One who has given the subject more than a passing thought might suppose it unnecessary to lay down to well-bred readers “Laws for Table Manners While Visiting.” Yet, when I saw a man of excellent lineage, and a university graduate, thump his empty tumbler on the table to attract the attention of the waitress, and heard him a few minutes later call out to her “Butter—please!” I wished that the study of such a manual had been included as a regular course in the college curriculum.
A true anecdote recurs to me here that may soothe national pride with the knowledge that the solecisms I have described and others that have not added to the traveled American’s reputation for breeding, are not confined to our side of the ocean.
ENGLISH FRANKNESS
Lord and Lady B——, names familiar some years back to the students of the “high-life” columns of our papers, were at a dinner party in New York with an acquaintance of mine who painted the scene for me. Lady B——, tasting her soup as soon as it was set down in front of her, calls to her husband at the other end of the table: “B——, my dear! Don’t eat this soup! It is quite filthy! There are tomatoes in it!”
We Americans are less brutally frank than our English cousins. Yet I thought of Lady B—— last week when my vis-à-vis,—a slim, pretty, accomplished matron of thirty, or thereabouts—at an admirably-appointed family dinner, accepted a plate of soup, tasted it, laid down her spoon and did not touch it again, repeating the action with an entrée, and with the dessert of peaches and cream. She did not grimace her distaste of any one of the three articles of food, it is true, being, thus far, better-mannered than our titled vulgarian. In effect, she implied the same thing by tasting of each portion and declining to eat more than the tentative mouthful.
SELF-DISCIPLINE
To sum up our table of rules: Bethink yourself, from your entrance to your exit from your host’s house, of the sure way of adding to the comfort and pleasure of those who have honored you by inviting you to sojourn under their roof-tree. If possessed of the true spirit of hospitality, they will find that pleasure in promoting yours. Learn from them and be not one whit behind them in the good work. If they propose any especial form of amusement, fall in with their plans readily and cordially. You may not enjoy a stately drive through dusty roads behind fat family horses, or a tramp over briery fields with the hostess who is addicted to berrying and botanizing—but go as if that were the exact bent of taste and desire. A dinner party, made up of men who talk business and nothing else, and their over-dressed wives, who revel in the discussion of what Mrs. Sherwood calls “The Three Dreadful D’s”—Disease, Dress and Domestics—may typify to you the acme of boredom. Comport yourself as if you were in your native element and happy there. The self-discipline will be a means of grace in more ways than one.
NEVER SHOW BOREDOM
On Sunday accompany your hosts to their place of worship with the same cheerful readiness to like what they like. You may be a high church Episcopalian and they belong to the broadest wing of Unitarians or the straitest sect of Evangelicals. Put prejudice and personal preference behind you and find consolation in the serene conviction of guestly duty done—and done in a truly Christian spirit.