Manners and Social Usages by Mrs John M. E. W. Sherwood (best english novels for beginners .TXT) 📕

Ribbons have been used with flowers, and add much to their effect;

for, since the Arcadian days of Rosalind and Celia, a flower, a

ribbon, and a pretty girl, have been associated with each other in

prose, poetry, painting, and romance.

The hanging-baskets, filled with blooming plants, trailers, and

ferns, have been much used at weddings to add to the bower-like

appearance of the rooms; and altars and steps of churches have been

richly adorned with flowering plants and palm-trees and other

luxuriant foliage.

The prices paid for flowers have been enormous. One thousand dollars

for the floral decorations for a single dinner has not been an

uncommon price. But the expenditure of such large sums for flowers

has not been unprofitable. The flowers grow finer every day, and, as

an enterprising florist, who had given a “rose tea” to his patrons,

remarked, “Every large order inspires us to produce a finer flower.”

CHAPTER XLIII. THE FORK AND THE SPOON.

A correspondent writes, “How shall I carry my fork to my mouth?” The

fork should be raised laterally to the mouth with the right hand;

the elbow should never be crooked, so as to bring the hand round at

a right angle, or the fork directly opposite the mouth. The mother

cannot begin too early to inculcate good manners at the table, and

among the first things that young children should learn is the

proper use of the fork.

Again, the fork should not be overloaded. To take meat and

vegetables and pack them on the poor fork, as if it were a beast of

burden, is a common American vulgarity, born of our hurried way of

eating at railway-stations and hotels. But it is an unhealthy and an

ill-mannered habit. To take but little on the fork at a time, a

moderate mouthful, shows good manners and refinement. The knife must

never be put into the mouth at any time—that is a remnant of

barbarism.

Another correspondent asks, “Should cheese be eaten with a fork?” We

say, decidedly, “Yes,” although good authorities declare that it may

be put on a morsel of bread with a knife, and thus conveyed to the

mouth. Of course we refer to the soft cheeses—like Gorgonzola,

Brie, cream-cheese, Neufchatel, Limburger, and the like—which are

hardly more manageable than butter. Of the hard cheeses, one may

convey a morsel to the month with the thumb and forefinger; but, as

a general rule, it is better to use the fork.

Now as to the spoon: it is to be used for soup, for strawberries and

cream, for all stewed fruit and preserves, and for melons, which,

from their juiciness, cannot be conveniently eaten with a fork.

Peaches and cream, all the “wet dishes,” as Mrs. Glasse was wont to

call them, must be eaten with a spoon. Roman punch is always eaten

with a spoon.

On elegant tables, each plate or “cover” is accompanied by two large

silver knives, a small silver knife and fork for fish, a small fork

for the oysters on the half-shell, a large table-spoon for soup, and

three large forks. The napkin is folded in the centre, with a piece

of bread in it. As the dinner progresses, the knife and fork and

spoon which have been used are taken away with the plate. This saves

confusion, and the servant has not to bring fresh knives and forks

all the time. Fish should be eaten with silver knife and fork; for

if it is full of bones, like shad, for instance, it is very

difficult to manage it without the aid of a knife.

For sweetbreads, cutlets, roast beef, etc., the knife is also

necessary; but for the croquettes, rissoles, _bouch�es � la

Reine_, timbales, and dishes of that class, the fork alone is

needed. A majority of the made dishes in which the French excel are

to be eaten with the fork.

After the dinner has been eaten, and the dessert reached, we must

see to it that everything is cleared off but the tablecloth, which

is now never removed. A dessert-plate is put before each guest, and

a gold or silver spoon, a silver dessert spoon and fork, and often a

queer little combination of fork and spoon, called an “ice-spoon.”

In England, strawberries are always served with the green stems, and

each one is taken up with the fingers, dipped in sugar, and thus

eaten. Many foreigners pour wine over their strawberries, and then

eat them with a fork, but this seems to be detrimental to the

natural flavor of the king of berries.

Pears and apples should be peeled with a silver knife, cut into

quarters, and then picked up with the fingers. Oranges should be

peeled, and cut or separated, as the eater chooses. Grapes should be

eaten from behind the half-closed hand, the stones and skin falling

into the fingers unobserved, and thence to the plate. Never swallow

the stones of small fruits; it is extremely dangerous. The pineapple

is almost the only fruit which requires both knife and fork.

So much has the fork come into use of late that a wit observed that

he took everything with it but afternoon tea. The thick chocolate,

he observed, often served at afternoon entertainments, could be

eaten comfortably with a fork, particularly the whipped cream on top

of it.

A knife and fork are both used in eating salad, if it is not cut up

before serving. A large lettuce leaf cannot be easily managed

without a knife, and of course the fork must be used to carry it to

the mouth. Thus, as bread, butter, and cheese are served with the

salad, the salad knife and fork are really essential. Salt-cellars

are now placed at each plate, and it is not improper to take salt

with your knife.

