Merely in the item of keeping an account of
the visits paid and due, a woman needs a bookkeeper. Only to know the
etiquette of how and when and to whom and in what order the visits are to
be paid is to be well educated in a matter that assumes the first
importance in her life. This is, however, only a detail of bookkeeping
and of memory; to pay and receive, or evade, these visits of ceremony is
a work which men can admire without the power to imitate; even on the
supposition that a woman has nothing else to do, it calls for our humble
gratitude and a recognition of the largeness of nature that can put aside
any duties to husband or children in devotion to the public welfare. The
futile round of society life while it lasts admits of no rival. It seems
as important as the affairs of the government. The Drawer is far from
saying that it is not. Perhaps no one can tell what confusion would fall
into all the political relations if the social relations of the capital
were not kept oiled by the system of exchange of fictitious courtesies
among the women; and it may be true that society at large--men are so
apt, when left alone, to relapse--would fall into barbarism if our
pasteboard conventions were neglected.
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