Haven't you always wondered how to properly accept a formal dinner invitation? Perhaps you have a débutante under your wing, in which case you need to make sure her appearance in society goes perfectly, to increase her chances of a brilliant match. And what exactly would be your duties as her chaperon? These and many other questions are expertly answered by Marion Harland in this little volume.
By : Marion Harland (1830 - 1922) and Virginia Terhune Van de Water (1865 - 1945)
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The sending and receiving of invitations underlies social obligations. It therefore behooves both senders and recipients to learn the proper form in which these evidences of hospitality should be despatched and received.
In the majority of cases an invitation demands an answer. If one is in doubt, it is well to err on the side of acknowledging an invitation, rather than on that of ignoring it altogether.
We will consider first such invitations as demand no acceptance but which call for regrets if one can not accept. Such are cards to “At Home” days, to teas and to large receptions. Unless any one of these bears on its face the letters “R. s. v. p.” (Répondez, s’il vous plaît—Answer if you please) no acceptance is required. If one can not attend the function, one should send one’s card so that one’s friend will receive it on the day of her affair.
CARDS FOR AN AT HOME
The cards for an “At Home” are issued about ten days before the function. They bear the hostess’ name alone, unless her husband is to receive with her, in which case the card may bear the two names, as “Mr. and Mrs. James Smith.” The average American man does not, however, figure at his wife’s “At Homes” when these are held in the afternoon. The exigencies of counting-room and office hold him in thrall too often for him to be depended on for such an occasion.
A plain, heavy cream card, simply engraved, is now used for most formal invitations in preference to the engraved notes that were the rule ten years ago.
The card bears in the lower right-hand corner the address of the entertainer; in the lower left-hand corner the date and the hours of the affair,—as “Wednesday, October the nineteenth,” and under this “From four until seven o’clock.”
If the tea be given in honor of a friend, or to introduce a stranger, the card of this person is enclosed with that of the hostess, if the affair be rather informal. If, however, it be a formal reception it is well to have engraved upon the card of the hostess, directly under her own name, “To meet Miss Smith.”
If a woman wishes to be at home for a guest unexpectedly arrived, and there is not time for the engraving of cards, or if she prefers to be informal, she may simply use her visiting-card, writing the name of her guest beneath her own, and adding the date on which she will receive, and the hours, in the lower left-hand corner. It is understood, of course, that abbreviations—with the exception of “P. p. c.” and “R. s. v. p.”—are never to be used on invitations and social notes.
The recipient, if sending cards instead of attending, encloses a card for the guest or friend whom she has been invited to meet.
THE EVENING RECEPTION
The cards for an evening reception may be issued in the same style. If not, they are in the form of a regular invitation, and in the third person, as:
“Mr. and Mrs. James Smith
Request the pleasure of Mr. and Mrs.
Brown’s company
On Wednesday evening, October the nineteenth,
From eight to eleven o’clock.
2 West Clark Street.”
If this formal invitation bears “R. s. v. p.” in one corner, it should be accepted in the same person in which it is written, thus:
“Mr. and Mrs. John Brown accept with pleasure Mr. and Mrs. Smith’s invitation for Wednesday evening, October the nineteenth.”
The reply to an invitation, whether formal or informal, should, to guard against misunderstanding, always explicitly repeat the date and the hour.
It is hardly to be supposed that any person who reads this book will be guilty of the outrageous solecism of signing his or her name to an invitation written in the third person. But such things have been done!...
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