and elbow sleeves, while others were severely simple, with a muslin fichu crossed and tied at the back, and broad-brimmed hats crowning the powdered hair, which was rolled high.

The men wore ordinary dress.

When the guests were assembled, a procession was formed of those in costume, who threaded their ways in and out between the trees, stepping daintily in time with the music of a small orchestra that played "Amaryllis" and other selections from composers of the period to be recalled.

Next followed a minuet, danced on the lawn by shepherdesses carrying crooks, to which bunches of paper roses were tied with ribbons-a pretty exhibition of stately grace.

After this, a little play was acted in the open air, the performers emerging from and disappearing behind the trees and bushes. The love of a wood-nymph and her despair at being deserted for a mortal formed the subject of the little drama.

Nothing is more charming than such little plays acted on the lawn. There are pretty pastorals that require just such a sylvan setting, and the audience will not be in too critical a mood. If the spot chosen be closed in by trees, the appearance and disappearance of the actors among the foliage make a curtain unnecessary.

Light refreshments were served, and the guests gathered in groups to chat and admire each other, of themselves making pictures that would not have been unworthy of the brush of a Watteau or a Lancret.

The considerate hostess had made her invitations contingent upon the weather. They read that the pleasure of the guest's company was requested upon a certain date, or if the weather proved inclement, "upon the first fine day thereafter.'

S

CHAPTER XXII

September

A HARVEST-HOME DANCE

OME merry girls gave an entertainment last September which was unique only in its adaptation. The invitations were for a "Harvest-Home Dance," and all were asked to come in costumes representing fruits and vegetables. The rooms were decorated as for a barn dance, the mantels and corners banked with pumpkins, bunches of yellow maize, leaves, wheat, and corn shocks.

When the guests arrived the rooms looked like an animated kitchen garden. One girl was lovely in palegreen cheese-cloth abundantly trimmed with parsley, her head wreathed with the feathery leaves. Another was a veritable Ceres in corn colour and masses of ripe wheat and poppies.

The men wore enormous boutonnières of onions, carrots, and parsley. Their grotesque appearance seemed to inspire a certain humorous contagion in their spirits, and the affair was universally conceded to have been a great success.

A LAWN PARTY BY MOONLIGHT

'Anything for a novelty" is the most quoted of proverbs, and even those who make pleasure their

business are aroused into an exhibition of interest when entertainment takes an unhackneyed form.

One hostess, counting upon the "Harvest Moon's" coöperation, tried with success the experiment of giving a lawn party by moonlight-with the proviso that, if the moon did not put in an appearance, the guests might follow its example and come the first fair evening after the date first named. The guests, upon arrival at her gates, found them spanned by arches of Japanese lanterns, which gala effect seemed to promise pleasure at the outset. And as the invitations had included the request to come in some sylvan costume, each person regarded every other with interest and eager curiosity. Maid Marian, Will Scarlet, Friar Tuck, and all Robin Hood's "merry men of the greenwood" were there in full force, as well as Flora, Pomona, Ceres, and the dryads. Corydon and Phillis, and Arcadian shepherds and shepherdesses jostled gypsies and other out-of-door folk, and the kind moonlight glorified all the scene and transformed the commonplace into the ideal.

The trees and piazzas were hung with lanterns in profusion, and a kiosk was improvised for the musicians by setting up half a dozen posts in a circle, which were connected with a taller one in the centre by poles with the bark on laid to form a roof. These were covered with spruce boughs and other foliage laid across them, and the upright posts wound with orange cheesecloth, with lanterns strung between them. Dancing on the lawn was much enjoyed, though square dances only were found really practicable.

A gypsy fortune-teller found a welcome, and strolls by moonlight with the accompaniment of strains of

distant music will have a romantic charm as long as youth endures

Good taste had provided that the guests should be so numerous as to make long tête-à-tête walks subject to frequent friendly interruptions, so that the proprieties even in seeming should be preserved.

Croquet was played with phosphorescent balls and hoops, and a contest of archery, at short range, was presided over by St. Hubert, the patron saint of foresters. His costume symbolised his story. A famous hunter turned monk after seeing a vision of the cross between the horns of a deer that he was pursuing. His head was encased in a close-fitting green cap, surmounted by a small pair of deer-horns, with a cross of gilt pasteboard between the branches. A long dressing-gown did duty. for a cassock, tied about the waist with a rope, and a bugle-horn in place of a crucifix-to combine the characters of monk and hunter.

The supper was a bountiful one, composed only of cold dishes-iced bouillon, salmon mayonnaise, galantine, salads, berries, ices, cakes, with punch and lemonade -and was served in the house.

The hostess had thought that after supper her guests would enjoy a dance indoors, but the spell of the moonlight was upon them and all eagerly sought the fairyland it made.

A COLONIAL COUNTRY DANCE

The invitations should be sent without envelopes, as was the manner in colonial times-the top and bottom of the paper folded down and up so as to meet in the middle of the sheet. The sides are next folded in the same way, so that one edge overlaps little, which takes the place of the flap of an envelope and receives the

seal in the middle. If wafers cannot be had, red sealingwax will do as well. The paper should be in large sheets, and the letter s" should be written in the old fashion that resembles an "f."

A barn is the ideal place for such an entertainment. So the invitations might be worded thus:

"An ye will come to an old-time partie, ye shall be welcome on ye evening of ye tenth day of October in ye barn of Mistreff All will please appear in oldtime countrie dress at ye hour of eight o' the clock." The floor should be swept clean and waxed for dancing, and walls and ceiling decorated with bunches of unhusked corn, hung in bunches from the rafters, strings of red and green peppers, and of dried apples, together with boughs of maple, sumac, hops, and any other effective things that opulent nature may provide at that season.

Old-fashioned games should alternate with the dancing. A fiddler should furnish the music for the dancers, calling out the figures in the lancers or quadrilles in the old-fashioned way. If the talented violinist is not well informed on the subject, some one else may shout the directions for the guidance of the dance. The music should, of course, as much as possible be selected from the simple old tunes known to our rustic forefathers "Yankee Doodle" and "Pop, Goes the Weasel" are not to be altogether despised. "Money Musk" and the "Virginia Reel" may alternate with a "Spelling Bee," a contest in "Apple-Paring" and "Corn-Husking." The ancient forfeit to the finder of a red ear-to be kissed by all the young men present-need not be insisted upon, but some penalty may be imposed on the young woman-to be decided by the young men present,