Gilded Age Leap Year Etiquette

Any lady insulting a gentleman will be put out of the hall at once, and all gentlemen will be protected from rudeness while in the hall regardless, of expense.” – The next opportunity for a Leap Year Party, will be in February of 2028

The Observances of Leap Year Parties

In answer to numerous inquiries as to the rules of etiquette to be observed at Leap Year parties, the unmarried local reporter on the Record-Union, who has been disappointed in love several times and is open to almost any kind of an engagement, suggests the following, which he thinks, if strictly adhered to, will answer all purposes:

• Every lady is expected to act like a perfect gentleman.
• Ladies will take gentlemen to and from the ballroom in carriages.
• No gentleman will dance unless asked by a lady. 
• No gentleman will walk across the floor unless leaning upon the arm of a lady.
• Any lady insulting a gentleman will be put out of the hall at once, and all gentlemen will be protected from rudeness while in the hall regardless, of expense.
• Gentlemen will dance on the right side of ladies, as a matter of course.
• Any ungentlemanly behavior on the part of a lady will he promptly checked by the floor committee, who shall have intimidating powers.
• Any gentleman showing a lady attention will be warned once and put out twice.
• Any gentleman attempting to put on his own overcoat will be shown the error of his ways in a decisive manner, and the overcoat will be given to the Board of County Commissioners,
• The orchestra will be composed exclusively of lady musicians.
• Any gentleman asked by a lady to dance can excuse himself by fibbing about his engagements if he chooses and all will be well.
• If a gentleman is not invited to go to supper by a lady, he is not to eat until a Democrat is elected President of the United States, then he will never eat again. – The Sacramento Daily Union, January, 1884

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

Gilded Age Snobbery and Charity

It’s too bad that charity began at the bazaars, but ended at the idea of showing any charity towards the parvenus or newly wealthy of the era!
– Meme from magicalquote.com

Gilded Age Humor on One’s Lineage 

Mrs. Muscovado— “The Newriches are people who don’t know who their grandparents were.”

 Mrs. Rockoil — “Oh, yes, they do, but they hope no one else does” — Harper’s Bazaar, 1893

Charity has been defined as this state of things: That so soon as ‘A’ is in trouble ‘B’ begins to consider what ‘C’ ought to do for him. All charitable fairs, for instance, are based on this principle. You go and buy something which you probably do not want in order that the profit made on it may go to some good cause. In case you had really wanted what you bought you would have perhaps bought it somewhere else, and the regular trade thus suffers from the loss of your custom. 

In the case of very large fairs, like the “sanitary fairs” in wartime, the ordinary local trade unquestionably suffers, perhaps for a whole year, and the community is thus impoverished to a degree in one way so that it may be helped in other ways. For a great national object, this can easily be endured, although, to be sure, we never have known just what the regular dealers thought about it. But when we consider that the same thing is done to some extent on behalf of every local or sectarian enterprise, it is evident that the principle of the affair is not quite satisfactory. 

Suppose, for instance, that we were all to agree for a single year to have all our shoes and hats made by amateurs “for sweet charity’s sake,” and to have a single church or hospital take the value of them all. Then sweet charity would make an apparent gain no doubt, but all the ordinary hatmakers and shoemakers would starve. Or, if they did not starve, they would be supported by their kindred, who perhaps are not for above the starvation point themselves, or they would be supported by sweet charity, and the last condition of things would be worse than the first. 

It is not really the fact that the evils of society can be greatly helped by dressing up young girls prettily and having them take money and give rather inaccurate change at a bazaar table. One day, perhaps, when the laws of trade are better understood, we shall look at charity fairs as we already look at lotteries, which were once regarded as one of the highest forms of sweet charity, but which are now prohibited by law.— Harper’s Bazaar, 1897

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