"Good-night to the season! the dances,
The fillings of hot little rooms,
The glancings of rapturous glances,
The flarings of fancy costumes,
The pleasures which fashion makes duties,
The phrasings of fiddles and flutes,
The luxury of looking at beauties,
The tedium of talking to mutes,
The female diplomatists, planners
Of matches for Laura and Jane,
The ice of her Ladyship's manners!
The ice of his Lordship's champagne."
The season in London extends from May to August, often longer if
Parliament is in session. In Paris it is from May to the _Grand Prix_,
when it is supposed to end, about the 20th of June. In New York and
Washington it is all winter, from November 1st to Lent, with good
Episcopalians, and from November to May with the rest of mankind.
It then begins again in July, with the people who go to Newport and to
Bar Harbor, and keeps up until September, when comes in Tuxedo and the
gayety of Long Island, and the Hudson. Indeed, with the gayety of
country-house life, hunting, lawn tennis and driving, it is hard to
say when the American season ends.
There is one sort of entertainment which is a favourite everywhere and
very convenient. It is the afternoon reception or party by daylight.
The gas is lighted, the day excluded, the hostess and her guests are
in beautiful toilets; their friends come in street dresses and
bonnets; their male friends in frock coats. This is one of the
anomalies of fashion. These entertainments are very large, and a
splendid collation is served. The form of invitation is simply--
MRS. BROWNTON at home
Thursday, from 3 to 6.
and unless an R. S. V. P. is appended, no reply is expected. These
receptions are favourites with housekeepers, as they avoid the
necessity of keeping the servants up at night.
The drawback to this reception is that, in our busy world of America,
very few men can spare the time to call in the daytime, so the
attendance is largely feminine.
On entering, the guest places a card on the table, or, if she cannot
be present, she should send a card in an envelope.
After these entertainments, which are really parties, a lady should
call. They are different things entirely from afternoon tea, after
which no call is expected. If the reception is given to some
distinguished person, the lady stands beside her guest to present all
the company to him or her.
If on the card the word "Music" is added, the guests should be
punctual, as, doubtless, they are to be seated, and that takes time.
No lady who gives a _musicale_ should invite more than she can seat
comfortably; and she should have her rooms cool, and her lights soft
and shaded.
People with weak eyes suffer dreadfully from a glare of gas, and when
music is going on they cannot move to relieve themselves. The hostess
should think of all this. Who can endure the mingled misery of a hot
room, an uncomfortable seat, a glare of gas, and a pianoforte solo?
A very sensible reformation is now in progress in regard to the
sending of invitations and the answering of the same. The post is now
freely used as a safe and convenient medium, and no one feels offended
if an invitation arrives with a two-cent stamp on the envelope. There
is no loss of caste in sending an invitation by post.
Then comes the ball, or, as they always say in Europe, the dance,
which is the gayest of all things for the _débutante_. The popular
form for an invitation to an evening party is as follows:--
MRS. HAMMOND
Requests the pleasure of
MR. and MRS. NORTON'S company
on Tuesday evening, December 23, at 9 o'clock.
R. S. V. P. Dancing.
The card of the _débutante_, if the ball is given for one, is
enclosed.
If a hostess gives her ball at some public place, like Delmonico's,
she has but little trouble. The compliment is not the same as if she
gave it in her own house, however. If there is room, a ball in a
private house is much more agreeable, and a greater honour to the
guest.
Gentlemen who have not an acquaintance should be presented to the
young dancing set; but first, of course, to the _chaperon_. As,
however, the hostess cannot leave her post while receiving, she should
have two or three friends to help her. Great care should be taken that
there be no wall-flowers, no neglected girls. The non-dancers in an
American ball are like the non-Catholics in a highly doctrinal sermon:
they are nowhere, pushed into a corner where there is perhaps a
draught, and the smell of fried oysters. Such is the limbo of the
woman of forty or over, who in Europe would be the belle, the person
just beginning to have a career. For it is too true that the woman who
has learned something, who is still beautiful, the woman who has
maturity and experience, is pushed to the wall in America, while in
Europe she is courted and admired. Society holds out all its
attractive distractions and comforts to such a woman in Europe; in
America it keeps everything, even its comforts, for the very young.
The fact that American ballrooms, or rather the parlours of our
ordinary houses, are wholly disproportioned to the needs of society,
has led to the giving of balls at Delmonico's and other public places.
If these are under proper patronage there is no reason why they should
not be as entertaining, as exclusive, and as respectable as a ball at
home. Any hostess or group of managers should, if they give up a ball
at home and use the large accommodations of Delmonico or the Assembly
Rooms, certainly consider the claims of chaperons and mammas who must
wearily sit through the German. It is to be feared that attention to
the mamma is not yet a grace in which even her daughter excels. Young
men who wish to marry mademoiselle had better pay her mother the
compliment of getting her a seat, and social leaders should also show
her the greatest attention, not alone from the selfish reason which
the poet commemorates:--
"Philosophy has got a charm,--
I thought of Martin Tupper,--
And offering mamma my arm,
I took her down to supper.
"I gave her Pommery, _Côte d'Or_,
Which seethed in rosy bubbles;
I called this fleeting life a bore,
The world a sea of troubles."
It is to be feared that the life of a _chaperon_ in America is not a
bed of roses, even if softened by all these attentions.
Kept up late, pushed into a corner, the mother of a society girl
becomes only a sort of head-chambermaid. Were she in Europe, she would
be the person who would receive the compliments and the attention and
be asked to dance in the German.
A competent critic of our manners spoke of this in the following
sensible words:--
"The evils arising from the excessive liberty permitted to American
girls cannot be cured by laws. If we ever root them out we must begin
with the family life, which must be reformed. For young people,
parental authority is the only sure guide. Coleridge well said that he
who was not able to govern himself must be governed by others; and
experience has shown us that the children of civilized parents are as
little able to govern themselves as the children of savages. The
liberty or license of our youth will have to be curtailed, as our
society is becoming more complex and artificial, like older societies
in Europe. The children will have to approximate to them in status,
and parents will have to waken to a sense of their responsibilities,
and subordinate their ambitions and their pleasures to their duties."
Mothers should go out more with their daughters, join in their
pleasures, and never permit themselves to be shelved.
Society is in a transition state in America. In one or more cities of
the West and South it is considered proper for a young man to call for
a young girl, and drive with her alone to a ball. In Northern cities
this is considered very bad form. In Europe it would be considered a
vulgar madness, and a girl's character compromised. Therefore it is
better for the mother to keep her rightful place as guardian,
_chaperon_, friend, no matter how she is treated.
Women are gifted with so much tact and so intuitive a faculty, that in
the conduct of fashionable life they need but few hints.
The art of entertaining should be founded first, on good sense, a
quiet considerateness, a good heart, a spirit of friendliness; next, a
consideration of what is due to others and what is due to one's self.
There is always a social conscience in one's organization, which will
point aright; but the outward performance of conventional rules can
never be thoroughly learned, unless the heart is well-bred.
Many ladies are now introducing dancing at crowded day receptions and
teas. Where people are coming and going this is objectionable, as the
hostess is expected to do too much, and the guests being in street
dress, while the hostess and her dancers are in low evening dress, the
appearance of the party is not ornamental.
Evening parties are far more formal, and require the most elaborate
dress. Every lady who can wear a low-necked dress should do so. The
great drawback in New York is now the ridiculous lateness of the
hour--eleven or twelve--at which the guests arrive.