Soirée

“ Soirées, as a rule, offer some particular form of amusement, such as music, dancing, a reading; an interchange of bright ideas, such as a conversazione. It means also pretty evening dress, not elaborate, ball costume, and a supper. It attracts gentlemen, who appreciate the easy-going, early-houred soirée. That is, gentlemen who do not particularly care for the ball-room, and it is here we are sure to find wits and the aristocracy of intellect. ”

“ The occupations, engagements, and amusements of the higher classes of society had long required a record; they found it in the Court Journal. The fête champêtre, the sumptuous banquet, the concert, the soirée, the ball, the public and private habits of royal and noble life, those habits which give the tone to manners throughout the empire, were depicted with a freshness and accuracy hitherto unattempted ”

“ When they give a soirée, a variety of refreshments are produced, as different descriptions of cakes, ices, orgeat and water, punch, warm wine, limonade, etc., according to the season of the year; and often a supper is given on a very liberal scale. ”

“ Another is the delightful soirée pur sang, where everybody comes as a matter of course, and where everybody who does not sing, dances or plays, or is a phenomenon in charades, or writes charming impromptus, or talks like the last book, or can play at any known game from loto to chess, or knows all the gossip of the last six hours; and where everybody chats and laughs, and sends everybody else comfortably home in the best of humors just about the time that the great people are expecting the coiffeur to arrive. ”

“ Some hostesses adopt the French fashion of calling it a matinée, meaning any social gathering that is held before dinner, as any party is called in France a soirée.
There are many advantages in a morning party. It affords ladies who do not attend evening receptions the pleasure of meeting on a semi-formal occasion, and is also a well chosen occasion for introducing a new pianist or singer. For a busy woman of fashion a matinée, beginning at two and ending at four or half-past, which are the usual hours for these entertainments, is a most convenient time. ”

“ As usual, everything shews in this month that our season will soon be past its perihelion: soirées, whether scientific, exquisite, or political, take place almost too frequently for the comfort and wellbeing of the invited; and loungers and legislators are alike beginning to dream of leafy woods and babbling brooks. ”

“ An elegant supper, and half an hour's conversation after it, closed the evening; when we returned home, delighted with our entertainment, and pleased with ourselves and each other. My imagination is so impressed with the festive scenes of the day that Morpheus waves his ebon wand in vain. The evening is fine beyond the power of description; all Nature is serene and harmonious, in perfect unison with my present disposition of mind. ”

“ The evening often finished with card games, reading newspapers, verse-making, fortune-telling, walks in the garden, impromptu dancing, perhaps gambling, and supper.
The nobility and gentry became more mobile and now mixed together at parties. At these afternoon parties, there were a variety of simultaneous activities, instead of everyone participating in the same activities together as a group. Guests could choose to engage in conversation, news, cards, tea-drinking, music, dancing, and even go into supper at different times. Sometimes a man other than her husband escorted a lady to a party. ”

“ The sight of so many little innocents joining in the most sublime harmony made me almost think myself already amongst the heavenly choir, and it was a great mortification to me to be brought back to this sensual world by so gross an attraction as a call to supper, which put an end to our concert, and carried us to another room, where we found a repast more elegant than expensive.
The evening certainly is the most social part of the day, without any of those excesses which so often turn it into senseless revelry. ”

“ Golden evening gave a refreshing coolness to the air, and picturesque shadows to the hills. It was a scene,—an hour,—when Nature imparts a quick and living enjoyment akin to the transports of love and the ecstacy of music—it touches a chord whose vibration is happiness. ”

“ THE EVENING LARK. For the Table Book.
I love thee better at this hour, when rest
Is shadowing earth, than e’en the nightingale:
The loudness of thy song that in the morn
Rang over heaven, the day has softened down
To pensive music.
In the evening, the body relaxed by the toil of the day, disposes the mind to quietness and contemplation. The eye, dimmed by close application to books or business, languishes for the greenness of the fields; the brain, clouded by the smoke and vapour of close rooms and crowded streets, droops for the fragrance of fresh breezes, and sweet smelling flowers. ”

