Then let the messengers collect the blanks, and after the hostess has read all the amusing results let a vote be taken for the cleverest message and a prize be awarded to the sender.
Of course, the entertainment can be extended by writing any number of telegrams or varied by requiring that each set of telegrams refer to some assigned subject.
TENNIS SOCIABLE
Write invitations on small white cardboard racquets. Decorate the walls with tennis racquets and nets. Have tennis racquets hung from each chandelier, and stretch a large net across the room. Place in this net red and white racquets of pasteboard, each tied to several yards of red and white ribbon, and have them all tangled up. The object is to wind up the string on the racquets, and secure as many as possible without breaking the ribbon. The committee should wear red belts with seven red streamers, each containing a letter, and spelling the word "welcome." Place welcome mottoes about the room and pinned upon the racquets and nets. Red and white flowers of all kinds can be used for decorations. Take small pasteboard racquets, write quotations on, cut in half and give one-half to the ladies and the other half to the gentlemen, and have them match the quotations.
Refreshments can be passed in regular tennis racquets; in summer, lemonade and wafers, or in winter, hot coffee and cake.
Red and white decorated racquets can be given the guests as they leave, for souvenirs.
TEN VIRGINS (SACRED PLAY)
Select ten young ladies who are good singers—six sopranos and four altos. Divide into two groups, three sopranos and two altos in each group. Have all dress in long white robes and each carry a candle. Five should have lighted candles and five not lighted. Have all behind a curtain and before they appear have the whole ten sing the hymn, "Be robed and ready when the bridegroom comes." This can be found in any sacred song book. Have a small room curtained off on one end of platform. While singing the last verse, "We'll all go forth to meet Him when He comes," the five with candles lighted will march forth from behind the curtain and pass across the platform into the small room. They go in and the door is shut. The other five virgins come forth with no light and pass across the platform silently, and knock at the door, but they cannot get in. The five foolish virgins then sing, "Oh, let us in, the night is dark and chill," and the five wise virgins who have passed in will answer, using the chorus of the same hymn, "Too late, too late, ye cannot enter now." This is found in Methodist Hymnal, No. 375. The five foolish virgins ask the questions contained in each verse and the five wise ones answer with the "Too late."
THANKSGIVING DAY DECORATIONS
Great cornstalks, with the husk merely turned back to show the yellow ear, are extremely effective. A huge bunch of these on either side of the drawing-room door will take the place of palms. They may also be placed at the entrance to the dining-room, their sentinel-like appearance making them charming as a doorway decoration. Here and there great pumpkins, hollowed out to admit of the flower-pot with its growing green, make unique jardinières. A bunch of corn, where the ear is red, tied by means of a bow of yellow ribbon to the chandelier, admits of the same suggestion as the mistletoe of Christmas time, and makes a pretty spot of color, besides being the cause of much quiet fun.