Perhaps nothing in the house is so expressive of the various personalities of its Mistresses as the dinner services which each has contributed. For my part I was entirely satisfied with the quiet taste displayed by Mrs. Roosevelt and contented myself with filling up the different broken sets in her service to the number necessary for one hundred covers.

I always enjoyed, however, using some of the old historic plates and platters at small luncheons and dinners. There are enough plates left of the Lincoln set to serve a course to a party of thirty. Though I speak of the different designs as expressive of personalities they represent, perhaps, various periods of popular taste rather than individual preference. Samples of all the different services, displayed in cabinets in the long eastern corridor, are among the most interesting exhibits in the White House.