Small Rules I Have Found Useful, Offered Without Insistence.

Rule 41.

On the rearranged pantry.

If someone who loves you has rearranged your pantry without being asked, do not move anything back for a fortnight. This is not cowardice. It is a period of honest trial. At the end of the fortnight, move back only what you have missed. You will be surprised how little that is, and how much of the rearrangement was, in fact, sound.

— Answer to M. K., who wrote in August. I am told it worked, more or less.

Rule 42.

The four-second napkin.

A napkin folded into a swan is a napkin that has been thought about too much. Fold it into thirds, the long way. Fold it into thirds, the short way. Place the open corner at the upper right, which is where the hand falls. Four seconds. It will look as though you meant it, because you did.

Rule 43.

On arrivals.

When a guest arrives, take their coat before you take their news. A coat on a hook sets the room at ease; a coat over an arm keeps them standing in the hall. You may ask after the journey while you are hanging it, which is the correct moment for the question and no other.

Rule 44.

On the second kettle.

Keep a second kettle. Not for grandeur — for the morning yours gives out, which will be the morning your neighbour has had bad news. A spare kettle, a spare tin of biscuits, a spare pair of clean socks by the door. The well-stocked house is not the one with the most; it is the one with the second.

Rule 45.

On holding a silence.

If someone at your table stops speaking mid-sentence, do not rush in. Count, in your head, to four. If they have not resumed by four, ask them a small practical question — more bread? will almost always do. The silence is usually where the real thing was about to be said; the small question gives them the dignity of either saying it or letting it pass.

Rule 46.

Tea for a tired guest.

Strong, hot, with milk unless told otherwise. One biscuit, not a plateful — a plateful is a demand; one biscuit is a companion. Sit down with your own cup in your hand within ninety seconds. A host standing over a seated guest is a host who has not yet arrived.

Rule 47.

Three stems, not seven.

For a small table, three stems from the garden in a pressed-glass tumbler are almost always better than a bouquet from a shop. The tumbler matters: it says this was done today, by someone who lives here. A cut-glass vase, on a weeknight, is trying too hard.

Rule 48.

The late note.

A thank-you note that arrives three weeks late is better than one that does not arrive. Do not apologise for the lateness at length — a single line ("this has been waiting on my desk longer than it should have") is enough. The note's job is to say you thought of them; its job is not to say you are sorry for being a person with a desk.