Etiquette, Emily Post [read people like a book txt] 📗
- Author: Emily Post
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At The House
An awning makes a covered way from the edge of the curb to the front door. At the lower end the chauffeur (or one of the caterer's men) stands to open the carriage door; and give return checks to the chauffeurs and their employers. Inside the house the florist has finished, an orchestra is playing in the hall or library, everything is in perfect order. The bride and groom have taken their places in front of the elaborate setting of flowering plants that has been arranged for them.
The bride stands on her husband's right and her bridesmaids are either grouped beyond her or else divided, half on her side and half on the side of the groom, forming a crescent with bride and groom in the center.
Ushers At The House
At a small wedding the duty of ushers is personally to take guests up to the bride and groom. But at a big reception where guests outnumber ushers fifty or a hundred to one, being personally conducted is an honor accorded only to the very old, the very celebrated or the usher's own best friends. All the other guests stand in a long congested line by themselves. The bride's mother takes her place somewhere near the entrance of the room, and it is for her benefit that her own butler or one furnished by the caterer, asks each guest his name and then repeats it aloud. The guests shake hands with the hostess, and making some polite remark about the "beautiful wedding" or "lovely bride," continue in line to the bridal pair.
Wedding Conversation
What you should say in congratulating a bridal couple depends on how well you know one, or both of them. But remember it is a breach of good manners to congratulate a bride on having secured a husband.
If you are unknown to both of them, and in a long queue, it is not even necessary to give your name. You merely shake hands with the groom, say a formal word or two such as "Congratulations!"; shake hands with the bride, say "I wish you every happiness!" and pass on.
If you know them fairly well, you may say to him "I hope your good luck will stay with you always!" or "I certainly do congratulate you!" and to her "I hope your whole life will be one long happiness," or, if you are much older than she, "You look too lovely, dear Mary, and I hope you will always be as radiant as you look to-day!" Or, if you are a woman and a relative or really close friend, you kiss the groom, saying, "All the luck in the world to you, dear Jim, she certainly is lovely!" Or, kissing the bride, "Mary, darling, every good wish in the world to you!"
To all the above, the groom and bride answer merely "Thank you."
A man might say to the groom "Good luck to you, Jim, old man!" Or, "She is the most lovely thing I have ever seen!" And to her, "I hope you will have every happiness!" Or "I was just telling Jim how lucky I think he is! I hope you will both be very happy!" Or, if a very close friend, also kissing the bride, "All the happiness you can think of isn't as much as I wish you, Mary dear!" But it cannot be too much emphasized that promiscuous kissing among the guests is an offense against good taste.
To a relative, or old friend of the bride, but possibly a stranger to the groom, the bride always introduces her husband saying, "Jim, this is Aunt Kate!" Or, "Mrs. Neighbor, you know Jim, don't you?" Or formally, "Mrs. Faraway, may I present my husband?"
The groom on the approach of an old friend of his, says, "Mary, this is cousin Carrie." Or, "Mrs. Denver, do you know Mary?" Or, "Hello, Steve, let me introduce you to my wife; Mary, this is Steve Michigan." Steve says "How do you do, Mrs. Smartlington!" And Mary says, "Of course, I have often heard Jim speak of you!"
The bride with a good memory thanks each arriving person for the gift sent her: "Thank you so much for the lovely candlesticks," or "I can't tell you how much I love the dishes!" The person who is thanked says, "I am so glad you like it (or them)," or "I am so glad! I hoped you might find it useful." Or "I didn't have it marked, so that in case you have a duplicate, you can change it."
Conversation is never a fixed grouping of words that are learned or recited like a part in a play; the above examples are given more to indicate the sort of things people in good society usually say. There is, however, one rule: Do not launch into long conversation or details of yourself, how you feel or look or what happened to you, or what you wore when you were married! Your subject must not deviate from the young couple themselves, their wedding, their future.
Also be brief in order not to keep those behind waiting longer than necessary. If you have anything particular to tell them, you can return later when there is no longer a line. But even then, long conversation, especially concerning yourself, is out of place.
Parents Of The Groom
The groom's mother always receives either near the bride's mother or else continuing the line beyond the bridesmaids, and it is proper for every guest to shake hands with her too, whether they know her or not, but it is not necessary to say anything. The bride's father sometimes stands beside his wife but he usually circulates among his guests just as he would at a ball or any other party where he is host.
