SOCIETY IN PARIS.
If there is one point in social matters wherein Philadelphia shines pre-eminent, it is in the matter of entertainments, whether private or public. A lavish and generous hospitality rules our actions whenever we bid a guest to our board. Emphatically, it is to our board. If that hospitality has a flaw, it is to be found in the fact that we make the eating and drinking part of our festivities of far too much importance. Terrapin and Roederer take the place of dress and of diamonds. Our cooks, and not our mantuamakers, are set in a flutter at the rumor of a projected ball. We are less learned in point lace than we are in croquettes. There may be a flaw in our diamonds, but our butter is peerless. Our balls have their culminating point in the supper, and not in the German. We invite our best friends more willingly to partake of a new dish than to meet some distinguished stranger. And at most of our grand entertainments two great rushes take place—the one toward the dining-room when supper is announced, and the other out of the front door when the banquet is ended, when repleted Nature finds no more joy at the thought of terrapin, and when champagne has become a delusion and a snare.
In far different style do people entertain on the other side of the water. In Paris, that very paradise of cookery, the substantial element of balls and parties is either wholly wanting or is but a very secondary consideration. A Parisienne will bid you to her house, and leave you to refresh exhausted Nature with a cup of tea and a sponge-cake. In summer she may vary the entertainment by offering you a glass of currant syrup and water. She would consider herself as utterly ruined in a financial point of view did she conceive that an assemblage of some twenty or thirty people would require anything more substantial. At entertainments on a larger scale, such as soirées musicales, evening receptions, etc., ices, coffee, sandwiches and a variety of small cakes are usually handed round during the course of the evening; and that is all. At the grandest of grand balls the supper is almost invariably composed entirely of cold dishes—chicken, filet of beef, fish with mayonnaise sauce, etc., with ices, cakes and delicious bon-bons. If extra magnificence in the matter of viands is aimed at, it is sought in the matter of unseasonable and consequently costly delicacies. Thus, at a ball which was given during the month of February last the feature of the supper was strawberries served in unlimited profusion. The substantiality, the abundance, the variety of one of our Philadelphia suppers, with its terrapin, its croquettes, its oysters dressed in half a dozen styles, its game and sweetbreads and chicken salad, its ices and Charlotte Russe and meringues, its fruits and flowers, its oceans of champagne, rivers of hock and lakes of claret punch, would make a Parisian open his eyes—ay, and his mouth as well. For, be it known, the foreigners who scorn suppers in their native land lay aside all such prejudices with marvelous celerity when bidden to a Philadelphia banquet.
It must, however, be confessed that this simplicity in the matter of food which is characteristic of French entertainments is a great encouragement to the givers of soirées in general. With us, to entertain as other people do requires not only a lengthy purse, but a degree of care and forethought in the preparation for any festivity which is very wearing on body and mind alike. If Mrs. Quakercity wishes to invite fifty people to her house, her soul is vexed within her and her body is worn to a shadow with the magnitude of her preparations before the event can take place. Not so with Madame la Marquise. The purse of Madame la Marquise is but slender and her rooms are small. Nevertheless, she shrinks not from bidding her friends come to see her. Either she has, in pleasant sociable fashion, a regular reception-evening, once a week, when she is "at home" to all her friends and acquaintances, or else she organizes a little soirée twice or thrice during the season. Fifty or sixty people, as many as her rooms will conveniently hold, are invited. The mistress of the house provides something in the way of some good amateur music, a charade or two acted in almost professional style, a bit of declamation, or possibly the presence of some literary or artistic lion. Everybody comes, and everybody tries to make himself or herself as agreeable as possible. Nobody turns up his or her nose at the cup of tea, the delicately cut sandwiches, the tiny cakes that are handed round during the course of the evening. Nobody goes away groaning, "Heavens! how hungry I am!" Madame la Marquise cannot afford to give her friends pâté de foie gras and hothouse strawberries, and they neither expect to have them nor blame her for not offering them. If she were obliged to offer costly and delicate viands to her friends whenever she invited them to her house, she would not be able to invite them at all. They recognize the fact, and enjoy the hospitality which she offers them without expecting anything more. But I should very much like to see a reception at home where tea and sandwiches formed the sole refreshments of the evening. The comments of the departing guests would be more audible than flattering to the hostess, I am afraid.
