My experience of talkers tells me that nothing annoys them so much as a blunder of this kind.

From the coldly polite way in which I have taken the talker's remarks, he discovers the value I put upon them, and after that, if he has a neighbor on the other side, he leaves me alone.
Enough has been said to show that the Arcadian's golden rule is to be careful about what he says.

This does not mean that he is to say nothing.

As society is at present constituted you are bound to make an occasional remark.

But you need not make it rashly.