Is it Yultide or christmas or just another day??

So today most businesses are closed.  Much of this practice originates with the pagan and heathen traditions.

Liberal history is fairly distorted but from there we can see that much of the traditions of today are of pagan origin and not of biblical truths.

Some information for this is seen in the

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yule

Christ was really born during the feast of tabernacles


More evidence on this site

Even if family members choose to celebrate Christ's birth on this day and call it whatever they may, remember to have Christian grace when approaching them and sharing the truth.
 

Etiquette: One's Position in the Community

Chapter IX. One’s Position in the Community

THE CHOICE FIRST of all, it is necessary to decide what one’s personal idea of position is, whether this word suggests merely a social one, comprising a large or an exclusive acquaintance and leadership in social gaiety, or position established upon the foundation of communal consequence, which may, or may not, include great social gaiety. In other words, you who are establishing yourself, either as a young husband or a stranger, would you, if you could have your wish granted by a genie, choose to have the populace look upon you askance and in awe, because of your wealth and elegance, or would you wish to be loved, not as a power conferring favors which belong really to the first picture, but as a fellow-being with an understanding heart? The granting of either wish is not a bit beyond the possibilities of anyone. It is merely a question of depositing securities of value in the bank of life.	1
THE BANK OF LIFE   Life, whether social or business, is a bank in which you deposit certain funds of character, intellect and heart; or other funds of egotism, hard-heartedness and unconcern; or deposit—nothing! And the bank honors your deposit, and no more. In other words, you can draw nothing out but what you have put in.	2
If your community is to give you admiration and honor, it is merely necessary to be admirable and honorable. The more you put in, the more will be paid out to you. It is too trite to put on paper! But it is astonishing, isn’t it, how many people who are depositing nothing whatever, expect to be paid in admiration and respect?	3
A man of really high position is always a great citizen first and above all. Otherwise he is a hollow puppet whether he is a millionaire or has scarcely a dime to bless himself with. In the same way, a woman’s social position that is built on sham, vanity, and selfishness, is like one of the buildings at an exposition; effective at first sight, but bound when slightly weather-beaten to show stucco and glue.	4
It would be very presumptuous to attempt to tell any man how to acquire the highest position in his community, especially as the answer is written in his heart, his intellect, his altruistic sympathy, and his ardent civic pride. A subject, however, that is not so serious or over-aweing, and which can perhaps have directions written for it, is the lesser ambition of acquiring a social position.	5
TAKING OR ACQUIRING A SOCIAL POSITION   A bride whose family or family-in-law has social position has merely to take that which is hers by inheritance; but a stranger who comes to live in a new place, or one who has always lived in a community but unknown to society, have both to acquire a standing of their own. For example:	6
THE BRIDE OF GOOD FAMILY   The bride of good family need do nothing on her own initiative. After her marriage when she settles down in her own house or apartment, everyone who was asked to her wedding breakfast or reception, and even many who were only bidden to the church, call on her. She keeps their cards, enters them in a visiting or ordinary alphabetically indexed blank book, and within two weeks she returns each one of their calls.	7
As it is etiquette for everyone when calling for the first time on a bride, to ask if she is in, the bride, in returning her first calls, should do likewise. As a matter of fact, a bride assumes the intimate visiting list of both her own and her husband’s families, whether they call on her or not. By and by, if she gives a general tea or ball, she can invite whom, among them, she wants to. She should not, however, ask any mere acquaintances of her family to her house, until they have first invited her and her husband to theirs. But if she would like to invite intimate friends of her own or of her husband, or of her family, there is no valid reason why she should not do so.	8
Usually when a bride and groom return from their wedding trip, all their personal friends and those of their respective parents, give “parties” for them. And from being seen at one house, they are invited to another. If they go nowhere, they do not lose position but they are apt to be overlooked until people remember them by seeing them. But it is not at all necessary for young people to entertain in order to be asked out a great deal; they need merely be attractive and have engaging manners to be as popular as heart could wish. But they must make it a point to be considerate of everyone and never fail to take the trouble to go up with a smiling “How do you do” to every older lady who has been courteous enough to invite them to her house. That is not “toadying,” it is being merely polite. To go up and gush is a very different matter, and to go up and gush over a prominent hostess who has never invited them to her house, is toadying and of a very cheap variety.	9
A really well-bred person is as charming as possible to all, but effusive to none, and shows no difference in manner either to the high or to the lowly when they are of equally formal acquaintance.	10
THE BRIDE WHO IS A STRANGER   The bride who is a stranger, but whose husband is well known in the town to which he brings her, is in much the same position as the bride noted above, in that her husband’s friends call on her; she returns their visits, and many of them invite her to their house. But it then devolves upon her to make herself liked, otherwise she will find herself in a community of many acquaintances but no friends. The best ingredients for likeableness are a happy expression of countenance, an unaffected manner, and a sympathetic attitude. If she is so fortunate as to possess these attributes her path will have roses enough. But a young woman with an affected pose and bad or conceited manners, will find plenty of thorns. Equally unsuccessful is she with a chip-on-her-shoulder who, coming from New York for instance, to live in Brightmeadows, insists upon dragging New York sky-scrapers into every comparison with Brightmeadows’ new six-storied building. She might better pack her trunks and go back where she came from. Nor should the bride from Brightmeadows who has married a New Yorker, flaunt Brightmeadows standards or customs, and tell Mrs. Worldly that she does not approve of a lady’s smoking! Maybe she doesn’t and she may be quite right, and she should not under the circumstances smoke herself; but she should not make a display of intolerance, or she, too, had better take the first train back home, since she is likely to find New York very, very lonely.	11
HOW TOTAL STRANGERS ACQUIRE SOCIAL STANDING   When new people move into a community, bringing letters of introduction to prominent citizens, they arrive with an already made position, which ranks in direct proportion to the standing of those who wrote the introductions. Since, however, no one but “persons of position” are eligible to letters of importance, there would be no question of acquiring position—which they have—but merely of adding to their acquaintance.	12
As said in another chapter, people of position are people of position the world over, and all the cities strung around the whole globe are like so many chapterhouses of a brotherhood, to which letters of introduction open the doors.	13
