=BEST MAN AS COMPANION-IN-ORDINARY=

With the bride’s and groom’s luggage properly bestowed, the ring and fee in his pocket, the groom’s traveling clothes at the bride’s house, the groom in complete wedding attire, and himself also ready, the best man has nothing further to do but be gentleman-in-waiting to the groom until it is time to escort him to the church, where he becomes chief of staff.

=AT THE HOUSE OF THE BRIDE=

Meanwhile, if the wedding is to be at noon, dawn will not have much more than broken before the house—­at least below stairs—­becomes bustling.

Even if the wedding is to be at four o’clock, it will still be early in the morning when the business of the day begins.  But let us suppose it is to be at noon; if the family is one that is used to assembling at an early breakfast table, it is probable that the bride herself will come down for this last meal alone with her family.  They will, however, not be allowed to linger long at the table.  The caterer will already be clamoring for possession of the dining-room—­the florist will by that time already have dumped heaps of wire and greens into the middle of the drawing-room, if not beside the table where the family are still communing with their eggs.  The door-bell has long ago begun to ring.  At first there are telegrams and special delivery letters, then as soon as the shops open, come the last-moment wedding presents, notes, messages and the insistent clamor of the telephone.

Next, excited voices in the hall announce members of the family who come from a distance.  They all want to kiss the bride, they all want rooms to dress in, they all want to talk.  Also comes the hairdresser, to do the bride’s or her mother’s or aunt’s or grandmother’s hair, or all of them; the manicure, the masseuse—­any one else that may have been thought necessary to give final beautifying touches to any or all of the female members of the household.  The dozen and one articles from the caterer are meantime being carried in at the basement door; made dishes, and dishes in the making, raw materials of which others are to be made; folding chairs, small tables, chinaware, glassware, napery, knives, forks and spoons—­it is a struggle to get in or out of the kitchen or area door.

The bride’s mother consults the florist for the third and last time as to whether the bridal couple had not better receive in the library because of the bay window which lends itself easily to the decoration of a background, and because the room, is, if anything, larger than the drawing-room.  And for the third time, the florist agrees about the advantage of the window but points out that the library has only one narrow door and that the drawing-room is much better, because it has two wide ones and guests going into the room will not be blocked in the doorway by others coming out.

The best man turns up and wants the bride’s luggage.

The head usher comes to ask whether the Joneses to be seated in the fourth pew are the tall dark ones or the blond ones, and whether he had not better put some of the Titheringtons who belong in the eighth pew also in the seventh, as there are nine Titheringtons and the Eminents in the seventh pew are only four.