LETTER CXLVI

Greenwich, June 10, O. S. 1751

My dear friend:  Your ladies were so slow in giving their specific orders, that the mohairs, of which you at last sent me the patterns, were all sold.  However, to prevent further delays (for ladies are apt to be very impatient, when at last they know their own minds), I have taken the quantities desired of three mohairs which come nearest to the description you sent me some time ago, in Madame Monconseil’s own hand; and I will send them to Calais by the first opportunity.  In giving ‘la petite Blot’ her piece, you have a fine occasion of saying fine things, if so inclined.

Lady Hervey, who is your puff and panegyrist, writes me word that she saw you lately dance at a ball, and that you dance very genteelly.  I am extremely glad to hear it; for (by the maxim, that ’omne majus continet in se minus’), if you dance genteelly, I presume you walk, sit, and stand genteelly too; things which are much more easy, though much more necessary, than dancing well.  I have known many very genteel people, who could not dance well; but I never knew anybody dance very well, who was not genteel in other things.  You will probably often have occasion to stand in circles, at the levees of princes and ministers, when it is very necessary ‘de payer de sa personne, et d’etre bien plante’, with your feet not too near nor too distant from each other.  More people stand and walk, than sit genteelly.  Awkward, ill-bred people, being ashamed, commonly sit bolt upright and stiff; others, too negligent and easy, ’se vautrent dans leur fauteuil’, which is ungraceful and ill-bred, unless where the familiarity is extreme; but a man of fashion makes himself easy, and appears so by leaning gracefully instead of lolling supinely; and by varying those easy attitudes instead of that stiff immobility of a bashful booby.  You cannot conceive, nor can I express, how advantageous a good air, genteel motions, and engaging address are, not only among women, but among men, and even in the course of business; they fascinate the affections, they steal a preference, they play about the heart till they engage it.  I know a man, and so do you, who, without a grain of merit, knowledge, or talents, has raised himself millions of degrees above his level, simply by a good air and engaging manners; insomuch that the very Prince who raised him so high, calls him, ’mon aimable vaut-rien’;—­[The Marichal de Richelieu.]—­but of this do not open your lips, ‘pour cause’.  I give you this secret as the strongest proof imaginable of the efficacy of air, address, ’tournure, et tout ces Petits riens’.