“The old man and me, sir, never go to bed without singing the Evening Hymn. Not that I’ve any voice left, for I haven’t, and as for him, he’s like a bee in a bottle, and then he don’t humour the tune, for he don’t rightly know one tune from another, and he can’t remember the words, neither, so when he leaves out a word I puts it in, and when I can’t sing I dances, and so we get through it somehow.” SHOWING AND SEEING.—Behaviour is a mirror in which everyone shows and might see her own image.—_Goethe._ MENTAL EXERTION. A lady took her Irish maid to task for carelessness and forgetfulness. “Why is it, Mary,” said she, “that you keep on making the same mistakes over and over again? Why don’t you try to remember what I tell you?” The day happened to be very warm, so Mary returned the quaint reply, “Sure, ma’am, I can’t be aggravatin’ me moind this hot weather.” CONSOLATION.—There never was a night which was not followed by a morning, nor a winter which was not succeeded by a summer. A most consoling reflection, this, to those distressed in the night and winter of spiritual trial and trouble. COURTESY. BY ELIZABETH A. S. DAWES, M.A., D.Lit. “_Plus fait douceur que violence._”—_La Fontaine_, vi. 3. “A beautiful behaviour is better than a beautiful form; it gives a higher pleasure than statues and pictures; it is the finest of the fine arts.”—_Emerson._ * * * * * I have chosen “courtesy” as the subject of my little address this time, as it is a virtue which is perhaps somewhat in danger of being forgotten and overlooked in these modern days of continual hurry and bustle; and yet it forms such an essential part of a beautiful character that nobody can justly claim the title of “gentleman” or “gentlewoman” if he or she neglects the practice of it, which is, too, the opinion of our Shakespeare, for he writes, “We must be gentle now we are gentlemen” (_Winter’s Tale_, v. 2). The derivation of the word, which really means the manners and behaviour to be observed at a royal court, is neatly given by Spenser in his _Faerie Queene_, Book vi. 1. “Of _court_, it seems, men _courtesie_ do call, For that it there most useth to abound; And well beseemeth, that in princes hall That vertue should be plentifully found, Which of all goodly manners is the ground And root of civil conversation”;