least two among those at the meeting will be able to speak for him.

In the example we have chosen, Clubwin Doe, having himself been a governor and knowing most of the present ones very well, has less difficulty in presenting his candidate to them than many other members might have, who, though they have for years belonged to the club, have used it so seldom that they know few, if any, of the governors even by sight.

At the leading woman’s club of New York, the governors appoint an hour on several afternoons before elections when they are in the visitors’ rooms at the club house on purpose to meet the candidates whom their proposers must present.  This would certainly seem a more practicable method, to say nothing of its being easier for everyone concerned, than the masculine etiquette which requires that the governors be stalked one by one, to the extreme inconvenience and loss of time and occasionally the embarrassment of every one.