Lawyers and physicians should have only the home address on the card used for social purposes. Another card with the business address should be used for business purposes. But Dr. is properly used by the physician in place of Mr. on his visiting-cards. Likewise, a clergyman uses Reverend, or its abbreviation Rev., on all his cards, which are commonly identical for both social and professional uses.
The letters indicative of degrees are not given after the name on the visiting-card, though a single exception is sometimes made by clergymen who omit Rev. before their names and, in lieu of it, use D.D. following the name.
When it becomes necessary, for any reason, to write one’s name on a visiting-card, the prefix Mr. should be given, following the ordinary form of the engraved card.
Care should be taken in the case of mourning-cards to avoid a too ostentatious parade of grief by an unduly broad margin of black. Somewhat less than a half inch is permissible for a widow’s card, and, after the first year, it is well to have this width reduced. Often, other reductions in the size of the border are made at intervals of six months, as long as the period of mourning continues.
The card of a widower must carry a border proportionately narrower, as its size is smaller than a woman’s card, but the decrease in width is made after the same manner.
When a woman elects to remain in mourning permanently, the narrow black border may be retained throughout her lifetime.
It is not customary to make variations in the mourning border for the commemoration of persons other than husband or wife. For these, a fitting width is about a twelfth part of an inch, which remains the same throughout the period of mourning.
When a call is made on a day at home, the card or cards are commonly left in the hall on a tray placed for that purpose. A married woman calling on the at-home day of another married woman for the first time in the season leaves her own card and two of her husband’s cards. But in later calls on the at-home day she leaves her card and the two cards of her husband’s only when the call acknowledges entertainment offered to them by the hostess.
There has been considerable simplification in recent years as to the leaving of cards. They are no longer weirdly bent in sign of delivery in person, and a smaller number are used. Thus, though the hostess referred to above may have unmarried daughters receiving with her, cards for them need not be left. But the presence of a married daughter or a friend formally assisting in the reception of the guests requires the leaving of a card.
A woman leaves no cards for the men of the family where she visits.