However, this is off the subject, which is to advise those who have no position, or letters, how to acquire the former. It is a long and slow road to travel, particularly long and slow for a man and his wife in a big city. In New York people could live in the same house for generations, and do, and not have their next door neighbor know them even by sight. But no other city, except London, is as unaware as that. When people move to a new city, or town, it is usually because of business. The husband at least makes business acquaintances, but the wife is left alone. The only thing for her to do is to join the church of her denomination, and become interested in some activity; not only as an opening wedge to acquaintanceships and possibly intimate friendships, but as an occupation and a respite from loneliness. Her social position is gained usually at a snail’s pace—nor should she do anything to hurry it. If she is a real person, if she has qualities of mind and heart, if she has charming manners, sooner or later a certain position will come, and in proportion to her eligibility.	14
One of the ladies with whom she works in church, having gradually learned to like her, asks her to her house. Nothing may ever come of this, but another one also inviting her, may bring an introduction to a third, who takes a fancy to her. This third lady also invites her where she meets an acquaintance she has already made on one of the two former occasions, and this acquaintance in turn invites her. By the time she has met the same people several times, they gradually, one by one, offer to go and see her, or ask her to come and see them. One inviolable rule she must not forget: it is fatal to be pushing or presuming. She must remain dignified always, natural and sympathetic when anyone approaches her, but she should not herself approach any one more than half way. A smile, the more friendly the better, is never out of place, but after smiling, she should pass on! Never grin weakly, and —— cling!	15
If she is asked to go to see a lady, it is quite right to go. But not again, until the lady has returned the visit, or asked her to her house. And if admitted when making a first visit, she should remember not to stay more than twenty minutes at most, since it is always wiser to make others sorry to have her leave than run the risk of having the hostess wonder why her visitor doesn’t know enough to go!	16
THE ENTRANCE OF AN OUTSIDER   The outsider enters society by the same path, but it is steeper and longer because there is an outer gate of reputation called “They are not people of any position” which is difficult to unlatch. Nor is it ever unlatched to those who sit at the gate rattling at the bars, or plaintively peering in. The better, and the only way if she has not the key of birth, is through study to make herself eligible. Meanwhile, charitable, or civic work, will give her interest and occupation as well as throw her with ladies of good breeding, by association with whom she can not fail to acquire some of those qualities of manner before which the gates of society always open.	17
WHEN POSITION HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED   When her husband belongs to a club, or perhaps she does too, and the neighbors are friendly and those of social importance have called on her and asked her to their houses, a newcomer does not have to stand so exactly on the chalk line of ceremony as in returning her first visits and sending out her first invitations.	18
After people have dined with each other several times, it is not at all important to consider whether an invitation is owed or paid several times over. She who is hospitably inclined can ask people half a dozen times to their once if she wants to, and they show their friendliness by coming. Nor need visits be paid in alternate order. Once she is really accepted by people she can be as friendly as she chooses.	19
When Mrs. Oldname calls on Mrs. Stranger the first time, the latter may do nothing but call in return; it would be the height of presumption to invite one of conspicuous prominence until she has first been invited by her. Nor may the Strangers ask the Oldnames to dine after being merely invited to a tea. But when Mrs. Oldname asks Mrs. Stranger to lunch, the latter might then invite the former to dinner, after which, if they accept, the Strangers can continue to invite them on occasion, whether they are invited in turn or not; especially if the Strangers are continually entertaining, and the Oldnames are not. But on no account must the Strangers’ parties be arranged solely for the benefit of any particular fashionables.	20
The Strangers can also invite to a party any children whom their own children know at school, and Mrs. Stranger can quite properly go to fetch her own children from a party to which their schoolmates invited them.	21
MONEY NOT ESSENTIAL TO SOCIAL POSITION   Bachelors, unless they are very well off, are not expected to give parties; nor for that matter are very young couples. All hostesses go on asking single men and young people to their houses without it ever occurring to them that any return other than politeness should be made.	22
There are many couples, not necessarily in the youngest set either, who are tremendously popular in society in spite of the fact that they give no parties at all. The Lovejoys, for instance, who are clamored for everywhere, have every attribute—except money. With fewer clothes perhaps than any fashionable young woman in New York, she can’t compete with Mrs. Bobo Gilding or Constance Style for “smartness” but, as Mrs. Worldly remarked: “What would be the use of Celia Lovejoy’s beauty if it depended upon continual variation in clothes?”	23
The only “entertaining” the Lovejoys ever do is limited to afternoon tea and occasional welsh-rarebit suppers. But they return every bit of hospitality shown them by helping to make a party “go” wherever they are. Both are amusing, both are interesting, both do everything well. They can’t afford to play cards for money, but they both play a very good game and the table is delighted to “carry them,” or they play at the same table against each other.	24
This, by the way, is another illustration of the conduct of a gentleman; if young Lovejoy played for money he would win undoubtedly in the long run because he plays unusually well, but to use card-playing as a “means of making money” would be contrary to the ethics of a gentleman, just as playing for more than can be afforded turns a game into “gambling.”	25
AN ELUSIVE POINT ESSENTIAL TO SOCIAL SUCCESS   The sense of whom to invite with whom is one of the most important, and elusive, points in social knowledge. The possession or lack of it is responsible more than anything else for the social success of one woman, and the failure of another. And as it is almost impossible, without advice, for any stranger anywhere to know which people like or dislike each other, the would-be hostess must either by means of natural talent or more likely by trained attention, read the signs of liking or prejudice much as a woodsman reads a message in every broken twig or turned leaf.	26
One who can read expression, perceives at a glance the difference between friendliness and polite aloofness. When a lady is unusually silent, strictly impersonal in conversation, and entirely unapproachable, something is not to her liking. The question is, what? Or usually, whom? The greatest blunder possible would be to ask her what the matter is. The cause of annoyance is probably that she finds someone distasteful and it should not be hard for one whose faculties are not asleep to discover the offender and if possible separate them, or at least never ask them together again. Post, Emily. Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics and at Home. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1922. Bartleby.com															27