“ Attend an evening party and see woman in her glory. How {74} the men crowd round her, anxious to serve or entertain! When supper is announced they vie with one another for the honor of escorting her to the dining-room. She must have first seat at table and be first served, and during the progress of the meal the men must be careful to see that she has everything her sweet will desires. When supper is over the ladies precede the men to the drawing-room, and by the time the men again appear on the scene the ladies, including the hostess, are settled in the easiest chairs. ”

“ In the afternoon there is always a bazaar, an amateur concert, an exhibition, a fashionable matinée or a Society tea-party to be visited. For the evening there are dinners, and theatres, and an endless succession of dances, at which the flowers, the suppers, and the general decorations possess as much or as little variety as the conversation of those who overcrowd the rooms to an accompaniment of dance-music that may once have been new. ”

“ Immediately after supper, we drove once more out of town, to a garden and tea-room, where all degrees and ages dance jovially together till morning. Whilst one party wheel briskly away in the valz, another amuse themselves in a corner with cold meat and rhenish. ”

“ Before supper, cards, conversation, music are made use of to entertain the guests. When dancing is a feature, it does not begin until after supper, and while this amusement is in progress opportunity for conversation, games, etc., should be provided in other rooms for those who do not dance. Rules for going out to supper at a large party are the same as those at a ball. ”

“ The hour of supper having arrived, the guests were placed at table in order according to the character of their clothing; those who wore the dress of princes were placed first, the rich and noble followed, and those who had attired themselves as poor men were sent to the lower end; but with regard to the jests and sports that were enacted after the supper, let every one picture to himself what these were, for they may be more easily imagined than described. ”

“ It is curious to observe a large, well-dressed party seated at dinner, all apparently frank and open as the day, full of fun and good humour, saying whatever comes uppermost, and to all outward seeming laying bare every crevice and cranny of their hearts, and then to reflect that each one of the throng has a separate life, entirely distinct from that which he or she parades before the public, cherished perhaps with a miser's care or endured with a martyr's fortitude. ”

“ The most approved form of evening entertainment is a round of calls among friends scattered over the broad lawns of the hotels, when one may divert himself with summer orchestras or itinerant bands of Italian singers in crimson sashes, or revel in a rare profusion of beautiful flowers ”

“ People are chatting gayly in the streets. Friends are drinking cups of fragrant tea in pleasant lamp-lit rooms. There are concerts, perhaps, or matinées, where the deft comedian provokes continuous laughter. No; it is not amusement that we seek in the lecture-hall. Too many really amusing things may be done on a winter afternoon. Too many possible pleasures lie in wait for every spare half-hour. ”

“ To-night all the neighbors assembled at my house, as usual on Sunday evenings, for sacred music. It always moves me to see the delight every one takes in this very simple way of passing the evening—men, women, and children are equally enthusiastic. ”

“ He took gladly the fourth voice in the concert of the pleasure-party. What a magnificent hanging garden, with its loveliest flowers and prospects, is built out into the evening-hours! How many happy ones a single roof covers! ”

“ The evening is spent in drinking home-brewed ale, and singing. Their songs generally bear some allusion to the subject in question, and are always rural. But what heightens the pleasure is, that there is no quarrelling, and the night passes on in the utmost harmony. I have attended many of them, and never saw the slightest symptoms of anger in any of the party. They seldom break up till daylight makes its appearance next morning. ”

“ At about two in the morning, as supper ended, no one was left sitting round the table but intimate friends, proved by intercourse of fifteen years, and some persons of great taste and good breeding, who knew the world. By tacit agreement, perfectly carried out, at supper every one renounced his pretensions to importance. Perfect equality set the tone. ”

