Page:When You Write a Letter (1922).pdf/112

 They were all mailed promptly, and then we waited for the replies—formal replies they should have been, written in the third person and couched in the same direct language as had been employed in the invitation.

"How is your dinner coming on?" I asked Virginia three days later when she had had ample time to hear from every one. She smiled in reply and showed me a little pile of envelopes. Now every one knows who has had any experience or who has thought about it at all that a formal invitation should have an immediate reply; especially is this true of an invitation to dinner. The hostess must know exactly how many guests she is to entertain, she must prepare her menu, and arrange her tables, and decide upon the seating of her guests. Otherwise she will offend some one or her dinner will be a higgledy-piggledy affair without order or definite arrangement, and that was not the sort of dinner that Virginia was planning to give.

I took the envelopes in my hand, less than a dozen of them, and looked them over. They were of all shades and sizes, pink, lavender, cream, and yellow; there