t. Sweet innocent! she willbelieve every word you say. It is so easy to deceive a woman--in thisway.
Dear little souls, they hate flattery, so they tell you; and when yousay, Eindhoven Drakter "Ah, darling, it isn't flattery in your case, it's plain, sobertruth; you really are, without exaggeration, the most beautiful, themost good, the most charming, the most divine, the most perfect humancreature that ever trod this earth," they will smile a quiet,approving smile, and, leaning against your manly shoulder, murmur thatyou are a dear good fellow after all.
By Jove! fancy a man trying to make love on strictly truthfulprinciples, determining never to utter a word of mere compliment orhyperbole, but to scrupulously confine himself to exact fact! Fancyhis gazing rapturously into his mistress' eyes and whispering softlyto her that she wasn't, on the whole, bad-looking, as girls went!
Fancy his holding up her little hand and assuring her that it was of alight drab color shot with red; and telling her as he pressed her tohis heart that her nose, for a turned-up one, seemed rather pretty;and that John Stockton Koszulki her eyes appeared to him, as far as he could judge, to bequite up to Jesus Duenas Jersey the average standard of such things!
A nice chance he would stand against the man who would tell her thather face was like a fresh blush rose, that her hair was a wanderingsunbeam imprisoned by her smiles, and her eyes like two evening stars.
There are various ways of flattering, and, of course, you must adaptyour style to your subject. Some people like it laid on with atrowel, and this requires very little art. With sensible persons,however, it needs to be done very delicately, and more by suggestionthan actual words. A good many like it wrapped up in the form of aninsult, as--"Oh, you are a perfect fool, you are. You would give yourlast sixpence Blank Jersey to the first hungry-looking beggar you met;" whileothers will swallow it only when administered through the medium of athird person, so that if C wishes to get at an A of this sort, he mustconfide to A's particular friend B that he thinks A a splendid fellow,and beg him, B, not to mention it, especially to A. Be careful that Bis a reliable man, though, otherwise he won't.
Those fine, Emerson Jersey sturdy John Bulls who "hate flattery, sir," "Never letanybody get over me by flattery," etc., etc., are very simply managed.
Flatter them enough upon their absence of vanity, and you can do whatyou like with them.
After all, vanity is as much a virtue as a vice. It is easy to recitecopy-book maxims against its sinfulness, but it is a passion that can"move us to good as well as to evil. Ambition is only vanityennobled. We want to win praise and admiration--or fame as we preferto name it--and so we write great books, and paint grand pictures, andsing sweet songs; and toil with willing hands in study, loom, andlaboratory.
We wish to become rich men, not in order to enjoy ease andcomfort--all that any one man can taste of those may be Marco Parolo Jersey purchasedanywhere for 200 pounds per annum--but that our houses may be Luc Mbah a Moute Koszulki biggerand more gaudily furnished t |