“ How often a lady is, during the first year of her wifehood, gadding out night after night,—one evening to a dinner party, the next night to private theatricals, the third to an evening party, the fourth to the theater, the fifth to a ball, the sixth to a concert, until in some cases every night except Sunday night is consumed in this way,—coming home frequently in the small hours of the morning, through damp or fog, or rain or snow, feverish, flushed, and excited—too tired until the morning to sleep, when she should be up, out, and about. ”

“ Once, being invited to an evening party in Virginia, I was so much pleased in the conversation of a young lady, that, had I not seen many gentlemen smiling and looking askance at us, I think the interesting subject we had on hand, would have taken all our evening time, before we could arrive to the conclusion of it: and nothing is more agreeable at an evening party, when we have matter on hand to keep off the chilling silent look. ”

“ It is a night and place when one might hear such a story as that of "The Bells," but the faces all look friendly and we chat on until dinner, about anything save murder. It is a good night for sleep and I am not long in seeking that tonic of nature. ”

“ A fortnight afterwards an evening party assembles at the house of some friend of the husband; amongst the poorer peasantry, it is usual for every neighbour to attend, and upon entering lay down his contribution on the tea-table. The night is then prolonged in mirth and good humour, the merry dance being generally kept up till daylight to the soft and gentle measures of the national lyre. ”

“ Why everybody, of course; you'll see soon enough. We begin directly after supper, and sing till bed-time. It ain't such good fun now though as in the summer half, 'cause then we sing in the little fives' court, under the library, you know. We take our tables, and the big boys sit round and drink beer; double allowance on Saturday nights; and we cut about the quadrangle between the songs, and it looks like a lot of robbers in a cave. And the louts come and pound at the great gates, and we pound back again, and shout at them. But this half we only sing in the hall. ”

“ After supper they spend an hour in some diversion, in summer in their gardens, and in winter in the halls where they eat, where they entertain each other either with music or discourse. They do not so much as know dice, or any such foolish and mischievous games. ”

“ One person out of harmony with the rest will spoil the whole evening as certainly as a sudden summer shower spoils the most elaborately planned garden party. It is important to select only those people whose tastes and temperaments blend. ”

“ In summer the mere fact that we sit at the great banquet of the spectacle of sun and{238} flowers and green things is royal entertainment. But the year turns, the lights burn lower, and we have to employ ourselves; but, like children in the dark, we quake at the gathering shadows. ”

“ The evenings more particularly possessed a charm, difficult to be understood by the thousands of our fellow creatures, unable to kill that fragment of time without the aid of constellations of wax-lights, and sparkling toilettes,—not to mention the bright sparks which conversation sometimes, but not always, sprinkles o'er the scene. ”

“ They say the supper is equally magnificent.
Oh, nothing is ever badly done in the Man's house.
What music! What an honour to be one of the guests at a ball given by the Man!
How persons must envy us who have not been accorded that honour! ”

“ The dinner itself has been good, the drawing-room interlude after dinner has been pleasantly varied with music, and the ladies have, with the tact for which they are sometimes distinguished, retired early to bed-rooms, where it is believed they spend hours in the combing of their beautiful hair, and the interchange of gossip. ”

“ What an event to them is an evening party! One would think each of the young aspirants to distinction expected to be the centre of a circle, so intense is the interest exhibited by every act of preparation. ”

“ The cheerful, interesting conversation at table, and in the odds and ends of time through the day, would be sufficient stimulus to all but the most exacting guests; while, as a matter of fact, there are always a few hours in the evening when everybody seems to be at leisure, and these form the social centre of the day. ”

“ At supper, these gentlemen greatly distinguish themselves, brightening up very much when the ladies leave the table, and proclaiming aloud their intention of beginning to spend the evening—a process which is generally understood to be satisfactorily performed, when a great deal of wine is drunk and a great deal of noise made, both of which feats the out-and-out young gentlemen execute to perfection. ”