The groom's father is a guest and it is not necessary for strangers to speak to him, unless he stands beside his wife and, as it were, "receives," but there is no impropriety in any one telling him how well they know and like his son or his new daughter-in-law.
The guests, as soon as they have congratulated the bride and groom, go out and find themselves places (if it is to be a sit-down breakfast) at a table.
Details Of A Sit-down Breakfast
Unless the house is remarkable in size, there is usually a canopied platform built next to the veranda or on the lawn or over the yard of a city house. The entire space is packed with little tables surrounding the big one reserved for the bridal party, and at a large breakfast a second table is reserved for the parents of the bride and groom and a few close, and especially invited, friends.
Place cards are not put on any of the small tables. All the guests, except the few placed at the two reserved tables, sit with whom they like; sometimes by pre-arrangement, but usually where they happen to find friends—and room!
The general sit-down breakfast—except in great houses like a few of those in Newport—is always furnished by a caterer, who brings all the food, tables, chairs, napery, china and glass, as well as the necessary waiters. The butler and footmen belonging in the house may assist or oversee, or detail themselves to other duties.
Small menu cards printed in silver are put on all the tables. Sometimes these cards have the crest of the bride's father embossed at the top, but usually the entwined initials of the bride and groom are stamped in silver to match the wedding cake boxes.
Example:
Bouillon
Lobster Newburg
Suprême of Chicken
Peas
Aspic of Foie Gras
Celery Salad
Ices
Coffee
Instead of bouillon, there may be caviar or melon, or grape fruit, or a purée, or clam broth. For lobster Newburg may be soft-shell crabs or oyster pâté, or other fish. Or the bouillon may be followed by a dish such as sweetbreads and mushrooms, or chicken pâtés, or broiled chicken (a half of a chicken for each guest) or squab, with salad such as whole tomatoes filled with celery. Or the chicken or squab may be the second course, and an aspic with the salad, the third. Individual ices are accompanied by little cakes of assorted variety. There used always to be champagne; a substitute is at best "a poor thing," and what the prevailing one is to be, is as yet not determined. Orange juice and ginger ale, or white grape juice and ginger ale with sugar and mint leaves are two attempts at a satisfying cup that have been offered lately.
The Bride's Table
The feature of the wedding breakfast is always the bride's table. Placed sometimes in the dining-room, sometimes on the veranda or in a room apart, this table is larger and more elaborately decorated than any of the others. There are white garlands or sprays or other arrangement of white flowers, and in the center as chief ornament is an elaborately iced wedding cake. On the top it has a bouquet of white or silver flowers, or confectioner's quaint dolls representing the bride and groom. The top is usually made like a cover so that when the time comes for the bride to cut it, it is merely lifted off. The bride always cuts the cake, meaning that she inserts the knife and makes one cut through the cake, after which each person cuts herself or himself a slice. If there are two sets of favors hidden in the cake, there is a mark in the icing to distinguish the bridesmaids' side from that of the ushers. Articles, each wrapped in silver foil, have been pushed through the bottom of the cake at intervals; the bridesmaids find a ten-cent piece for riches, a little gold ring for "first to be married," a thimble or little parrot or cat for "old maid," a wish-bone for the "luckiest." On the ushers' side, a button or dog is for the bachelor, and a miniature pair of dice as a symbol of lucky chance in life. The ring and ten-cent piece are the same.
If a big piece of the wedding cake is left, the bride's mother has it wrapped in tin foil and put in a sealed tin box and kept for the bride to open on her first anniversary.
The evolution of the wedding cake began in ancient Rome where brides carried wheat ears in their left hands. Later, Anglo-Saxon brides wore the wheat made into chaplets, and gradually the belief developed that a young girl who ate of the grains of wheat which became scattered on the ground, would dream of her future husband. The next step was the baking of a thin dry biscuit which was broken over the bride's head and the crumbs divided amongst the guests. The next step was in making richer cake; then icing it, and the last instead of having it broken over her head, the bride broke it herself into small pieces for the guests. Later she cut it with a knife.
The Table Of The Bride's Parents
The table of the bride's parents differs from other tables in nothing except in its larger size, and the place cards for those who have been invited to sit there. The groom's father always sits on the right of the bride's mother, and the groom's mother has the place of honor on the host's right. The other places at the table are occupied by distinguished guests who may or
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