Etiquette: Words, Phrases and Pronunciation

Chapter VIII. Words, Phrases and Pronunciation

PHRASES AVOIDED IN GOOD SOCIETY IT is difficult to explain why well-bred people avoid certain words and expressions that are admitted by etymology and grammar. So it must be merely stated that they have and undoubtedly always will avoid them. Moreover, this choice of expression is not set forth in any printed guide or book on English, though it is followed in all literature.	1
To liken Best Society to a fraternity, with the avoidance of certain seemingly unimportant words as the sign of recognition, is not a fantastic simile. People of the fashionable world invariably use certain expressions and instinctively avoid others; therefore when a stranger uses an “avoided” one he proclaims that he “does not belong,” exactly as a pretended Freemason proclaims himself an “outsider” by giving the wrong “grip”—or whatever it is by which Brother Masons recognize one another.	2
People of position are people of position the world over—and by their speech are most readily known. Appearance on the other hand often passes muster. A “show-girl” may be lovely to look at as she stands in a seemingly unstudied position and in perfect clothes. But let her say “My Gawd!” or “Wouldn’t that jar you!” and where is her loveliness then?	3
And yet, and this is the difficult part of the subject to make clear, the most vulgar slang like that quoted above, is scarcely worse than the attempted elegance which those unused to good society imagine to be the evidence of cultivation.	4
People who say “I come,” and “I seen it,” and “I done it” prove by their lack of grammar that they had little education in their youth. Unfortunate, very; but they may at the same time be brilliant, exceptional characters, loved by everyone who knows them, because they are what they seem and nothing else. But the caricature “lady” with the comic picture “society manner” who says “Pardon me” and talks of “retiring,” and “residing,” and “desiring,” and “being acquainted with,” and “attending” this and that with “her escort,” and curls her little finger over the handle of her teacup, and prates of “culture,” does not belong to Best Society, and never will! The offense of pretentiousness is committed oftener perhaps by women than by men, who are usually more natural and direct. A genuine, sincere, kindly American man—or woman—can go anywhere and be welcomed by everyone, provided of course, that he is a man of ability and intellect. One finds him all over the world, neither aping the manners of others nor treading on the sensibilities of those less fortunate than himself.	5
Occasionally too, there appears in Best Society a provincial in whose conversation is perceptible the influence of much reading of the Bible. Such are seldom if ever stilted or pompous or long-worded, but are invariably distinguished for the simplicity and dignity of their English.	6
There is no better way to cultivate taste in words, than by constantly reading the best English. None of the words and expressions which are taboo in good society will be found in books of proved literary standing. But it must not be forgotten that there can be a vast difference between literary standing and popularity, and that many of the “best sellers” have no literary merit whatsoever.	7
To be able to separate best English from merely good English needs a long process of special education, but to recognize bad English one need merely skim through a page of a book, and if a single expression in the left-hand column following can be found (unless purposely quoted in illustration of vulgarity) it is quite certain that the author neither writes best English nor belongs to Best Society.	8
NEVER SAY:    CORRECT FORM: In our residence we retire early (or arise)    At our house we go to bed early (or get up) I desire to purchase    I should like to buy Make you acquainted with    (See Introductions) Pardon me!    I beg your pardon. Or, Excuse me! Or, sorry! Lovely food    Good food Elegant home    Beautiful house—or place A stylish dresser    She dresses well, or she wears lovely clothes Charmed! or Pleased to meet you!    How do you do! Attended    Went to I trust I am not trespassing    I hope I am not in the way (unless trespassing on private property is actually meant) Request (meaning ask)    Used only in the third person in formal written invitations. Will you accord me permission?    Will you let me? or May I? Permit me to assist you    Let me help you Brainy    Brilliant or clever I presume    I suppose Tendered him a banquet    Gave him a dinner Converse    Talk Partook of liquid refreshment    Had something to drink Perform ablutions    Wash A song entitled    Called (proper if used in legal sense) I will ascertain    I will find out Residence or mansion    House, or big house In the home    In some one’s house or At home Phone, photo, auto    Telephone, photograph, automobile	9
“Tintinnabulary summons,” meaning bell, and “Bovine continuation,” meaning cow’s tail, are more amusing than offensive, but they illustrate the theory of bad style that is pretentious.	10
As examples of the very worst offenses that can be committed, the following are offered:         “Pray, accept my thanks for the flattering ovation you have tendered me.”         “Yes,” says the preposterous bride, “I am the recipient of many admired and highly prized gifts.”         “Will you permit me to recall myself to you?”	11
Speaking of bridesmaids as “pretty servitors,” “dispensing hospitality,” asking any one to “step this way.”	12
Many other expressions are provincial and one who seeks purity of speech should, if possible, avoid them, but as “offenses” they are minor:         Reckon, guess, calculate, or figure, meaning think.         Allow, meaning agree.         Folks, meaning family.         Cute, meaning pretty or winsome.         Well, I declare! ’Pon my word!         Box party, meaning sitting in a box at the theater.         Visiting with, meaning talking to.	13
There are certain words which have been singled out and misused by the undiscriminating until their value is destroyed. Long ago “elegant” was turned from a word denoting the essence of refinement and beauty, into gaudy trumpery. “Refined” is on the verge. But the pariah of the language is culture! A word rarely used by those who truly possess it, but so constantly misused by those who understand nothing of its meaning, that it is becoming a synonym for vulgarity and imitation. To speak of the proper use of a finger bowl or the ability to introduce two people without a blunder as being “evidence of culture of the highest degree” is precisely as though evidence of highest education were claimed for who ever can do sums in addition, and read words of one syllable. Culture in its true meaning is widest possible education, plus especial refinement and taste.	14
The fact that slang is apt and forceful makes its use irresistibly tempting. Coarse or profane slang is beside the mark, but “flivver,” “taxi,” the “movies,” “deadly” (meaning dull), “feeling fit,” “feeling blue,” “grafter,” a “fake,” “grouch,” “hunch” and “right o!” are typical of words that it would make our spoken language stilted to exclude.	15
All colloquial expressions are little foxes that spoil the grapes of perfect diction, but they are very little foxes; it is the false elegance of stupid pretentiousness that is an annihilating blight which destroys root and vine.	16
In the choice of words, we can hardly find a better guide than the lines of Alexander Pope:         “In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold;         Alike fantastic, if too new, or old:         Be not the first by whom the new are tried,         Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.”	17
PRONUNCIATION   Traits of pronunciation which are typical of whole sections of the country, or accents inherited from European parents must not be confused with crude pronunciations that have their origin in illiteracy. A gentleman of Irish blood may have a brogue as rich as plum cake, or another’s accent be soft Southern or flat New England, or rolling Western; and to each of these the utterance of the others may sound too flat, too soft, too harsh, too refined, or drawled, or clipped short, but not uncultivated.	18
To a New York ear, which ought to be fairly unbiased since the New York accent is a composite of all accents, English women chirrup and twitter. But the beautifully modulated, clear-clipped enunciation of a cultivated Englishman, one who can move his jaws and not swallow his words whole, comes as near to perfection in English as the diction of the Comédie Française comes to perfection in French.	19
The Boston accent is very crisp and in places suggestive of the best English but the vowels are so curiously flattened that the speech has a saltless effect. There is no rhyming word as flat as the way they say “heart”—“haht.” And “bone” and “coat”—“bawn,” “cawt,” to rhyme with awe!	20
Then South, there is too much salt—rather too much sugar. Every one’s mouth seems full of it, with “I” turned to “ah” and every staccato a drawl. But the voices are full of sweetness and music unknown north of the Potomac.	21
The Pennsylvania burr is perhaps the mother of the Western one. It is strong enough to have mothered all the r’s in the wor-r-rld! Philadelphia’s “haow” and “caow” for “how” and “cow,” and “me” for “my” is quite as bad as the “water-r” and “thot” of the West.	22
N’Yawk is supposed to say “yeh” and “Omurica” and “Toosdeh,” and “puddin’.” Probably five per cent. of it does, but as a whole it has no accent, since it is a composite of all in one.	23
In best New York society there is perhaps a generally accepted pronunciation which seems chiefly an elimination of the accents of other sections. Probably that is what all people think of their own pronunciation. Or do they not know whether their inflection is right or wrong? Nothing should be simpler to determine. If they pronounce according to a standard dictionary, they are correct; if they don’t, they have an “accent” or are ignorant; it is for them to determine which. Such differences as between saying wash or wawsh, advertisement or advertisement are of small importance. But no one who makes the least pretence of being a person of education says: kep for kept, genelmun or gempmun or laydee, vawde-vil, or eye-talian.	24
HOW TO CULTIVATE AN AGREEABLE SPEECH   First of all, remember that while affectation is odious, crudeness must be overcome. A low voice is always pleasing, not whispered or murmured, but low in pitch. Do not talk at the top of your head, nor at the top of your lungs. Do not slur whole sentences together; on the other hand, do not pronounce as though each syllable were a separate tongue and lip exercise.	25
As a nation we do not talk so much too fast, as too loud. Tens of thousands twang and slur and shout and burr! Many of us drawl and many others of us race tongues and breath at full speed, but, as already said, the speed of our speech does not matter so much. Pitch of voice matters very much and so does pronunciation—enunciation is not so essential—except to one who speaks in public.	26
Enunciation means the articulation of whatever you have to say distinctly and clearly. Pronunciation is the proper sounding of consonants, vowels and the accentuation of each syllable.	27
There is no better way to cultivate a perfect pronunciation, apart from association with cultivated people, than by getting a small pronouncing dictionary of words in ordinary use, and reading it word by word, marking and studying any that you use frequently and mispronounce. When you know them, then read any book at random slowly aloud to yourself, very carefully pronouncing each word. The consciousness of this exercise may make you stilted in conversation at first, but by and by the “sense” or “impulse” to speak correctly will come.	28
This is a method that has been followed by many men handicapped in youth through lack of education, who have become prominent in public life, and by many women, who likewise handicapped by circumstances, have not only made possible a creditable position for themselves, but have then given their children the inestimable advantage of learning their mother tongue correctly at their mother’s knee.	29
Post, Emily. Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics and at Home. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1922. Bartleby.com

