At a formal dinner party the host should enter the dining-room first and with the lady in whose honor the dinner is given; the hostess goes into the dining-room last with the most important man guest, who should be seated at her right.
Where menus are used they should be placed on the left-hand side, beside the forks. When the dinner is over, at a signal from the hostess, the women rise and retire to the drawing-room, where coffee is usually served, the men remaining in the dining-room for coffee and cigars.
Five o’clock tea may be served in a variety of ways: the hostess may brew it herself in a teapot upon her tea-table in the parlor; she may make it by pouring boiling water over a tea-ball; or it may be served by either a man or maid servant in the dining-room. Its proper accompaniments are sugar, cream, sliced lemon, and either wafers, thin sandwiches, or cake.
It is in better form to have a luncheon served at a large table, especially when the guests do not number more than twenty, than to have small tables. Two o’clock is the fashionable hour for a luncheon; after it is over the guests usually disperse.
A host, in entertaining at a hotel or a restaurant, even if he entertains only one woman, should give the order for the meal himself, and save her the slight embarrassment it may be for her to make her own selection. The most courteous thing is for him to order the meal beforehand, but if the occasion is very informal and he prefers to wait until they are at the table, he should, after he and his guest are seated, hand the menu to her and ask if she has any especial preference, and then, respecting her wishes, give the order himself to the waiter.
If, however, friends happen in, and are asked informally to stay to a meal at a hotel, they may order themselves what they want from the menu, and, if necessary, the host or hostess of the occasion may pay the bill before leaving the dining-room, but the bill should not be paid until the guests have departed.
In giving one’s order for dinner at the hotel, oysters come first, then soup, fish, a roast or a bird, ices, whatever dessert may be desired, and coffee. Very often a woman is well served, when she is alone, by allowing the waiter to arrange a dinner for her.
If the only guest at the family dinner-table is a man, he should not be served until all the ladies of the family have been attended to.
If the hostess is the only woman at the table, she is served first, as a lady is of most importance from a social standpoint, and it is always proper to attend to her wants first. After her the man who is a visitor, or whose age gives him precedence, receives attention.
The guest of honor at a tea arrives a little earlier than the other guests, and remains somewhat later, but at a luncheon or dinner she should appear at the regulation time. One should remove one’s gloves at a luncheon, but the retaining of the hat is entirely a matter of personal taste.