Julia and I received your congratulations with pleasure, my only
regret being that I cannot return them in kind.
“Gather roses while ye may,
Old Time’s a-flying.”
A word to the wise, etc., and let me speedly have occasion to
felicitate you in like manner.
Your friend and well-wisher,
JOHN MYERS.
MR. RICHARD DOE,
Georgetown, D. C.
It should be mentioned here that while one congratulates a gentleman
upon his engagement, or marriage, and may congratulate his parents
upon the same occasion, it is inadmissible to congratulate a lady on
a similar event, or to extend the congratulations to her parents.
Well-bred mothers have been known to resent this solecism keenly.
You may, and indeed are expected to, offer to her, and her parents,
all manner of good wishes for future happiness, but be sure not to
congratulate.
Almost any success, or pleasant happiness in life, may be made the
subject of a congratulatory letter, but a multiplicity of forms is
unnecessary here.
Proposals, Engagements, “Naming the Day,”
And other letters of this description are important affairs that may
all be transacted through the medium of correspondence, but it is to be
hoped that a matter so closely personal will quicken the imagination
and inspire the pen of the dullest swain.
Let him woo his Dulcinea swiftly and tempestuously, as King Hal wooed
Kate, or let him serve twice seven years as Jacob served for Rachel,
but let him never search out printed forms whereby to declare his
passion: nor fit the measure of his love to the lines of the “Model
Letter-Writer.” As to “naming the day,” ’twere a wordless lover indeed
who could not say, as the poet says:
“Sun comes, moon comes,
Time slips away.
Sun sets, moon sets,
Love, fix a day.”
The note has become a factor in modern social life. We send a note when
we send a gift, when we ask a favor, when we acknowledge a favor, when
we offer an apology, when we postpone an engagement, and when we give,
accept, or refuse an informal invitation. These forms will be given
here for reference, excepting those pertaining to invitations, which
are discussed in their place.