Query about address

[emckean at ENTERACT.COM]

This is a common trope from romance novels of the 1930s; the suitor is
unaware that his intended is the younger sister; sends a note addressed to
"Miss Thingummy" and the elder sister reads it (since if it were meant
for her sister it would have been addressed to "Miss Elspeth
Thingummy", of course, and (choose one) arrives at the rendezvous, answers
it but deliberately obscures that she is the elder, sends it back, etc.

Erin McKean
editor at verbatimmag.com

On Thu, 5 Apr 2001, sagehen wrote:

> If we may take Jane Austen's usage as representative, it would appear that
> among the gentry, at the end of the XVIII, beginning of the XIX Cent, the
> eldest unmarried daughter would be styled Miss Surname, while her younger
> sisters  would be Miss Given Name.  Collectively, they would be the Misses
> Surname; this latter, a usage which was still in order in my childhood, at
> least, in the Midwest of the Thirties.
> A. Murie
>