Indiscriminate introductions are always in bad taste, yet, since the sweetest of our friendships are wont to reach us through the medium of a formal presentation, it is well that we understand how, when and where these introductions should properly take place.
As a rule, introductions, to be agreeable, should be desired before being given; and since we are, or should be, in a measure, the endorsers of those whom we present to our friends, a due degree of care should be exercised in so doing, lest inadvertently we force upon another what may prove an undesirable acquaintance.
Introductions are given in cases of necessity, such as business transactions, or emergencies that may arise in traveling, as when we wish to consign some friend to the care of another. They are given at balls, that partners may be found for all the dancers. Here, however, care must be taken beforehand to ascertain if the parties will dance, for such is the selfishness and, shall it be said, ill-breeding of our society young men that not unfrequently they will walk away without even offering the lady the courtesy of the next dance. In this way her hostess unwittingly exposes her to a marked slight, since the ball-room introduction is supposed to mean an intention on the part of the gentleman to show some attention to the lady, with whom he should either dance, promenade, or talk through one set.
Neither are young ladies quite guiltless in this respect, since it often happens that they refuse partners from simple caprice, and no gentleman likes to be refused, even for a quadrille. It may be added that these introductions necessitate no after acknowledgments on either side unless mutually agreeable.
Introductions are given at card parties when necessary to fill out tables for a game, and they occur also where one person especially wishes another to become acquainted with a friend.
An English Custom.
Strangers are always introduced to visitors, and at dinners, if previously unacquainted, the gentleman is introduced, a few minutes beforehand, to the lady he is to take out to the table. In England, however, where they exercise great care in giving introductions, even this formality is not always complied with. Richard Grant White speaks of being informed at the last moment, in some house whose owner boasted many titles, that he was to take down “the lady in pink over there in the bay window,” to whom, therefore, he duly went, and, bending an inviting elbow, said in his most persuasive tones: “May I have the pleasure?” The proffered honor was accepted, and he and the lady, each equally ignorant as to the other’s identity, went out to spend a long two hours in entertaining one another.