get
them for a trifle less. They are put on in a moment, and, to my vulgar
eye, look neat and tasteful.

Of course, I know I am not a gentleman. I have given up hopes of ever
being one. Years ago, when life presented possibilities, I thought that
with pains and intelligence I might become one. I never succeeded. It
all depends on being able to tie a bow. Round the bed-post, or the neck
of the water-jug, I could tie the wretched thing to perfection. If only
the bed-post or the water-jug could have taken my place and gone to the
party instead of me, life would have been simpler. The bed-post and the
water-jug, in its neat white bow, looked like a gentleman--the
fashionable novelist's idea of a gentleman. Upon myself the result was
otherwise, suggesting always a feeble attempt at suicide by
strangulation. I could never understand how it was done. There were
moments when it flashed across me that the secret lay in being able to
turn one's self inside out, coming up with one's arms and legs the other
way round. Standing on one's head might have surmounted the difficulty;
but the higher gymnastics Nature has denied to me. "The Boneless Wonder"
or the "Man Serpent" could, I felt, be a gentleman so easily. To one to
whom has been given only the common ordinary joints gentlemanliness is
apparently an impossible ideal.

It is not only the tie. I never read the fashionable novel without
misgiving. Some hopeless bounder is being described:

"If you want to know what he is like," says the Peer of the Realm,
throwing himself back in his deep easy-chair, and puffing lazily at his
cigar of delicate aroma, "he is the sort of man that wears three studs in
his shirt."

The difficulty of being a Gentleman.

Merciful heavens! I myself wear three studs in my shirt. I also am a
hopeless bounder, and I never knew it. It comes upon me like a
thunderbolt. I thought three studs were fashionable. The idiot at the
shop told me three studs were all the rage, and I ordered two dozen. I
can't afford to throw them away. Till these two dozen shirts are worn
out, I shall have to remain a hopeless bounder.

Why have we not a Minister of the Fine Arts? Why does not a paternal
Government fix notices at the street corners, telling the would-be
gentleman how many studs he ought to wear, what style of necktie now
distinguishes the noble-minded man from the base-hearted? They are
prompt enough with their police regulations