Details Of A Sit-down Breakfast

Unless the house is remarkable in size, there is usually a canopied platform built next to the veranda or on the lawn or over the yard of a city house. The entire space is packed with little tables surrounding the big one reserved for the bridal party, and at a large breakfast a second table is reserved for the parents of the bride and groom and a few close, and especially invited, friends.

Place cards are not put on any of the small tables. All the guests, except the few placed at the two reserved tables, sit with whom they like; sometimes by pre-arrangement, but usually where they happen to find friends—and room!

The general sit-down breakfast—except in great houses like a few of those in Newport—is always furnished by a caterer, who brings all the food, tables, chairs, napery, china and glass, as well as the necessary waiters. The butler and footmen belonging in the house may assist or oversee, or detail themselves to other duties.

Small menu cards printed in silver are put on all the tables. Sometimes these cards have the crest of the bride's father embossed at the top, but usually the entwined initials of the bride and groom are stamped in silver to match the wedding cake boxes.

Example:

Bouillon
Lobster Newburg
Suprê me of Chicken
Peas
Aspic of Foie Gras
Celery Salad
Ices
Coffee

Instead of bouillon, there may be caviar or melon, or grape fruit, or a puré e, or clam broth. For lobster Newburg may be soft-shell crabs or oyster pâ té, or other fish. Or the bouillon may be followed by a dish such as sweetbreads and mushrooms, or chicken pâ té s, or broiled chicken (a half of a chicken for each guest) or squab, with salad such as whole tomatoes filled with celery. Or the chicken or squab may be the second course, and an aspic with the salad, the third. Individual ices are accompanied by little cakes of assorted variety. There used always to be champagne; a substitute is at best " a poor thing, " and what the prevailing one is to be, is as yet not determined. Orange juice and ginger ale, or white grape juice and ginger ale with sugar and mint leaves are two attempts at a satisfying cup that have been offered lately.

The Bride's Table

The feature of the wedding breakfast is always the bride's table. Placed sometimes in the dining-room, sometimes on the veranda or in a room apart, this table is larger and more elaborately decorated than any of the others. There are white garlands or sprays or other arrangement of white flowers, and in the center as chief ornament is an elaborately iced wedding cake. On the top it has a bouquet of white or silver flowers, or confectioner's quaint dolls representing the bride and groom. The top is usually made like a cover so that when the time comes for the bride to cut it, it is merely lifted off. The bride always cuts the cake, meaning that she inserts the knife and makes one cut through the cake, after which each person cuts herself or himself a slice. If there are two sets of favors hidden in the cake, there is a mark in the icing to distinguish the bridesmaids' side from that of the ushers. Articles, each wrapped in silver foil, have been pushed through the bottom of the cake at intervals; the bridesmaids find a ten-cent piece for riches, a little gold ring for " first to be married, " a thimble or little parrot or cat for " old maid, " a wish-bone for the " luckiest." On the ushers' side, a button or dog is for the bachelor, and a miniature pair of dice as a symbol of lucky chance in life. The ring and ten-cent piece are the same.

If a big piece of the wedding cake is left, the bride's mother has it wrapped in tin foil and put in a sealed tin box and kept for the bride to open on her first anniversary.

The evolution of the wedding cake began in ancient Rome where brides carried wheat ears in their left hands. Later, Anglo-Saxon brides wore the wheat made into chaplets, and gradually the belief developed that a young girl who ate of the grains of wheat which became scattered on the ground, would dream of her future husband. The next step was the baking of a thin dry biscuit which was broken over the bride's head and the crumbs divided amongst the guests. The next step was in making richer cake; then icing it, and the last instead of having it broken over her head, the bride broke it herself into small pieces for the guests. Later she cut it with a knife.

The Table Of The Bride's Parents

The table of the bride's parents differs from other tables in nothing except in its larger size, and the place cards for those who have been invited to sit there. The groom's father always sits on the right of the bride's mother, and the groom's mother has the place of honor on the host's right. The other places at the table are occupied by distinguished guests who may or may not include the clergyman who performed the ceremony. If a bishop or dean performed the ceremony, he is always included at this table and is placed at the left of the hostess, and his wife, if present, sits at the bride's father's left. Otherwise only especially close friends of the bride's parents are invited to this table.