| | | | | There are certain things which can never be accurately | described ~~ things so shadowy, so fitful, so dependent on the mood of | the moment, both in the audience and the actor, that analysis and | representation are equally at fault. And flirting is one of them. What | is flirting? Who can define or determine? It is more serious than | talking nonsense and not so serious as making love; it is not chaff | and it is not feeling; it means something more than indifference and | yet something less than affection; it binds | no-one ; it commits no-one | though it raises expectations in the individual and sets society on | the look-out for results; it is a plaything in the hands of the | experienced but a deadly weapon against the breast of the unwary; and | it is a thing so vague, so protean, that the most accurate measurer of | moral values would be puzzled to say where it exactly ends and where | serious intentions begin. | But again we ask: What is flirting? What constitutes its essence? What | makes the difference between it and chaff on the one hand, and it and | love-making on the other? Has it a cumulative power, and, | according to the old saying of many a pickle making a mickle, does a | long series of small flirtings make up a concrete whole of love? or is | it like an unmortared heap of bricks, potential utilities if | conditions were changed, but valueless as things are? The man who | would be able to reduce flirting to a definite science, who could | analyze its elements and codify its laws, would be doing infinite | service to his generation; but we fear that this is about as difficult | as finding the pot of gold under the end of a rainbow, or catching | small birds with a pinch of salt. | Everyone has his or her ideas | of what constitutes flirting; | consequently everyone | judges of that pleasant exercise according to | individual temperament and experience. Faded flowers, who see | impropriety in everything they are no longer able to enjoy, say with | more or less severity that Henry and Angelina are flirting if they are | laughing while whispering together in an alcove, probably the most | innocent nonsense in the world; but the fact that they are enjoying | themselves in their own way, albeit a silly one, is enough for the | faded flower to think they are after mischief, flirting being to her | mind about the worst bit of mischief that a fallen humanity can | perpetrate. The watchful mother, intent on chances, says that dancing | together oftener than is necessary for good breeding and just the | amount of attention demanded by circumstances, is flirting; timid | girls newly out, and not yet used to the odd ways of men, think | they are being flirted with outrageously if their partner fires off | the meekest little compliment at them, or looks at them more tenderly | than he would look at a cabbage; but bolder spirits of both sexes | think nothing worthy of the name which does not include a few | questionable familiarities, and an equivoke or two, more or less | risky. With some, flirting is nothing but the passing fun of the | moment; with others, it is the first lesson of the great unopened book | and means the beginning of the end; with some, it is not even angling | with intent; with others, it is deep-sea fishing with a broad, | boldly-made net, and taking all fish that come in as good for sport if | not for food. | Flirts are of many kinds as well as of all degrees. There are quiet | flirts and demonstrative flirts; flirts of the subtle sort whose | practice is made by the eyes alone, by the manner, by the tender | little sigh, by the bend of the head and the wave of the hand, to give | pathos and point to the otherwise harmless word; and flirts of the | open and rampant kind, who go up quite boldly towards the point, but | who never reach it, taking care to draw back in time before they | fairly cross the border. This is the kind which, as the flirt male, | does incalculable damage to the poor little fluttering dove to whom it | is as a bird of prey, handsome, bold, cruel; but this is the kind | which has unlimited success, using as it does that immense moral | leverage we call

'tantalizing'

~~ for ever | rousing hopes and exciting | expectations, and luring a woman on as an | ignis fatuus lures us | on across the marsh, in the vain belief that it will bring us to our | haven at last. | Akin to this kind are those male flirts who are great in the way in | which they manage to insinuate things without committing themselves to | positive statements. They generally contrive to give the impression of | some mysterious hindrance by which they are held back from full and | frank confession. They hint at fatal bonds, at unfortunate | attachments, at a past that has burnt them up or withered them up, at | any rate that has prevented their future from blossoming in the | direction in which they would fain have had it blossom and bear fruit. | They sketch out vaguely the outlines of some thrilling romance; a few, | of the Byronic breed, add the suspicion of some dark and melancholy | crime as a further romantic charm and personal obstacle; and when they | have got the girl's pity, and the love that is akin to pity, then they | cool down scientifically, never creating any scandal, never making any | rupture, never coming to a moment when awkward explanations can be | asked, but cooling nevertheless, till the thing drops of its own | accord and dies out from inanition; when they are free to carry their | sorrows and their mysteries elsewhere. Some men spend their lives in | this kind of thing, and find their pleasure in making all the women | they know madly or sentimentally in love with them; and if by chance | any poor moth who has burned her wings makes too loud an outcry, | the tables are turned against her dexterously, and she is held up to | public pity ~~ contempt would be a better word ~~ | as one who has suffered | herself to love too well and by no means wisely, and who has run after | a Lothario by no means inclined to let himself be caught. | Then there are certain men who flirt only with married women, and | others who flirt only with girls; and the two pastimes are as | different as tropical sunlight and northern moonshine. And there are | some who are

'brothers,'

and some who are |

'fathers'

to their young | friends ~~ suspicious fathers on the whole, not unlike Little Red | Ridinghood's grandmother the wolf, with perilously bright eyes, and | not a little danger to Red Ridinghood in the relationship, how | delightful soever it may be to the wolf. Some are content with | cousinship only ~~ which however breaks down quite sufficient fences; | and some are

