Visiting, Morning Calls, Cards

A morning visit should be paid between the hours of two and four p.m., in winter, and two and five in summer. By observing this rule you avoid intruding before the luncheon is removed, and leave in sufficient time to allow the lady of the house an hour or two of leisure for her dinner toilette.

Be careful always to avoid luncheon hours when you pay morning visits. Some ladies dine with their children at half-past one, and are consequently unprepared for the early reception of visitors. When you have once ascertained this to be the case, be careful never again to intrude at the same hour.

A good memory for these trifles is one of the hall-marks of good breeding.

Visits of ceremony should be short. If even the conversation should have become animated, beware of letting your call exceed halfan-hour's length. it is always better to let your friends regret than desire your withdrawal.

On returning visits of ceremony you may, without impoliteness, leave your card at the door without going in. Do not fail, however, to inquire if the family be well.

Should there be daughters or sisters residing with the lady upon whom you call, you may turn down a corner of your card, to signify that the visit is paid to all. It is in better taste, however, to leave cards for each.

Unless when returning thanks for 'kind inquiries', or announcing your arrival in, or departure from, town, it is not considered respectful to send round cards by a servant.

Leave-taking cards have P.P.C. (pour prendre congé) written in the corner. Some use P.D.A. (pour dire adieu).

It is not the fashion on the Continent for unmarried ladies to affix any equivalent to the English 'Miss'  to their visiting cards. Emilie Dubois, or Kätchen Clauss, is thought more simple and elegant than if preceded by Mademoiselle or Fraülein. Some English girls have of late adopted this good custom, and it would be well if it became general.

Visits of condolence are paid within the week after the event which occasions them. Personal visits of this kind are made by relations and very intimate friends only. Acquaintances should leave cards with narrow mourning borders.

On the first occasion when you are received by the family after the death of one of its members, it is etiquette to wear slight mourning.

Umbrellas should invariably be left in the hall.

Never take favourite dogs into a drawing-room when you make a morning call. Their feet may be dusty, or they may bark at the sight of strangers, or, being of too friendly a disposition, may take the liberty of lying on a lady's gown, or jumping on the sofas and easy chairs. Where your friend has a favourite cat already established before the fire, a battle may ensue, and one or other of the pets be seriously hurt. Besides, many persons have a constitutional antipathy to dogs, and other never allow their own to be seen in the sitting-rooms. For all or any of these reasons, a visitor has no right to inflict upon her friend the society of her dog as well as of herself. Neither is it well for a mother to take young children with her when she pays morning visits; their presence, unless they are unusually well trained, can only be productive of anxiety to both yourself and your hostess. She, while striving to amuse them or to appear interested in them is secretly anxious for the fate of her album, or the ornaments on her étagére; while the mother is trembling lest her children should say or do something objectionable.

If other visitors are announced, and you have already remained as long as courtesy requires, wait till they are seated, and then rise from your chair, take leave of your hostess, and bow politely to the newly arrived guests. You will, perhaps, be urged to remain, but, having once risen, it is best to go. There is always a certain air of gaucherie in resuming your seat and repeating the ceremony of leave-taking.

If you have occasion to look at your watch during a call, ask permission to do so, and apologise for it on the plea of other appointments.

In receiving morning visitors, it is not necessary that the lady should lay aside the employment in which she may be engaged, particularly if it consists of light or ornamental needle-work. Politeness, however, requires that music, drawing, or any occupation which completely engross the attention, be at once abandoned.

You need not advance to receive visitors when announced, unless they are persons to whom you are desirous of testifying particular attention. It is sufficient if a lady rises to receive her visitors, moves forward a single step to shake hands with them, and remains standing till they are seated.

When your visitors rise to take leave you should rise also, and remain standing till they have quite left the room. Do not accompany them to the door, but be careful to ring in good time, that the servant may be ready in the hall to let them out.

