Etiquette of the Patriarch Ball

This is in itself not original with the “Four Hundred” —vulgar term!—but was copied from the St. Cecilia, the most exclusive affair of the kind in aristocratic Charleston, where it has existed since the days of the Revolution.

In every city there is an assembly or dancing organization on the lines of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs in New York. This is in itself not original with the “Four Hundred” —vulgar term!—but was copied from the St. Cecilia, the most exclusive affair of the kind in aristocratic Charleston, where it has existed since the days of the Revolution. 

The assemblies proper in New York are called the Matriarchs. The arrangements are in the hands of a number of fashionable women instead of men. The plan of all these organizations is practically the same. In order to make matters easy and to pilot my reader through the intricacies of a fashionable ball, I will suppose that he is a stranger in New York, with some smart friends, and that he is going either to the Patriarchs’ or to the Assembly. The rules laid down will hold good for other cities. 

Your first intimation may be while visiting at the house of one of the patrons or patronesses, when your hostess or host may ask you if you would like to go to the Assembly or the Patriarchs’. If you have no other engagement for that evening—and I think it would be policy for you to make others subservient to this—you should reply that you would be delighted to do so. Your host or hostess will then say that he or she will send you a ticket. This may be one way, or you may receive a note asking if you are free for that particular date, whether “would you like to go to the Assembly?” etc., or again, you might simply receive a note with a ticket. 

In any one of these cases, just as soon as you receive the ticket you must answer your correspondent immediately, accepting, or, if you can not go, regretting and returning it. You must remember that all tickets are personal and each Patriarch or each patroness has only a certain number. — From The Complete Bachelor, Manners for Men, 1896

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