Etiquette: Conversation

Chapter VII. Conversation

NEED OF RECIPROCITY IDEAL conversation should be a matter of equal give and take, but too often it is all “take.” The voluble talker—or chatterer—rides his own hobby straight through the hours without giving anyone else, who might also like to say something, a chance to do other than exhaustedly await the turn that never comes. Once in a while—a very long while—one meets a brilliant person whose talk is a delight; or still more rarely a wit who manipulates every ordinary topic with the agility of a sleight-of-hand performer, to the ever increasing rapture of his listeners.	1
But as a rule the man who has been led to believe that he is a brilliant and interesting talker has been led to make himself a rapacious pest. No conversation is possible between others whose ears are within reach of his ponderous voice; anecdotes, long-winded stories, dramatic and pathetic, stock his repertoire; but worst of all are his humorous yarns at which he laughs uproariously though every one else grows solemn and more solemn.	2
There is a simple rule, by which if one is a voluble chatterer (to be a good talker necessitates a good mind) one can at least refrain from being a pest or a bore. And the rule is merely, to stop and think.	3
“THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK”   Nearly all the faults or mistakes in conversation are caused by not thinking. For instance, a first rule for behavior in society is: “Try to do and say those things only which will be agreeable to others.” Yet how many people, who really know better, people who are perfectly capable of intelligent understanding if they didn’t let their brains remain asleep or locked tight, go night after night to dinner parties, day after day to other social gatherings, and absent-mindedly prate about this or that without ever taking the trouble to think what they are saying and to whom they are saying it! Would a young mother describe twenty or thirty cunning tricks and sayings of the baby to a bachelor who has been helplessly put beside her at dinner if she thought? She would know very well, alas! that not even a very dear friend would really care for more than a hors d’oeuvre of the subject, at the board of general conversation.	4
The older woman is even worse, unless something occurs (often when it is too late) to make her wake up and realize that she not only bores her hearers but prejudices everyone against her children by the unrestraint of her own praise. The daughter who is continually lauded as the most captivating and beautiful girl in the world, seems to the wearied perceptions of enforced listeners annoying and plain. In the same way the “magnificent” son is handicapped by his mother’s—or his father’s—overweening pride and love in exact proportion to its displayed intensity. On the other hand, the neglected wife, the unappreciated husband, the misunderstood child, takes on a glamor in the eyes of others equally out of proportion. That great love has seldom perfect wisdom is one of the great tragedies in the drama of life. In the case of the overloving wife or mother, some one should love her enough to make her stop and think that her loving praise is not merely a question of boring her hearers but of handicapping unfairly those for whom she would gladly lay down her life—and yet few would have the courage to point out to her that she would far better lay down her tongue.	5
The cynics say that those who take part in social conversation are bound to be either the bores or the bored; and that which you choose to be, is a mere matter of selection. And there must be occasions in the life of everyone when the cynics seem to be right; the man of affairs who, sitting next to an attractive looking young woman, is regaled throughout dinner with the detailed accomplishments of the young woman’s husband; the woman of intellect who must listen with interest to the droolings of an especially prosy man who holds forth on the super-everything of his own possessions, can not very well consider that the evening was worth dressing, sitting up, and going out for.	6
People who talk too easily are apt to talk too much, and at times imprudently, and those with vivid imagination are often unreliable in their statements. On the other hand the “man of silence” who never speaks except when he has something “worth while” to say, is apt to wear well among his intimates, but is not likely to add much to the gaiety of a party.	7
Try not to repeat yourself; either by telling the same story again and again or by going back over details of your narrative that seemed especially to interest or amuse your hearer. Many things are of interest when briefly told and for the first time; nothing interests when too long dwelt upon; little interests that is told a second time. The exception is something very pleasant that you have heard about A. or more especially A.’s child, which having already told A. you can then tell B., and later C. in A.’s presence. Never do this as a habit, however, and never drag the incident into the conversation merely to flatter A., since if A. is a person of taste, he will be far more apt to resent than be pleased by flattery that borders on the fulsome.	8
Be careful not to let amiable discussion turn into contradiction and argument. The tactful person keeps his prejudices to himself and even when involved in a discussion says quietly “No. I don’t think I agree with you” or “It seems to me thus and so.” One who is well-bred never says “You are wrong!” or “Nothing of the kind!” If he finds another’s opinion utterly opposed to his own, he switches to another subject for a pleasanter channel of conversation.	9
When some one is talking to you, it is inconsiderate to keep repeating “What did you say?” Those who are deaf are often obliged to ask that a sentence be repeated. Otherwise their irrelevant answers would make them appear half-witted. But countless persons with perfectly good hearing say “What?” from force of habit and careless inattention.	10
THE GIFT OF HUMOR   The joy of joys is the person of light but unmalicious humor. If you know any one who is gay, beguiling and amusing, you will, if you are wise, do everything you can to make him prefer your house and your table to any other; for where he is, the successful party is also. What he says is of no matter, it is the twist he gives to it, the intonation, the personality he puts into his quip or retort or observation that delights his hearers, and in his case the ordinary rules do not apply.	11
Eugene Field could tell a group of people that it had rained to-day and would probably rain tomorrow, and make everyone burst into laughter—or tears if he chose—according to the way it was said. But the ordinary rest of us must, if we would be thought sympathetic, intelligent or agreeable, “go fishing.”	12
GOING FISHING FOR TOPICS   The charming talker is neither more nor less than a fisherman. (Fisherwoman rather, since in America women make more effort to be agreeable than men do.) Sitting next to a stranger she wonders which “fly” she had better choose to interest him. She offers one topic; not much of a nibble. So she tries another or perhaps a third before he “rises” to the bait.	13
THE DOOR SLAMMERS   There are people whose idea of conversation is contradiction and flat statement. Finding yourself next to one of these, you venture:	14
“Have you seen any good plays lately?”	15
“No, hate the theater.”	16
“Which team are you for in the series?”	17
“Neither. Only an idiot could be interested in baseball.”	18
“Country must have a good many idiots!” mockingly.	19
“Obviously it has.” Full stop. In desperation you veer to the personal.	20
“I’ve never seen Mrs. Bobo Gilding as beautiful as she is to-night.”	21
“Nothing beautiful about her. As for the name ‘Bobo,’ it’s asinine.”	22
“Oh, it’s just one of those children’s names that stick sometimes for life.”	23
“Perfect rot. Ought to be called by his name,” etc.	24
Another, not very different in type though different in method, is the self-appointed instructor whose proper place is on the lecture platform, not at a dinner table.	25
“The earliest coins struck in the Peloponnesus were stamped on one side only; their alloy———” etc.	26
Another is the expounder of the obvious: “Have you ever noticed,” says he, deeply thinking, “how people’s tastes differ?”	27
Then there is the vulgarian of fulsome compliment: “Why are you so beautiful? It is not fair to the others———” and so on.	28
TACTLESS BLUNDERERS   Tactless people are also legion. The means-to-be-agreeable elderly man says to a passée acquaintance, “Twenty years ago you were the prettiest woman in town”; or in the pleasantest tone of voice to one whose only son has married. “Why is it, do you suppose, that young wives always dislike their mothers-in-law?”	29
