Page 45 - RSCDS Toronto Golden Jubilee Book

Rules of Etiquette for Dancing
Adapted from the Boston Weekly Magazine, 10/12/1903.
1. Admittance 50 cents, refreshments included.
2. The music to consist of a fiddle, a pipe and tabor and a hurdy- gurdy (NB: no chorus to be sung until dancing is over).
3. To prevent spitting, no gentleman to chew tobacco or smoke.
4. No scissors or gimlets are to be brought either by ladies or gentlemen unless their pockets are whole.
5. No whispering to be allowed - if anyone shall be found to make insidious remarks about anyone’s dancing, he or she shall be put out of the room.
6. Long beards are forbidden, as it would be very disagreeable if a gentleman should happen to put his cheek beside a lady’s.
7. Those ladies who have not white cotton stockings and black morocco shoes will not be admitted under any pretence what ever. Two old ladies will be provided to examine all who enter.
8. No gentleman must squeeze his partner’s hand, nor look earnestly upon her, and furthermore he must not even pick up her handkerchief, provided it were to fall - the first denotes he loves her, the second he wishes to kiss her, and the last that she makes a sign for both.
. . . From The Puget Scot April-May 1991.
Compare with: "The Etiquette or The Ball Room as it Particularly Relates to Country Dancing" (by Thomas Wilson, The Complete System of English Country Dancing, c. 1820)
Gentlemen are not permitted to enter the Ball Room in boots, spurs, gaiters, trowsers, or with canes or sticks; nor are loose pantaloons considered proper for a Full Dress Ball.
Two Ladies, or two Gentlemen, cannot Dance together, without permission of the Master of the Ceremonies; nor can permission be given while there are an equal number of Ladies and Gentlemen.
It is the duty of the Master of the Ceremonies alone to direct the band; and for the band to obey no other person.
No Dance ought to be performed twice the same evening.
Snapping the fingers, in Country Dancing and Reels, and the
sudden howl or yell too frequently practised, ought particularly
to be avoided, as partaking too much of the customs of barbarous
nations; the character and effect by such means given to the Dance,
being adapted only to the stage, and by no means suited to the Ball Room.
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