And when a Frenchman is rude, his impoliteness is worse than that of other nations, because he knows better:  he is rude with malice prepense.  The lower classes have especially lost much of their courtesy since the Commune.  I have seen a French workingman thrust a lady violently aside on a crowded sidewalk, with a scowl and a muttered curse that lent significance to the act.  And the graceful, suave courtesy of the shopkeepers—­how swiftly it flies out of the window when their hope of profit in the shape of the departing shopper walks out of the door!

Shortly before quitting the United States I went into one of our large public libraries to consult a voluminous work of reference.  In the remote recess where the books were kept sat a gentleman intent on the perusal of a volume, his chair tipped back as far as it could be with safety inclined, and his feet resting on the table.  “Horrid fellow!” I said to myself, glancing at the obtrusive members, and going forward to the bookcase in search of the work I wanted.  It proved to be of somewhat ponderous dimensions, and higher than I could conveniently reach, so I stood on tiptoe and tugged vainly at it for a moment.  My friend of the feet saw my dilemma, and down went his book, and he sprang to my assistance in an instant, “Allow me,” he said; and in a moment the heavy tome was brought down, dusted by a few turns of his pocket-handkerchief and laid on the table for my accommodation.  If he had but known it, there was mingled with my thanks a world of unuttered but heartfelt apologies for my former hard thoughts respecting his attitude.  And therein lay the difference between the two nationalities.  A Frenchman would have died rather than have made a library-table a resting-place for his feet, but he would have let a woman he did not know break a blood-vessel by her exertions before he would have rendered her the slightest assistance.

American women are too apt to accept all the courtesies offered them by strangers at home as their right, even neglecting to render the poor meed of thanks in return.  But let them when in Paris try to get into an omnibus on a wet day, and being thrust aside by a strong-armed Frenchman they will remorsefully remember the seats accorded to them in crowded cars, and accepted thanklessly and as a matter of course.  And when the lounger on the boulevards dogs their steps or whispers his insulting compliments in their shuddering ear, they will remember how they were guarded at home not by one protector, but by all right-minded mankind, and will thank Heaven that their brothers, their sons, their husbands “are not even as these are.”

     LUCY H. HOOPER.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

GYPSY MUSIC IN HUNGARY.