A lady should dress well, but not too richly, when she pays a morning visit. If she has a carriage at command, she may dress more elegantly than if she were on foot.


Source: Routledge, George. The Well-Bred Person's Book of Etiquette. (Gloucestershire: The History Press, 1891), 16-19.

Etiquette of Smoking

Rules for Lovers of the Weed.

Smoking - that is to say, the smoking of men - hardly comes under the rules of etiquette, most men will declare. It is second nature, so incessant and inevitable a companion to man that few would bear an argument on the subject of its hygienic properties, or its propriety.
But aside from health and propriety (says a writer on etiquette). It must be admitted that there are times and places when and where men should not smoke. The modification of old-fashioned rules in this regard has made the lines faint, it is true, and there is no book on etiquette that does not reprehend as "unbecoming a gentleman" smoking in drawing-rooms, boudoirs, dining-rooms, restaurants, where now men not only are allowed, and invited to smoke, but where highly respectable women have been known to join them.

When in Ladies' Society.

Gentlemen in this country do smoke, when at home, in the drawing-room and dining-room, there is no doubt about that; that is, when the women of the family do not object. Most women have a decided objection to bedroom smoking; and it is not a wise practice on any account to use up the freshness of bedroom air. But putting aside old-fashioned prejudices, and out-of-date "notions" as many sensible dislikes of women are called, a man should never smoke anywhere without first assuring himself that it is not disagreeable to the ladies in the room and in the house. A gentleman paying an afternoon visit should not smoke unless others begin, and even then it should be someone in authority, and not a younger brother, for instance, or a "cheeky" caller who leads him on. He should never smoke before the ladies have left the dining-room except in unusual instances; he should not smoke when anyone - with a real voice - is singing, for tobacco smoke is death to vocal success, and causes great discomfort to singers, whose throats, being highly trained, are proverbially sensitive.

The Etiquette of Little Things.

There are some people who never seem to be sure whether they ought to shake hands with you or not, and from shyness or nervousness put out their hand halfway, and then draw it back in a hesitating, lukewarm fashion that is both most disconcerting and awkward. Others, again, there are who will shake hands with you one day in quite a friendly manner, and the next, perhaps, merely favour you with a formal bow, and, though this conduct may, and very frequently does, arise from the same cause as the half-extended hand, it is more often than not attributed to caprice, conceit, or a desire on the part of the offender to give herself airs, and yet all the while the person who does these things, instead of being desirous to give herself airs, is often painfully anxious to do, not only what is correct, but also what is polite and agreeable. Still, people, as a rule, do not, or will not, believe this, and both dislike and resent being met one day as a friend and next day treated as a mere acquaintance.


There is another thing, too, that constantly leads to misconstruction, and not infrequently checks what might otherwise have proved a pleasant friendship, and this is the carelessness, of forgetfulness of a mistress who leaves the thinking of all little things to servants, and trusts too much to their memory and discretion. She will, perhaps, forget to say whether she is to be at home to visitors or not. Then when the hall-door bell rings, the servant will probably go to answer it without thinking of, or waiting to make sure about, the matter, and, in consequence, has to say in reply to the visitor's question, "Is Mrs A at home?" "that she is not sure, but will go and see." While she goes the visitor has to stand at the door and wait her return. If she comes back and says that she is sorry, but finds that her mistress is not as home, the probability is that the visitor, on hearing this, will walk away with the firm, but secret, conviction that the lady was at home all the while, but that for some reason or other she did not care to see her, and, therefore, told her servant to say that she was not at home. Naturally, this view of the matter is followed by the resolution not to cultivate the friendship of Mrs. A. Or, perhaps, the servant will admit the visitor, show her into the drawing-room, and, leaving her there, will return after a while, and say that she is sorry that she has made a mistake, but finds that her mistress is not at home, after all. Now, neither of these things would have happened if the mistress had remembered to tell the servant that she would not be at home that afternoon. Little mistakes of this sort, are doubly awkward should they happen when it is a visitor's first call.

