PREFACE

WHEN stationed at Hong Kong I travelled about a good deal in China and Japan. There I learned that much greater value is attached to civility and manners by the people of these countries than is the case with us in the West. This made me think of this book, and if any one is as interested in reading it as I was in writing it I shall be satisfied.

It is not a book of etiquette, for I could not rise to that. I am anything but a master of ceremonies, and only write of the principles from which good manners proceed in all classes of society. What I mean by manners is much what Bushido stands for in Japan-the instincts of a gentleman, the principles of the gentle life.

Centuries ago a Frenchman, Jacque Legrand, wrote "The Book of Good Manners" in pity for "the condition of unmannered folks who are like brute beasts." I have never seen this book, and do not know whether it is or is not in existence;

but is there not need in our day of a similar one? Certainly such a book would have many readers if every one wanting in manners bought a copy and passed it on to a friend similarly deficient.