lady of the house on your way to the drawing-room door, take your
leave of her as unobtrusively as possible, and slip away without
attracting the attention of her other guests.

[Footnote A: For a succinct guide to whist, loo, _vingt-et-un_,
speculation, &c., &c., &c., see Routledge's "Card-player," by G.F.
Pardon, price _sixpence_.]

* * * * *

IX.--THE DINNER-TABLE.


To be acquainted with every detail of the etiquette pertaining to
this subject is of the highest importance to every gentlewoman. Ease,
_savoir faire_, and good breeding are nowhere more indispensable than
at the dinner-table, and the absence of them is nowhere more apparent.
How to eat soup and what to do with a cherry-stone are weighty
considerations when taken as the index of social status; and it is not
too much to say, that a young woman who elected to take claret with
her fish, or ate peas with her knife, would justly risk the punishment
of being banished from good society. As this subject is one of the
most important of which we have to treat, we may be pardoned for
introducing an appropriate anecdote related by the French poet
Delille:--

Delille and Marmontel were dining together in the month of April,
1786, and the conversation happened to turn upon dinner-table customs.
Marmontel observed how many little things a well-bred man was obliged
to know, if he would avoid being ridiculous at the tables of his