Dear Mary | 18 June 2011

Q. I am a man of modest means but every year my cousin allows me to use his country house to host a cricket match against the village close to the family seat in the West Country. I invite members of the itinerant London-based team for which I play, and their families, to stay for the weekend, and provide food and drink at my own expense. The point of difficulty is that my cousin’s staff expect to be tipped and my guests, unfamiliar with conventions of country houses, do not, in the main, oblige. As a consequence I have to make up the difference. I have thought of approaching our captain and asking him to brief the team, but although a splendid fellow he cannot be relied on in this regard. Mary, how best can I communicate my wish that my guests should tip the staff without giving the impression that I am asking, rather meanly, for a contribution to my own expenses?

— W.S.,