Part 2

I shot a present into the air; It fell to earth, I know not where!

WHY, there are innumerable ways of insulting the giver of a present. Listen, for instance, to this acknowledgment, from Zeroine: “All my life,” she wrote, “I have given away pink azaleas to my friends; and this is the first time I ever received one.” How’s that for egoism? Compared to her noble, extravagant and advertised generosity didn’t my one gift loom pretty small?

Rather clever she is, that Zeroine, a positive genius, sometimes--you know them--at making one wish one hadn’t tried to be nice to her. As the bride of one of my confreres I met her first in Paris. To celebrate her marriage I racked my brains for something charming enough with which to greet a new friend. Something not costly, you know, yet perfect and unique. Well, the loveliest things of that sort I had found, were the marvelous ribbon roses made by the Comtesse de Laumont for the benefit of the widows of officers. Every one is a work of art--a beautiful and faithful portrait of some particular rose from her own garden on the Marne.

To her house on the Avenue Malakoff I went (her only son, last of his line, had just been killed at the front, but her work must go on), and three exquisite William Allen Richardsons I picked out from all the rest. Late that night, too impatient to wait, through the narrow, shuttered, unlighted Paris streets I walked--no taxicabs in those war days--over the river to deliver my initiatory tribute at Zeroine’s hotel. And with it I left a letter telling her the roses’ pathetic story.

This is what Zeroine replied:

“Yes, I know the De Laumont roses. They’re lovely. I saw the wife of the Ambassador wearing one last week, and got the address. I have been intending to buy some of them; but you have kindly saved me the trouble.”

BUT for the most extraordinary misunderstanding of all that gifts should mean, I think I must, after all, award the prize to Mrs. Hilking. The Christmas tree that day at Mrs. Hilking’s was heavily hung with presents--piled deep on the floor they were. Mrs. Hilking was happy--oh, she was awfully happy! Didn’t she have good reason to be happy? “Why,” gurgled Mrs. Hilking, so proudly, “baby has received so many, many Christmas presents that I didn’t have to give him a single one myself!” Selah!

DO you begin to see, now, what Sadie meant by style in kindness? Style is what a smart hat has, isn’t it? It’s what an expensive motor car has--or a beautiful dancer. It’s the perfect technique of any artist--a successful clergyman, or a good novelist, or a clever burglar such as Mr. Raffles. In short, style is a combination of good taste and imagination. Then what is style in giving? To give what you’d like yourself may be kindness. But the Educated Heart isn’t quite satisfied even with the Golden Rule. It amends, or, rather, translates it thus: “Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, were ye such as they, do ye even so to them.”

But perhaps you don’t know what your friend wants. Ah, but the Educated Heart makes it its business to know, to remember, or to find out. “A man’s heart,” you know, “deviseth his way.”

One friend I have to whom I can’t express a taste or desire that isn’t treasured up against need. If I happen to mention liking a Japanese writing set, it is only a question of time when that set is mine.

I said to the Prandials once that I loved watercress, and lightly wished that I might have it for every meal. Never a meal have I ever had at the Prandials’ table, since then, without finding watercress bought specially for me.

D’YOU think it’s easy, this business of giving? Verily, verily, I say unto you, giving is as much of an art as portrait-painting, or the making of glass flowers. There really ought to be a four years’ course in the art of making presents in every college for those who are not born intelligently generous.

In one’s freshman year one would be taught, perhaps, not to present an $85 inlaid umbrella with a gold dog’s-head handle with rhinestone eyes to a gentleman of culture like Mr. Richard Mansfield, for instance, as was once done one Christmas by an ardent but unillumined friend. If a lady has saved your son’s life, the Educated Heart doesn’t reward her by offering her chastely appointed apartment a two-ton carved ebony chair upholstered in red plush.

Oh, no, it’s not easy. People nowadays haven’t the artless gratitude of that easily-satisfied girl who used to sing:

“He promised to bring me a bunch of blue ribbons To tie up my bonny brown hair!”

The people I know usually prefer to select their own ribbons--and gloves and boudoir caps and neckties--rather than have them chosen, however expensively, by--well, by those who do sometimes have the audacity to choose them for you.

Now taste, you will say, cannot be disputed. Each one has his own. Perhaps it can’t even be educated. We’ll see, later.

But imagination surely can be brought to bear. Suppose we suggest a few ways, in illustration.

ARE you sailing for Italy? Ah, it isn’t the basket of fine fat fruits that brings the tears to your eyes, nor the flowers with trailing yards and yards of red ribbon--all that’s mere kindness, ordinary everyday kindness. Even the Vanderbilts can do that. But it’s the things--oh, it’s the things Mr. Rockefeller never would think of--it’s that little purse full of Italian currency, bills and small change all ready for you when you first trip ashore at Genoa. It’s the little nest of spools of colored silk Minnie made for you to catch up the first threatened run in your stocking. I may, oh, yes, I may forget the three hundred dollars you lent me that time I was broke; but the little corkscrew you so thoughtfully added when you gave me that bottle of your pet malt extract--that I shall never, never forget!

No, he didn’t have much style, I admit, to his dented, dusty derby, poor old Westrose, but, God bless him, his heart was certainly up to date. He may have got a lady’s coat upside down occasionally when he helped her on with it--but he understood the Fourth Dimension of Kindness, all right. Never a friend of his wife’s did he ever puffingly put aboard a street car, but he’d tuck, apologetically, into her hand the nickel to save her rummaging in her bag.

Real elegance, the gesture of inherent nobility, I call that. It’s like the flourish to the signature of Charles Dickens. It’s kindness with a kick to it. In short, it’s the manner and custom of the Educated Heart, that makes you turn over at night and decide to add a codicil to your will--why should brother Fred have it all?

Well knows the Educated Heart that the doctor’s clients usually pay slowly, and itself therefore pays without delay. Which lover has the Educated Heart--he who orders the florist to send, every day, five dollars’ worth of flowers, or he who himself selects and presents a single rose? Ask the sweetheart--she knows that

“’Tis not so much the gallant who woos, As the gallant’s way of wooing!”

* * * * *

“I’m so sorry I couldn’t send you anything this Christmas,” said Millicent, “but I’ve been awfully hard up!”

Too hard up, in fact, to afford two cents to stamp a letter, sending her love!

* * * * *

AND now, I beseech you, consider the usual Christmas present. No one but a boor would present a diamond wrapped in a scrap of newspaper, would he? No; and so the most trivial of gifts, when sent by a civilized donor on Christmas, is, by universal practice, carefully wrapped in a pretty paper, red or gold, is tied with a fancy ribbon and decorated, mayhap, with a sprig of holly.