MIME encoding of HTML text

Is there any agreement on how 8-bit characters should be sent
when HTML text is sent in a MIME message.

I can see two possibillities:
(a) Use content-transfer-encoding: quoted-printable and then use
the quoted-printable method for transferring 8-bit characters.

(b) Use content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT and then use the HTML
convention (&#<decimal character value>;) for transferring
8-bit characters.

I guess both alternatives are probably permitted, but which
is preferred?

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jacob Palme <jpalme(_at_)dsv(_dot_)su(_dot_)se> (Stockholm University and KTH)
for more info see URL: http://www.dsv.su.se/~jpalme/Welcome.html