Evening clothes are essential for the male guest at a ball, and the wearing of white gloves is obligatory. A careful man is very likely to provide himself with an extra pair. At informal dances, ungloved men often cover the hand with a handkerchief to avoid any risk of soiling a partner’s bodice. If a man serves as escort for a woman, or for a girl and her chaperon, it is a part of his duty to provide a carriage to and fro.
The ball-dress for women is usually the most elegant their taste and means will contrive. It is always decolleté, and commonly sleeveless.
BREAKFASTS
A HOSTESS MAY USE her visiting-card for invitations to breakfast, simply writing on it below her name:
Breakfast at eleven o’clock
April the fourth
A more formal affair may have an engraved invitation on paper similar to that used in the case of dinners. This would have the following form:
Mrs. George Vinton Thorne
requests the pleasure of
................................
company at breakfast
on....................................
at.............................o’clock
Eleven Green Street