The dinner-parties which form in Paris, as with us, a very prominent feature of social life, are far less heavy in character than are the same class of entertainments with us. They consist of fewer courses, which are served more rapidly. The guests are usually invited at seven o'clock, and are seldom detained at table after ten. Music, either private or professional, usually fills up the evening. It is customary to invite a certain number of guests to come in after a grand dinner to pass the remainder of the evening—a practice which proves that in Parisian society people are far less "cantankerous" than they are in our own. I can scarcely picture to myself a state of affairs wherein an American belle or society-man would consider an invitation to "come in" after dinner as anything but an insult. Which proves that we are not, after all, as we pride ourselves upon being, the most sensible people on the face of the earth in all respects. That pleasant willingness to accept invitations as they are really meant, and to appreciate hospitality for its own sake, is a social lesson that the members of American society would do well to study after the example set by their Parisian brethren.
A Parisian dinner-party is far less conducive to indigestion than is one of our own. Not only are the courses fewer, as I before remarked, but the viands are less rich in quality and are served in smaller portions. Delicacy of flavor, and not solidity, is the result aimed at by a true French cordon bleu. There is also considerable taste and ingenuity displayed in serving the ices, which are brought to the table in all manner of pretty and fanciful forms. Thus, at one dinner-party a basket formed of brown nougat was handed round. It was filled with apricots moulded in peach-tinted ice and of delicious apricot flavor. At another the basket was of white nougat, and the ice-cream was colored and moulded to represent pink and crimson roses. On another occasion a large silver dish was borne in, on which was placed a bundle of asparagus, the stalks held together by a broad blue satin ribbon. The ribbon was untied, the stalks fell apart, and one was served to each guest, together with a rich sauce from a silver sauce-boat. The asparagus-stalk was composed of vanilla ice-cream, and the green part of pistacchio ice, while the sauce was a delicately flavored cream. The imitation of the vegetable was perfect in every particular, and was thoroughly deceptive. The floral decorations at dinner-parties are usually on a far less extensive scale than with us. A single basket tastefully arranged for the centre of the table is considered quite sufficient, except on occasions of extra magnificence and importance.
The official balls at the Élysée, of which two or three are usually given every winter, are very informal in character. The American traveler who wishes to attend must send in his or her name through the medium of the American minister. The invitation-lists are divided into as many sections as there are balls to be given, so as to avoid over-crowding in the comparatively small salons of the Élysée. Madame MacMahon and the marshal receive their guests in a small reception-room, which is the first of the suite of apartments on the first floor, all of which are thrown open to the public on such occasions. They receive in a perfectly simple and informal manner. Each guest on entering bows to the host and hostess without any form of presentation, and is then at liberty to wander about at will. The apartments thrown open comprise the state suites on the first and second floors, numbering some twenty or thirty rooms in all. A temporary gallery is erected to serve as a supper-room, and there refreshments are served all through the evening, there being no set hour for supper, as with us. The profusion of flowers and lights, the crowd of powdered footmen in the white and scarlet liveries of the marshal, the delightful music and splendid toilettes, combine to make these balls very elegant and attractive, though far less so than were the official fêtes given under the Empire, when the superb apartments of the Hôtel de Ville and of the Tuileries formed the grand ball-rooms for the hospitalities of the government. The Élysée is much too small to accommodate the crowds that usually rush to these festivals. The heat and crush are excessive, and it is recorded that after the great ball last year wisps of costly laces, shreds of Chantilly, rags of old point, scraps of point de Bruxelles strewed the grand staircase from top to bottom. The crowd, owing to the division of the invitation-lists of which I have spoken, is less dense this year, but still great enough to render a ball at the Élysée anything but a comfortable form of enjoyment.