For Fiancee and Bride.

Although more freedom of action is accorded by some parents to a girl when she is engaged to be married, the rule of etiquette, which prescribes that no young unmarried lady should enter society or appear at any public place of amusement without a chaperon, is not in the slightest degree relaxed, and it would be quite incorrect for an engaged couple to do so. At a dinner party it is customary to send an engaged couple into dinner together; but it is considered very bad taste for them, at a ball or dance, to dance or sit out too much together, or to make themselves conspicuous in any way by their behaviour. When the families of an engaged couple are not already acquainted it is the family of the gentleman, and not the lady, who should take the initiative in the matter by writing to the bride-elect and calling upon her and her parents, and these letters should be replied to at once, and the visits returned as soon as possible. Although it is the parents of the bridegroom-elect who take the first step in making an acquaintance, it is the mother of the young lady who sends the announcement of the engagement to the papers, and it is she also who writes and announces it to the relations and near friends of her family; and if from any cause the engagement should be broken off, it is the mother of the young lady who announces the fact.


When sending a wedding present, a letter should accompany it of congratulation and good wishes, and it is also a good plan to enclose with the present the card of the donor, and all presents received should at once be acknowledged by a letter of thanks, the bride-elect writing to all who have sent their presents direct to her, and the bridegroom writing to those friends who, being unacquainted with the bride, have sent their gifts direct to him. Should it happen that the engagement is not carried out, all wedding presents are returned to the respective donors. On the wedding day, the presents received are arranged on tables of various sizes for the inspection of the guests, and each should have the name of the donor attached to it, and for this purpose the cares enclosed with the present when sent are generally used.

Etiquette for Two.

Jerry (sulkily): You're uncommonly cool tonight.
Kitty (in a fascinating spirit of mischief): Oh, no; I am simply behaving well. I have been reading "Etiquette for Young Ladies," by Aunt Margery. Young ladies should not receive gentlemen alone.
Jerry (glowering): No?
Kitty: No. Ben and Clara are out, but papa and mamma and George will be down in a minute.
Jerry (with strong displeasure): Indeed?
Kitty: You may go and lay your hat on the hall rack; or you may hold it.
Jerry: Don't trouble yourself, pray.
Kitty: Oh, I don't mean to. It is not proper for a young lady to dispose of a gentleman's hat. It is only a shade less improper than helping him on with his overcoat.
Jerry (with heavy gloom): You've always done that for me.
Kitty: I blush to think of it. Aunt Margery would have been horrified beyond expression if she had seen me. But the worst thing, positively the most shocking, is going to the door with a gentleman when he takes leave.
Jerry (with sundry sweet recollections, savagely): I am gratified to hear it.
Kitty: I knew you would be. Aunt Margery says so, and she knows. I am so glad I have learned how to behave well. I shall endeavor not to forget anything. I wonder where papa and mamma and George are? It is so improper for me to be alone here with you. (Lapses into a stiff and wrathful silence.)
Jerry (brightening, after a wrathful five minutes): I was going to remark that I have been reading "Etiquette for Young Gentlemen."
Kitty: Yes.

Etiquette for Men.

When paying a call, accompanied by ladies, you must enter the room behind them, and must not greet your hostess until they have done so.


The ladies must be the ones to terminate the call, not the man. Do not rise until they do, and, having made your adieux after them, and opened the door, follow them out of the room.


Should ladies be shown in while you are calling, rise immediately and remain standing until they are seated. When a lady takes her leave, rise also, and hold open the door for her as she leaves the room. You would not, of course, put yourself forward if a gentleman belonging to the house were present, unless you were nearer the door than he.


Source: The Penny Illustrated Paper and Illustrated Times, Saturday September 30, 1905, page 199, Issue 2314

A Delicate Question of Etiquette

Source: The Penny Illustrated Paper and Illustrated Times, Saturday October 05, 1907, Issue 2419.