Threescore and Seventeen by Robert Benchley

Author:Robert Benchley [Benchley, Robert C.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Humor, Satire, Social Commentary
Publisher: MobileRead.com
Published: 1920-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

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Eight O’clock Sharp

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Several of my young friends (I make friends easily and of all ages) have recently received a questionnaire from the Junior League and the Parents’ League designed to bring them to their senses in the matter of tardiness at parties. The idea seems to be that, with people arriving later and later at dinners and dances, the hour of breaking-up is gradually being extended so far into the forenoon of the following day that it cuts in on business conferences and dentist appointments. If guests would arrive at a party on time, they could get it over with and be at home and in the general direction of the bed at a reasonable hour. (If any hour can be said to be reasonable.)

Evidently the Junior League and the Parents’ League don’t care whether I am late to parties or not for they didn’t send me a questionnaire. But I am going to answer one anyway, and perhaps from the replies of a man who has been later to more parties than anyone since Charlie Ross (so late, in fact, that many times I have not arrived at all) they may find the solution to their problem.

The first question is: “Are you in favor of dining on time?” This is a little abstruse. There could be no objection to dining on time if dinner were served on time, whatever “on time” may mean. Once in a while, especially during the first week after daylight-saving has gone out of effect and I have forgotten to change my watch, I arrive at dinner approximately at the appointed time. What is the result? I am met at the door by a man who hasn’t quite finished buttoning his waistcoat and who looks at me with ill-concealed suspicion, the supposition being that anyone arriving so early is either drunk or a reporter. My hat and coat are laid out in solitary state on the hall-catafalque and I am ushered upstairs into the library for half an hour with “The Rise and Fall of Robespierre” and several brisk turns around the room. My host calls from upstairs that he will be “right down” and for me to “make myself at home.” This I proceed to do by dropping off into a restless sleep until I am awakened by the tinkling of ice.

The cocktail problem for the guest who has arrived “on time” is no mean one. If you are the first guest to arrive (as you will be if you are “on time”) and if you begin drinking cocktails with the first brewing, stringing along with the field as the others arrive, by the time the really late ones have come you are not only the most vivacious guest in the room – you are the host. You do the greeting; you insist on passing the canapés (or what you yourself have left of the canapés exclusive of the powdered egg which has been shed on the

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