'dearest friends,'

no more, | and find that an exceedingly | useful centre from which to work onward and outward. For, if any peg | will do on which to hang a discourse, so will any relationship or | adoption serve the ends of flirting, if it be so willed. | But what is flirting? Is sitting away in corners, talking in low | voices and looking personally affronted if any unlucky outsider comes | within earshot, flirting? Not necessarily. It is just possible that | Henry may be telling Angelina all about his admiration for her sister | Grace; or Angelina may be confessing to Henry what Charley said to | her last night; ~~ which makes her lower her eyes as she is doing now, | and play with the fringe of her fan so nervously. May be, if not | likely. So that sitting away in corners and whispering together is not | necessarily flirting, though it may look like it. Is dancing all the |

'round'

dances together? This goes for decided | flirting in the code of | the ball-room. But if the two keep well together? If they are really | fond of dancing, as one of the fine arts combining science and | enjoyment, they would dance with each other all night, though outside | the

'marble halls'

they might be deadly enemies ~~ | Montagues and | Capulets, with no echo of Romeo and Juliet to soften their mutual | dislike. So that not even dancing together oftener than is absolutely | necessary is unmistakeable evidence, any more than is sitting away in | corners, seeing that equal skill and keeping well in step are reasons | enough for perpetual partnership, making all idea of flirtation | unnecessary. In fact, there is no outward sign nor symbol of flirting | which may not be mistaken and turned round, because flirting is so | entirely in the intention and not in the mere formula, that it becomes | a kind of phantasm, a Proteus, impossible to seize or to depict with | accuracy. | One thing however, we can say ~~ taking gifts and attentions, offered | with evident design and accepted with tacit understanding, may be | certainly held as constituting an important element of flirting. But | this is flirting on the woman's side. And here you are being | continually taken in. Your flirt of the cunningly simple kind, | who smiles so sweetly and seems so flatteringly glad to see you when | you come, who takes all your presents and acted expressions of love | with the most bewitching gratitude and effusion, even she, so simple | as she seems to be, slips the thread and will not be caught if she | does not wish to be caught. At the decisive moment when you think you | have secured her, she makes a bound and is away; then turns round, | looks you in the face, and with many a tear and pretty asseveration | declares that she never understood you to mean what you say you have | meant all along; and that you are cruel to dispel her dream of a | pleasant and harmless friendship, and very wicked indeed because you | press her for a decision. Yes; you are cruel, because you have | believed her honest; cruel, because you did not see through the veil | of flattery and insincerity in which she clothed her selfishness; | cruel, because she was false. This is the flirt's logic when brought | to book, and forced to confess that her pretended love was only | flirting, and that she led you on to your destruction simply because | it pleased her vanity to make you her victim. | Then there are flirts of the open and rollicking kind, who let you go | far, very far indeed, when suddenly they pull up and assume an | offended air as if you had wilfully transgressed known and absolute | boundaries ~~ girls and women who lead you on, all in the way of good | fellowship, to knock you over when you have got just far enough to | lose your balance. That is their form of the art. They like to | see how far they can make a man forget himself, and how much stronger | their own delusive enticements are than prudence, experience and | common-sense. And there are flirts of the artful and |

'still waters'

| kind, something like the male flirts spoken of just now; sentimental | little pusses ~~ perhaps pretty young wives with | uncomfortable husbands, | whose griefs have by no means soured nor scorched, but just mellowed | and refined, them. Or they may be of the sisterly class; creatures so | very frank, so very sisterly and confiding and unsuspicious of evil, | that really you scarcely know how to deal with them at all. And there | are flirts of the scientific kind; women who have studied the art | thoroughly; and who are adepts in the use of | every weapon known ~~ using | each according to circumstances and the nature of the victim, and | using each with deadly precision. From such may a kind Providence | deliver us! As the tender mercies of the wicked, so are the scientific | flirts ~~ the women and the men who play at bowls | with human hearts, for | the stakes of a whole life's happiness on the one side and a few weeks | of gratified vanity on the other. | It used to be an old schoolboy maxim that no real gentleman could be | refused by a lady, because no real gentleman could presume beyond his | line of encouragement. Ŕ fortiori , | no lady would or could give more | encouragement than she meant. What are we to say then of our flirts if | this maxim be true? Are they really

'no gentlemen'

| and

'no ladies,'

| according to the famous formula of the kitchen? Perhaps it would | be said so if gentlehood meant now, as it meant centuries ago, the | real worth and virtue of humanity. For flirting with intent is a | cruel, false, heartless amusement; and time was when cruelty and | falsehood were essentially sins which vitiated all claims to | gentlehood. And yet the world would be very dull without that innocent | kind of nonsense which often goes by the name of flirting ~~ that | pleasant something which is more than mere acquaintanceship and less | than formal loverhood ~~ that bright and animated intercourse which | makes the hours pass so easily, yet which leaves no bitter pang of | self-reproach ~~ that indefinite and undefinable interest by which the | one man or the one woman becomes a kind of microcosm for the time, the | epitome of all that is pleasant and of all that is lovely. The only | caution to be observed is: ~~ Do not go too far.