In London--dear, lovely, unsnobbish London--one can do absolutely as one likes about everything, and nowhere is society as good as it is there. In the country the very best society is dull. In London one can meet with the only society worth having, in my opinion: the society of those who either in art, literature, science, or politics have ‘done something,’ and are making the history of the world. From this country folk are absolutely debarred: another reason, dear readers, why I say live in London, if you can in any way contrive to do so, and do not leave it on any pretext whatever. But as man must associate with his kind or perish, no doubt there are compensating elements in country society that are evident to those who have lived among it all their lives. At any rate, we can live more unselfishly in the country, and do more good to those of our poorer brethren than we can in these crowded streets, where they are nothing to us save a probable source of infection, and a certain source of annoyance and dread.
To sum up this chapter briefly, then: let no move be made, unless such a course is absolutely imperative; let it be done in order and with regularity; and make no rushes into friendship in your new neighbourhood until you have discovered who is who, and made due inquiries on this subject; and, above all, under all circumstances, if fate has absolutely obliged you to make that particular move, make the best of it, and don’t always either mentally or openly contrast your present abode unfavourably and bad-temperedly with your last location. You have to live where you have pitched your tent: therefore, bad as the place may appear to you, try and smother your feelings until use has made you reconciled to your new surroundings, even if ‘home’ has not asserted its charm and caused you to become fond of the place, because your best and dearest are there with you. It will be an effort, I can assure you, to do so, but if you are strong-minded enough to suffer in silence, you will be repaid for so doing a thousand-fold.
The first part of the new house that should be attacked by the decorator’s art is undoubtedly the hall: and as undoubtedly it is here that the ordinary speculative builder surpasses himself; for, as a rule, the moment one opens the front door one falls up the staircase, or else one is confronted by a long, hopeless passage, which strikes a chill into the stoutest heart, especially if the owner of that heart has not had much experience in the art of ‘how to make the best’ of a very bad state of affairs.