Nothing but white damask is used by gentlewomen. The woman who gives a tea never pours it. There are other things she can do to please her callers. Tea is usually served with candlelight, and to be a success need cost next to nothing, for nothing need be served that is substantial enough to dislocate the appetite for dinner. Some women serve an old fashioned beat biscuit, about the size of an English walnut, with the cup of tea. These biscuits are awfully good, but only the old mammies who have survived the War know how to make them, and there is where the old families have the advantage of the new people. Others serve brown sandwiches made of Boston brown bread and butter.
More slices of lemon than cream jugs are used. Cream is something of a nuisance, and if people don't take lemon they can take tea as Li Hung Chang does. For a guest to have a preference and emphasize it, is downright rude. To be asked to a lady's house is glory enough for any one. The grumbler can go to a restaurant and take a cup and drink it up for a dime.
An Afternoon Tea.
Send out the invitation for an afternoon tea a week or ten days or even two weeks beforehand. Use visiting cards and below the name or in the lower left corner, the hours: 2 to 6, or any hours one chooses. On the top of the card or below the name write the name of the guest for whom the tea is given, if it is an affair in honor of some guest.
Decorate the rooms simply or elaborately as one chooses. For a small tea simply fill the vases with flowers, and make a special feature of the tea table in the dining room. Have a center basket of flowers and ferns tied with satin ribbons on the handle, or have cut glass vases at the corners. Use lighted candles, white, or the color of your flowers, if carrying out a certain color scheme in the dining-room. Pink, red or yellow are liked for this room as they are warm, bright colors. If the tea is given in spring or summer, green and white are liked. Have candles and shades match the color scheme and place silk or satin of the color used under the mats and doilies. On the table have cut glass or fine china dishes filled with candies, chocolates, salted nuts and candied fruits. Tea may be served from one end of the table and an ice from the other. Have a friend pour tea. Place before her the small cups, saucers, spoons. She fills the cups and hands them to the guests or to those assisting in the dining-room. The cream, sugar or slices of lemon are passed by assistants. Piles of plates are on the table by the one serving ice. The ice is served into a cut glass cup and placed on the plate with a spoon. Cakes are passed; so are the bonbons. Serve tea and chocolate or coffee. If one wish a more elaborate collation, pass assorted sandwiches, which are on plates on the table, or have a plate containing chicken salad on a lettuce leaf, olives and wafers. Waiters are best when the refreshments include two or three courses. The ices may be brought in or served from the table and the coffee and tea served from the table.
Ask from five to ten friends to assist in the parlors, to see that guests go to the dining-room and that strangers are introduced. Stand at the entrance or before a bank of palms in a window or corner and greet the guests. The guest or guests of honor stand with the hostess and she introduces them. A great many ladies do not wear gloves when receiving, but it is proper to wear them. It would seem that the hands would keep in better condition to shake hands with guests, if gloves were worn.
Bank the mantels with ferns and flowers and cover the lights with pretty shades of tissue paper. Use pink or green and white in the parlors and red, yellow or pink in the dining-room. Serve a fruit punch from a table covered with a white cloth and trimmed with smilax, ferns and flowers. Use a large punch bowl and glass cups. Have a square block of ice in the bowl. If a cut-glass punch bowl is used, care should be used lest the ice crack it. Temper the bowl by putting in cold water and adding a few bits of ice at a time until it is chilled. Do not put ice into a warm bowl or one that has not been thus tempered.
If there is music have a string orchestra concealed behind palms in a corner of the hall or dining-room.
Telling Fortunes by Teagrounds.
First, the one whose fortune is to be told should drink a little of the tea while it is hot, and then turn out the rest, being careful not to turn out the grounds in doing so, and also not to look at them, as it is bad luck.