When you came into the room I should, of course, rise and watch you exclusively and appreciatively. Your own activities on this occasion should be actuated by your temperament. Your physical appearance should determine whether you approach with dignity or with coquettish abandon. In either case I should, and probably will, be appreciative if you do it nicely.

Things to say on such occasions are quite easy and should be natural. Enter the room with some cheery greeting which will at once establish a glowy feeling in the young man. Above all else, warn your mother or aunt or cousin not to take on the obvious appearance of a match-maker. Make her understand that, so far as you know, I think nothing whatever of you and that I am, after all, only a friend, and a very casual one at that. Also warn her not to relate anecdotes of your childhood. Make it plain that most normal young men despise little girls and would prefer not to hear about them however clever they may have seemed to their various relations at that age.

You have, I repeat, entered the drawing room of your present abode. You have greeted me with an outstretched hand and appreciative smile. You are subtly complimenting my neat appearance. Let me give you a secret. Young men of whatever age are as vain of their appearance as peacocks. They love to be thought handsome or well dressed and intelligent. A well chosen phrase about their taste in clothing will do more to make them appreciate your beauty than anything else on earth. That is, most young men. Others practice a studied indifference to their personal appearance, going to no end of trouble to ruin the press in a pair of trousers in order to seem slightly disheveled.

The latter type likes to be thought quite brilliant. He may recite poetry to you. He, of all types, is most dangerous because, while he seems attentive, you get the feeling eventually that he is a hair-brained idealist and needs a mother and when that occurs to you—well—. Be cautious about poets and indifferent young men. They can make you excessively happy for a short time but more often they make a perfect hash of life.

The meticulous dressers come of two types. One is the gay type, the trifler, the drug store cowboy, etc., ad infinitum. The other type is the Babbitt-like youth who is interested principally in girls and work. He makes the most satisfactory husband. He will never let you go unfed or unclothed and your life will be even, often dull and sometimes maddening, but your vegetable happiness should be complete if you don’t let yourself believe everything you hear and read about the fine average American.

Probably I have digressed too far. Back again to us. We have greeted each other and after a little small talk, gotten our wraps against going to the dance. Your mother or aunt or cousin or friend has told us goodby but she has not, as is often thought proper, trusted you to my gentlemanly care.

It depends on several things whether I have come for you in a taxi. All that will be taken up when we speak about the young man wallflower. Needless to say there are certain young men of very good families who have a perfect penchant for doing the incorrect thing on all occasions.

If I have an automobile everything is different. Let us say I have a nice coupe of a popular make, not too showy but still quite nice.

We descend the steps from your house, you hanging to my right biceps, seeming, so I think, to be quietly admiring the feel of so strong an arm. That gets over big. Don’t let the young man think you consider him a hairy ape; just let him understand that you feel protected but at the same time give him the assurance that you know all about taking care of yourself. Be to the best of your ability and particularly your ingenuity, a woman. Let me tell you before I go farther that any woman can get herself a man or a husband but that is not what she should strive for. What she really wants is admirers.

Will we never get to that dance? It seems not.

During the ride to the dance gauge your man. Find out what his thoughts and emotions (be careful with the latter) are, if any. You can tell in this way just what the evening is going to be.

If he is silent mostly and his sentences come in funny spurts and starts, he is probably bashful himself as we have assumed you are. If he starts talking at a great rate, mouthing good, sweet, moral sentiments at every breath and asking you if you attend B.Y.P.U. or Epworth League, he probably has a dirty mind and will very soon switch to the pornography in the Bible. That is a slur. Some talkative youths are quite bright and while they may be sophomoric in their mental attitudes, still they are most entertaining.

If he adopts the gay strain and quotes in reckless wise such things as _Yukon Jake_[*] or, say, the youthful salaciousnesses of Edna Millay before she grew to her full stature in such things as The King’s Henchmen and Fear. Let us suppose he quotes:

I burn my candle at both ends, It will not last the night. But O, my foes, and Ah, my friends, It gives a lovely light.

rest assured that he is a complete “dud.” He is, in the beginning, a hedonist, a pseudo-intellectual with a dash of cynicism, just enough to make him say at frequent intervals, “This age is decadent, quite putrid.” Avoid him, beware! He will protest that he is an intellectual and he will say that he must laugh loud and long to keep from weeping so much. Beware! Beware! He is a goat in sheep’s clothing.

[Footnote *: The Ballad of Yukon Jake in Little Blue Book No. 1025.]

I am one of these young men. Your problem between your house and the dance is to determine which one I am. I’ll give you a hint. I like the last one described. You are finding out what I want to talk about. You are establishing a personal relationship. You are, or should be, making me one of your admirers. Say that you have discovered in spite of my hint that I am the last young man.

I have flatly denied being a cynic and then rather paradoxically gone on to prove to you that I am one. You should listen to me very attentively for a little and then quietly bomb my ship by saying,

What is the use of talking? There is no end to talking. There is no end of things in the heart.

I should understand by that that you have dealt me a very neat blow in the abdomen, that you are, therefore, my equal and that you see clear through me and out the other side. By that one statement you have made me ridiculous, yourself sage and us compatible.

If I am the first youth, who speaks as if he had an impediment in his throat or behind his tongue, the kindest thing that you could possibly do would be to talk a great deal yourself at first. Don’t sit silently by, waiting for me to start things. Like as not I never will and, while you may enjoy your own thoughts more, you will probably be surprised to discover that I am, behind all my bashfulness, quite a likable person. Of course I may be horribly repressed and self conscious but still for that very reason, I become intensely grateful to you if you try to make me understand that you don’t see it that way and that you think me the most charming young person of your acquaintance.

If I begin by deploring the activities of the younger generation and ask you if you really don’t think the world is coming to a pretty pass, the best thing for you to do is to remark that so far as you know it has always been at a pretty pass. Tell me before I have a chance to that you really think, as far as literature is concerned, that the Bible is just as naughty as anything that has been written in the last ten years. To get along with that sort of person you can talk about anything and get away with it just so long as it implies something quite risque and at the same time deplores it.

If I am just a talkative sophomore, let me talk on and be sure to laugh at the right places. Be careful to laugh with me and not at me, however.

If I am a well dressed Rotarian of good address, I think I said that this type make choice husbands, the best way to get me is by being about the worthiest business proposition in sight. Don’t think it will be necessary to love me. That isn’t what I want at all; I want somebody, who either by association or by some subtle means like social standing or membership in a good church, that is to say, a church where the richer people of the community go, will be of advantage to me financially. So if you are pretty and well dressed and ever so slightly intelligent you are just what I want. But if you talk to me about your ambitions along some line such as biology or law or medicine, you are out. Whatever your ambitions may be, your abilities for the type of man I have so suddenly become should be simply two: how to dress and how to cook. And there is that other one; how to flatter till it makes you laugh inside at man’s vanity.

The best thing to say to this type of man is something about the new receipt for something or other that you saw today. Or mention the fact to him that you made the dress you are wearing, whether you did or not. Most struggling young businessmen, if they are to be at all worth while, will spend money freely but they like to think that they are really being economical. Let him understand that you would be a very practical appliance to have around the house. Let him know, too, that you could and would make his home into a veritable paradise. In a word the best way to catch the most desirable husband is to make him think that you are working for his best interests at all times. Probably I have said too much about these boys, but remember, they are the ones who will have the prettiest cars and the best houses and the most things.