If you have any ambition to be sought after in society you must not talk about the unattractiveness of old age to the elderly, about the joys of dancing and skating to the lame, or about the advantages of ancestry to the self-made. It is also dangerous, as well as needlessly unkind, to ridicule or criticize others, especially for what they can’t help. If a young woman’s familiar or otherwise lax behavior deserves censure, a casual unflattering remark may not add to your own popularity if your listener is a relative, but you can at least, without being shamefaced, stand by your guns. On the other hand to say needlessly “What an ugly girl!” or “What a half-wit that boy is!” can be of no value except in drawing attention to your own tactlessness.	30
The young girl who admired her own facile adjectives said to a casual acquaintance: “How can you go about with that moth-eaten, squint-eyed, bag of a girl!” “Because,” answered the youth whom she had intended to dazzle, “the lady of your flattering epithets happens to be my sister.”	31
It is scarcely necessary to say that one whose tactless remarks ride rough-shod over the feelings of others, is not welcomed by many.	32
THE BORE   A bore is said to be “one who talks about himself when you want to talk about yourself!” which is superficially true enough, but a bore might more accurately be described as one who is interested in what does not interest you, and insists that you share his enthusiasm, in spite of your disinclination. To the bore life holds no dullness; every subject is of unending delight. A story told for the thousandth time has not lost its thrill; every tiresome detail is held up and turned about as a morsel of delectableness; to him each pea in a pod differs from another with the entrancing variety that artists find in tropical sunsets.	33
On the other hand, to be bored is a bad habit, and one only too easy to fall into. As a matter of fact, it is impossible, almost, to meet anyone who has not something of interest to tell you if you are but clever enough yourself to find out what it is. There are certain always delightful people who refuse to be bored. Their attitude is that no subject need ever be utterly uninteresting, so long as it is discussed for the first time. Repetition alone is deadly dull. Besides, what is the matter with trying to be agreeable yourself? Not too agreeable. Alas! it is true: “Be polite to bores and so shall you have bores always round about you.” Furthermore, there is no reason why you should be bored when you can be otherwise. But if you find yourself sitting in the hedgerow with nothing but weeds, there is no reason for shutting your eyes and seeing nothing, instead of finding what beauty you may in the weeds. To put it cynically, life is too short to waste it in drawing blanks. Therefore, it is up to you to find as many pictures to put on your blank pages as possible.	34
A FEW IMPORTANT DETAILS OF SPEECH IN CONVERSATION   Unless you wish to stamp yourself a person who has never been out of “provincial” society, never speak of your husband as “Mr.” except to an inferior. Mrs. Worldly for instance in talking with a stranger would say “my husband,” and to a friend, meaning one not only whom she calls by her first name, but anyone on her “dinner list,” she says, “Dick thought the play amusing” or “Dick said——”. This does not give her listener the privilege of calling him “Dick.” The listener in return speaks of her own husband as “Tom” even if he is seventy—unless her hearer is a very young person (either man or woman), when she would say “my husband.” Never “Mr. Older.” To call your husband Mr. means that you consider the person you are talking to, beneath you in station. Mr. Worldly in the same way speaks of Mrs. Worldly as “my wife” to a gentleman, or “Edith” in speaking to a lady. Always.	35
In speaking about other people, one says “Mrs.,” “Miss” or “Mr.” as the case may be. It is bad form to go about saying “Edith Worldly” or “Ethel Norman” to those who do not call them Edith or Ethel, and to speak thus familiarly of one whom you do not call by her first name, is unforgivable. It is also effrontery for a younger person to call an older by her or his first name, without being asked to do so. Only a very underbred, thick-skinned person would attempt it.	36
Also you must not take your conversation “out of the drawing-room.” Operations, ills or personal blemishes, details and appurtenances of the dressing-room, for instance, are neither suitable nor pleasant topics, nor are personal jokes in good taste.	37
THE “OMNISCIENCE” OF THE VERY RICH   Why a man, because he has millions, should assume that they confer omniscience in all branches of knowledge, is something which may be left to the psychologist to answer, but most of those thrown much in contact with millionaires will agree that an attitude of infallibility is typical of a fair majority.	38
A professor who has devoted his life to a subject modestly makes a statement. “You are all wrong,” says the man of millions, “It is this way——”. As a connoisseur he seems to think that because he can pay for anything he fancies, he is accredited expert as well as potential owner. Topics he does not care for are “bosh,” those which he has a smattering of, he simply appropriates; his prejudices are, in his opinion, expert criticism; his taste impeccable; his judgment infallible; and to him the world is a pleasance built for his sole pleasuring. But to the rest of us who also have to live in it with as much harmony as we can, such persons are certainly elephants at large in the garden. We can sometimes induce them to pass through gently, but they are just as likely at any moment to pull up our fences and push the house itself over on our defenseless heads.	39
There are countless others of course, very often the richest of all, who are authoritative in all they profess, who are experts and connoisseurs, who are human and helpful and above everything respecters of the garden enclosure of others.	40
DANGERS TO BE AVOIDED   In conversation the dangers are very much the same as those to be avoided in writing letters. Talk about things which you think will be agreeable to your hearer. Don’t dilate on ills, misfortune, or other unpleasantnesses. The one in greatest danger of making enemies is the man or woman of brilliant wit. If sharp, wit is apt to produce a feeling of mistrust even while it stimulates. Furthermore the applause which follows every witty sally becomes in time breath to the nostrils, and perfectly well-intentioned people, who mean to say nothing unkind, in the flash of a second “see a point,” and in the next second, score it with no more power to resist than a drug addict can resist a dose put into his hand!	41
The mimic is a joy to his present company, but the eccentric mannerism of one is much easier to imitate than the charm of another, and the subjects of the habitual mimic are all too apt to become his enemies.	42
You need not, however, be dull because you refrain from the rank habit of a critical attitude, which like a weed will grow all over the place if you let it have half a chance. A very good resolve to make and keep, if you would also keep any friends you make, is never to speak of anyone without, in imagination, having them overhear what you say. One often hears the exclamation “I would say it to her face!” At least be very sure that this is true, and not a braggart’s phrase and then—nine times out of ten think better of it and refrain. Preaching is all very well in a text-book, schoolroom or pulpit, but it has no place in society. Society is supposed to be a pleasant place; telling people disagreeable things to their faces or behind their backs is not a pleasant occupation.	43
Do not be too apparently clever if you would be popular. The cleverest woman is she who, in talking to a man, makes him seem clever. This was Mme. Recamier’s great charm.	44
A FEW MAXIMS FOR THOSE WHO TALK TOO MUCH—AND EASILY!   The faults of commission are far more serious than those of omission; regrets are seldom for what you left unsaid.	45
The chatterer reveals every corner of his shallow mind; one who keeps silent can not have his depth plumbed.	46
Don’t pretend to know more than you do. To say you have read a book and then seemingly to understand nothing of what you have read, proves you a half-wit. Only the very small mind hesitates to say “I don’t know.”	47
Above all, stop and think what you are saying! This is really the first, last and only rule. If you “stop” you can’t chatter or expound or flounder ceaselessly, and if you think, you will find a topic and a manner of presenting your topic so that your neighbor will be interested rather than long-suffering.	48
Remember also that the sympathetic (not apathetic) listener is the delight of delights. The person who looks glad to see you, who is seemingly eager for your news, or enthralled with your conversation; who looks at you with a kindling of the face, and gives you spontaneous and undivided attention, is the one to whom the palm for the art of conversation would undoubtedly be awarded. Post, Emily. Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics and at Home. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1922. Bartleby.com www.bartleby.com/95/.

