The tables for the wedding-breakfast may be placed about the drawing-rooms, and the guests are seated informally at them. The only exception to this rule is the bride’s table at which the bridal party sits. As artificial lights are usually used at elaborate functions, even at high noon, pretty candelabra are upon each table. Or, if preferred, fairy lamps may take the place of the candelabra.
THE WEDDING BREAKFAST
The menu for the wedding-breakfast may consist of grapefruit with Maraschino cherries, or of oyster cocktails, or of clams on the half-shell, as a first course; next, hot clam bouillon (unless clams have already been served) or chicken bouillon; fish in some form, as fish croquettes with oyster-crab sauce; sweetbread pâtés with green peas; broiled chicken or French chops with potato croquettes or with Parisian potatoes; punch frappé; game with salad; ices, cakes, coffee. If wines are used, champagne is served with the breakfast. Slices of the wedding-cake packed in dainty satin-paper boxes are given to the guests as they leave.
The breakfast over, the bride slips away quietly, to change her dress for the wedding journey, and departs as after a home wedding.
The guests at a wedding-breakfast must call on the mother of the bride within three weeks after the marriage. They will, of course, call on the bride on one of her “At Home” days, the dates of which are given with the wedding invitations or with the announcement cards.
ANNOUNCEMENT CARDS
Announcement cards are issued immediately after the wedding, so must be addressed and stamped ready to be mailed at once. The text usually used is this: