Class Ikl4L_ Book.J^2JL_ CcpigfcN? COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD I ife in Southern Fr The American Woman Abroad Written and profusely illustrated by BLANCHE McMANUS NEW YORK DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 1911 A 1 6 Door « ANX &• ■ FOREWORD The American Woman needs no introduction abroad. Always she is the most welcome of the throngs of self-invited guests who attend the great annual " At Home " which the European world holds for the visit- ing strangers, an entertainment that is becoming an all the year around function. All that Europe has to offer is hers on call, so long as she radiates that graciousness and appreciation which everywhere distinguishes her — the most viva- cious and distinctive feminine personality of all the women of the world to be seen on the European Play- ground. To the American woman abroad is due the credit of having so far influenced the conventions and traditions of the Old World as to have it recognise and accept with good grace (in so far at least as her own actions are concerned) a new standard of feminine conduct — freer and more independent than its own, but none the less modest and self-protective. The scheme of the following chapters is that of discursive comments on the more intimate and per- sonal phases of life in European countries which might be of interest to the American woman at home or abroad; whether she is the casual summer bird of passage across the Atlantic, or is planning a house- vi FOREWORD hunting tour of Europe, or only wants to read about it comfortably at home. In this book, it is hoped, will be found set forth fairly and correctly the results of the observations of one who has tried to study the values in the foreign picture with an open mind. Toulon, France. B. McM. 'Em onfenfs V VI VII VIII IX X XI XII XIII XIV XV XVI XVII XVIII XIX XX XXI CHAPTER PAGE I The Cost of Living Abroad . 3 II Servants and the Servant Question ... 33 III Foreign Markets and Marketing 63 IV Some Housekeeping Experiences . 89 The Lone Woman Traveller . .133 Tips and Tipping . . . 157 The European Shopping Tour . 179 Clothes and the Woman . . . 209 The Men Dressmakers of Paris and London . . . . . .231 The Social Side . . . . .251 Cities of Pleasure .... 269 The Country Hotels of Europe . 299 Woman and the European Hotel . 329 Light Refreshments .... 353 The Woman Traveller and the French Cafe . . . . • 37 1 Some German Spas .... 391 Artists' Sketching-Grounds Abroad . 409 Winter Sports in Switzerland . . 439 The Woman and the Car . . . 461 The Touring Club de France and How It Aids the Traveller . . 483 French Law for Foreigners , . 505 Villa Life in Southern France Frontispiece The Water Supply . Birthday Gifts A Mediterranean Market A Blanchisseuse of Normandy The Way Around Algeria When the Native Lady Goes Shopping in North Africa ..... Society Dines Out of Doors . On the Riviera .... On the Cote d'Emeraud — Normandy Hotel Garden — Montreux The Hour of the Aperitif Dejeuner — Hotel Bellevue les Andelys From the Point of View of the Cook A Country Hotel of France . FACING PAGE 20 38 76 Il6 v 142 I90 262 276 306 332 378 4l6 468 490 LIVING ABROAD THE MYTH OF CHEAP LIVING ABROAD COST OF LIVING ADVANCING ALL OVER EUROPE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE AMERICAN INVASION KEEPING DOWN THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD HOW THE FRENCH LANDLORD RAISES THE RENT ITALY AS A WINTER HOME " PALACE HOUSEKEEPING " IN ITALY BUYING WOOD BY THE POUND PARIS APARTMENTS PRICES GO UP IN FRUGAL GERMANY TIPS INCREASE HOUSEHOLD EXPENSES LONDON FLATS AND " MANSIONS " LIFE IN LONDON CHAMBERS A BOUT WITH THE BRITISH WORKMAN THE COST OF SMALL THINGS CAFE-AU-LAIT WITH DINNER " DEMORALISING AMERICAN DOLLARS " WHY AMERICANS ARE OFTEN OVERCHARGED MODERN VILLAS OF EUROPE THE AMERICAN WOMAN IN THE SMALL RURAL COM- MUNITY THE AMBULANT BATH TUB EXCUSE FOR LIVING IN EUROPE REAL CHARM OF LIFE ABROAD THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD To a man is due the discovery that one can live cheaply abroad, because one can wear his, or her, old clothes. This, brought down to the last analysis, precipitates the fact that cheap living in Europe is made possible by what one goes without, and the willingness to do things abroad that one does not like to do, or will not do, at home. No greater myth exists, in so far as its practical application to the majority of cases goes, than the belief that living abroad, which is taken to mean living in western Europe, for the American, is cheap. The majority of Americans who try it make the excuse that it is for economical reasons, but as a matter of fact it is more likely to be a desire for a change, or from the ennuis of the servant question, or that they just want to take a rest. They have heard the usual tale of how everything costs just half of what it does at home. It is a good chance for one's children to acquire French or German or dancing or art or some other accomplishment at the same time. Friends who have gone before may have brought back stories of heatless and waterless houses, but it is difficult to bring this fact and just what it means home to the average American housekeeper who has 3 4 T: MERICAM WOMAN ABROAD ithout all of the mechanical conventc ices that the ingenuity of a resourceful people have been the housekeeping question. Hie A ■ . . who finds the problem of high it home ever perplexing her. will find it duplicated in many phases on the other side oi the p. It is a common assertion oi late that Amer- - -... • .. ■ :. do with the increased cost of living : . but this is probably giving them undue prominence in the I I gtl scheme C IgS In the las: ten 5 the COSt oi living all over meed sorm I m - as much as fiftj cent, and in sonic cases a hundred would not be extravagant an estimate, and while the economic cause for this lies far beyond the circumscribed round oi the tourist traveller, it is true that the higMn gh*sp< . ig t vn . From America must bear the nsibilitv some of the increase in prices, in so far as th. the -granger on the Continent. Thus it is when the American worn.: I gOCS hunting in a Eur. capital for things on the same 5 as she has them at home, she will rind that it I her just as much, p nately even more, than the same thing at home, and. to use I "shamrock " phrase, it is not the same thing either, very often not even :i, while unfamiliarity with tor- household economics completes the demoralisa- tion. The experiment is apt to be brief, and a year or two rinds the family back to the delights of veranda life in some comfortable American suburb. There is only one way to live cheaply abroad — THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 5 Jive as the people of the country live. Not until one does this is any economy possible, or enjoyment. For most of us that is just the rub. It means making over one's tastes, habits of body and mind, and if this is to be done at all, one must begin young or be born a philosopher, and however numerous may be a woman's virtues, equanimity, under a new set of laws governing daily life, is rarely one of them. Anywhere outside of the large city modern con- veniences can rarely be found at any price, and where they are creeping in, have increased the cost of living out of all proportion to their benefits. Take as an example a certain French town of a hundred thousand inhabitants. A few modern apart- ment buildings have just gone up — the most desira- ble in the town. An apartment of eight rooms rents for say, two thousand five hundred francs (five hun- dred dollars) per annum; dear enough for a provin- cial town. There is an elevator of a kind, but the tenant must, in addition, pay five hundred francs a year for its use, besides an extra hundred francs to have the garbage removed and something more for the lighting of the public halls, besides a " fur- niture " a n d a door and window tax. It is the Euro- pean system of extras that runs up the bills. An economically inclined French family might insist on using the stairway, having been accustomed to noth- ing else, but, as a matter of fact, the system as out- lined, is only an ingenious way of raising the rent. Florence is one of the most popular European cities that attracts the prospective housekeeper on the 6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD other side, principally because the fact is well adver- tised that it has one of the largest English-speaking colonies, which alone makes for advanced prices, and then they are drawn there by the lure of Italy. Apartments are called cheap there, and five to seven rooms, at from twenty-five dollars to thirty-five dol- lars a month, can be gotten furnished. But the .American shivers in marble halls, which the small stove or open fireplace can as readily warm as they could an ice plant, and if there is a calorifere, or any system of central heating by steam or hot water in pipes, it is but a makeshift, except only in some of the great modern hotels in which steam heat has been installed on a lavish scale. Next to the un- limited use of water nothing is considered so extrava- gant as heat. Americans flock to Italy, impelled by the tradition that comes to them by way of England that Italy has a good winter climate. Northern Italy has probably the worst winter climate of all the Mediterranean countries, inasmuch as it is rainy as well as cold. All of southern Europe seems bitterly cold to the American, and the universal stone houses, always with marble, stone or tiled floors, seem like sepulchres. Frequently there are no fireplaces at all, and where they do exist are most inadequate. What may be called "palace housekeeping" is one of the most common forms of living in Italy. As few of the Italian nobility 7 are in sufficient funds to keep up their hereditary palaces of a thousand rooms, they are practically turning them into apart- THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD ment houses, the great size of the edifices lending itself to the sheltering of several households, which after all is going back to their original purpose, wherein each member of the family when married was apportioned cer- tain accommodations, an apartment in fact, under the paternal roof. The price for one of these palace apartments is gov- erned by their loca- tion and the impor- tance of the family who formerly occupied it. In Rome and Flor- ence they command from five hundred dol- lars up to two and three thousand; as an additional inducement one often has the satis- faction of living under the same roof with a princely landlord. Such a palace apartment might mean anything from ten to forty rooms, furnished with a certain amount of antique fittings, slightly moth-eaten and damaged, to be sure, but not more so than the for- tunes of the family. Principally an apartment will be made up of a series of great reception rooms, with dim, cobwebby corners and much tarnished gilt and 8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD painting. The marble floors, to be properly cov- ered in order to ward off the chill, would need the contents of a rug emporium. The bedrooms will be thrust into any dark nook, but this is one of the tenets of the old and new Italian indifference to hygiene. Frequently there is nothing to suggest plumbing, even in its most primitive form. In winter, the Italian expects an earthen scald'im filled with glowing ashes to heat a room thirty feet square, or perhaps an in- efficient iron stove that radiates more coal gas than heat. One American is known who collected as many scald'im as possible, and making a circle of them and sitting in the middle, was thus able to keep fairly warm. Another with a screen shut off a small eighteen-foot corner, and, in a measure, accomplished the same thing. An apartment in Venice is a charming experience in warm weather, but when the snow flies through the beautiful colonnades, — Oh, no! In a Venetian pal- ace (one cannot get away from palaces in Italy) there will, likely enough, be found a garage for a motor boat under the back stairs, though it was originally built for a gondola, a species of craft which is becoming extinct before the invasion of modernity. There are possibilities in life in Italy if one does not go there under the delusion that it is a com- fortable winter resort. Even a palace is within reach of most Americans abroad, some sort of a palace at least, as might be expected of a country where a maid-of-all-work can be had for three or THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD four dollars a month, and a butler for twenty cents a day, though the latter is nothing of the specialist that is his English prototype, for he will do anything from running the automobile to preparing the morn- ing coffee or sweeping out the apartment. One American couple who tried spending a winter on the shores of the Mediterranean, charmed by the novelty of life close to the soil, spent a good part of their income, and most of their time, in trying to solve the question of fire and heat. The only fuel to be had was the roots of olive trees, cut away from the living trunk and delivered in big baskets brought on the head of a sturdy southron and paid for by the pound. The local supply soon be- ing exhausted, contribu- tions were levied from the country round about, and before many weeks most of the able-bodied inhabitants of the little town of a thousand souls were engaged in the hunting down of a supply of burnable wood. These Americans, naturally, it being their first wrestle with conditions abroad, insisted on keeping warm. We, who had passed this first acute stage, io THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD knew how impossible this achievement was, and had given it up long ago. It was like foraging for an army corps. Finally the mayor formally waited upon them, and said that the olive crop was in danger and the wood would have to be imported from a neighbouring commune at increased cost, whereupon the couple gave up the struggle and went back to a Paris hotel. One of the traditions of that little community to-day — the story that is told to all new- comers — is about the crazy foreigners who burnt ten dollars' worth of wood a week. It is thus shown that in the most primitive en- vironment the cost of living can only be kept down by doing as the native does when he wants to keep THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD n warm ; sit on the sunny side of a wall with one's feet on a chaufrette full of hot embers. This is not what most Americans want, even though conditions may not always be so onerous, so it's either Paris or London for most of them, or Berlin, which has leaped into American favour with much vividness since the German Emperor has in- cluded so many Americans on his visiting list. Paris as a dwelling place for Americans abroad is still in the lead, and an apartment in the " City of a Thousand and One Nights " is still the acme of enchantment and the acme of price as well. Circling about the Bois de Boulogne, the Quartier of the aristocratic Etoile, the neighbourhood of the Champs-Elysees and about the Pare Monceau, are the highest-priced and most luxurious modern apart- ment houses. Built in the style of modern French Renaissance, with much sculptured ornament, they are charming to look at and much more beautiful in adornment than most things of the kind else- where. Inside they are bien Frangaise, with an opu- lence of gilding, mirrors and cleverly arranged salons; they of course have the latest sanitation and bath- room installations, but prices will be quite as high as the same thing at home, if not more so, for there again will be endless array of small expenses and taxes which are always added to the rent in France. Even on this basis one may not always count on an ele- vator nor any general, or " central," heating system. Just outside the gates of Paris are to be had moderate-priced apartments, in Neuilly, Passy and 12 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD other suburbs, where for twenty-five dollars a month or even less, five rooms and a bath may be had, the rooms large and airy, and really far superior in arrangement to a flat at double or treble the price in America. Sometimes such an apartment may be had heated, but after a more or less inefficient fashion, which the American will be obliged to eke out by individual fires, either in a stove, or by coal or wood burned in a grate. A point to be remembered in this connection is that all household supplies, even kerosene oil for the lamps, not to say butter and eggs for the table, are considerably less in price out- side the walls of Paris than within. The octroi tax is not levied outside the fortifications. These cheaper apartments are often occupied by a better class of people than would be found in Amer- ican flats of the same rental. The Continental habit of the central courtyard adds considerably to the facilities for making a satisfactory arrangement of the rooms in an apartment house. Halls and stair- ways are spacious and well-lighted, and, it must be confessed, they are usually better cared for than at home and the smell of food is agreeably absent from the public halls. It is possible that the hooded fireplace with which the French kitchen is usually fitted is responsible for this. Americans who come to Paris to settle for any length of time all seem to want to live in a fashion- able neighbourhood, and as near the centre of shops and life as they can. The same is true of the aver- age French Paris household of moderate means, THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 13 hence apartment life is universal. Only millionaires and the blue-blood aristocrats of the Faubourg Saint- Germain, can afford to live in houses inside the gates of Paris. In the Etoile quarter a small, furnished apartment of four rooms, a kitchen and bathroom is not unduly dear at fifty dollars, but at this price it would be situated on the courtyard, which might prove noisy if garages for automobiles and stables for horses, at the disposal of tenants, were on the ground floor; besides a courtyard is usually a mid-day gossiping place for all the servants, and if there were no elevator, as likely enough there might not be, a con- stant going and coming on the stairs and through the corridors might prove a considerable disadvantage, to avoid which it might often be considered worth while to pay more. Still, the offer of such accom- modation is not unusual, nor is the price nor location. The glamour that hangs about the Latin Quarter induces many to forego fashion and the boulevards for the cheaper Rive Gauche, where the best moder- ate-priced apartments in Paris can be had. On the newly opened Boulevard Raspail are many modern apartment buildings that compare favourably with those on the other side of the Seine. Cheap living in Paris means existence in the con- ventional old-time Parisian apartment, whether it be on the " Right " or " Left Bank," the climbing up of any number of stairs (and French stairways are designed on long lines) with no bathroom, no mod- ern sanitary fittings worth mentioning, no dumb H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD waiter to bring up your groceries and no steam heat, only expensive sticks of wood with which to warm up a Paris winter. The compensating feature is that a bonne a tout faire will do all the work of an eight-room apartment at forty francs a month. The entrance door may have a vegetable shop on one side, trailing out over the sidewalk, and a laun- dry on the other, and a cafe opposite that only gets into full swing at midnight. But isn't all this the picturesque Europe that we go in search of? The cost of living in Germany, once the most frugal country in which to make a home in the calculation of the visiting foreigner, has risen enor- mously in the last ten years. The increasing wealth in Germany makes for display and a luxurious style of living undreamed of in the old days even by wealthy Germans. First-class apartments in Berlin are the equal of those in Paris in price and elegance. Houses are rented on the basis of so much for each room, thus is the price of a house regulated by law beyond dickering. The housekeeper in Germany must get used to a rather irritating oversight of her domestic life by police, which rather makes one feel as if one is bonded out on good behaviour, and it behooves the American entering the field of home life in Germany to get posted as to the regulations, and observe them. They extend from the supervi- sion of one's servants to the regulation of the hours of piano practice. The police are Germany's real rulers, and their power is sometimes even greater, as, unlike most THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 15 rulers, they come in close contact with the people. The increased cost of living has brought about the general practice of renting rooms with a German private family. This offers a solution of living on moderate lines to the stranger, and avoids the as- sumption of much serious responsibility. Life in a small town in Germany to-day is subject to no small extent to the advance in the cost of living, but can be made moderate enough if the lively American can stand the stagnation and deadly dulness and the rigid- ity of conventional social intercourse. Dusseldorf is one of the most charming and mod- ern of the smaller German cities. Its boulevards are as well laid out as those of Paris and are lined with spacious, attractive apartment buildings, but their rentals would certainly rise to the par of those of Berlin or Dresden. The cost of housekeeping abroad, on the Continent in particular, is affected not a little by the drain on one's purse by the occasional, and annual, tips. In France, the domestic poarboire is an item to be reck- oned with quite as much as that of rent and taxes. The concierge expects an honorarium when the tenant takes possession of the apartment, and this is not left to the tenant's caprice, but is based on a percentage of the rental, with an additional twenty to fifty francs at the jour de Van — New Year's Day. The first day of the new year brings a regular riot of giving of presents. Those who expect to be remembered are without end. There is the postman, the telegraph messenger, porters from the shops who 16 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD may have brought your parcels during the year, the baker's boy, the milk woman, every one who has rendered the slightest service, to say nothing of the servants of the house. Every one demands a cadeau as a right, its value usually estimated on a tariff formulated by custom, and if you expect services to be rendered to proceed smoothly the coming year you meet the expected demands as nearly as your patience and pocketbook will allow. The petty graft of the poarboire is everywhere. Compared to the Continent, prices are higher in London, where apartments of the first rank are often grouped into what are called " Mansions," while anything under this in the scale is reckoned as just a plain flat. English people are aghast when they hear one mention a thousand pounds a year as the rent of an apartment in the neighbourhood of Hyde Park or elsewhere in the aristocratic West End cen- tring around Buckingham Palace. Such rentals are not uncommon, but do not comprehend anything at all to be compared with the modern ideas which have been incorporated lately into American apartments at a similar figure. In spite of the advantage that the flat possesses over the house as a labour-saving proposition, the true British housekeeper would much prefer the latter. It gives one a more substantial position, for in England there is still the feeling that life in a flat is a menace to the sanctity of the home. Life in London " chambers " has romantic associ- ations with the old Inns of Court and ancient and THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 17 somnolent city squares, where one can live in the atmosphere of dead memories and associations, features that tend to add considerable to the charm of London for the American. Usually " chambers " are to be had at a cheap rental, but also with a few attendant disadvantages. In the Adelphi Terrace, a little backwater just off the Strand that the flood of modernising which is sweep- ing over London threatens annually to blot out, one can still hope to find vacant " chambers " in a house decorated by the famous Adam Brothers. Before the door, as like as not, will be found an iron stand- ard into which the link-boys once thrust their blazing torches. The whole Adelphi region is redolent of memories of Dickens, who in his youth played about the great storage vaults that burrow under the Ter- race from the Thames Embankment below. It is a quaintly interesting district. Here you may see a house once inhabited by Roger Bacon, and across the way is still visible a certain brass door-knocker which figured in one of Dickens' most famous tales. In almost any of these houses are to be found exquisitely carved marble mantels. The walls are of stone, with a dressing of wallpaper stretched over cloth, which wavers in ghostly fashion in the too-frequent currents of air, like the ancient wall-hung tapestries of a haunted castle. From the windows of many of these houses one may look out over the Embankment Gardens and the foggy stretches of the Thames. The Royal Chapel of Savoy is a near neighbour, and ghosts of Dickens' 18 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD characters float around every corner. On a winter's day at four o'clock the muffin man, ringing his bell, still makes his round of the district. Muffins and crumpets for afternoon tea at twopence each are a pleasant interlude and quite in the spirit of this old- time atmosphere. Hereabout one ought to be able to find five rooms, distributed over two unevenly laid floors, for five to six pounds a month, which is not out of proportion for such genuine historic associations as the rental includes. To discount this there will be a lack of water, hot and cold, except that which flows inter- mittently from an adapted kitchen sink, and your heat, what does not go up the chimney, is all radiated from grate fires. In these old buildings there are no elevators, no dumb waiters even, and coal, wood and everything else must be lugged up the front stairs, though plenty of willing hands are to be found, and at a small price, to do one's fetching and carry- ing. Ashes and garbage must be carried down to a tiny, well-like courtyard, and within the week the dustman will come along to remove it, of course demanding a tip. You may ask why, but he couldn't tell you if he would, except that it is in accordance with precedent, the thing that governs all walks of English life. The tenants collectively contribute towards the cost of the lighting of the front hall and of the keeping of it clean, the tenants of each floor attend- ing to their own hall. The cost of living abroad is the cost of the small THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 19 things of life, and it is their multiplicity that fritters away the time and temper of the housekeeper, more so in Britain than elsewhere. Laundry work is wretchedly done all over the British Isles and at prices quite up to the American standard, while the clothes come home of a shade that matches the Lon- don fog, and fresh curtains must be put up each week on account of this same phenomenon. Thus sighs the London housekeeper. Sub-letting is a common practice in England, but is sometimes prolific of dire annoyance. You may arrive some day at your sub-rented flat to find the bailiff in possession. The law provides that if the original tenant fails to pay the rent, that the upper landlord can attach the belongings of whoever may be living there at the time. There may be no re- dress, no extenuating circumstances, and you may find yourself in the unpleasant predicament of having to pay rent twice over in order to release your belong- ings. Of the smaller London flat much the same may be said as of those on the Continent. The various rooms are usually conveniently placed, and everything has not been sacrificed to the economy of space. The English still treat themselves liberally when it comes to fresh air. An inconvenient British custom is that the out- going tenant carries away the gas fixtures and the piping as well, and in Scotland the one moving out takes away even the grates. This of course pre- sumes that they brought them with them when they 20 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD became a tenant; still the inconvenience exists for the incomer, and worst of all, he has to contend with the plumber for a period ranging anywhere from a week to a month, which of itself is discouraging; besides there will be damaged wallpaper and chipped paint, which means the introduction of various other classes of the British workman into one's daily life for a more or less extended period. The British workman, for whatever species of labour you have to call him in, is another one of the things that increases the cost and annoyance of living in England. He is the curse of the home and the home-maker, and in his most highly trained form, the most tyrannical labour unionist in the civilised world. He does his work in inconceivably uneco- nomical ways, for he is slothful and inattentive, and unabashed will ask you for a tip when he finishes, though more often you have to give him one midway in order to get him to finish, all the time running the risk that he will break an arm or a leg during the job, so that you will have to contribute towards his support pending his recovery. He will build you a house at his agreed upon price, but will ultimately send you in an additional bill for coal used in keeping himself warm while he was at work. When the British workman comes in at the door peace flies out of the window, while to get finished with him and get him out of the house usually means a process of law if the job is of any magnitude. For the moderate consumer living is dear in Eng- land, and cheap living, like everything that is cheap .-~kj The Water Supply THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 21 in the tight little isle, is bad. One can live as well perhaps in London as anywhere, but one must be prepared to pay for it. In the last five years the necessities of food have gone up approximately one- fourth to one-third in price. One of the commonest of causes for this hoisting of prices comes from the demand for things exotic from America. Grape- fruit and even bananas a few years ago were un- known in London, now every one has them and pays the price. When the menu palls, many a London housekeeper goes to Jackson's in Piccadilly for American groceries (in Paris to Prunier's), and deli- cacies from overseas. The American will think it worth while, but she is doubling expenses, and, though the joy may be doubled, there will be a disturbing influence brought into life abroad which was not what she presumably came over for. Nothing inflates a foreign hotel bill so much as tampering with the menu, and the American woman abroad is the greatest of sinners in this respect; it is true, too, that she generally gets worsted in the pro- ceedings. Anything that attempts to alter the routine menu of a hotel meal affects prices as hydrogen affects a balloon. When an American party comes to table d'hote at a hotel in a large country town in France and orders cafe-au-lait, and wonders why such a simple request creates something near a riot, and why it usually comes to be served them when they are nearly through their meal, there's a reason. The head waiter goes to the proprietor with the proposi- THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 5 takes i of them to the kitchen, to m the wrath of th< - has boon inter* in the S* Lg dinner. indue* um eave bis sauces ig < make send the scullf to hunt up outsick - list the least bit annoyed, but c the whole dining- oom full of people has got tteresft - st nore so ^ hen the party es bo drink the concoct on With their , ; . The meml i s the part] themselves beg n bo der when the] COm< their bill, for the addi- .- will be quite a third of the total. The . shrugs his shouh i s tells them that ej want to take to-morrow morn- ig*s break st th dinner the night before that he : .s willing bo serve it that but that those who do th< . . ig mist pa] for it This they do, grumbling at the way foreigners stick Amer- icans. Another disregard for economy is to order a dishes the regular table d'hote bill, under the impress tnthat U be cheaper. In such a case the I be served and charged for at a iriably he mon than that oi the . gular dinner. Alt the palatial apartments and hotels which are going up in the cap tal - es the Old World due to the American demand, as is SO frequently claimed? ably thirty thousand Americans live in Par - - is derably less number in Berl as many in Lorn - iflux, or invasion, certainly has THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 23 something to do with the demand for what the American first took to as luxuries, but soon came to consider as necessities. The lavishly convenient American way of living has had much to do with the change that has come over the European caterer to the foreigner. Now that he has learned the trick and is working on his own account, adapting it to his own needs, even though the pace be slow, it is still evident that it has come as a result of a first desire to please an American clientele. The patriotic Frenchman dramatically points to the big hotels which have gone up in Paris during the last few years, and exclaims, " It is for you Americans that these luxurious establishments have been built; it is you who are coming here in our midst and demoralising our own people with your dollars." There is no use in asserting that you only wish to make use of his beautiful and attractive land at a moderate expenditure of money, and that there are plenty of other Americans with the same modest desires. He will not look at it that way, perhaps he cannot be expected to, and for a fact, it is not at all improbable that the American invasion has done something towards increasing the expenses of the Frenchman's own cost of living, just as the pro- gressive Italian is beginning to complain that the sen- timental traveller refuses to regard his country in any other light than a " has-been." It is beginning to dawn upon the American, whether living or touring abroad, that things are cost- ing them more than the native who is doing the same 24 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD thing, and bitter complaints are becoming frequent. There is some justice in this. Their demands are more exacting, for rarely, most rarely, is the Amer- ican content to take things as found, and often at- tempts to make over existing arrangements, result in advancing the cost. An American will pay fifty per cent more at a hotel and get no more of value than will the German or Belgian. Principally this is because she, or he, has, according to taste, sought to improve upon the menu or the service. Under such circumstances the custom of the hotel, naturally, is to cover this trouble with a blanket of higher prices. Another mislead- ing American trait tending to bewilder the European in his effort to cater to their wants is the wrath of the American over small impositions when he seems so ready, as a rule, to pay extravagantly for real luxuries. It is in trying to reconcile these extremes that many of the troubles that hamper the free movements of the American abroad arise. The average American will pay a straightaway bill meekly enough, but when a kur-tax is added at the end, and he learns that this is a local custom for the privilege of listening to the band while stopping at some Ger- man spa, immediate resentment arises; a grumble ensues, too, when lights and attendance are charged for. Still the foreigner with lower standards goes on wondering why one is willing to spend thirty dollars on souvenirs, which he knows are of no real value, and protests at the added trifle of thirty cents. Certainly there is a growing tendency to exploit THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 25 the American whose very generosity and liberality have aroused the cupidity of a people who are un- trained to this easy, open-handed dealing. How often is the American seen to double some price with the remark, " that's not much," and a feeling that these " poor people have a hard time anyway." A Swiss child holds up a handful of wild raspberries to the window of a train which has stopped at a small station; she has picked them by the wayside and timidly offers them for a few cents. " Oh," says the impulsive American woman, " that's too cheap, here's a franc." The child understands the money if not the words. This is a pleasant little incident produced in the exuberance of a holiday spirit, but the lady should not complain when next she comes that way that her wild berries can only be got for a franc — it is she who has made the price. Does the presence of Americans cause an increase in prices? Take Carlsbad, one of the most popular " cures " with Americans. Last year there were some three thousand Americans who took the " cure " there and at Marienbad, its neighbour, and another three thousand or thereabouts passed through, stop- ping en route long enough to take the waters in some form or another and buy some specimens of Bohemian glassware as souvenirs. They must have left in the neighbourhood of five or six hundred thousand dollars as the total of their expenditure, including mere unnecessary trifles. It is this that has given Carlsbad rank as one of the most expensive 26 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD places in Europe. American visitors to foreign spas are usually of the wealthy class. To live comfortably in a southern European climate, on the Riviera, is possible on almost any scale. A Riviera villa can be got for a year, often furnished, for the price of a month's rent of the aver- age New York apartment. The subject is treated in extenso elsewhere, and it is not intended to refer here to that super-luxuriousness with which the gay world of Paris and St. Petersburg surrounds itself in the magnificent and often palatial villas of Beau- lieu and Cap Saint Jean. Modern villas, for rent by the season, are going up all over Europe. In some of the Belgian water- ing places a small villa after the old Flemish style can be had for as little as two hundred dollars for the season, and in Switzerland, modern chalets, pat- terned after the genuine old thing, are being erected near all the great resorts. Rentals are by no means as low as in Belgium, the cheapest being perhaps four or five times the price. Where can one live cheaply abroad? Naturally this is more nearly possible in the small town, or in a purely country neighbourhood, but since the average American can only live happily in colonies this is usually not to be thought of. It is the exceptional person who has the courage to break away from the companionship of one's own people, and the incentive for doing so must usually be greater than the saving of a few dollars. Large numbers of Americans are going about Europe looking for rest and quiet," THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 27 but their search generally fetches them up not too far away from the divertisements of more or less populous and lively centres. Put the average American woman into a little provincial community in a foreign country and it is like putting her in jail. Dependent upon local soci- ety for her chief entertainment the novelty of un- usual surroundings soon becomes stale, whether one is living in a restored feudal castle or an adapted farmhouse that has caught one's fancy. Like the amateur gardener with his plant, she pulls herself up periodically to see if she has really taken root, and is perhaps relieved to find that the roots have not struck in, and that she can, when she will, move on to a more congenial environment without remorse. To be happy living in a foreign land requires an absorbing occupation or remarkable inner resources in order to be able to cut adrift from a conventional home-land existence and adjust one's outlook to the viewpoint of the country. The way, then, to live cheaply abroad is to shun the fashionable neighbourhoods, particularly those which have been made so largely by one's own people, and to take an old house, or apartment, rather than the newest that one can find. After all, for what does one go to Europe for but the old? One should learn to walk upstairs, to patronise the ambulant bath that is brought hot to your door, the public baths, or learn the acrobatic feat of bath- ing in two inches of water in an exaggerated soup 2S THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD plate. One should not worry over the kind of en- trance which the apartment house may possess, or what rank in the scale of fashion the neighbourhood may have. The actual question of surroundings does not make very much difference in Europe; one's social status is not reckoned or recognised by her geographical location, and anyway, the temporary sojourner should be glad to put it all down to the credit of new experiences. What really hides behind this excuse of the search abroad for an economical style of living is first of all a feeling that there should be an excuse for one's peripatetic vagaries. A money consideration can always be understood, but the pivotal motive is the same as that which induces one to turn from a noisy street into a garden of old-fashioned flowers. The charm of a more tranquil life, with simpler pleasures, THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 29 is an attraction which will often serve as a temporary excuse for one's not remaining amid their altogether too-practical home civilisation. It is for the American woman abroad to cherish this great market of charm and fascination, and above all not spoil it by introducing the extravagant modern- ities from which she is trying to escape. <2> SERVANTS and. ^ SK#: Servant Questiofl SIGNS OF UNREST IN THE DOMESTIC WORLD PRIVATE SERVANTS ENGLISH SERVANTS AND SERVICE THE ENGLISH HOUSEKEEPER'S POINT OF VIEW THE " LADY HELP " WORKINGS OF THE ENGLISH DOMESTIC MACHINE THE CHEAP BELGIAN SERVANT AND THE ENERGETIC DUTCH MAID FRENCH SERVANTS " BONNE A TOUT FAIRE " AND HER DUTIES FRENCH HOUSEHOLD ECONOMICS CUISINIERE AND VALET DE CHAMBRE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE FRENCH HOUSEKEEPER LOW MORAL STATUS OF EUROPEAN DOMESTIC SERVANTS PICTURESQUE NURSEMAIDS THE ARISTOCRATIC " NOUNOU " THE SOUBRETTE IN REAL LIFE SCHEDULE OF DAY'S WORK IN A PARIS HOUSEHOLD HARD-WORKING GERMAN WOMAN SERVANT GOOD, BUT UNSYMPATHETIC, SWISS SERVANTS HAPPY-GO-LUCKY ITALIAN MAID-OF-ALL-WORK PUBLIC SERVANTS CAFE GARCON PERSONNEL OF THE BIG EUROPEAN HOTEL VERSATILE HALL PORTER II SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION There is a servant question in Europe. Students of domestic economics, reading between the lines, say that there are significant signs of unrest among the serving classes. To the uninitiated, however, the usual problems of domestic service seem largely non- existent; obviously, they have not passed beyond the stage of symptoms. Good, capable, abundant and cheap (according to American standards) servants can still be had all over Europe. Service is respectable, and often hereditary, and in the matter of treating servants, monarchial Europe, that is Continental Europe, is more democratic than America. In the middle-class European family, while the servants perform menial work of drudgery under conditions unthinkable in our land of super-conveni- ences, they are usually treated more as one of the family which they serve than here. It may be this, quite as much as tradition and need, that makes serv- ants contented with their obviously onerous lot on the Continent, and keeps them for years, or for a lifetime, in the same employ. From England come the most formal complaints. This is but natural in a land where personal service 33 34 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD has been brought so near perfection. The more nearly perfect a machine, the more noticeable any flaw in its operation. " Servants are too independ- ent," says the English mistress, " they are becom- ing more difficult to get, and every year are demand- ing higher wages." " They are spoilt," continues the housekeeper, forgetting that it is she who is the spoilt one. All this may be true, but English serv- ants are still the best examples of the personal re- tainer. The English servant has no wish to be anything but a servant. The process of " improving his con- dition " never goes beyond his desire for improve- ment. The apparent unrest simply means that there is a movement among the serving classes for an amelioration of the conditions under which they work more than anything else, for old-time conditions of servitude have been maintained on lines which are astonishingly near those of feudal times. The mis- tress of the household is even yet a dictator in her realm. What her servants wear, who their friends may be, limiting recreation, as well as their working hours, she controls absolutely, and, to all intents and purposes, their religion and politics are under strict surveillance. " As the Squire and the Vicar say," is still the creed of rural England, and in each of these instances it is the wives of these solons who have the regulation of the servant question in their charge. It is only recently that the housemaid was allowed to ride out on a bicycle, while over be-rib- boned hats, even on " evenings out," are still SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 35 frowned upon. The English servant has been brought up to know her place. Little cause for won- der when she begins to define that place herself that the foundations of the English system of serving get a shock! On the whole, the feeling is strong in England against a servant forgetting her place. The English servant still has an ingrained respect for " her betters " in spite of the strides of socialism. There is a tendency creeping in that their children might seek to rise in the world, and this is what has shaken the nerves of the English housekeeper — that working girls should be allowed to look forward to any other occupation than that of going out into service as did their parents before them. It is the " board schools " that are unfitting the working classes for domestic service. This is the the- ory of the English housekeeper. " Board schools," that inadequate English form of a public school, have only provided compulsory education for little more than a quarter of a century, but the upper classes regard the plan of purveying education for the masses as the beginning of troubles that their grandparents never even suspicioned. The English first set the complicated and elabo- rate household machine to running smoothly, but now they must watch out that they are not caught in the cogs. English servants have formed themselves into a vigilant band of censors and expect their em- ployers to live up to their positions, incidentally re- fraining from bringing discredit upon them. Eng- lish servants having been trained by Church and 36 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD State to the service of their superiors hold their superiors, in turn, up to their duties. They seek not only to guard themselves against encroachment from the competition of fellow-workers, but from their employers as well. Nothing so demoralises a servant as to turn in and do work one's self. Under such circumstances a servant would let you know in a politely impertinent way that you have demeaned yourself, that you are " no lady." She would much prefer being overworked herself to suffer the igno- miny of having a mistress who could so far lose sight of her dignity as to be willing to do any work that belonged to the province of her maid. No labour union was ever more ingeniously safe- guarded, and the mistress becomes a "scab" if in- clination or circumstance impel her to put her hand to more than the lever which sets the domestic machine in motion. A rather curious development, said to be the out- come of two things — the difficulty of getting general servants, and the necessities of a large class of " re- duced gentlewomen " — has brought about the rise of the " lady help," an anomalous thing, only possible in a land of compromise, such as England. The " lady help " will perform practically any duty, but the fact must never be lost sight of that she is a " lady." The etiquette varies somewhat, but she may demand that she have her tea with her employer, or even that she take her meals with them. Beyond this she is not usually intrusive. This new phase of the servant question has not been in operation long SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 37 enough to test its practical working. The " lady " servant asks slightly higher wages on the ground of bringing a superior intelligence to bear on the do- mestic problem, but doubtless she counts somewhat on the value of her dignified position. Caste is as strongly defined in the servants' hall as in the drawing-room. There is no grade of English servant but what is able to, and does, look down on another, and the chauffeur or coachman (for whom the employer is taxed by the government for the privilege of having them at his beck and call) natu- rally feel very much above the scullion or the dairy- maid. In some respects the workings of the great houses are simpler than that of a more modest establishment. Where there is a housekeeper to whom all others must look, and who is responsible for the running of the house, the actual cares of the mistress are much lightened. It is a household within a household, of which the butler and the housekeeper are the heads, and hold positions of equal dignity. One just cause for the servant unrest in England is that arising from the economy of food. The larger the army of servants the more niggardly, very often, is the policy of the house towards the food supply of the servants' hall. The grander the estab- lishment the more diligently must small economies be practised, especially on the scale of the steadily de- creasing incomes of the majority of land-owners. English servants are better lodged than their fel- lows on the Continent, but that they are better nour- 38 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD ished is certainly open to doubt. The food for each servant is carefully apportioned — just so many pounds of meat, bread, tea, sugar, milk, a certain allowance of the latter being for puddings, it being often ex- plicitly stated as to whether puddings for the serv- ants are to be milk puddings, or just " plain boiled." The careful housekeeper sees to it that not an ounce extra is ever given out. Each servant may demand a daily allowance of beer, or is otherwise entitled to "beer money"; this at least is the traditional pro- cedure, though not always enforced to-day. Any- thing beyond this regime is at the expense of the servant. Board wages — when the house is closed, the family being away — are usually allowed at the rate of ten shillings a week. What would the well- fed American servant say to being expected to live on two dollars and a half a week? The " Employers' Liability Act " has recently be- come a law in Britain and adds considerably to the complication of the domestic problem. If a servant is injured in service, even though it be through her own negligence, the employer is liable for an indem- nity. One insures against this by the payment of a cash premium, which automatically adds to what one pays in assumed responsibility. If wages are creeping up in England, they still seem, to us, within reason. A general servant at a hundred dollars a year, even if her ability as a cook is questionable, does not seem unduly expensive, and parlour maids are cheap from sixty to eighty dollars a year. It is in the aggregate that English service is costly. The Tbr-.S ( Itot Birthday Gifts SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 39 staff required to run an average house and family is from four to six — cook, butler and parlour maid (or two maids), scullery maid, gardener and chauffeur, or coachman, according to taste. The chauffeur adds another complication; he ranks above the old- time coachman, and holds himself high above the other servants, is usually catered for apart, and in- deed is the subject of special consideration all along the line. Far down on the long list of English servants is that peculiar London type, the charwoman, most lowly of menials, whose life is spent in the grimy labour which has been evolved as a result of the uneconomically arranged London house. For a shil- ling for two or three hours' work, she blacks the grates, carries coals up, and ashes down, many flights, and sweeps the floors on her knees with a handbrush and dustpan. Faithful in her work but untruthful in speech, kind-hearted and sloppy, coming to her day's work on the strength of only a cup of tea, making up deficiency on surreptitious " beers," she has, with true British pride, a wholesome respect for her work and the knowledge that there is some one still farther down the scale whom she may yet patronise. It is these qualities, after all, that con- duce to the still unchallenged superiority of the Eng- lish servant. English servants are trained for their careers. The cottager's daughter is taught to arrange a tea-tray, that a neat apron is a necessity, and that she must say " thank you, ma'am," though the old-fashioned 4 o THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD bob-curtesy is a relic of the early Victorian period seldom seen. One may still run across it, but it only exists, like rare birds, in out of the way spots. The superior English servant radiates comfort, but one must be of her race to get the best results from her service. No matter how circumspectly the stranger, coming to England to make her home, models the conduct of her establishment on English lines, the attitude of the servant is slightly super- cilious. She is made to feel that she is not of the elect. Wages are lower all over the Continent than in, England. In France from thirty to fifty francs (six to ten dollars) is the wage of a general servant. In Germany it is less, and the work is harder. For cheap labour the Belgian woman is unequalled. In the matter of throwing pails of water about, and putting a shine on things, the white-capped Dutch girl has no peer, and works at a nominal price, though the stranger in Holland generally finds most things very expensive. Along with the fear of a diminishing population in France comes the scare of a famine in servants. The number of female domestic servants has been steadily decreasing in the last fifty years, so that there has been an influx of a cheaper kind from the more necessitous countries, notably Switzerland, Italy and Belgium. Still, the bonne a tout faire, the stolid peasant woman of the old French provinces, is the mainstay of the French menage. The average French household is economically run SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 41 with but one general servant — the bonne a tout faire, or at most two — a cuisiniere and a femme de chambre. The servant in France is on a different plane from that of her English sister. Her relations with the family are more intimate, and she shares the family cares and pleasures alike, being really one of them. It would be impossible, in many cases, to compress — iL_J-L_ the expansive French temperament into the formal, impassive mould of the English servant. The French bonne a tout faire, the general maid of all work, is a faithful animal, a product of the fields of France; her only emotion is work, her only pleasure to lay by, sou by sou, a meagre dot in the hope that it will gain her a husband — that is if she is young. More often she spends her life in the 42 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD service of one family, her small hoardings secreted in the traditional bank of a French peasant, the bas de laine. She cooks, does the ordinary wash of the family, sews, and mends all the family stockings. She rises at break of day and is the last to retire. Where there is but one servant the mistress is ex- pected to, and does, work side by side with her. The French servant would be more likely to think her mistress was not a lady if she did not turn her hand to the housework, and besides the French house- keeper is always a domestic worker, all except the real woman of society, a class which scarcely exists outside Paris. The bonne goes about her work in the morning in her petticoat; presumably it is for economical reasons, as she does not don her dress until late in the day. Where the bonne sweeps the room, madame is supposed to dust, to wipe the dishes and to help in the making of the beds and chamber work. The natural outcome of this is that maid and mistress are on a friendly footing. This brings up the ob- jection to the transplanted housekeeper from other lands of too much familiarity, and the friendly in- terest that is sometimes a real charm in the French servant might conceivably become an interference. As a French servant is charged for all the break- age, there is less of the usual slaughter of household crockery here than in England or America. The bonne a tout faire is paid from thirty to fifty francs a month, according as to whether she is in the country or the city. The Parisian servant com- SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 43 mands the highest wages, though that of itself does not always imply the most capable service. The French servant is quite accustomed to a strict regime in spite of the social latitude which is allowed. No one practises small economies so well as the French housekeeper. It is she who carries the keys and everything is under lock. Every end of the loaf is accounted for and even candle ends are saved. Lumps of sugar are counted out as if they were coin. In spite of this the perquisites of the French serv- ant are openly tolerated, particularly that commis- sion on all household purchases, which, by unwritten law, amounts to a sou in a franc. Naturally this petty graft comes out of the household; the shop- keepers do not tax their profits to meet this extor- tion. Some effort has been made to counteract this custom, and at the same time reduce household ex- penses by allowing the servant a certain percentage on any saving which may be made in the household running expenses, such as heating, lighting and the cost of staples used in cooking. This implies a very good working knowledge on the part of the mistress as to the real cost of things, and in that way makes for a valuable knowledge of home economics. It is thus that wasteful tendencies on the part of serv- ants are controlled. The cuisiniere considers as her right this danse du panier, as it is called, and she will likely enough leave her employ if she is not allowed the privilege of going alone to market, or should her mistress watch her purchases too closely. 44 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD A combination frequently seen in the French house- hold is the married couple, the wife serving as cook, or cuisiniere, the husband as valet de chambre. Divid- ing the work among themselves they are thus able to keep all perquisites in the family. The functions of the valet de chambre are intimate, but one gets used to a man-servant about the house after experi- ences with ship stewards, the silk-clad Arabs who Femma de Menace S-McM. Valet" de Cbambre glide about the corridors of North African hotels, and the Swiss-German who prepares your bath in the famous spas. The valet de chambre brings madame her morn- ing chocolate, places it discreetly beside the bed and retires; he valets monsieur, does the rooms, waits on the table, and in toto combines the duties of butler, footman and chambermaid. Where the combination is a cuisiniere and a femme de chambre, the duties of the latter are practically SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 45 the same as those of the valet de chambre, except that, in addition, she has a certain amount of laundry work which she must also mend and keep in order, besides assisting in any plain sewing to be done. Under such an arrangement the cook is expected to take care of the salon and salle a manger, in addition to her kitchen duties and the marketing, which latter for her is really a recreation. Where there are chil- dren the femme de chambre is supposed to occupy herself to some extent with their needs. A housekeeper in France has great responsibilities attached to her position. Theoretically, she is re- sponsible for the moral conduct of her servants. Not only must she care for them in illness, but should any harm come to a young girl in her employ the parents could hold her responsible, the law regard- ing the servant as a member of the family of her employer. In Paris, it is true, this is virtually a dead letter, for the immorality of the Parisian do- mestic servant is flagrant. Any consideration of this aspect of the case is usually met by a shrug of the shoulders; the French are a cynical race; "if she is a good servant, what more could one ask? " The low moral status of women servants is gen- erally recognised throughout Europe as a result of the difficulties with which marriage is hedged about, though more probably in many instances it is as a result of the last feeble flickerings of a feudal system which took no account of the overlord's obligations towards a menial. Things are better in England; the moral standard among servants is higher, out- 46 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD wardly at least, but there are sturdy, self-respecting working parents who say that the great country-house, with its gay week-end parties, is no place for a young girl. This is another phase of the servant question. A picturesque figure in Continental cities whose functions keep her in the eye of the public, is the Og-*V- M._ nursemaid, and to her is largely due the credit of preserving the national dress of her country. The Spanish-Catalan nurse wears the black lace mantilla draped gracefully over her head and held by long, gold pins, while in Italy the charming Neapolitan costume is the favourite livery of the nurse; the folded white head dress, the coral necklace, the laced bodice and apron, with its coloured bands, dress up SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 47 the Italian nursemaid who still carries baby wrapped in the same style of swaddling clothes as those of the Lucca della Robbia infants. The English nurse- maid is a symphony in grey and white, with a close- E.ng)isb Nursemaio fitting black bonnet, with white floating strings, who must look continually immaculate on a pittance of from six to ten pounds a year. The profession of nursemaid in Paris is almost exclusively in the hands of the little Breton girls, 48 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD whose dainty coiffes, black dresses and silken aprons form the badge of the Parisian children's nurse. They are among the most reliable of French types of servitors, though rarely paid above ten dollars a month, more often but seven or eight. The " nounou*' the nursing nurse, is the aristocrat of the profession. With floating cloak and ribbon head-dress of bright- coloured streamers, her charge smothered in laces on a pillow in her arm, she is the most pic- turesque adjunct of the beautiful gardens of Paris. She is the queen of that portion of the Bois set apart for the use of children, undefiled by the automobile, a sym- phony in blue or rose. The " nounou " of the chic Parisian must be as dainty as her mistress, who furnishes her charming costume free of cost, includ- ing the ruched bonnet composed of many yards of twelve-inch ribbon, often of the value of her em- ployer's own hat. The " nounou " carries herself haughtily, but her very trade tends to a life of im- morality. A wage of twenty-five dollars a month is too strong a temptation not to keep her in service. SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 49 The soubrette seems to us such a reminder of the stage that we rarely think of her except as tripping before the footlights, tossing her head under its coquettish cap, hands in the pockets of her berib- boned apron. The soubrette in real life, however, in the character of lady's maid, plays an important role in the social drama of fashionable life. Her intimate relations with her mistress often make her a confidante. No gay French farce is ever pre- sented but shows up the little soubrette, the guardian of the secrets of the boudoir, and the convenient go- between in the menage a trots. Such a play reflects the versatile functions of the soubrette with consid- erable fidelity. Madame often consults her maid's taste; as a hair-dresser she has no equal; her deftness with chiffons makes her an invaluable assistant in the intricacies of the toilet of the woman of fashion, and altogether she is one of the least to be spared of French feminine servants. The French lady's maid is most valued by the woman of the world, whatever may be her nation- ality. Even the Englishwoman replaces her more reliable, hard-working English girl with the vraie Parisienne when the purse permits. The exchange costs about fifty per cent more, but the English- woman considers that she gains this in " smartness." " The lady's maid as an economic factor in life is worth what she costs," says the Englishwoman; " she saves the small outside expenses." Besides the per- sonal service that she renders, the French maid usu- ally has a working knowledge of dressmaking and 50 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD ought even to be able to run together a gown if necessary. The English servant still dies in service and is laid away in the village churchyard in the shadow of the escutcheoned tomb of the house she has served, usually so well, or it may be that she will have been retired on a pension. In France the State, so fond of giving decorations, more theatrically rewards the faithful servant by giving her a medal for a certain number of years of continuous service, also a small sum of money. Truly the servant question is great! The disposition of the time of the servants of a Paris household is usually about as follows : In a household of three servants, a woman cook, a butler and a chambermaid or parlour maid. COOK 7.00 A. M. Preparing of the petit dejeuner and general making ready for the day's work. 8.30 A. M. Marketing. 9.30 A. M. Servants' breakfast, the preparing of sundry desserts for the mas- ter's dejeuner and dinner, and the cooking of the mid-day meal. 12.00 Noon. Master's dejeuner. 1 to 1.30 P.M. Servants' dejeuner. Afternoon devoted to the clean- ing up of cooking and eating utensils, dishes, etc., and the preparing of dinner. SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 51 7.00 P. M. Dinner. 8 to 8.30 P. M. Servants' dinner, cleaning of dinner dishes, etc. General cleaning. — Monday afternoons: kitchen and cupboard, windows, etc. Tuesday: the range and its appurtenances. Wednesday: cupboard shelv- ing, plate racks, etc. Thursday: walls, ceiling base- boards, etc. Friday: all brass and copper cooking utensils. Saturday: floors thoroughly cleaned, which, however, are usually washed down every day. BUTLER A. M. Make and light fires, polish boots, brush men's clothing, prepare the salle a manger for dejeuner, serve at table, etc. P. M. Lay table for dinner, serve same, clear away, and at ten o'clock make ready the sleeping- rooms. Monday morning: Wax and polish halls and one sleeping-room. Afternoon: Clean silver and copper and brass in dining-room. Tuesday morning: Clean thoroughly the salon, wax and polish floor of salle a manger, clean thor- oughly one sleeping-room. Afternoon: Attend callers. Wednesday morning: Polish furniture of salle a manger, clean thoroughly one sleeping-room. 52 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Afternoon: Clean and polish lighting fix- tures, windows and mirrors. Thursday morning: Clean thoroughly one sleep- ing-room. Afternoon: Clean and polish mirrors and fixtures of small salon. Friday morning: Wax and polish stairs and banis-ters, clean thoroughly bathroom. Afternoon: Clean brasses. Saturday morning: Clean thoroughly small salon. Afternoon: Clean thoroughly pantry cup- boards, trays, etc. At all times the butler is supposed to be able to arrange his work in such a manner as to be present- able for receiving callers. CHAMBERMAID (FEMME DE CHAMBRE) OR PARLOUR MAID Morning: Awaken children, serve the petit de- jeuner, clean lamps and fixtures, brush dresses of mistress, sew up rips or clean off spots if necessary, make up beds and put sleeping-rooms in order. Afternoon: Sewing and ironing. In winter close windows at sundown. Arrange beds for the night. Monday: Make up list of soiled linen for laun- dry and put that which is to be SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 53 washed in the house to soak. Sort and mend fresh linen returned from laundry. Tuesday: Wash household linen and mend. Wednesday: Sewing and mending. Thursday: Ironing. Friday: Sewing. Saturday: Clean thoroughly and arrange linen cupboard. In an establishment with but two domestics, a cuisiniere and a femme de chambre, much the same sequence of operations would take place, with the extra cleaning of halls and rooms falling equally upon the two, the chambermaid serving also as par- lour maid and attending the door. With but one servant, the general maid of all work, or bonne a tout faire, will of necessity need the aiding hand once and again of the mistress of the house, or by the supplanting by an occasional ex- tra day's labour called in from outside. Mornings: Salle a manger, petit dejeuner, salon, marketing and making up the sleep- ing-rooms aided by the mistress. Afternoon : On succeeding days one apartment to be thoroughly cleaned. Dejeuner to be served at noon. The washing of small household linen, mending, iron- ing; preparing and serving of dinner at seven o'clock and the washing up. 54 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD All this, assuming that the family meals are of the simplest order and that little or no entertaining is undertaken, and that the mistress does many of the light errands and largely occupies herself with the children in case there are any. A good general servant can be got in the country districts in Germany for as little as fifty dollars a year, maybe even less, but she will do wonders on that two hundred and fifty marks, dressing neatly in heavy homespun and woolens that do not often have to be replenished, eating her frugal black bread and sausage, provided for her by the house, without a grumble, even laying by money in the savings bank. One of the principal points of disfavour for do- mestic service which is manifesting itself in Germany is the wretched way in which a servant is often housed, frequently sleeping in a dark cupboard, without light or air — a mere hole in the wall that cannot be used for anything else. The German woman labourer is the hardest worked of menials; she often does a man's work in addition to her own. She it is who cleans the streets and removes the garbage. It is nothing strange, then, to learn that she is going more and more into factory work, which the growing industrial boom in Germany is opening up for her. Servants are usually abominably housed every- where on the Continent. In France they are usually jammed up under the mansard with only a pane of glass in the ceiling to give air and light. The sub- SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 55 ject has been much agitated of late, but no general reform has resulted, nor was one looked for. In the French country hotel, the early riser will often discover the gargon rolled up in a blanket on the floor at the back of the hall, or at best on a collapsible cot which he will carry away under his arm in the morning. Swiss servants are good, reliable and industrious, but are apt to be cold, disagreeable and unpleasant to get on with. Especially with a stranger they are often unsympathetic, not to say hostile, a fact which makes their presence in the house not always agree- able. The great demand for servants in hotels in Switzerland tends to make them independent to a shameful degree. In the summer season, between the getting in the crops, work in the hotels and the embroidery factories, the supply of labour is not always up to the demand, hence every one is over- worked and unduly hurried and apt to be irritable. In marked contrast is the happy-go-lucky Italian servant who has some of the exasperating and endear- ing qualities which are possessed by the Irish. Smiling and of pleasant manner, the Italian woman servant will try to please for any old price one is minded to give her. For thirty or forty lire she will serve you well and cook good meals in native style for a month, with never a grumble as to short rations if you clean up the platter in the dining-room. She calls her mistress madonna, with a caressing accent, and buys her a candle that has been blessed to burn beside her bed. Her kitchen looks like the 56 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD wake of a whirlwind, with a baby or two making playthings of the vegetables, clucking fowls stalk- ing about, and neighbours dropping in for a chat. On your fete day, or birthday, your French servant will remember you with a present of a pot-plant in flower, tied up with a ribbon, often accompanied by a badly spelled, affectionate little note. In turn you are expected to reciprocate in the same manner, and if you get up for her a little informal party, with cakes and wine, you will incur no lack of dignity or strain your proper relations. The French cafe garqon is one of the most com- petent of public servants. Also he is the most per- sonally intimate of waiters. This comes from the fact that the clientele of the average cafe is largely made up of people who come regularly, thus mutu- ally dependent relations come about quite naturally between the waiter and the particular coterie which he regularly serves. He is polite and attentive, chatty and communicative, but never familiar. He will bring writing materials if you ask him for du quoi ecrire — the cafe letter head, in a folder, accom- panied by blotting paper that won't blot, pale ink and a scratchy pen. With good taste and judgment he will pick out from the pile of illustrated journals which the establishment provides for its clients those that he thinks are suitable for the eyes of the ladies — though not many of them are. He brings out the backgammon board and the dominoes, first wiping off the table with the folded napkin which always SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 57 hangs across his left arm. He never suggests by a covert hovering about that one should order some- thing more, but serves the coffee, or whatever may have been ordered, and allows one to sit under its protection all of the evening if so desired. He un- derstands that one comes to a cafe to repose, often more for this even than to drink. He will do any- thing but bring one a glass of ice water alone. In return for his excellent service this embarrassing order should never be given him by those with de- generate palates. When one stops to think of the cosmopolitan treat- ment that the servants of European hotels have to contend with, the world-varying demands which they have to meet, with complaints in a dozen languages that they must straighten out — usually caused by misunderstanding, brought about by the ignorance of foreign manners and customs on the part of those whom they are serving, it must certainly be admitted that as a class European public servants are good and efficient. There may be individual shortcomings, but these only prove the strength of the statement. Their politeness is not always reciprocated by those whom they serve, and this of itself is enough to strain good nature to the breaking point. Whatever may be the present defects in the system of recruiting, and the conduct of servants in European hotels, the question may be asked if some of them may not be induced, often unwittingly maybe, by their exigent patrons. The following observations on Continental hotel 58 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD servants may open a new line of thought with some who would otherwise condemn hastily: One of the first requirements of the cosmopolitan type of European hotel is that its personnel — its staff — must have some working knowledge of three or four languages. The European waiter educates himself by taking service in various countries for the purpose of increasing his vocabulary, well knowing that nothing will so quickly improve his ability to grasp opportunity. As for the hall porter, that resplendent guardian of the hotel entrance, he is a veritable linguist. In the course of a few minutes he must switch from one to another of a half a dozen languages, beside be an expert in differentiating between American lingo and real English. His is no sinecure, and a tip is often worthily bestowed on him, for he is a buffer between the tourist and her own incompetence. No question is too trivial for his consideration, no situation so complicated that he cannot grapple with it. The strain on his temper and ability can only be met by keeping the parting tip always in mental view. He is the mainstay of the ladies and is asked almost as many questions as the captain of an Atlantic liner. He is the local directory, and can give any kind of information from where to buy hat pins to what the weather will be a day hence — if he does not really know he will make a good guess at it. His province is to see to the incoming and outgoing of the luggage, to sift out an excited and nervous crowd of travellers, with only, in most cases, a general SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 59 idea of where they want to go, and what they want to do, and clarify their plans for them, getting them off to the right trains, or into their own automobiles or carriages. Whatever tip he may get he usually deserves, whether it be as little as two francs or as much as ten. The head waiter controls the dining-room and the army of waiters. He seemingly has nothing to do but to bow politely, but the responsibility is his and all kicks should be made to him; also it is he who presents the bill on parting, when it is asked for at the last meal. The big, fat tips of one's stay goes usually to this Chesterfieldian personage principally for those pleasant bows and " good-mornings " with which he has brightened your stay, though one with any conscience will tip her waiter who has served as well. Out of each million of hotel guests in Paris, count- ing those only who frequent the four chief classes of hotels, 650,000 are French provincials, the rest be- ing etrangers, Americans, most likely, in the largest number. The valet de chambre, or the femme de chambre in a big Paris hotel gains on an average of thirty- five francs a month as salary, which with " gratifica- tions," a new word which the craft has adopted for ponrboire, may bring it up to one hundred, one hun- dred and twenty-five or even one hundred and fifty francs. The sommeliers, or garcons, who serve on the upper floors, who dress staidly in black and shuffle 60 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD about like croque-morts (usually Swiss or Alsaciens, or even Germans) touch perhaps a hundred francs as salary or two hundred and fifty or more — gratifica- tion compris. The wages, or perhaps one should say salaries, of the kitchen staff of a great modern Paris hotel — leav- ing the chef-directeur, the successor of the former ecuyer de cuisine, out of the calculation, and who may get anything that the management can be made to pay — run from three hundred to four hundred francs a month — Potagers, sauciers, rotisseurs, entre- metiers, patissiers and glaciers. Seven brigades of these sub-cellar employees (though now it is the fashion to put the kitchens on the roof) make soup in marmites as big as bath tubs, roast meat on broches as long as assagai spears and make a friture of three hundred baby trout in a cauldron of boiling oil as big as the basin of a Versailles fountain. A dependency of all hotel kitchens is the cafeterie. Here real artists pour boiling water drop by drop on the finest powdered moka, make also the smooth- est possible chocolate and infuse the choicest pekoes, and the, be it not forgot, returns the greatest pro- portionate profit in many a cafe and restaurant in Paris where the drinking of it has become a fad if not a custom — four sous' worth of tea-leaves return the cafe proprietor thirty sous in silver. no marketing by telephone in european households outdoor markets of europe markets index to national character representative mediterranean market toulon's multi-coloured daily market cosmopolitan market women bargaining under the red umbrellas primitive weights and measures cheap garden produce a corner in snails variety the characteristic of the foreign MARKET BIG STALL OWNERS AND SMALL VENDORS BLEND OF FLOWERS AND VEGETABLES OFFICERS GO MARKETING CHEAP END OF THE MARKET FISH MARKET GREAT GOOSE MARKET OF GERMANY COVENT GARDEN, WHERE LONDON GOES TO MARKET THE COSTER AND HIS " MOKE " ONE BUYS DEARLY IN LONDON MARKETS ICE A LUXURY PUSH-CART VENDORS IN PARIS 11 LES MERCHANDES DES QUATRE SAISONS " Ill FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING One does not market by telephone in Europe. The telephone is rare enough in business, and has not entered into the domestic scheme of things at all. The good, frugal housekeepers go to market them- selves, making of it one of the serious businesses of the day. Besides being an economic question, it is to the lady of the house an amusement. Bargaining is a passion of the European woman, and nowhere does this antiquated method of buying and selling exist in so near an approach to its most primitive form as in the market place. The Frenchwoman goes to market herself, and if of the better class, with a bonne carrying the market basket in which to bring back the purchases. Often the bonne or the cuisiniere is entrusted with this duty herself, though for the most part the mistress prefers to go; she longs for the excitement of getting her bunch of asparagus one sou cheaper, even if it takes the best part of the morning. She is the most careful of buyers, no skilful arrangement of fruit to hide defects escapes her keen eye, no juggling of the scales goes on unnoticed. The daily marketing oper- ation brings out the Frenchwoman's aptitude for small savings. 63 64 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The Italian housekeeper goes marketing with her maid for a chaperone, the maid invariably following after, carrying her mistress' parasol as well as the market basket, it not being etiquette for the Italian lady to carry anything. The Dutch woman is seen at market sampling the round, flat cheeses of her country, with a modern hat perched on top of the white cap and antique gold ornaments in an endeavour to reconcile con- flicting styles. The insistent point is that marketing in Europe is a woman's occupation. As the economy of Europe consists in saving rather than producing, there is no branch of her expendi- ture that the thrifty housekeeper watches more closely than the daily marketing, and where the servant is entrusted with it her mistress is always too well posted on values to permit of much juggling with the market money. If one wants to learn something of the real life of a people, go to market with them and study what they eat and how they buy it. The open-air markets of Europe are out-of-door theatres — moving-picture shows — where every phase of life, from social science to household economics, can be studied. In their general characteristics markets are much alike and furnish always one of the most picturesque impressions that one retains of life abroad. They are usually spread out in the principal square, with a centre-piece of a sculptured fountain, or grouped about an ancient church in an intimate and confiding manner. Thus one bargains for a salad beneath FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 65 sculptured saints and broken-nosed angels, or under big umbrellas like gigantic polychrome mushrooms in the warmer latitudes. The produce is brought in from the country round about in the slow, uneconomic way that the European peasant usually works, by diminutive donkey-carts, or in basket panniers slung across the backs of mules, in high, two-wheeled French carts, in quaint, cradle- shaped Dutch wagons, or by Sicilian carts decorated like a circus wagon ; perhaps even it may be brought in a basket on the arm, or down a mountainside strapped over the shoulders. Every Continental town of any pretensions has a weekly market — a veritable county fair, where every conceivable article that may tempt a small community is on sale. The market is the social gathering place as well as a produce exchange. This gives the frugal European peasant an opportunity to exchange local gossip without neglecting business. There is amuse- ment, too. An itinerant little theatre in a gypsy wagon runs a little show, and there may be a merry- go-round, and there are always foolish knick-knacks being offered for sale which have no place in any self-respecting trading community. As a representative Mediterranean market that of Toulon, in southern France, may be taken as a type. It has all the characteristics of the markets of all semi-tropical European countries, and a good many peculiar to itself. Toulon is France's biggest war port and naval station. From a dozen to twenty-five ships of the 66 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD fleet are always at anchor in the harbour, and the blue-jackets aboard must be fed, as well as a stand- ing garrison of thirty thousand or more soldiers, in addition to the city's population of a hundred TV VVO Men ~*~~ thousand. Toulon's market under such conditions may be taken as a concrete example, and a study of it will prove a liberal education for any one interested in foodstuffs. It is a daily market, and from seven until noon, stretches along one of the principal tree-lined boule- FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 67 vards for fully half a mile, a riot of colour, with the excited movements of a lively southern people, for Toulon can show as parti-coloured a conglomeration of inhabitants as any of the cosmopolitan Mediter- ranean seaports. You and the bonne with a filet on her arm (the cord bag or carryall for all kinds of plunder) , start out about nine for the day's marketing. These southern countries don't stir early, and before nine you run the risk that not all of the petty merchants will have arranged their wares. Temporary stalls of boards are ranged on either side under the giant plantain trees, often still further protected by great umbrellas and awnings, not of the usual white, but red-brown, that the sun and wind have bleached to every shade from orange to tan. Toulon's market, because of its varied colouring, has been the inspiration of many an artist. Heaped up in big baskets is as varied and exotic a lot of produce as was ever brought together. You join the crowd of buyers strolling critically along the promenade between the stalls, over which women preside almost exclusively. It is the women who control the markets of Europe. It is essentially a woman's business, and the men appear only as auxiliaries, except where a cattle market is an adjunct of the ordinary market. The men are the producers and leave it to their women to get the money and also keep it safely. These Toulon market women are as motley as their wares. There are Italians, Corsicans, Maltese 68 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD and the native dark Provengaux. Every Mediter- ranean type is here, an unkempt, independent crowd. Many of them scarcely speak French enough to sell their produce, and they have nine-and-twenty ways of counting money, which, combined with a laxity in giving the right change, keeps one on the alert. They are more noisy and vociferous than their phlegmatic sisters of the North, and have honeyed tongues when they wish. " Ma belle, ma belle," they call out to you coaxingly, and again, " What a beautiful hat, Madonna; won't the bella donna look at my strawberries, only twelve sous the kilo." Six cents a pound isn't dear for March strawberries. Though the French say Toulon is the most ex- pensive market in France, it seemed cheap enough to the American housekeeper. A family of three fared sumptuously on an outlay of from three to four francs a day. If you paid more than two cents for a fine head of escarole you were a bad bargainer; ten cents' worth of petits pots took the bonne a good part of the morning to shell out, and asparagus sold at a sliding scale from eight to twenty cents for a bunch of two dozen stalks, according to quantity in the market. Spaniards, who patriotically paint their barrows in the national colours, in red and yellow stripes, handle the orange business and the recently introduced banana, which is scrubby and tasteless and costs two and three sous apiece. Spring vegetables were really winter vegetables, and came from across the Mediterranean from Al- FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 69 geria so early that there was scarcely any break in their continuity from one year's end to another. The highly prized and expensive burr artichoke, with us what is called " French," is the staple and most common vegetable of the Mediterranean countries, and at times is almost an encumberer of the markets at a sou or two apiece, while the eggplant runs it a close second at a similar price. Most vegetables are sold by weight. The mer- chant under the red umbrella weighs your potatoes on a primitive brass scale (which is probably quite unreliable) which she balances by hand, and in the manipulating becomes so expert that if one adopted the tactics of the good English housekeeper and weighed the purchases over again at home, the error might not always be found in the seller's favour. Figs are an exception and are carefully counted out by the dozen, big purple ones and the choice grey varieties. There is also the Barbary fig, which has been brought across from Africa, in other words, the prickly pear, a diet which would seem to us as suit- able only for a hedgehog, but which in reality is the staple food with the Arab and much liked by the southern French, and indeed, is not at all bad when one learns to like it. You discover a fat snail climbing up your gown, and find that you have reached the place where snails are sold, and that you have captured a stray one from a lot which have been turned out to graze on a straw mat smeared with some sort of stickiness. There are baskets of thousands of them sitting about, as 70 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD many clinging to the outside as are inside. Moving slowly, they do not stray far, but personal contact is not agreeable. Snails may seem dear at a franc a dozen if one has not the gout for them. These are not the common, garden-destroying kind, but a special breed that is hunted in thickets at night by the light of a lantern, or fattened in a pen of logs covered with a wire netting. Luxuries they are, however, and are so regarded by the French, and some few of the rest of us. Near the snails is the vendor of wild herbs, where for a few sous you may buy a variety of weeds out of which to make one of the fifty or more kinds of tizanes, or herb teas. The French love to dose them- selves on these brews, one or another of which is warranted to ease most of the ills of flesh. There are also the sweet-scented mountain plants, wild lavender, thyme and the like, good for laying away among clothes to keep out insects. In the spring you can buy young plants already rooted with which to stock your flower or vegetable garden, and three-day-old little chicks at a franc apiece and goslings at a little more. Thus is saved much preliminary work for the amateur farmer and bird fancier. From the big stall owners you work down the long line to where the small vendors sit. These, for the most part, have only a meagre little handful of stuff grown in a tiny garden shaded by a couple of olive trees. One old woman sits knitting with a single white hen resting contentedly on her knee, while FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 71 another has only a bunch of wild flowers picked by the roadside, another a queerly assorted basket whose contents are cherries and a pair of guinea pigs, the latter being a great delicacy with the country French, and not dear at a franc and a half a pair. There are strawberries eight months of the year, sometimes tied up in cabbage leaves that they may not wilt, or they are the little wild strawberry sold in earthen jars covered with a cornucopia of paper, more prized than the cultivated variety and selling at nearly double the price. In the winter come in the olives, green and black, and chestnuts, out of which the Italian population makes flour. In summer there is a red riot of to- matoes at two cents a pound, and melons of many shades, none of the latter being particularly cheap at a franc. The flower stalls are brilliant in this southern country. Even among the vegetable dealers a few flowers can always be picked up. This mingling of flowers and green stuff for the table is the great charm of many European markets, particularly those around the Mediterranean, where for a few cents a day the house can be kept in flowers the year round. Here in Toulon's open-air market cheap butchers sell to the cheap trade queer cuts of equivocal-looking meat, and Italian women make a business of the manufacture of ravioli — macaroni stuffed with meat and herbs — for the same class of trade. You pass this end of the market by. There are booths that sell all kinds of drygoods, and a corner is devoted 7J rilF AMERICAN woman ABROAD to miscellaneous rubbish, ranging from odd shoes to rusty keys l>\ ten 0*dock I dense crowd surges between the is, mistresses and their attendant bonnes, maids alone, eagerly looking out tor their " commission. " each armed with either a basket When the lady of the houst tempts - carry her own pur- - ilways in i cloth bag. often nicely era- dered; tfH > the badge of the servant. This >. ::le distinctions to be observed. Officers from the warships at anchor in the Roads l ■. . ig for their mess, with tu o blue-jackets trailing . — iging a big < _ . basket \ three-starred - .'