Etiquette: At the Opera, the Theatre, and Other Public Gatherings

Chapter VI. At the Opera, the Theatre, and Other Public Gatherings

EXCEPTING a religious ceremonial, there is no occasion where greater dignity of manner is required of ladies and gentlemen both, than in occupying a box at the opera. For a gentleman especially no other etiquette is so exacting.	1
In walking about in the foyer of the opera house, a gentleman leaves his coat in the box—or in his orchestra chair—but he always wears his high hat. The “collapsible” hat is for use in the seats rather than in the boxes, but it can be worn perfectly well by a guest in the latter if he hasn’t a “silk” one. A gentleman must always be in full dress, tail coat, white waistcoat, white tie and white gloves whether he is seated in the orchestra or a box. He wears white gloves nowhere else except at a ball, or when usher at a wedding.	2
As people usually dine with their hostess before the opera, they arrive together; the gentlemen assist the ladies to lay off their wraps, one of the gentlemen (whichever is nearest) draws back the curtain dividing the ante-room from the box, and the ladies enter, followed by the gentlemen, the last of whom closes the curtain again. If there are two ladies besides the hostess, the latter places her most distinguished or older guest in the corner nearest the stage. The seat furthest from the stage is always her own. The older guest takes her seat first, then the hostess takes her place, whereupon the third lady goes forward in the center to the front of the box, and stands until one of the gentlemen places a chair for her between the other two. (The chairs are arranged in three rows, of one on either side with an aisle left between.)	3
One of the duties of the gentlemen is to see that the curtains at the back of the box remain tightly closed, as the light from the ante-room shining in the faces of others in the audience across the house is very disagreeable to them.	4
A gentleman never sits in the front row of a box, even though he is for a time alone in it.	5
AS TO VISITING   It is the custom for a gentleman who is a guest in one box to pay visits to friends in other boxes during the entr’actes. He must visit none but ladies of his acquaintance and must never enter a box in which he knows only the gentlemen, and expect to be introduced to the ladies. If Arthur Norman, for instance, wishes to present a gentleman to Mrs. Gilding in her box at the opera, he must first ask her if he may bring his friend James Dawson. (He would on no account speak of him as Mr. Dawson unless he is an elderly person.) A lady’s box at the opera is actually her house, and only those who are acceptable as visitors in her house should ask to be admitted.	6
But it is quite correct for a gentleman to go into a stranger’s box to speak to a lady who is a friend of his, just as he would go to see her if she were staying in a stranger’s house. But he should not go into the box of one he does not know, to speak to a lady with whom he has only a slight acquaintance, since visits are not paid quite so casually to ladies who are themselves visitors. Upon a gentleman’s entering a box it is obligatory for whoever is sitting behind the lady to whom the arriving gentleman’s visit is addressed, to relinquish his chair. Another point of etiquette is that a gentleman must never leave the ladies of his own box alone. Occasionally it happens that the gentlemen in Mrs. Gilding’s box, for instance, have all relinquished their places to visitors and have themselves gone to Mrs. Worldly’s or Mrs. Jones’ or Mrs. Town’s boxes. Mrs. Gilding’s guests must, from the vantage point of the Worldly, Jones or Town boxes, keep a watchful eye on their hostess and instantly return to her support when they see her visitors about to leave, even though the ladies whom they are momentarily visiting be left to themselves. It is of course the duty of the other gentlemen who came to the opera with Mrs. Worldly, Mrs. Jones or Mrs. Town to hurry to them.	7
A gentleman must never stay in any box that he does not belong in, after the lowering of the lights for the curtain. Nor, in spite of cartoons to the contrary, does good taste permit conversation during the performance or during the overture. Box holders arriving late or leaving before the final curtain do so as quietly as possible and always without speaking.	8
A “BRILLIANT OPERA NIGHT”   A “brilliant opera night,” which one often hears spoken of (meaning merely that all the boxes are occupied, and that the ladies are more elaborately dressed than usual) is generally a night when a leader of fashion such as Mrs. Worldly, Mrs. Gilding, or Mrs. Toplofty, is giving a ball; and most of the holders of the parterre boxes are in ball dresses, with an unusual display of jewels. Or a house will be particularly “brilliant” if a very great singer is appearing in a new rôle, or if a personage be present, as when Marshal Joffre went to the Metropolitan.	9
AFTER THE PERFORMANCE   One gentleman, at least, must wait in the carriage lobby until all the ladies in his party have driven away. Never under any circumstances may “the last” gentleman leave a lady standing alone on the sidewalk. It is the duty of the hostess to take all unattended ladies home who have not a private conveyance of their own, but the obligation does not extend to married couples or odd men. But if a married lady or widow has ordered her own car to come for her, the odd gentleman waits with her until it appears. It is then considerate for her to offer him a “lift,” but it is equally proper for her to thank him for waiting and drive off alone.	10
AT THE THEATER   New Yorkers of highest fashion almost never occupy a box at the theater. At the opera the world of fashion is to be seen in the parterre boxes (not the first tier), and in boxes at some of the horse shows and at many public charity balls and entertainments, but those in boxes at the theater are usually “strangers” or “outsiders.”	11
No one can dispute that the best theater seats are those in the center of the orchestra. A box in these days of hatlessness has nothing to recommend it except that the people can sit in a group and gentlemen can go out between the acts easily, but these advantages hardly make up for the disadvantage to four or at least three out of the six box occupants who see scarcely a slice of the stage.	12
WILL YOU DINE AND GO TO THE PLAY?   There is no more popular or agreeable way of entertaining people than to ask them to “dine and go to the play.” The majority do not even prefer to have “opera” substituted for “play,” because those who care for serious music are a minority compared with those who like the theater.	13
If a bachelor gives a small theater party he usually takes his guests to dine at the Fitz-Cherry or some other fashionable and “amusing” restaurant, but a married couple living in their own house are more likely to dine at home, unless they belong to a type prevalent in New York which is “restaurant mad.” The Gildings, in spite of the fact that their own chef is the best there is, are much more apt to dine in a restaurant before going to a play—or if they don’t dine in a restaurant, they go to one for supper afterwards. But the Normans, if they ask people to dine and go to the theater, invariably dine at home.	14
