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Rh and refuse to meet your hostess's friends. Once there, you are bound to be polite to them, though afterward you need only recognize them very faintly, and gradually the recognition may die away altogether. It is always permissible to refuse to have a man presented to you if another man offers to do it, but you can never do this to your hostess. You want a form of declination for those invitations which you are sure will place you either in disagreeable positions or among people whom you do not care to meet? Well, here is one that is always courteous and which is, at the same time, truthful:

"Miss Brown thanks Mrs. Charles Jones for her kind invitation for Wednesday evening, and regrets her inability to accept it."

That is a note that can never be questioned, and no hostess is ever supposed to ask one one's reason for declining her invitation.

I realize that in many small places the custom obtains for the young girl of the house to receive visitors alone and that it is very general, but still I do not think it is right. I believe implicitly in my girl, but I want her to make a change about this. Have the parlor the prettiest and most comfortable room in the house, but don't be alone there—have