.. with much be seen selecting espe< te lot of eh* es - his ig absence < w /ride. n. shuttles are the bfigmrt sellers, this trad < j being great cakes bake* i tj g tic pie dishes is at a sou a sfict tiers out to the cIm iff can pick oufl s >: . sea ~nd damaged stuff. By FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 73 noon everything must be cleared away, and now is the time for low prices. Things that won't keep over to be sold as seconds the next day are cut down to almost gift prices. Carts come along in due time and gather up the empty baskets, stalls are torn down and carried away and the street sweepers appear with their brooms, picturesquely clad and kerchiefed Italian women. In another hour not a cabbage leaf is to be seen. Near Toulon's principal market, in the aptly named Place de la Poissonnerie, is the fish market, where the best of the Mediterranean finny tribe lie in damp beds of seaweed, the only method of keeping them fresh being to pour water over them. The fish dealers sit with their feet on a petit-banc or foot-stool, out of reach of the soused pavement, blagueing and blackguarding their neighbours, too indolent and ignorant of business methods to care if one buys or not. One of the sights of Germany is the goose market at Friedrichfelde, a little village near Berlin. Here are gathered geese from all parts of Europe, and five million foreign and domestic birds are sold each year. The goose is the national bird of the German dinner table, and however the German housekeeper may scrimp all the week there must always be a gans for the Sunday dinner. Every day from twenty to thirty thousand squawk- ing, hissing geese are brought to this great wholesale market, chiefly in slatted crates, by train from all over eastern Europe. During the summer, Germany can 74 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD furnish her own supply, but in the winter, train loads are brought from Holland, where, the season being milder, the geese are more easily bred. In the late summer they come in large numbers from Russia and Poland, being driven along the road and their num- bers added to as they pass through the villages. At the frontier they are loaded on to box cars in four- story crates and forwarded by fast freight to the central market. For four or five days they travel without food or drink, hence it is small wonder that a nervous, bad-tempered lot of geese usually await the buyers. Each buyer carries a shepherd's crook with which he singles out his purchases by the neck. The market is controlled by a syndicate, and strict measures are taken to insure only a healthy product, a corps of inspectors being employed to examine the health of the birds, doubtful cases being quarantined for six weeks, while those manifestly diseased are destroyed at once. They are young, these much-travelled geese, aver- aging from five to eight months, and are bought in the market for eighty cents to a dollar, according to weight. After they are fattened for a month or two on the best barley and green stuff, they bring nearly two dollars and a half and weigh from ten to twelve pounds. The method of fattening to produce the diseased livers which are used to fabricate the pate-de-foie- gras rather destroys one's taste for this delicacy. The geese are nailed down by their feet so that ex- ercise may not interfere with their putting on flesh, FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 75 when, at regular intervals, they are stuffed by a machine, their stomachs being nicely massaged at the same time. Nothing is left to the vagaries of the natural appetite. Strassbourg has the reputation of turning out the best grade of pate-de-foie-gras, but it is made all over Germany with success, and while the fattening process may not always be so barbarous, forced feeding is generally re- sorted to. London goes to market at Covent Garden, the one district which is astir early. Six o'clock is late and at eight the bargain hunters begin to be seen. At ten the garbage is being swept up and picked over by street combers, and before noon this heart of old London is deserted. The actual area of Covent Garden seems small to encompass the central food supply of the world's biggest city until one notices that it really trickles through the ramifications of a maze of neighbouring streets. Stalls, push-carts, wagons, costers and their donkeys, and barrows with peddlers of all ranks link up Holborn and the Strand by a livid stream of humanity and its paraphernalia in a most amazing fashion. All the stall owners pay a tax for the privilege of selling produce in London streets here- abouts as a ground rental to the Duke of Bedford, London's largest landowner. Covent Garden and the surrounding streets are his property, as well as the houses which line them, and the enormous ren- tals pay a truly royal tribute to the wealthiest of Britain's peers. 76 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD London markets in general are perhaps the dear- est in Europe. Continental Europe and North Africa are Britain's market gardens, though the Eng- lish housekeeper still clings fondly to the belief that whatever is grown in her own country is the best, the shopkeeper encouraging her in this delusion. The catch phrase in the English shop is, " Best English, ma'am," though the produce may be aspar- agus from Provence, little potatoes from Brittany, tomatoes from Algeria or eggs and butter from Den- mark and Norway. In spite of all this the English housekeeper will readily pay more for produce grown at home than for that which comes from across the Channel, the North Sea or the Mediterranean. This is not because the quality is actually superior, but because it is home-grown, though this may be preju- dice quite as much as patriotism. Covent Garden market has its chief picturesque element in its costers and their environment. The coster in his velveteens with many rows of " pearlies " heaps up his tiny barrow, drawn by his faithful " moke," and perambulates green stuff through Lon- don's East End, accompanied by his " Harriet," the couple forming the typical 'Arry and 'Arriet of the comic papers. Like most picturesque survivals, mod- ern life is ironing him down to the flat ugliness of the average London type, and his be-buttoned cos- tume is fast changing into the commonplace garb of the British workingman, though his partner still flaunts her hat of bedraggled plumes, which is always in fashion among her kind. She buys these plumes A Mediterranean Market FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 77 through a "feather club" by paying a weekly in- stalment. No more unsuitable feminine head adorn- ment for one of her class could be conceived than an ostrich plume, which, by the very order of things, is most unsuitable for the misty, moisty climate of the banks of London's river. The coster barrow-vendor buys cheap stuff to be- gin with, and sells cheaply too, so that his margin of profit is slight, but he will go hungry before his " moke " will, and he treats the little animal better by far than he does his own family when it comes to distributing favours amongst them. Weights and measures with the English small shopkeeper are queer and untrustworthy. Not long ago a bitter discussion was carried on through the press on the subject, and the defence of the market- man was not a denial so much as an excuse that he had to make up somewhere for the long credit sys- tem that prevails among the clientele of all classes of traders. This made for losses which could not otherwise be met. The cost of living is a factor here which is being discussed in its higher reaches. A scarcity of food of certain kinds accounts for some of this, an ex- travagant attitude towards life for more, and the actual conditions of luxury and convenience under which the food supply is purveyed in this twentieth century for much more. The thing is noticeable in England, in Germany, in France and even in Italy. There is no monopoly of this state of affairs in America ; all classes all over the world are feeling it. 78 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD but are doing very little that might really combat it successfully. In England one buys fowls and fish in the same shop. Ice is a luxury that can often only be had of the fishmonger, and as a favour on the part of that usually high-handed individual. Such a small lump as one may get for a few cents melts into a mere spot of dampness by the time it is delivered and seems hardly worth the while. If one buys any- thing of an exotic nature in England it costs money. To depend upon a purely British home-market bill of fare, on the other hand, is monotonous, for the supply is exceedingly limited as well as to variety as to quantity. Successful shopping and marketing in Paris de- pends greatly upon a knowledge of local conditions as well as a very complete and true estimate of the ways of the shopkeeper and greengrocer. Neither the shopkeeper nor the market man or woman are wedded to fixed prices as yet, at least not all of them, very few in fact, so it behooves the stranger to pocket her pride and do a little bargaining on the side, and beat them down if she can. As a phase of woman's work, that of the shop em- ployees of Paris, as well as of those who may sell on their own account from a push-cart or a market- stall, is an interesting study. Its like exists in no other land. In the lowest merchandising scale are the ven- deuses ambulantes, the push-cart sellers, whose stock in trade may be fresh vegetables, coal and wood, or FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 79 thread and needles and odds and ends of so-called " bankrupt stocks " of drygoods. There are sup- posedly six thousand of this class of " shopkeepers " in Paris, and they all make known their wares by the most strident and unmusical cries. Of all this noisy crew the only class which ever had any interest for us was the marchande de quatre saisons, or fresh vegetable dealers, of whom we oc- casionally bought supplies instead of going to the greengrocer's on the corner. " Pots Verts, Pots Verts," or " J'ai de la cerise, de la belle cerise — Cerise douce," or " La Valence, la belle Valence," meaning green peas, cherries or oranges. These are the sounds one hears in the quartiers of Paris, but they are by no means the only harmonious notes to be picked out of the chorus. All these hard-working women, for their risks are great and their profits small, are possessed of a per- mit from the Prefet of Police and wear in a con- spicuous place, frequently attached to their belts, an enormous numbered plaque as a sort of guarantee of identification if not of responsibility. One woman of this class will often make her rounds throughout the year, varying her agricultural merchandise accord- ing to the four seasons, hence their familiar name. These ambulant orange, fish, vegetable or flower sellers make their provision at the great central markets, Les Halles, around four in the morning, buying from a commission dealer a certain quantity per day, or often combining among themselves and taking a truck load at specially favourable prices, 8o THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD assuming of course an additional risk if the quantity be large or their numbers few. Their stocks are displayed with a barbaric sort of taste, and with their heavy load they are soon ready to start out on their rounds, in many cases after having pushed their carts four or five miles across town, each to her own particular quarter. At noon these wandering women are supposed, in accordance with the law, to retire from the public thoroughfares, and it is at this moment, or there- abouts, that one is able to buy at the lowest prices, if indeed one is willing to run the risk of still being able to find a fresh and varied assortment, which of course sometimes happens, though, on the other hand, a stock of fish or lettuces and other aliments of a like nature that has been trundled through dusty streets for six or eight hours can hardly be of the highest sanitary value as food. A woman from thirty to thirty-five years of age, at this hard labour, may gain as much as two and a half francs a day if she meets with no engulfing losses FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 81 caused by unsold stocks. Their little carts, charettes, are, for the most part, hired by the day at twelve or fifteen sous. Another class of vendeuses, more miserable still, and whose merchandise, so far as edibles go, is often in a still more dubious condition, but frequently a little cheaper in price, is that which sells from a great basket carried on the arm and hip, or perhaps on the head. They gain perhaps a franc a day net at the occupation, and with such modest ambitions are natu- rally not of a class noted for their probity in com- mercial transactions. The marchands de platsirs are a Paris institution and may be men, women or boys. They are the sellers of children's toys, balloons, mechanical toys of little worth and low prices and all that sort of thing. They are found in their greatest numbers on the Champs Elysees, in the Gardens of the Tuileries and in the Luxembourg Gardens on the Rive Gauche. Of the itinerant restaurants, the Restaurants des Pieds Humides, the Parisian precursors of the Owl- Lunch Wagons, there is nothing to be recounted in the way of personal experience except that of obser- vation to the purport that their owners seem to be in quite the lowest social scale of tradespeople in the food of man in all Paris, whether cooked or un- cooked. The coffee sellers of course pursue a less harmful course, but even they are falsifiers in that they do not sell coffee per se, at least not pure coffee. They claim that the midnight taste is not for pure coffee 82 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD (at two sous a mug it should be noted), and probably it isn't. There is even something besides chicory in it according to the " pure food " investigators. One species of small shopkeeper, as much an in- digenous Paris product as the " cocher," is the news- dealer. Sometimes she is a shopkeeper, in a very small way, when she is privileged to sell what she likes within certain bounds, but if she occupies one of those quaintly picturesque " kiosques " which are found chiefly along the boulevards, from Neuilly to Vincennes and from the Lion de Belfort to the Montmartre, she must confine her sales to magazines and newspapers and may not include even the pop- ular picture post-card. The cheese merchants, the milk dealers and the pastry cooks are all of the small shopkeeping hier- archy which is such an interesting phase of foreign life to the stranger. In France, these professions are, for various reasons, as interesting as anywhere, the more so that they deal with certain minor phases of life which in a more commercial world are handled on a much larger scale. This is the more apparent when one considers how very cut up these small industries are. You go to a triperie to buy tripe, but you go to a charcuterie to buy sausage, and not always do you find butter, eggs and milk in the same shop. The keeping of the small grocery and a little mercerie, where are to be found the odds and ends of the sewing basket, form two other feminine occupations. Their proprietors struggle with the competition of FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 83 the great universal food and drygoods providers until one wonders that their profits can be sufficient to pay the rent, let alone a living. Because they exist one patronises them occasionally, in the same familiar way that one goes to the general store of a New England village for a piece of soap, some salt or a paper of pins, for these items at least seem to be out of the competitive class. Nothing can be more charmingly interesting than the markets of some of the old Swiss towns, where the main street is the usual market place. Market- ing in Geneva is a real feat of daring, accomplished in the intervals between dodging the motor cars of tourists and a double line of street-cars with which it shares one of the principal thoroughfares. Rumour says that Geneva is going to abolish its picturesque street markets; the picturesque seems never to be practical, and the old city of Calvin is so slicking up that it is beginning to look as unin- teresting as the capital city of a new-made state. When it comes to a choice between the white-capped market women and their quaint baskets and a trolley car, the wishes of the stranger might be consulted by the authorities who are supposed to care for the prosperity of their constituencies. Could any one forget the market at Berne? The spouting waters from the grotesque mediaeval foun- tains splash over the green stuff which has been painfully drawn from nearby farms in small carts, man and wife pulling side by side with the faith- ful dog. Transportation, when it comes to the 84 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD food of the table, is a mixed problem everywhere. At a certain Breton market one has seen women tak- ing sheep to market singly in a wheelbarrow, head and legs tied down. The Swiss cheeses come down from the lofty mountain chalets, born aloft, singly, too, on the shoulders of a sturdy mountaineer, held on a sort of a small, short-legged table, the latter resting on the man's shoulders, the table being placed over his head with the cheese on top. In general, marketing is dear in Switzerland, the cost of food having gone up in some parts as much as fifty per cent in recent years. This has undoubt- edly been caused here by the great expansion of the tourist traffic which now brings strangers to Switzer- land the year round — in winter for the snow sports — in numbers as large as when they formerly came in summer only. If one is wintering at Nice on the Riviera, market- ing may be said to be one of the supreme attractions as one strolls along under the long rows of white umbrellas which line certain of the back streets not far from the more exclusive and elegant Place Mas- sena and the Promenade des Anglais. Nice is the winter flower market of all Europe. You may buy a basket of carnations and violets for a few francs which would cost as many dollars on Broadway or Wabash Avenue. An institution of the markets of Nice is the band of little porteuses, one of whom will carry home for you, in a flat basket balanced nicely on her head, all that you may pur- chase in an hour's round. The cost is but a few FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 85 sous, and she will follow your footsteps the whole morning and then get home before you do with her burden. Each basket bears a numbered plaque, for she is a licensed porter, and a small tax is paid to the municipal authorities for the privilege of plying her trade. The flower and vegetable and fish markets of Marseilles are a revelation to one who has known only the conventional market stall. Seemingly miles of this assorted food line many of the streets near the very centre of the city, and down along the famous Vieux Port, where the fish and shellfish are spread out for view, there is an unrealness about it all that is as if one saw it in a dream, particularly at night, when all is aglow with flaming torches like a page preserved out of mediaevalism. In Italy, Spain, Algeria and Tunisia there is a wealth of colour in the markets, and the throng which goes to give the life and movement of a sixteenth- century civilisation living in the land of to-day. The keynote of it all is kaleidoscopic. They are sur- rounded by an individuality and freedom of man- ners unknown in our own land where even the pur- chase of a box of berries, a pound of butter or the provender of the winter's supply for a whole house- hold is accomplished as the result of a mere hello call over the telephone. The element of picturesqueness certainly lends a charm from the aesthetic viewpoint, and the procedure is indeed interesting. That marketing in the Euro- pean fashion is a more satisfactory method than our 86 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD own, or less so, is all a matter of individual opinion and the conditions under which one may