in consumable goods. He becomes a connoisseur in creditable
viands of various degrees of merit, in manly beverages and
trinkets, in seemly apparel and architecture, in weapons, games,
dancers, and the narcotics. This cultivation of aesthetic faculty
requires time and application, and the demands made upon the
gentleman in this direction therefore tend to change his life of
leisure into a more or less arduous application to the business
of learning how to live a life of ostensible leisure in a
becoming way. Closely related to the requirement that the
gentleman must consume freely and of the right kind of goods,
there is the requirement that he must know how to consume them in
a seemly manner. His life of leisure must be conducted in due
form. Hence arise good manners in the way pointed out in an
earlier chapter. High-bred manners and ways of living are items
of conformity to the norm of conspicuous leisure and conspicuous
consumption.

Conspicuous consumption of valuable goods is a means of
reputability to the gentleman of leisure. As wealth accumulates
on his hands, his own unaided effort will not avail to
sufficiently put his opulence in evidence by this method. The aid
of friends and competitors is therefore brought in by resorting
to the giving of valuable presents and expensive feasts and
entertainments. Presents and feasts had probably another origin
than that of naive ostentation, but they required their utility
for this purpose very early, and they have retained that
character to the present; so that their utility in this respect
has now long been the substantial ground on which these usages
rest. Costly entertainments, such as the potlatch or the ball,
are peculiarly adapted to serve this end. The competitor with