A theater party can of course be of any size, but six or eight is the usual number, and the invitations are telephoned: “Will Mr. and Mrs. Lovejoy dine with Mr. and Mrs. Norman at seven-thirty on Tuesday and go to the play?”	15
Or “Will Mr. and Mrs. Oldname dine with Mr. Clubwin Doe on Saturday at the Toit d’Or and go to the play?”	16
When Mr. and Mrs. Oldname “accept with pleasure” a second message is given: “Dinner will be at 7.30.”	17
Mrs. Norman’s guests go to her house. Mr. Doe’s guests meet him in the foyer of the Toit d’Or. But the guests at both dinners are taken to the theater by their host. If a dinner is given by a hostess who has no car of her own, a guest will sometimes ask: “Don’t you want me to have the car come back for us?” The hostess can either say to an intimate friend “Why, yes, thank you very much,” or to a more formal acquaintance, “No, thank you just the same—I have ordered taxis.” Or she can accept. There is no rule beyond her own feelings in the matter.	18
Mr. Doe takes his guests to the theater in taxis. The Normans, if only the Lovejoys are dining with them, go in Mrs. Norman’s little town car, but if there are to be six or eight, the ladies go in her car and the gentlemen follow in a taxi. (Unless Mrs. Worldly or Mrs. Gilding are in the party and order their cars back.)	19
TICKETS BOUGHT IN ADVANCE   Before inviting anyone to go to a particular play, a hostess must be sure that good tickets are to be had. She should also try to get seats for a play that is new; since it is dull to take people to something they have already seen. This is not difficult in cities where new plays come to town every week, but in New York, where the same ones run for a year or more, it is often a choice between an old good one or a new one that is poor. If intimate friends are coming, a hostess usually asks them what they want to see and tries to get tickets accordingly.	20
It is really unnecessary to add that one must never ask people to go to a place of public amusement and then stand in line to get seats at the time of the performance.	21
GOING DOWN THE AISLE OF A THEATER   The host, or whichever gentleman has the tickets, (if there is no host, the hostess usually hands them to one of the gentlemen before leaving her house), goes down the aisle first and gives the checks to the usher, and the others follow in the order in which they are to sit and which the hostess must direct. It is necessary that each knows who follows whom, particularly if a theater party arrives after the curtain has gone up. If the hostess “forgets,” the guests always ask before trooping down the aisle “How do you want us to sit?” For nothing is more awkward and stupid than to block the aisle at the row where their seats are, while their hostess “sorts them”; and worse yet, in her effort to be polite, sends the ladies to their seats first and then lets the gentlemen stumble across them to their own places. Going down the aisle is not a question of precedence, but a question of seating. The one who is to sit eighth from the aisle, whether a lady or a gentleman, goes first, then the seventh, then the sixth, and if the gentleman with the checks is fifth, he goes in his turn and the fourth follows him.	22
If a gentleman and his wife go to the theater alone, the question as to who goes down the aisle first depends on where the usher is. If the usher takes the checks at the head of the aisle, she follows the usher. Otherwise the gentleman goes first with the checks. When their places are shown him, he stands aside for his wife to take her place first and then he takes his. A lady never sits in the aisle seat if she is with a gentleman.	23
GOOD MANNERS AT THE THEATER   In passing across people who are seated, always face the stage and press as close to the backs of the seats you are facing as you can. Remember also not to drag anything across the heads of those sitting in front of you. At the moving pictures, especially when it is dark and difficult to see, a coat on an arm passing behind a chair can literally devastate the hair-dressing of a lady occupying it.	24
If you are obliged to cross in front of some one who gets up to let you pass, say “Thank you,” or “Thank you very much” or “I am very sorry.” Do not say “Pardon me!” or “Beg pardon!” Though you can say “I beg your pardon.” That, however, would be more properly the expression to use if you brushed your coat over their heads, or spilled water over them, or did something to them for which you should actually beg their pardon. But “Beg pardon,” which is an abbreviation, is one of the phrases never said in best society.	25
Gentlemen who want to go out after every act should always be sure to get aisle seats. There are no greater theater pests than those who come back after the curtain has gone up and temporarily snuff out the view of everyone behind, as well as annoy those who are obliged to stand up and let them by.	26
Between the acts nearly all gentlemen go out and smoke at least once, but those wedged in far from the aisle, who file out every time the curtain drops are utterly lacking in consideration for others. If there are five acts, they should at most go out for two entr’actes and even then be careful to come back before the curtain goes up.	27
VERY INCONSIDERATE TO GIGGLE AND TALK   Nothing shows less consideration for others than to whisper and rattle programmes and giggle and even make audible remarks throughout a performance. Very young people love to go to the theater in droves called theater parties and absolutely ruin the evening for others who happen to sit in front of them. If Mary and Johnny and Susy and Tommy want to talk and giggle, why not arrange chairs in rows for them in a drawing-room, turn on a phonograph as an accompaniment and let them sit there and chatter!	28
If those behind you insist on talking it is never good policy to turn around and glare. If you are young they pay no attention, and if you are older—most young people think an angry older person the funniest sight on earth! The small boy throws a snowball at an elderly gentleman for no other reason! The only thing you can do is to say amiably: “I’m sorry, but I can’t hear anything while you talk.” If they still persist, you can ask an usher to call the manager.	29
The sentimental may as well realize that every word said above a whisper is easily heard by those sitting directly in front, and those who tell family or other private affairs might do well to remember this also.	30
As a matter of fact, comparatively few people are ever anything but well behaved. Those who arrive late and stand long, leisurely removing their wraps, and who insist on laughing and talking are rarely encountered; most people take their seats as quietly and quickly as they possibly can, and are quite as much interested in the play and therefore as attentive and quiet as you are. A very annoying person at the “movies” is one who reads every “caption” out loud.	31
PROPER THEATER CLOTHES   At the evening performance in New York a lady wears a dinner dress; a gentleman a dinner coat, often called a Tuxedo. Full dress is not correct, but those going afterwards to a ball can perfectly well go to the theater first if they do not make themselves conspicuous. A lady in a ball dress and many jewels should avoid elaborate hair ornamentation and must keep her wrap, or at least a sufficiently opaque scarf, about her shoulders to avoid attracting people’s attention. A gentleman in full dress is not conspicuous.	32
