The Importance of Good Table Manners

How do your manners appear? Eve knows her manners are not a pretty sight and that they can offend others whom she is dining with at a table.

Eve doesn't know her table manners offend the nice friends she longs for. It's not a pretty sight to play with ice-cream in all-day, sucker fashion. Nor is it charming to carry food half-way to the mouth, then plunge at it the way a duck dives for his dinner. It looks pleasanter and it's so much better manners to lift food straight to the mouth and take the whole spoonful at once.

To be uncertain about table service is a give-away, too. If the host passes a filled dinner plate to a guest, the plate should be kept, not passed around with cries of “you first.” Second helpings, if they're wanted, should be accepted without excuses for “large appetites.” Be at ease, learn the correct code for table manners. – Santa Ana Journal, May, 8, 1957

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia