The Project Gutenberg EBook of Americans and Others, by Agnes Repplier

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Title: Americans and Others

Author: Agnes Repplier

Release Date: September 19, 2005 [EBook #16722]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AMERICANS AND OTHERS ***

Produced by Ron Swanson

By Agnes Repplier

COUNTER-CURRENTS.
AMERICANS AND OTHERS.
A HAPPY HALF-CENTURY AND OTHER ESSAYS.
IN OUR CONVENT DAYS.
COMPROMISES.
THE FIRESIDE SPHINX. With 4 full-page and 17 text illustrations by
Miss E. BONSALL.
BOOKS AND MEN.
POINTS OF VIEW.
ESSAYS IN IDLENESS.
IN THE DOZY HOURS, AND OTHER PAPERS.
ESSAYS IN MINIATURE.
A BOOK OF FAMOUS VERSE. Selected by Agnes Repplier. In Riverside
Library for Young People.
THE SAME. _Holiday Edition_.
VARIA.

AMERICANS AND OTHERS

BY
AGNES REPPLIER, LITT.D.

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
The Riverside Press Cambridge

COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY AGNES REPPLIER
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
_Published October 1912_

The Riverside Press
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.

Note

Five of the essays in this volume appear in print for the first time.
Others have been published in the _Atlantic Monthly_, the _Century
Magazine_, _Harper's Bazar_, and the _Catholic World_.

Contents

A Question of Politeness

The Mission of Humour

Goodness and Gayety

The Nervous Strain

The Girl Graduate

The Estranging Sea

Travellers' Tales

The Chill of Enthusiasm

The Temptation of Eve

"The Greatest of These is Charity"

The Customary Correspondent

The Benefactor

The Condescension of Borrowers

The Grocer's Cat

AMERICANS AND OTHERS

A Question of Politeness

"La politesse de l'esprit consiste a penser des choses honnetes et
delicates."

A great deal has been said and written during the past few years on
the subject of American manners, and the consensus of opinion is,
on the whole, unfavourable. We have been told, more in sorrow than
in anger, that we are not a polite people; and our critics have cast
about them for causes which may be held responsible for such a
universal and lamentable result.