And on the subject of theater dress it might be tentatively remarked that prinking and “making up” in public are all part of an age which can not see fun in a farce without bedroom scenes and actors in pajamas, and actresses running about in negligés with their hair down. An audience which night after night watches people dressing and undressing probably gets into an unconscious habit of dressing or prinking itself. In other days it was always thought that so much as to adjust a hat-pin or glance in a glass was lack of breeding. Every well brought up young woman was taught that she must finish dressing in her bedchamber. But to-day young women in theaters, restaurants, and other public places, are continually studying their reflection in little mirrors and patting their hair and powdering their noses and fixing this or adjusting that in a way that in Mrs. Oldname’s girlhood would have absolutely barred them from good society; nor can Mrs. Worldly or Mrs. Oldname be imagined “preening” and “prinking” anywhere. They dress as carefully and as beautifully as possible, but when they turn away from the mirrors in their dressing rooms they never look in a glass or “take note of their appearance” until they dress again. And it must be granted that Lucy Gilding, Constance Style, Celia Lovejoy, Mary Smartlington and the other well-bred members of the younger set do not put finishing touches on their faces in public—as yet!	33
THE COURTESY OF SENDING TICKETS EARLY   Most people are at times “obliged” to take tickets for various charity entertainments—balls, theatricals, concerts or pageants—to which, if they do not care to go themselves, they give away their tickets. Those who intend giving tickets should remember that a message, “Can you use two tickets for the Russian ballet to-night?” sent at seven o’clock that same evening, after the Lovejoys have settled themselves for an evening at home (Celia having decided not to curl her hair and Donald having that morning sent his only dinner coat to be re-faced) can not give the same pleasure that their earlier offer would have given. An opera box sent on the morning of the opera is worse, since to find four music-loving people to fill it on such short notice at the height of the season is an undertaking that few care to attempt.	34
A BIG THEATER PARTY   A big theater party is one of the favorite entertainments given for a débutante. If fifty or more are to be asked, invitations are sometimes engraved.	35
But—and usually—the “general utility” invitation (see XI¶41) is filled in, as follows:	36
Or notes in either wording are written in hand.	37
All those who accept have a ticket sent them. Each ticket sent a débutante is accompanied by a visiting card on which is written: “Be in the lobby of the Comedy Theater at 8.15. Order your motor to come for you at 010 Fifth Avenue at 1 A. M.”	38
On the evening of the theater party, Mrs. Toplofty herself stands in the lobby to receive the guests. As soon as any who are to sit next to each other have arrived, they are sent into the theater; each gives her (or his) ticket to an usher and sits in the place alloted to her (or him). It is well for the hostess to have a seat plan for her own use in case thoughtless young people mix their tickets all up and hand them to an usher in a bunch! And yet—if they do mix themselves to their own satisfaction, she would better “leave them” than attempt to disturb a plan that may have had more method in it than madness.	39
When the last young girl has arrived, Mrs. Toplofty goes into the theater herself (she does not bother to wait for any boys), and in this one instance she very likely sits in a stage box so as to “keep her eye on them,” and with her she has two or three of her own friends.	40
After the theater, big motor busses drive them all either to the house of the hostess or to a hotel for supper and to dance. If they go to a hotel, a small ballroom must be engaged and the dance is a private one; it would be considered out of place to take a lot of very young people to a public cabaret.	41
Carelessly chaperoned young girls are sometimes, it is true, seen in very questionable places because some of the so-called dancing restaurants are perfectly fit and proper for them to go to; many other places however, are not, and for the sake of general appearances it is safer to make it a rule that no very young girl should go anywhere after the theater except to a private house or a private dance or ball.	42
Older people, on the other hand, very often go for a supper to one of the cabarets for which New York is famous (or infamous?), or perhaps go to watch a vaudeville performance at midnight, or dance, or do both together.	43
Others, if they are among the great majority of “quiet” people, go home after the theater, especially if they have dined with their hostess (or host) before the play.	44
DON’T BE LATE   When you are dining before going to the opera or theater you must arrive on the stroke of the hour for which you are asked; it is one occasion when it is inexcusable to be late.	45
In accepting an invitation for lunch or dinner after which you are going to a game, or any sort of performance, you must not be late! Nothing is more unfair to others who are keen about whatever it is you are going to see, than to make them miss the beginning of a performance through your thoughtless selfishness.	46
For this reason box-holders who are music-lovers do not ask guests who have the “late habit” to dine before the opera, because experience has taught them they will miss the overture and most of the first act if they do. Those, on the other hand, who care nothing for music and go to the opera to see people and be seen, seldom go until most if not all of the first act is over. But these in turn might give music-loving guests their choice of going alone in time for the overture and waiting for them in the box at the opera, or having the pleasure of dining with their hostess but missing most of the first part.	47
AT GAMES, THE CIRCUS OR ELSEWHERE   Considerate and polite behavior by each member of an audience is the same everywhere. At out-door games, or at the circus, it is not necessary to stop talking. In fact, a good deal of noise is not out of the way in “rooting” at a match, and a circus band does not demand silence in order to appreciate its cheerful blare. One very great annoyance in open air gatherings is cigar smoke when blown directly in one’s face or worse yet the smoke from a smouldering cigar. It is almost worthy of a study in air currents to discover why with plenty of space all around, a tiny column of smoke will make straight for the nostrils of the very one most nauseated by it!	48
The only other annoyance met with at ball games or parades or wherever people occupy seats on the grandstand, is when some few in front get excited and insist on standing up. If those in front stand—those behind naturally have to! Generally people call out “down in front.” If they won’t stay “down,” then all those behind have to stay “up.” Also umbrellas and parasols entirely blot out the view of those behind. Post, Emily. Etiquette in Society, in Business, in Politics and at Home. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1922. Bartleby.com www.bartleby.com/95/.	49