momentarily be living. At all events it lends variety and a pleas- urable occupation to one's life abroad, and that is one of the chief reasons why one leaves home and settles in a foreign land in the first instance. |Some HousekeepirMj Experiences 11 tnf •<( — * FC3T COTTAGE in ? -— KENT. » | £7 COUNTRY HOUSE /» NORMANDY ! & VILLA on the i MEDITERRANEAN* o*3=> INCENTIVE FOR HOME LIFE ABROAD THE ALLURING ENGLISH COUNTRYSIDE RENTING IN ENGLAND OUR COTTAGE IN KENT MOVING IN SERVANT QUESTION FOOD SUPPLY SOCIAL AMENITIES HOUSEHUNTING IN FRANCE OUR NORMAN COUNTRY HOUSE FURNISHING A " BONNE A TOUT FAIRE " MARKETS AND MARKETING " BLANCHISSEUSE VS. LAVEUSE " NORMAN CIDER HOW WE LOST OUR HOUSE WHERE FASHIONABLE EUROPE WINTERS A LAND OF VILLAS HOUSE HUNTING BY AUTOMOBILE VILLA " BEAU SOLEIL " LIFE BY THE BLUE MEDITERRANEAN HOUSEKEEPING ON THE RIVIERA " BOUILLABAISSE, GARLIC AND OLIVES " WHAT THE MAN THOUGHT ABOUT IT HOW THE WOMAN SUMMED IT UP THE CHARM OF HOUSEKEEPING ABROAD IV SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES In the majority of cases housekeeping abroad for the American woman is merely an episode, brought about by a spirit of adventure or the desire for nov- elty, or, more often perhaps, that longing for a hearthstone latent in the most inveterate feminine globe-trotter, even though it be a temporary one, rep- resented by a British grate, a German porcelain stove, an Italian copper brasier of charcoal, or the Pro- vencal's apology for its cheerful glow — the smoulder- ing root of an olive tree. The woman in the case may be a mother whose daughters are " studying " something or other, and she feels it her duty to provide a home atmosphere for the "girls"; again she may belong to that in- creasing class of American wanderers who have con- tracted the " European habit," and, becoming sur- feited with sights and shopping, turns to the making of a home as a welcome relief. It may be that the cost of living at home has induced her to move the family across the ocean in the hopes of finding that cheap living abroad of which she has heard such glow- ing accounts. That phase of the question, however, is dealt with in another chapter. Whatever may be the incentive, it not infrequently 8 9 go THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD happens that when the woman traveller lingers in a foreign land for a longer period than the conven- tional few months of feverish touring, her domestic instincts begin to assert themselves, spurred on by a natural curiosity to get behind the scenes and study the workings of a domestic machinery so different from that at home, its oftimes archaic features being only an added fascination, which, it must be confessed, is apt to fade away when given the personal test. By this time she has become wearied of the banal pension or the conventional hotel, and finds herself wondering whether domestic architecture may not be as interesting as cathedrals, and markets as fascinat- ing as " old masters " if studied with the same amount of fervour — so some day she goes house-hunting. But more often the courage of the intending house- keeper fails; she fears to open what may be a Pan- dora's box of unknown troubles, and in consequence her villa by the blue Mediterranean, or country house among the leafy lanes of old England, remains one of those aerial buildings that even the aeroplane can- not reach. However, if the woman touring abroad has time for the domestic experiment, and enters upon it with an open mind, regarding it either as a lark or an educational experience, according to temperament, she should, by all means, try it. Thus she will get a peep behind the stage-setting arranged for the tourist, and an insight into things not starred by Baedeker, but no less entertaining and instructive. It is amazing the difference in the viewpoint between the home and SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 91 the hotel, and it should not be missed if one really wants to know a country intimately. The first of these three minor housekeeping ex- periments was made in England. Nowhere does country life make so strong an appeal as it does in the mellow, finished English countryside. At once imagination flashes up pictures of Elizabethan manor houses, Queen Anne mansions, old timbered cottages, velvet lawns and the ideal garden; while, to the American housekeeper, who recalls her struggles in the sign language with the newly arrived Hungarian girl, it opens up a vision of trained servants to whom the service is a profession and not mere incident in their careers. On the other hand, it must not be overlooked in the yearning for a taste of home life in the little British island, that a superior service does not always bridge over a lack of conveniences, nor do picturesque surroundings altogether compen- sate for comforts which have become necessities in the American household and are more than likely to be wanting in the English house, either great or small. The romantic manor-house is not likely to be heated, and the American tenant, accustomed to being parboiled between steam radiators, finds that the chills of centuries in its stone walls are but illy dispelled by 92 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the deceptively comfortable looking open fire. As to the plumbing, it may be thrilling to recall that it is the same that was installed in the time of a Tudor King, but scarcely hygienic to have under one's roof. Again, more often than not, is the rose-bowered cot- tage without running water, and the bathroom non- existent (the English practice of "tubbing" by no means implies the existence of a bathroom). But if the American woman is in search of a new sensation and is philosophical enough to make the best of exist- ing conditions, the way is made easy for her to sam- ple, if she will, home life under English conditions. There is no country where " renting " is reduced to such a science as in conservative England. The Englishman's house may be his castle, but he is seem- ingly willing enough to hand over its keys for a con- sideration, while the Englishwoman, without a qualm, will put her most intimate household treasures into the keeping of stranger hands with a confidence and absence of sentiment difficult for the American householder to understand — a part of the secret prob- ably being that rented property is here treated with a far greater respect than might be supposed. The result is that it is a comparatively easy matter, if one will but take the trouble to look about, to find almost any style of house that may be wanted and for almost any price, in any one of the counties, unfur- nished, furnished or really furnished, as may be de- sired, even to household linen and family plate. In some cases it is possible to take on the family serv- ants, an arrangement that would seem ideal. SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 93 One has only to make a study of the " advertise- ment pages " of the high class English daily or weekly journals to find a most alluring list from which to make a choice, from the " gentleman's mansion, with a banqueting hall and stabling for twenty," to a moated grange with a " ghost that walks," or a thatched roof cottage with a genuine old ingle-nook; where there may be " an opportunity for hunting with three packs." Arrangements are usually made through some well- known London firm of " estate agents," though some- times one deals directly with the owner; occasionally the renting will be in the hands of a local agent. Then again, in rambling about the country, one may stumble upon just what is wanted, as we did, which, after all, is the best way. Why not a " House Hunt- ing Tour of England " as a varient from the time- honoured " Cathedral Tour "? England being a land of formalities there is a cer- tain amount of red tape to be untangled, especially in the case of renting a furnished house where inven- tories must be made, etc., etc. The tenant for his protection usually has an inventory made out at his own expense. When in doubt it is well to follow the custom of the country and call in the services of a " solicitor " — In our tongue, a lawyer. The English, even in the slightest business transaction, rush to their " solici- tor " as chickens scurry to shelter under the mother hen's wing. For the stranger, in almost any business transaction except the simplest, a " solicitor " is al- 94 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD most a necessity and will save trouble. He will some day send a bill covering half a dozen sheets of legal foolscap, carefully itemised in clerkly long-hand, to the effect that a certain style of letter written in your behalf cost three shillings, sixpence, another " seven and six," etc., etc. But don't be alarmed. The bill will probably not total up more than a few dollars at most. Minor law is cheap in England; the rather disconcerting results of such a system are that should a dispute arise with the cook or the washerwoman you will in all probability find yourself " referred to her solicitor " before you are aware that the matter has become in the least serious. When the fogs of several London winters drove us into the country for a season, it was in Kent, the garden county of England, among its hop-fields and their picturesque " oast-houses " that we found " Rosemary Cottage," typically English, with latticed windows, an artistic thatched roof, bowered in jas- mine and roses. A rent board leaned over the neatly clipped hedge, giving directions to apply to the steward of the nearby great estate of which " Rose- mary " was a tiny faction. We did so by letter, and found that " Rosemary," with all its picturesqueness, six rooms and a semi- detached kitchen — unfurnished — could be ours for twenty pounds (a paltry hundred dollars) a year. At first blush it seemed as though it were being given to us. We lost no time in signing a year's lease, giv- ing as references a London bank, and paid the first quarter's rent — five pounds — (rents being paid quar- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 95 terly instead of monthly), and prepared to move in. We took the advice of seasoned movers and had our furniture brought down from London, thirty-five miles away, in a " pantechnicon " by road. A pan- technicon bears some resemblance to a caricature freight train that has lost its way. It consists of one or more covered vans drawn by a road engine of the " stone crusher " type, which chugs painfully along the highroads at what seems to be the rate of about one-and-a-quarter miles an hour. The pan- technicon is slow and sure, like many things English, and is the popular method, because cheap, of trans- porting household effects about the country. It seemed to answer the purpose, and in less time than might have been expected our household was duly installed. Water was " laid on," as is the term, to the extent of there being a faucet installed over the kitchen sink. This was the private enterprise of our landlord, who had it piped at his own expense from a local source to the houses on his estate, and in this respect we were better off than we should have been in many rural neighbourhoods. For light there were candles, and but for our "Rochester" burner (which we had carried around with us on all our wanderings) to lighten the darkness, we would have fared badly. The European lamp is but a poor substitute, being more top heavy and monumental than luminous. It would seem as though one servant ought to have sufficed for such a modest establishment; not so in England, where sub-division of housework has 96 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD been reduced to a fine art. Any overlapping of duties is rigidly tabooed, and the " general servant " is still in the experimental stage. Three were necessary and readily found in the tiny hamlet a quarter of a mile away, though our English friends had warned us that it might be difficult to get servants in the country now. The servant bogey is apparently be- ginning to threaten the English housekeeper. A woman came in to cook, a young girl as housemaid ("Rosemary's" limited quarters would not admit of their "living in"); and while the cook would whiten the doorsteps, it required a man (a gardener) to sweep off the few feet of brick walk to the front gate. Because that came within the gardener's prov- ince ! Notwithstanding that, the wages of all three did not equal that demanded by " the girl " at home. It was not long before we found ourselves in the grip of the great problem of housekeeping — the ques- tion of food supply. Our sole dependence for gro- ceries and household requisites was the one tiny " general store," where there was little to be had be- yond candles and Colman's mustard. Its proprietor (who was also the postmaster) had formed a trust of one, and cornered the business of the neighbour- hood; consequently, with no competition, you had to take, on an emergency, what he had or go without. The only other alternative was a three-mile walk to a village, a shade larger than ours, where the sup- plies were sufficiently varied to include marmalade and pickled walnuts. As the inelastic code of Eng- lish service could not be revised to meet these condi- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 97 tions we ran our own errands; that the walk lay through our landlord's beautiful home park mitigated somewhat against the inconvenience. This was before the useful automobile had become — as it did later — our best ally, both in house-hunting and housekeeping. With it we could have foraged to better advantage, and saved, as well, a livery bill which also went to swell the till of the village " trust." Having discovered " Rosemary " in the course of a walking tour, we did not realise that the railway sta- tion was four miles away, and while three shillings for the " brougham " and two shillings for a " trap " there and back could not be called dear in the course of the year it helped to do away with the feeling that our cottage in the country was costing us " noth- ing to speak of." All our coal had to be hauled four miles, and no matter whether it was " kitchen," " best kitchen " or " drawing-room," the quality threw out almost the same trivial amount of heat, and the bill was nearly double what it would have been in America, had we been obliged to heat a house with half a dozen un- economic open fires. There was no " greengrocer's " in this little com- munity of about four hundred souls, so we had to fall back on the favour of our retinue of servants to skirmish about for the daily supply of vegetables and fruit; the result being that their various relatives, as a great favour, would be persuaded into selling us, at city prices and something more, cabbages, turnips and potatoes, and an occasional cauliflower, the beginning 98 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD and end of the usual list of English vegetables, though sometimes this was supplemented by a tough lettuce. Even these sources of supply were capricious and would fail at inopportune times. English fruits at the best are negligible as to qual- ity and quantity, and expensive, save the strawberry, though there always seemed to be a bountiful supply of the plebian, furry gooseberry, judging by the fre- quency with which our cook served us that abomina- ble dessert — stewed gooseberries and custard. Kent is considered the home of the best English strawberry, but they were never " at home " for us ; when we did capture a box, it was at Covent Garden Market prices; as for apples, they were weighed out to us by the ounce as grudgingly as if they were precious stones. An itinerant butcher brought around daily the " joints " and chops, but anything more, such as a special steak or a fowl, had to be ordered in advance, and then was not always forthcoming; it was more often than not a see-saw between leg of mutton and mutton chops. There was but one variety of bread — the " cottage- loaf " — heavy and stodgy, the product of a bake- oven that had come down from the time of the Georges, an adjunct of the baker's own cottage. As an example of the futility of trying to modify tradition, we pleaded with the baker to make us something that at least looked like a roll. He promised, to do him justice, reluctantly, and next day we received a litter of six miniature " cottage- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 99 loaves," perfect replicas of the large one. As well try to alter the mould of his mind as change the shape of that loaf, which must have been designed by King Alfred when he turned cook! Eggs in time became a luxury, and in winter could not be had at any price. The only recourse was to A U1TTELR OF COTTACrL LOAVE.5 include them on our shopping list and bring them out from London. We finally rebelled at a diet made up largely of boiled mutton, boiled potatoes and soggy puddings, and in desperation had all of our supplies sent from London, three hours away by rail; again a profit on the village " monopoly " for bringing them from the station. These included a stock of American canned goods at prices double what they cost at home. In truth, our living in our English country cottage proved even more expensive than in our London city apartment. The charm of the English countryside is very ioo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD real, but its resources are apt to be meagre and unsatisfactory. It is well for the prospective house- holder to inquire into the practical housekeeping possibilities of the neighbourhood wherein is situated the picturesque cottage or Tudor mansion before closing the bargain. To be forty miles from a fresh egg is rather a damper on the enthusiasm inspired by the proximity of the ivy-clad ruin whose history is written in Domesday Book. We might have thought that some of our troubles resulted from an ignorance of the local situation, except for the fact that English housekeepers in all rural communities may be heard bewailing the same conditions. There is a live movement now on foot in England towards imitating the intensive gardening of the French. If it is successful it will do much towards lightening one phase of the burden of housekeeping. In setting up an establishment in a small English community the stranger comes in contact with tradi- tions and customs that seem puerile and even amus- ing to an outsider, but are often none the less ex- asperating; all the same it is well to respect them. Nothing is so out of place as originality under these circumstances, though the " outlander," especially the American, who runs counter to local prejudices, will be judged leniently, where one of their own country- men would not be. The cult of the American is a popular one everywhere across the water these days. Even as casual tenants we found that we could not escape certain ready-made duties. There was a SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 101 waiting list of recipients for our bounty; the lady of the house was expected to do her share of " dis- trict visiting " and distributing tracts, and might be called upon to pour tea at Sunday-school " treats." There is more or less of a code of etiquette gov- erning the initiation of a newcomer into local society, which, if freely translated, might read this wise: Muddy t,»f> -B.»\.-JJ, If the house is rented furnished, it implies that its occupants are birds of passage, and that therefore their stay will not be long enough to justify letting down the social barriers, though if one attends the parish church the vicar will call, and probably the vicar's wife — in which case there will be an invitation to tea at the vicarage. On the other hand, to take a house and furnish it carries with it a certain sug- gestion of stability and permanence that makes the newcomer worth while, in which case the squire's 102 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD family will likely call, followed by other local " some- bodies," and there will be invitations to afternoon teas and garden parties. This delicately graded scale is naturally modified by local conditions, but here again the American scores, especially the Amer- ican woman, if she is a sportswoman and can talk " horse and dog," is not averse to long walks, and content with gossiping " teas " as her principal diver- sion. But as a class the American women are not sporty. Riding to hounds does not appeal to their tastes, nor does " puppy walking " along muddy lanes hold any charms for one addicted to silken hose and pumps. And so, in spite of well-meant efforts of the community, the American woman is apt to feel isolated, and become bored by the, it must be acknowledged, rather dull and spiritless existence of rural England. Undoubtedly this largely accounts for the fact that the sociable and vivacious American woman is more often to be found making a home in the gayer and less formal atmosphere of Continental Europe, rather than in that of the alluring English country- side, in spite of its traditions of the best home life. To confess the truth, we " funked " it, as our English friends would say, and as a tenant was forthcoming to take the lease off our hands, basely deserted " Rosemary " before the year was out. Since then we have taken our enjoyment of the pleasures of English country life from the equally picturesque and far more convenient English country inn. SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 103 5^1 COUNTRY HOUSE in NORMAN We were beguiled into another trial of house- keeping in a foreign land by one of those " beauty spots " so common in the lovely windings of the Seine Valley. It was in a little Norman village that could boast of every picturesque attribute that a vil- lage should have which dated from William the Conqueror, old timbered houses that leaned crazily over the one straggling street, an ancient Gothic church, the whole overtopped by the ruins of a feudal castle. The stage setting was perfect, while for the housekeeper it had the practical advantage of being the appendage of a large, flourishing market town, with good shops only a mile away, the two being known as ha Grande Ville and La Petite Ville. For two years or more this particular corner of Normandy had been familiar ground. We had come and gone, making the rambling old riverside hotel our headquarters for months at a time. Thus it was that when we decided to look for a -pled de terre of our own, it was to our old friend, its patron, that we went for advice, and, in the course of much local gossip, finally weeded out the information that there were two houses that might be rented. The first in local importance was a modern French chalet — the kind known as a " Villa coquette," ?l hideous type of country house adored by the average io 4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Frenchman who is disfiguring the loveliness of his country with these fantastic specimens of domes- tic architecture; an aberration from the national artistic taste that cannot be explained except by the strong streak of artificiality in the French character. This one was of the reddest of brick, with zig-zag trimmings of yellow stone, carefully separated by chocolate coloured lines. The slate roof, all pin- nacles and peaks, was crowned with a fence-like arrangement of spiked iron ornaments that made one shiver to look at. There were pink and green porcelain plaques let in about the windows, while a realistic terra cotta cat, with arched back and a " cheshire-grin," decorated the ridge pole. The rectangular garden was garnished with a sum- mer house and a couple of benches of imitation rustic work. In spite of ten rooms and a glass-enclosed verandah, where one could dine and overlook one of the finest views in Normandy, the colour scheme of house and cat seemed dear to live with at a rental of three hundred dollars per annum. A real bargain was a maison bourgeoise, a good example of the ample solid mansion of the well-to-do provincial French family, big enough to have ab- sorbed several of the average modern city flats. The ground floor was taken up with the practical working part of the establishment. On entering the massive front door, flush with the street, the first thing that met the eye, and the most prominent, in good French style, was the spacious kitchen with its rows of shining coppers, to which was subordinated SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 105 the dining-room. Then came the usual number of small rooms and passages that clutter up the large French house without seeming to be put to any spe- cial use, but which, taken together, give really a vast area to be put to domestic uses. The house was furnished in the formal and meagre French taste, in a way that would be totally inade- quate to the needs of the American or English house- keeper — principally with ornate mantel ornaments and gilt tables and long mirrors, but with never an easy chair in the whole house. While there were electric lights (scarcely any town in France is too unimportant to be without them) , and the parquet of the salon had come from a real historic chateau, the sanitary arrangements were practically nil; and while to each bedroom was at- tached an elegant and commodious cabinet de toil- ette, the stationary washstand (why this deception no one could fathom) was pure make-believe and had to be filled with water brought in a cruche from the pump in the garden. We could have gotten all this, with a garden and an espalier thrown in, for less than the price of the gaudy " villa coquette," about two hundred and fifty dollars per annum with taxes, the tenant, not the landlord, paying the taxes. But a family of two could do with smaller quarters. Besides, this was a type of house that could have been duplicated in any French neighbourhood, and we were looking for " local colour," otherwise why go house-hunting in the most picturesque of old French provinces? 