[Table Etiquette]
The minutiæ of table etiquette offers to onlookers the best evidence of good or ill-breeding, and in the graceful observance thereof is displayed all the “difference between dining elegantly and merely consuming food,” for it is at the table that the ill-bred and the well-bred man are most strongly contrasted.
How to eat soup, or partake of grapes, and what to do with a cherry stone, though apparently trivial in themselves, are weighty matters when taken as an index of social standing. And it is safe to say that the young man who drank from his saucer, or the young woman who ate peas with her knife, would court the risk of banishment from good society.
In regard to the first essentials of table manners we are bound to consider the laying of the table, the manner of being seated thereat, the use of the napkin, the proper handling of those most invaluable implements, knife, fork and spoon, together with a short dissertation on those older implements, “Adam’s knives and forks.”
The Breakfast Table.
This first repast of the day should always be daintily and appetizingly spread, and the etiquette there observed, as at all other meals of the day, should be of a nature to render the observance on more stately occasions second nature to the members of the family. Children so trained will find little difficulty in after days as to their table etiquette.