in the best regulated family." There is
nothing more distasteful to guests than to observe that their host is
anxious lest the arrangements of the hostess miscarry, or that their
hostess is making herself quite wretched by a fear that the dishes will
not be prepared to perfection, or over the breaking of some choice bit
of crystal. At a dinner recently I saw the hostess nervous enough to
weep over an accident which demolished a treasured salad bowl; and the
result was that it took strong effort on the part of a self-sacrificing
and friendly guest to keep up the pleasant flow of talk. How much more
tactful and delightful was the manner in which another hostess treated a
similar situation. The guests were startled by a crash in the butler's
pantry, and every one knew from the tinkling sound that it was cut
glass. After a few words of instruction quietly given, the hostess
laughingly said, "I hope there is enough glass in reserve so that none
of you dear people will have to drink champagne from teacups." This was
not only a charming, informal way of smoothing out an awkward situation,
but it gave the poor butler the necessary confidence to finish serving
the dinner. Had the hostess been upset over the affair her agitation
would have been communicated to the servants; and instead of one mishap
there might have been several. A hostess should still "be mistress of
herself tho China fall." In dinner-giving, as in life, it is the part
of genius to turn disaster into advantage. "I was once at a
dinner-party," said an accomplisht diner-out, "apparently of undertakers
hired to mourn for the joints and birds in the dishes, when part of the
ceiling fell. From that moment the guests were as merry as crickets."

Interrupting within the conversational group is perhaps the most
insufferable of all impediments to rippling talk; and interruptions from
without are quite as intolerable. What pleasure is there in conversation
between two people, or among three or four, when the thought is
interrupted every other remark? Frequent references to subjects entirely
foreign to the topic under discussion give conversation much the same
jerky, sputtering ineffectualness as sticking a spigot momentarily in a
faucet prevents an even flow of water from a tank. People who have any
feeling for really good conversation do not allow needless hindrances to
destroy the continuity and joy of their intercourse with friends and
acquaintances. And people who do p