=CARVING ON THE TABLE=

Carving is sometimes seen at “home” dinner tables.  A certain type of man always likes to carve, and such a one does.  But in forty-nine houses out of fifty, in New York at least, the carving is done by the cook in the kitchen—­a roast while it is still in the roasting pan, and close to the range at that, so that nothing can possibly get cooled off in the carving.  After which the pieces are carefully put together again, and transferred to an intensely hot platter.  This method has two advantages over table carving; quicker service, and hotter food.  Unless a change takes place in the present fashion, none except cooks will know anything about carving, which was once considered an art necessary to every gentleman.  The boast of the high-born Southerner, that he could carve a canvas-back holding it on his fork, will be as unknown as the driving of a four-in-hand.

Old-fashioned butlers sometimes carve in the pantry, but in the most modern service all carving is done by the cook.  Cold meats are, in the English service, put whole on the sideboard and the family and guests cut off what they choose themselves.  In America cold meat is more often sliced and laid on a platter garnished with finely chopped meat jelly and water cress or parsley.

=THE “STAG” OR “BACHELOR” DINNER=

A man’s dinner is sometimes called a “stag” or a “bachelor” dinner; and as its name implies, is a dinner given by a man and for men only.  A man’s dinner is usually given to celebrate an occasion of welcome or farewell.  The best-known bachelor dinner is the one given by the groom just before his wedding.  Other dinners are more apt to be given by one man (or a group of men) in honor of a noted citizen who has returned from a long absence, or who is about to embark on an expedition or a foreign mission.  Or a young man may give a dinner in honor of a friend’s twenty-first birthday; or an older man may give a dinner merely because he has a quantity of game which he has shot and wants to share with his especial friends.

Nearly always a man’s dinner is given at the host’s club or his bachelor quarters or in a private room in a hotel.  But if a man chooses to give a stag dinner in his own house, his wife (or his mother) should not appear.  For a wife to come downstairs and receive the guests for him, can not be too strongly condemned as out of place.  Such a maneuver on her part, instead of impressing his guests with her own grace and beauty, is far more likely to make them think what a “poor worm” her husband must be, to allow himself to be hen-pecked.  And for a mother to appear at a son’s dinner is, if anything, worse.  An essential piece of advice to every woman is:  No matter how much you may want to say “How do you do” to your husband’s or your son’s friends—­don’t!

CHAPTER XV

DINNER GIVING WITH LIMITED EQUIPMENT