Twentieth Century Culture and Deportment / Or the Lady and Gentleman at Home and Abroad; Containing Rules of Etiquette for All Occasions, Including Calls; Invitations; Parties; Weddings; Receptions; Dinners and Teas; Etiquette of the Street; Public Places, Etc., Etc. Forming a Complete Guide to Self-Culture; the Art of Dressing Well; Conversation; Courtship; Etiquette for Children; Letter-Writing; Artistic Home and Interior Decorations, Etc.

by Maud C. Cooke

Receiving.

At a large evening party the arrangements for receiving guests, the dressing rooms, etc., and duties of the hostess in receiving, are the same as at a ball, and the supper served in the same fashion.

Ladies invited to help receive are not simply asked as a compliment to their friendship. It is not their sole duty to stand beside the hostess for the hour of coming and smile and shake hands with each guest and then see no more of them that evening. When a lady issues invitations for a large evening gathering she usually decides to ask some intimate friends “to receive with her.”

If she expressed what she really meant, and what she supposes her friends understand, she will say: “Will you come and help me in the actual entertaining of the guests, for I shall have only time to stand at the door and say, ‘How do you do;’ ‘Good-by.’” But no, she phrases it conventionally: “Will you come and receive with me?” And so they come in a flock and do nothing but “receive.”