There is one feature about Parisian entertainments, whether public or private, which is apt to strike a stranger very unpleasantly; and that is the card-playing—nay, to put it accurately, the actual gambling—which forms one of the amusements of the evening. It is not pleasant to behold in the salons of the President of the French Republic an accurate reproduction in miniature of the departed glories of Baden-Baden and of Homburg—the shaded lamps, throwing a lurid light on the "board of green cloth," the piles of gold, the shifting cards, the intent faces of the players, and the groups of gazers looking on in silence. Vast sums are, I am told, often lost and won in this manner during a single evening. This, at least, is a reproach from which American entertainments of the highest class are certainly free. John Morrisey may take his seat in Congress, but he does not direct the amusements in the back parlor of the White House.
But if French society is unexacting in the matter of refreshments, it runs to waste in regard to dress. The toilettes worn at all entertainments of any extent and formality far surpass in costliness and beauty any festal garbs which feminine humanity can contrive to don in America. In this birthplace of dress, dress is a pre-eminent and all-important feature. Two great points are de rigueur in a Frenchwoman's toilette: it must always be appropriate, and always be fresh. It may not be costly, it may not be elaborate, but those two qualities must not be lacking. And they shade things off so much more minutely than they do with us. A ball-dress cannot be a dinner-dress, and vice versâ; while in America the same toilette is considered appropriate for both occasions. If a dinner-party is to number over twelve guests, a low-necked dress is admissible; otherwise, the dinner-dress must be made with open corsage and half-long sleeves. The same shade of glove is not suitable at a wedding-reception that is proper for a formal call. The handsomest of walking-dresses is inadmissible to receive calls in or to wear out in the evening to the opera or to a small party. The very length of skirt that is appropriate for each festive occasion is regulated by the laws of fashion. A lady at the Grand Opéra or Les Italiens must not wear her opera-cloak after she takes her seat in the theatre: it is considered only a wrap, no matter how magnificent or costly it may be. Fancy jewelry of all kinds is entirely out of fashion, and is seen no more: pearls and precious stones alone are worn on full-dress occasions. This rule has, it is whispered, caused a great increase in the trade of dealers in imitation jewelry, those who cannot afford the real article taking refuge in the highly vraisemblable splendors of wax-lined pearls and paste diamonds. It is rumored that after one of the great official balls of last season a superb diamond necklace was found behind one of the cushions of a sofa at the Élysée. It was placed in the hands of the prefect of the police, where it remained for some time without any claimant presenting herself. Finally, it was decided that the ornament should be sold and the proceeds applied to the relief of the poor of Paris. A jeweler was accordingly summoned, who, by the application of acids and a file, soon proved conclusively to the authorities that the precious trouvaille was a worthless piece of imitation. Sardou's heroine in his Maison Neuve, who sells her small real diamonds in order to appear at a ball ablaze with paste, is a true character of the epoch, and was evidently sketched from real life. But the disappearance of the masses of clinquante which used to be worn some years ago is a positive boon to the lovers of correct taste in dress.
Another striking feature of European society to an American is the predominance of old women therein—ladies of sixty or seventy years of age, very much coiffées, tremendously dressed and glittering with gems. This element is far from being an attractive one. A venerable dowager with white roses and lilies of the valley in her frizzed gray hair, with many diamonds and pearls displayed upon a neck which should long ago have retired into the deep obscurity of kerchief and high corsage, is not a charming object. It has been made a subject of reproach against American society that it is given up so entirely to the youth of both sexes. Well, after all, it is better so—that is, so far as balls and dancing-parties are concerned. Seventeen in white tarletan is a far more beauteous and appropriate ornament for a ball-room than is seventy in white brocade or rose-pink satin.
L. H. H.