106 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The right combination was finally found just where the village street trailed off into a grassy path by the river. It was a cross between a small country house and an old sixteenth-century Norman farm- house, of weather-beaten grey stone, with a mellow red tile roof of many ups and downs, with black timbers showing in the high gables and under the overhanging eaves. It stood among lush, green meadows, in an orchard of apple trees — the small cider apple tree of Normandy. There were some flower beds and a grape vine hung over the door — the whole enclosed by a high, stone wall, capped with crumbling tiles. The owner was an anjocat in La Grande Ville who made this his summer home when he went en vil- legiature during the fishing season. We had more than once stopped in times past to peer admiringly through the tall iron gate, and had always envied Monsieur I'avocat as he sat placidly fishing, his portly person perched on a chair in one end of a clumsy boat, with madame, his wife, at the other end, sewing industriously. This year, for some reason, monsieur had decided to forego his fishing — a sport dear to the Frenchman — and it was this which made our opportunity. We interviewed monsieur at his etude in his town house, and offered to rent the place if the terms were agreeable; they were, and the matter was quickly arranged. A lease was signed for a year, with an option of renewing it for three. The rent, plus the taxes, came to something over one hundred dollars SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 107 a year, payable quarterly. The house was even partly furnished, though not in a manner of sufficient importance to call for a formal inventory, which in France, as in England, is taken with a painful atten- tion to minutae in leasing a furnished house. In the house proper were five rooms — a fair-sized salon, an enormous kitchen with a spacious hooded chimney, and a small dining-room, an arrangement which gives a good illustration of the relative im- portance of rooms in the French domestic scheme. Above were two bedrooms, each with its tiny cabinet de toilette, the usual adjunct of the sleeping-room in France, no matter how restricted may be the quar- ters in which are hidden away the microscopic bath- ing arrangements. An outside flight of stone stairs led up to three large rooms, and that looked as if they had been slapped on as an afterthought. These were promptly fitted up as a studio and workroom, and proved an ideal arrangement in avoiding conflict between the artistic and literary and the domestic factions of the household. Monsieur had not installed electric lights, so we burned candles in tall, brass candlesticks and an American lamp, while water came from the pump beside the kitchen door. Great beams crossed the low ceilings, and a high mantelpiece — a good example of sixteenth-century Norman carved woodwork — nearly filled up one side of the little salon, and in the fireplace of which stood a pair of " basket " andirons, wrought in a fashion that would have tempted a collector to carry them away. io8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The furniture was sparse, but enough to build on. We got some furnishings from our Paris studio, picked up some things at local auction sales; un- earthed an ancient armoire and some good " lustre " ware, and odds and ends of old china in the village itself; while for a few francs the kitchen was stocked with a generous supply of the earthen casseroles and marmites that play such an important role in the French kitchen. Thus the problem of furnishing was solved by degrees, and in the process we got not a little fun, as well as some mild excitement, in bar- gaining. Our establishment ran smoothly with a bonne a tout faire — a maid-of-all- work — who, for the not ex- travagant sum of thirty francs (six dollars) and keep, did all the work, from polishing the waxed floors to cooking simple, but ex- cellent, meals. The French bonne rather prefers to be in undisputed possession of the domestic field, and while she does her work by rule of thumb she can get through with a tremendous lot in the course of the day. No matter what Yvonne's work might be, her SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 109 black dress and blue cotton apron were always neat, and her blonde hair tidy under the close-fitting white cap of the Norman peasant woman. At five in the morning Yvonne was up and shuffling about the house in her black, cloth slippers, slipping them into wooden sabots when she went out of doors, and as conscien- tiously dropping them off again at the door before stepping on her spotless floors, as does the Moham- medan shed his shoes before the sacred mosque. On pleasant days we ate out of doors in delightful French country fashion, and Yvonne served three daily meals under the apple trees with never a grum- ble about the extra work that this entailed. She did the marketing, ran errands, gave the orders and was a competent " buffer " between us and the daily fric- tion in dealings with the butcher, the baker and others of their ilk. The few sous that may have been no THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD diverted into her own pocket by the process were only her just dues — which, to tell the truth, was ex- actly the way she looked at it. Yvonne was not perfection. She was unduly voluble, not at all truthful, and her manners, to more conventional housekeepers, might have seemed free and easy; but the French servant is pliable to an extent unintelligible to the starched English maid, and is not always clogging the domestic machinery by stopping to define the exact boundaries of her do- main. When there was nothing else to do Yvonne would polish off the brass and rub down the body- work of the automobile which was housed in the ancient stable. Nothing so accentuates the difference between country life in France and that of neighbouring Eng- land as the superiority of the French local resources. Each petit pays, or community, is self-supporting and self-contained. In the chief town a weekly market focusses the produce of the surrounding villages and farms, both for the convenience of the local buyer and for distribution to points further away. Every Monday afternoon Yvonne, armed with her black, straw-covered basket, went to the market in the place of La Grande Ville. She would bar- gain with keenness and relish for the week's supplies up and down the long line of market women sitting sphinx-like before their heaped up baskets. Here, in covered booth and under widespread umbrellas, nearly everything could be found, from live stock to drygoods, and from flowers to scrap-iron. This was SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES m our bonne's only day off, nor would she have wanted any better holiday than this weekly tilt in wits and the opportunity it gave for gossip. Only recently a law has been passed in France providing for a repos hebdomadaire, which entitles every employee to a day of rest, but so far the French servant has rarely availed herself of it. " Mon Dieu, que faire," she exclaims, and simply shrugs her shoulders and goes about her work as usual. Beside the weekly market there came to our door each morning the marchands de quatre saisons (so called from the fact that they handle the products of the four seasons), peasant women with push-carts of vegetables and fruits from the outlying farms. They are well-named; no matter what might be the time of the year their supply of green stuff was abun- dant and varied, thanks to the French system of in- tensive gardening, which is being recognised as the best exponent of that art the world over. Winter had its salads no less than summer, nor was one dependent upon the long garden list of escaroles and romaines at any time, for the peasant woman of Normandy can go out into the fields and grub up, what, to the uninitated, would be regarded only as weeds, and bring them into the market in the form of most appetising salads. Notable among such was the tender, white shoots of the dandelion from under the young wheat, the de luxe variety of the ordinary dandelion salad. Asparagus was a spe- cialty of the neighbourhood, and haricots verts, which 112 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD might be labelled as the vegetable of the French, were grown by the square acre in the neighbourhood. One particularly sheltered garden supplied our table with strawberries, including the higly prized white variety of Normandy, from April until December. Another fruit that seemed to come to stay was the cherry, which can take its place along with the haricots verts in the affections of the French house- keeper. But on the whole the French fruits do not rank with their vegetables. In spite of the fact that a tax had to be paid on all produce brought within the village limits — the octroi tax, that like a belt is tightly drawn about every French town — prices were reasonable, and there was no attempt at rivalling those of the city markets. Normandy is the dairy of France, and is the home of the best milk, butter, and the most varied number of cheeses produced on French soil, so we fared very well in this particular, though the milk came in the unhygienic tin milk-can of the dark ages of house- keeping (milk in bottles not having penetrated be- yond the confines of some of the large cities), but its quality, at eight cents the litre, as well as that of the unsalted butter, could not be excelled. In the warm months our dairy woman, for it is usually the woman who is the vendor about the French countryside, brought also the cceur de la creme } temptingly laid out on a bed of grape leaves — a small, home-made cream cheese, which takes its name from its heart-shaped basket moulds. Then SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 113 there were the numerous family of Norman cheeses to draw upon — the world-renowned Camembert, Gournay, the delicate, sweet Gervais, while the little browns jugs of the rich Crime d'higny were also one of the products of our pays, the Pont I'Eveque, the Brie and the Port Saiut coming from a little farther away. Poultry and eggs came from an island just oppo- site us, and the cheerful cackle that floated across the water in no way suggested the " cold storage " fowls only too prevalent these days in our own city markets. It was here that Yvonne went when in search of a particularly fine poulet de grain — one that had been properly fattened on corn, or a basket of fresh-laid eggs, rowing there and back in Mon- sieur I'avocat's old fishing punt. ii4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Fowls, Yvonne would always roast on the broche before the open fire, which was nearly lost in one end of the huge chimney, in preference to the in- competent stove, as she did also the gigot (always with a tange of garlic), the leg of mutton that takes the place on the French menu of that occupied by roast beef on the English dinner table. Nor were we entirely dependent upon La Grande Ville for household odds and ends. A well-stocked shop in the village itself sold a little of every- thing from gasolene for the automobile to fishing poles and bait. There was a woman cordonnier who could re-sole shoes as well as her masculine com- petitors. A well-appointed butcher's shop, flying its insignia — a red cloth at the doorway — furnished good beef, mutton, lamb and veal at as reasonable rates as could be expected in a land where one must expect to pay well for good meat. There was com- petition in the bonlangerie business, and we had sev- eral varieties of rolls, as well as brioches, for the Sun- day breakfast, and as a treat even pastry on fete days. We employed a blanchisseuse, not a laveuse. The distinction means much to one's clothes. The laveuse is the ordinary washerwoman who takes one's linen to the river bank, or any convenient bit of water, lays the clothes on a board, and pounds out the dirt with a wooden paddle. By this process in time one's wearing apparel is riddled with small holes, as if bird-shot had gone through it. Whereas the blanchisseuse does her work in tubs on her own premises, and also frequently irons, the two accom- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 115 plishments, however, not necessarily going together. The work is usually well done, and one's shirtwaists cost one-half, and often a third of what they would in America, with everything else in proportion, though the pernicious use of lessive, or lye, has naturally a bad effect upon one's linen in time. All good housekeepers in Normandy make their own cider. From October through November the village cider-press travels from house to house, and the air is heavy with the acrid scent of crushed apples. We followed the example of our neighbours and engaged a burly, blue-bloused Norman man-of- all-work for three francs for the day to set up the press in our garden and turn our crop of apples into the golden beverage of Normandy. The procedure was simple enough. The right mixture of tart and sweet apples were first cut up in a chopping machine and then packed tightly into the press. Warm water was poured in and allowed to drip through, after which the apples were pressed dry. The liquid was put into barrels and stowed away in the dark cellar, for no French house is without its cave — and eight days later was supposed to be ready to use; but Norman cider must be mellow to be enjoyed; even at its best it is a bit sour and thin even to the palate accustomed only to ice-water. Why did we ever leave such a paradise might well be asked? Procrastination was our undoing. We could have bought our house and the four acres of land attached for something less than a couple of thousand dollars, and did seriously think of be- n6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD coming permanent householders in La Petite Ville, but while dallying with the idea, little dreaming of any need for haste, we went off for a six weeks' jaunt through Holland and Belgium and came back to find that a small " boom " had burst upon the village. Monsieur I'avocat had been offered what seemed to him a fabulous amount for the property and had closed the bargain. Ultimately the vandal purchaser tore down the house and put up what was even worse than the " villa coquette " — an imitation old Norman house. In disgust, when our lease was up, we shook the dust of La Petite Ville off of our feet, and so it was that when the housekeeping germ began its deadly work again, it found us by the shores of the blue Mediterranean. ^L,VILLA onffle ^ MED ITERRANEAN We sat around our studio fire making plans for the winter. The cold fogs of autumn were wrapping Paris in their clammy folds. A Paris fog has not the consistency of that of London, but it has a chill of its own, and Paris has by far less adequate pro- vision for keeping warm than any city in Europe. " We will winter on the Riviera, in a villa," was the decision, " and be fashionable." The most chic, exclusive winter amusement of all o SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 117 Europe is the wintering in a Riviera villa, on the shores of the blue Mediterranean, which by the poetic Frenchman is described as " a beautiful woman in a blue gown." Ah, but gowns cost money, even to look at sometimes ! Would not even a modest villa loom to too expensive proportions on this en- chanted shore, the modern garden of the Hesperides, where the golden apples are indeed golden. How to find out ! We took the obvious course and got the addresses of various house agents, be- ginning at Marseilles and running along the coast to Cannes, Nice and Menton. The experience opened up vistas of foreign business methods which were anything but practical, for some never answered our queries at all, while others had not yet returned from the holidays in the mountains — and so made the fact known to us by a brief message written on a picture post-card from some retreat in the mountains where they were spending their time trying to catch trout. Our modest demand for something habitable which could shelter two people and an automobile was met by others who offered us palatial chateaux with everything to match, including the price. One quoted a rental of fifty thousand francs for three months, for which we were to have a spacious de- mure surrounded by ten acres of gardens and com- posed of twelve bed and dressing-rooms, boudoirs, billiard room, a " winter garden," endless halls and salons and servants' quarters, and as many as two ( ?) bathrooms, with gas and electricity, running water, an entrance lodge, two garages and a boathouse. u8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Certainly the price was not high for what was offered. It was the automobile that did it, for when we stipu- lated for a garage it was hard to convince them that four additional rooms were enough. " It is easy to see what class of Americans they take us for, or do they think that we want to run a hotel," said the Man in disgust. " We'll go house- hunting by automobile and investigate any, and every, place that we pass on the road that has a sign a louer hanging in front of it," and so we decided forthwith. Two days down by road from Paris, and we turned eastward at Marseilles and plunged gaily into the real Riviera over the famous Route d'ltalie which links up Paris with the Italian frontier. From Marseilles on to Menton at the edge of Italy is the villa region of Europe. They are not con- verted villas — the made-over palaces, desecrated con- vents and mouldy ruins that the searcher after the old usually associated with the word " villa " in Italy. These villas of the French Riviera are newly built, new for Europe at least, for it is only within the last quarter of a century that this exploitation has begun, and within the last ten that it has become internationally popular. To-day the boom is fairly on. One pleasing result is that what is lost in an- tiquity is made up to the housekeeper in a comfort such as is rarely successfully grafted on to the monu- mental palaces of other days. Villas were dotted along the grey flanks of the mountains that rise here from the sea; they are perched on rocky crags, smothered in orange groves SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 119 and surrounded by sweet-scented gardens of exotic shrubs, and built on purple and ochre rocks out into the water. White most of them, or of shell tints and of what might be styled Mediterranean archi- tecture — a blend of Moorish in open colonnades, of Spanish in the flat, projecting tile roofs, of Italy in the stucco walls and conventional balustrades, with here and there just a dash of French coquetry to give them the piquancy demanded by the exigencies of the gay life that goes on within the delicately tinted walls. The correct type of Riviera villa must always have a brilliant frieze stencilled in colours just up under the roof, usually of a design of gaudy flowers, a decorative Italian idea, which is very charming, and turquoise blue porcelain ornaments play a prominent part in the exterior decoration. They were fancifully named, all of these villas, in bold letters on the gate-post, and though the villa, " My Darling," seemed rather too personal as an address, the villa, " Mary and Martha," suggested that both the material and spiritual welfare of the household was cared for. We succeeded in getting much more information in personal interviews with the house agents. Busi- ness by correspondence is not one of the strong points of the foreigner. Nice being the hub and the metropolis of the Riviera, offered the greatest choice compared to other places. Furnished villas, the only kind to hire, on account of the expense of moving household goods, 120 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD varied from five hundred dollars to five thousand for a season. This was according to size, and that desideratum of the Riviera — location. Small villas! Oh, that was another story. There were some that rented from three to six hundred dollars, but they were scarce and had been spotted and grabbed up by