Dessert-spoons and small forks do not form a part of the original

“cover;” that is, they are not put on at the beginning of the

dinner, but are placed before the guests according as they are

needed; as, for instance, when the Roman punch arrives before the

game, and afterwards when the plum-pudding or pastry is served

before the ices.

The knives and forks are placed on each side of the plate, ready for

the hand.

For the coffee after dinner a very small spoon is served, as a large

one would be out of place in the small cups that are used. Indeed,

the variety of forks and spoons now in use on a well-furnished table

is astonishing.

One of our esteemed correspondents asks, “How much soup should be

given to each person?” A half-ladleful is quite enough, unless it is

a country dinner, where a full ladleful may be given without

offence; but do not fill the soup-plate.

In carving a joint of fowl the host ought to make sure of the

condition of both knife and fork. Of course a good carver sees to

both before dinner. The knife should be of the best cutlery, well

sharpened, and the fork long, strong, and furnished with a guard.

In using the spoon be very careful not to put it too far into the

mouth. It is a fashion with children to polish their spoons in a

somewhat savage fashion, but the guest at a dinner-party should

remember, in the matter of the dessert-spoon especially (which is a

rather large implement for the mouth), not to allow even the

clogging influences of cabinet pudding to induce him to give his

spoon too much leeway; as in all etiquette of the table, the spoon

has its difficulties and dangers. Particularly has the soup-spoon

its Scylla and Charybdis, and if a careless eater make a hissing

sound as he eats his soup, the well-bred diner-out looks round with

dismay.

There are always people happy in their fashion of eating, as in

everything else. There is no such infallible proof of good-breeding

and of early usage as the conduct of a man or woman at dinner. But,

as every one has not had the advantage of early training, it is well

to study these minute points of table etiquette, that one may learn

how to eat without offending the sensibility of the well-bred.

Especially study the fork and the spoon. There is, no doubt, a great

diversity of opinion on the Continent with regard to the fork. It is

a common German fashion, even with princes, to put the knife into

the month. Italians are not always particular as to its use, and

cultivated Russians, Swedes, Poles, and Danes often eat with their

knives or forks indiscriminately.

But Austria, which follows French fashions, the Anglo-Saxon race in

England, America, and the colonies, all French people, and those

elegant Russians who emulate French manners, deem the fork the

proper medium of communication between the plate and the mouth.

CHAPTER XLIV. NAPKINS AND TABLECLOTHS.

The elegance of a table depends essentially upon its napery. The

plainest of meals is made a banquet if the linen be fresh, fine, and

smooth, and the most sumptuous repast can be ruined by a soiled and

crumpled tablecloth. The housewife who wishes to conduct her house

in elegance must make up her mind to use five or six sets of

napkins, and to have several dozens of each ready for possible

demands.

A napkin should never be put on the table a second time until it has

been rewashed; therefore, napkin-rings should be abandoned—

relegated to the nursery tea-table.

Breakfast napkins are of a smaller size than dinner napkins, and are

very pretty if they bear the initial letter of the family in the

centre. Those of fine, double damask, with a simple design, such as

a snow-drop or a mathematical figure, to match the tablecloth, are

also pretty. In the end, the economy in the wear pays a young housekeeper to invest well in the best of napery—double damask, good

Irish linen. Never buy poor or cheap napkins; they are worn out

almost immediately by washing.

Coarse, heavy napkins are perhaps proper for the nursery and

children’s table. If children dine with their parents, they should

have a special set of napkins for their use, and some very careful

mammas make these with tapes to tie around the youthful necks. It is

better in a large family, where there are children, to have heavy

and coarse table-linen for everyday use. It is not an economy to

buy colored cloths, for they must be washed as often as if they were

white, and no color stands the hard usage of the laundry as well as

pure white.

Colored napery is, therefore, the luxury of a well-appointed country

house, and has its use in making the breakfast and luncheon table

look a little unlike the dinner. Never use a parti-colored damask

for the dinner-table.

Those breakfast cloths of pink, or yellow, or light-blue and white,

or drab, are very pretty with napkins to match; but after having

been washed a few times they become very dull in tint, and are not

as agreeable to the eye as white, which grows whiter with every

summer’s bleaching. Ladies who live in the city should try to send

all their napery to the country at least once a year, and let it lie

on the grass for a good bleaching. It seems to keep cleaner

afterwards.

For dinner, large and handsome napkins, carefully ironed and folded

simply, with a piece of bread inside, should lie at each plate.

These should be removed when the fruit course is brought, and with

each finger-bowl should be a colored napkin, with which to dry the

fingers.

Pretty little fanciful doyleys are now also put under the finger-bowl, merely to be looked at. Embroidered with