PROPRIETY a name from nothing." But then, even poor clothes do not work irreparable dam age; for Charles Lamb has shown that they may be passed off to the idiocyncrasies of genius. But not so with poor victuals. Dining, decorous dining, is the dean in the assemblage of legal proprieties. You may worry along with shiny coat, and hat of a past epoch; but these will be forgotten in the presence of impressive dining. This is just what those French schools so well understand. And it is a great and worthy matter. In its presence legal knowl edge becomes insignificant, and thousands of pompous law books stand mute. And hor rors! reader, this crux, this nexus, this sine qua non of all legal advancement, this source of all life, animal and legal — victuals and dining has no place whatever in our legal curriculum. Think of it, too, this is over looked by a profession whose business is to overlook nothing, and cavil at undotted i's and uncrossed t's. And here we find ourselves in this dazzling new century with out a single syllable on this transcendant subject! O ye proprieties, ye venerable gods! forgive while I atone for my profession with a line. Dining, then, young man, is the most critical thing in legal life; it is the most necessary thing to life; why, pray, should it not be made the most impressive thing in life? Yes, Lord Byron was right. "Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dining." All depends on dining. But mark you, it must be decorous dining — not that twentyfive-cent-stool dining which advertises at once your hunger and your poverty. It must be dining that advertises your ability to pay, and that tells your co-diners of your success, real or simulated. Watch the men of the Bar of repute. At the busiest hours they enter the "St. Nicholas" or the "Gibson" of the various cities, advancing to their tables with al mighty unction. They regard the waiters
615
with the studied, nonchalant, automobile hauteur of established position; and, as their overcoats are taken, they sweep their eagle eyes over the assembled greatness of the city with the careless military air of Napoleon viewing the heights of Austerlitz. They meet handsome many-languaged waiters with intrepedity, and examine the menu, in foreign tongues, without pertur bation. (Oh, how I have coveted this power!) Obviously, these men harvest ice in midsummer. Their affairs move resist lessly on the rubber tires of success; and no marvel, for early in legal life they were confirmed at the altars of this great pro priety — dining. Long fidelity to this admirable propriety has brought dyspepsia upon some of these legal worthies. But it was not the food. It was the four day's abstention in the week in early legal life, that they might dine with dignity the remaining two. It was fidelity to principle that caused it. Two such Nestars of the Bar have honored me with their acquaintance, and I feel in their pres ence just as I feel when I meet some hero of Chickamaugua or Stone River. Let us, then, as Solomon puts it, hear the conclusion of the whole matter. You cannot join the golf club, or any other club — you have neither the pull nor the price; a box at grand opera is impossible; you must still ride vis a vis and limb to limb with poverty in the only democratic insti tution that survives; you cannot afford a pew in the Episcopal Church; you cannot even afford good clothes, but, my friend, you can dine twice a week with impressive dignity. By all means do it. Go where men will unconsciously cerebrate about you. put yourself in the dazzling vibrations of success. Dine decorously; eat reputably and conspicuously; and the libation thus poured out to that Great Gastronomic God — America's Deity — will secure you His loving favor (in fees). Put money in thy purse, and eat right. CINCINNATI, OHIO, October, 1906.