the first of October. Furnished apartments might have been had at similar prices, or the finer new ones that are making Nice as convenient to live in as Paris, at Paris prices, if that was what one was looking for. Not so with us; we had come for a villa, and a villa or some detached substitute, therefore, we would have. These prices were for the Riviera season of three months, from the last of January to the last of April. The rent, in most cases, included the linen, china and silver, or what passes for silver, but not the water. Your water bill depends upon yourself and the use you make of that commodity. Conditions were much the same at Menton, though the tendency was towards lower prices, and small villas set in groves of lemon trees were not unknown at three and six hundred dollars for the season. But they were all taken. " Yes," we were assured by complacent agents, " it is becoming more difficult each year to secure just what is wanted, the demand for villas is steadily increasing." So we were finding out. In the charming, rose-bowered peninsula of An- tibes, living was not so dear, and we had the satisfac- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 121 tion of learning that water went with the rent, but that it was the " habitude " to rent out such acces- sories as linen, silver and china as " extras." These distinctions were interesting, but we were using up a lot of oil and gasolene and not coming up with the special brand of villa, suitable to artistic and literary needs of modest financial capacity. At Cannes we were offered charming and extensive places that had been hallowed by having been the residences of Russian Grand Dukes, German Heredi- tary Princes or English Earls, seemingly the principal frequenters of this delightful Mediterranean town that caters for the noblesse. All this tended to ad- vance prices, so they were not for us. It was use- less even to demand prices ; we were getting beyond the stage where this amused us. " We might as well turn around and begin at the other end," said the Man. So we rushed the mag- nificent roadway over the red Esterels into Saint Raphael, where there were charming villas to be had, " patronised by Americans," we were told. The new golf links and palace villas under the par- asol pines of Valescure were tempting, but beyond our limit as to price. A run through the cork forests of the " Maures," and we dropped down into Hyeres, the first or last Riviera resort — it depends from which way you come. Just a few miles away, down on the coast, where a fringe of wind-tossed rock pines overhang the Medi- terranean, is a little village of a single hotel, a few 122 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD fishermen's houses, a wine-shop — little else. Here we found our villa. The renting was in the hands of the proprietor of the hotel. The villa Beau Soleil was built on the usual casual architectural lines peculiar to these Med- iterranean countries — rough stones, stuccoed white with a pinkish-orange roof of tiles. Solid green shutters rendered it as impenetrable as a fortress. On its gable, which was the front, was painted a golden sun, and in its centre the name. A white balustraded terrace, without which no Riviera villa is complete, overhung the water and was roofed with interlaced dry bamboo canes in the fashion of the country. The villa was of bungalow construction, so com- mon to the country houses about the Mediterranean, called variously bastides and cabanons. There were four living-rooms and the usual big kitchen, designed for people who in winter use the one end of the kitchen as a sitting-room. There was one room under the golden sun in which we housed our one servant. The open terrace gave us a charming out- of-doors living-room where we could set up the liter- ary and artistic shop. Here, too, we dined, literally under our own vine and fig-tree that tempered the rays of the southern sun. That the boathouse could be used for a garage was the deciding point in the favour of Beau Soleil. Here the Man might tinker when he felt inclined. We took the villa for twelve months (no Riviera season here) for the moderate rental, furnished, of SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 123 eight hundred francs a year, say a hundred and sixty dollars. The hotel patron wrote out a curious and informal lease on an old-fashioned ruled letter sheet of -papier timbre with the dregs of the ink bottle eked out with water. It seemed a crazy document but never gave us any trouble. The cool, white-washed walls of the rooms were in pleasing contrast with the red-tiled floors, and suggested the repose of a convent cell, which delusion was helped out by the spare amount of furnishings, but there were some old pieces of Provengal furniture, some great .armoires and cupboards, ornamented with huge, ornate steel locks and hinges, and a panetier, the hanging cupboard for bread, and below it the trough-like table in which the bread was supposed to be made. These two pieces of furniture to-day serve only the purposes of collectors, and drift chiefly to the antique shops of Paris, Avignon and Marseilles. There were several mirrors of indifferent reflecting ability, but with charming though tarnished gold frames. The matter of household supplies was not an onerous one. Hyeres was well supplied with shops by reason of its prominence as one of the most popular, though not one of the gayest, of the Riviera resorts. The invaluable Potin had a branch here, and there were even some American and English goods stocked. Outside of the big cities the demand for these Amer- ican products is so intermittent that they are apt to be stale and the style old-fashioned, but certain of them could be made to serve once and again. 124 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD With the automobile we did our own delivering, otherwise we would have gone without. As we were in the garden spot of Europe for fruits and veg- etables, from which supplies are drawn for northern Europe, contrary to what might usually be expected, we found them cheap and plentiful at all seasons. They were picturesquely brought around to our door loaded in basket panniers swung across lazy, small donkeys, or in carts, guided by women whose sun- baked faces were shielded by flapping straw hats with conical crowns bound with black velvet bands. Our maid was a Provencal, who came from the neighbourhood of Aries, and wore proudly the cos- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 125 tume of that pays. The tiny ribbon coiffe and shawl fichu and the uneconomic black dress that the labour- ing classes all over Europe cling to, clothed the girl most agreeably, and coming from the most demo- cratic region of Europe, the " Midi " of France, she treated us as equals without embarrassment. She was a charming, handsome, warm-hearted creature who felt it her duty to entertain us socially in her rests between labours. Celestine worked hard and faithfully, though with- out any system. She cooked in the nondescript Mediterranean style, a little more so if anything, which like its architecture is a composite of all the attributes of the various warm countries bordering upon it. How Celestine cooked even as well as she did was a never ceasing marvel. The kitchen range was a high platform of brick under a hooded chimney. The fire was built on top and there were sundry little depressions into which coals were dropped and over which casseroles stewed dreamily away. The pin- tard — guinea hen — was the bird of the country, and when Celestine roasted it on a broach before the fire of grapevine stems, as well as rows of tiny greves (which were certainly sparrows) strung on a long skewer, heads flapping in a horrible, life-like way with the motion of the slow-turning broach, we usu- ally withdrew and let Celestine eat these. We bar- gained with one of the fishermen to bring us fish for the daily bouillabaisse, that Mediterranean fish stew to be had at its best, and in its only true form, when 126 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD made of the celebrated rock fish of the Mediterra- nean, and has plenty of yellow saffron, garlic, herbs and oil bestrewn upon it; either this or it is not bouillabaisse at all. Lapin garenne, stewed rabbit, with a thick wine sauce, is another specialty of Celes- tine's, and we sometimes longed for the " plain " cooking of England, though indeed the girl's art was a marvel. Lamb was our main dependence for meat, and goat's milk was all that we could get in the way of lacteal fluid, save a concoction sold by the itinerant milkman who would mix sheep's milk with it. Wine was cheap and good, costing by the barrel five sous a litre, double that for something better. Our shortage on milk had to be made up on wine. After luncheon in the warm, drowsy afternoon, Celestine would take her sewing out under the olive SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 127 trees, or weave the flat, round baskets used by the olive presser, which we found, incidentally, made very good mats for the terrace. Always at such times her head would be covered with several hand- kerchiefs, for fear of a coup de soldi; when it was cool she sat with her feet on a tin chauffrette full of live coals. Celestine and her mode of life was more interesting to us than ourselves, and on the whole we enjoyed her and profited by her acquaintance. All water had to be brought from the village, and as for baths, the Mediterranean alone served as our tub. The baker at Hyeres sent us out each day a collection of the queer, lumpy loaves known as the "pain d'Aix," that is, when he didn't forget it; at other times we cranked up the automobile and went in search of them ourselves, bringing back on the side an occasional sack of " boulets," or compressed coal dust, in morsels about the size of an egg. These black-diamond eggs Celestine burned in the fire which heated up the brick oven on certain occasions, and so far as they went did really give out an efficient heat, though truly they proved expensive. Without the automobile, housekeeping in our Med- iterranean villa would hardly have been a practical success. Celestine washed our clothes in the big stone tank of water at the end of the garden. This was divided into two compartments, one for the washing and one for the rinsing, and she got fairly good results, con- sidering that she used only cold water and olive oil soap. We had a repasseuse come in to prevent 128 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Celestine giving us the household linen ironed in French country fashion by being pulled out and folded, rough dry. All through the warm spring nights the nightin- gales trilled in the olive trees of our garden, while the light of the moon, big as a balloon, made a broken path of beaten gold across the water. Idyllic days those when we sat on the terrace, in broken light and shade, soothed by the chant of the cigale — the thermometer of southern France — sky and water a symphony in blue, fanned by the warm breezes from the African coast, and watching the orange sails of the fishing boats drift around the violet headlands of Cap Sicie and Porquerolles. " Is this what you would call a fashionable win- ter?" asked the Man, coming up from the boat- house, where he had been tinkering with the automo- bile, wearing the blue cotton overalls of a French mechanic, grease up to his elbows. Celestine had just come from the fountain, bring- ing the evening supply of water, and was resting the two big, green pottery cruches beside the monumental gateway, while she flirted amiably with the boy who had led up his flock of brown and white goats to deliver the milk, piping to them as do the shepherds still to their flocks on the grey-green hills of Greece. " Well," I said, looking back at the Colle Noir that formed our mountain background, and across to where two mammoth hotels reared their half-mile of colonnaded white fronts above the pines of Mont des Ojseaux; "there's the Costabelle Hotel just yon- SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 129 der that popular superstition says you can't get in at for less than twenty-five francs a day (what is nearer the truth is, you probably could not get away for less than fifty francs a day) , whose guests are spend- ing their days on the golf links and their nights at the bridge table, and two-thirds of them have English titles. Again, over there is San Salvadour, patronised by the French noblesse and the American millionairesses, where those of the guests who have not come in their own automobiles are renting them from a Hyeres garage at two hundred dollars a week. That cloud of dust you see up the road was just left by the motor car of the grandest of Russian Grand Dukes taking a run over from Cannes, and 130 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD besides," warming to the subject, " do we not go to the one ourselves and eat through a ten-course dinner when Celestine slips up in her good judgment and gives us a combination of all the exotic peculiarities of this region, such as moules, oursins, rabbit, aioli and greves the same day, and to the other for after- noon tea when we want gay society? How much more of the fashionable world would you expect at our present cost of living per capita — one American dollar a day? " " I don't suppose you include those teas and din- ners up at these mountain hostelries in the estimate, do you?" murmured the Man as he went to the washing arrangement in the garden to rinse the grease and dirt from his hands by a liberal dousing in real olive oil. I did not answer, but I knew that I had made my point, that it was just such contrasts as these that make up the charms of experimental house- keeping abroad. Those dinners and teas were ex- tras, mere amusements not at all necessary to an enjoyable existence. " Say, do you know?" said the Man, reappearing with immaculate hands. " I think there is money to be made exploiting olive oil as a dirt remover." r rave//er //e AS THE ITALIAN HOTEL PROPRIETOR SEES HER ONEROUS PROFESSION OF TOURIST SOCIABLE AMERICANS THROUGH THE FOREIGN CUSTOM HOUSE BLOOMSBURY BOARDING-HOUSE LIFE IN LODGINGS ENGLISH PRIVATE HOTEL PAYING GUEST AMUSEMENTS IN AN ANCIENT CHATEAU ENGLISH RAILWAY STATIONS RAILWAY TRAVEL IN THE BRITISH ISLES PENSIONS VS. HOTELS EUROPEAN BOARDING-HOUSE FRENCH PENSION BOARDING IN A FRENCH FAMILY IN A " HOTEL-MEUBLE " PARIS RESTAURANTS OMINOUS SIGN OF THE HORSE'S HEAD WOMAN TRAVELLER AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL THE CASE OF THE FRENCHMAN BERLIN COMPETES WITH PARIS CONTINENTAL RAILWAYS TRAVELLING COMPANIONS V THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER The proprietor of a well-known tourist hotel in one of the large Italian cities, whose clientele is largely composed of the independent woman traveller, un- burdened himself in an expansive moment, of his impressions of this large class of Americans abroad. He had been fifty years in the business and had seen the American woman come into her own in his country, and was in a position to form an opinion as to the success with which she had managed this particular end of her European tour. " Ah, they are wonderful women, these Ameri- can women," he said contemplatively. " They are wonderful; I watch them come and go; they are very interesting; so calm; so composed; they know just what they want; but the most wonderful thing about them is, the ease with which they can put any- thing from them which they do not like. They do not take it to heart, they do not worry over it, they simply put it to one side and go their way." It is this quality, the ignoring of what is not wanted, the disagreeable, and going about their busi- ness, that makes for the security and confidence which are the characteristics which mark the American woman abroad, married or single, young or old. 133 134 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD When the lone woman traveller leaves her steamer and stands before some doorway to Europe for the first time, she sometimes finds herself in the midst of a confusion of ideas as well as a confusion of tongues. She has left home with a clear-cut idea of what she wants to do and see, but about twenty different peo- ple on shipboard have given her as many different kinds of advice. If she can but realise it, every por- ter, cabby and hotel waiter is waiting for her com- ing, and if she will but put herself in the hands of the great army of those who cater to the wants and needs of the tourist, she will be passed along as expeditiously and safely as a bale of merchandise. Her type has become as well recognised, and she is catered for equally as well as the large party who orders a suite of rooms in advance, usually at ad- vanced prices. The profession of tourist means a lot of hard work. It's not raptures and roses all along the way. If the average tour abroad was made compulsory what a howl would go up from many a wanderer. Most people take more exercise in a few months of travel than they do in years at home. They reverse their way of living, crowd their stomachs with strange food, and their bags grow steadily heavier with fool- ish souvenirs, and in the multiplying of new brain cells, in the tussle with several samples of languages, that poor organ gets as sore as a set of unused mus- cles. The lone woman has all sorts of fears. She is as nervous as a cat trying to get across a THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 135 street. Will she be lonely; who will she have to talk to ? For a fact, if she can get out of the sound of an American voice she will be lucky. The sights of Europe are obscured by her compatriots. It is also easy to attach oneself to a party. The American likes nothing better than to travel in bunches, through sociability and, perhaps, a certain lack of confidence. Anyway, they are to be seen all over the country in parties, that, like a snowball rolling along, grows in size at every pension and hotel it comes to, until it finally becomes too unwieldy to be housed and moved about. Here is just where there occurs much loss of time and not a little friction : It is impossible not to be so in a crowd of a dozen or more women with an easy-going man or two> in the background. The American man rather regards the trip abroad, as he does religion and society, as the particular province of his womankind, and is usually quite willing that she should lead the attacking force against the for- eigner and his language, which attitude still further mystifies that perplexed individual in his efforts to understand his American clientele. There is a first loneliness and strangeness which clutches the lone woman traveller, a sort of land- sickness which must be gone through with as is sea- sickness, but once the crisis is passed she will be in a fairer way to enjoy herself than if she was tagged to any group of people, no matter how agreeable they might appear. 136 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Even in linking up the most desirable of com- panions en voyage, one should be in a position to throw off the line readily and be able to part con- veniently, pleasantly and easily. Once the ship arrives on the other side the steward carries her hand-baggage off the steamer onto the dock, or to the tender which takes the passengers ashore. He has become as an old friend, and she almost clings to him when she gives the parting tip. The native porter is at the landing stage and seizes her bags to carry into the nearby custom house, where eventually her trunks arrive by some mysterious means. Customs examinations are perfunctory in most cases, and as a rule merely amount to the trouble of unlocking a single trunk or bag. An official, in some cases with gloved hands (we are behind in this thing at home), ruffles up a corner of a tray and asks the conventional question, which is composed on about the same formula in every country — whether you have cigarettes, cigars, matches, perfumery or spirituous liquors, the articles customs officials seem most keen about. In an equally perfunctory way he chalks your luggage, and the waiting porter (he will wait, if he is not tipped, until the end of the world) gathers up everything and shows the way to the ticket-office. The woman traveller follows to where her trunks must be registered (checked), and any excess over the usual sixty pounds or thereabouts must be paid for, as well as a small fee for regis- tration. THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 137 She takes the receipt and the porter now takes her and the hand-luggage to the train (or into the cab or taxi that is to carry her to a hotel), which is waiting to meet the steamer, finds her a seat, puts the bags in the rack above her head — and then awaits his reward. If he has done all this — as he should have done — a tip of the value of twenty-five to fifty cents U^ should be given him. The point is to make one's porter stay by and do the business. He will never lose you or your baggage as long as the tip is still ahead of him. Usually the lone woman traveller comes by way of England, where she can talk in a language ap- proximating her own. Her destination is usually a boarding house in Bloomsbury or Kensington. Around Bloomsbury, with the British Museum as a nucleus, has sprung up, in the last fifteen years, 138 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD a rank and file of boarding houses which are filled from May to September with unattached American women, and a few scattering, subdued men. The Bloomsbury boarding house is like most things in older London — just a little dingy; but the proprietor — who is generally a woman of the severe British matron type — usually knows her business and tries to her utmost to please Americans, even giving them as nearly an American breakfast as she can concoct. The London boarding house is supposedly cheap, and can actually be made fairly so if one arranges for room and breakfast only, and shops around for meals in connection with sight-seeing. Such accom- modation can often be had from a guinea to thirty shillings a week. As the American has usually noth- ing but praise for the London boarding house, this speaks well for its attempt to cater for this special class of customers. The English themselves still cling to the habit of lodgings. Life in lodgings, it must be confessed, is a singularly lonely existence, but if one wants to get an insight into one phase of life in the British Isles, such as they will not find elsewhere, it can be made quite an amusing and instructive experience. More especially is this so when one " goes into lodg- ings," as they say, in some small country town. One is not risking anything to* go on a hunt for " lodgings " and trust to luck to find what is wanted. Any attractive typical small English house, with a little garden and a neat appearance that puts out the THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 139 sign " Lodgers Wanted," will, in nine cases out of ten, prove to be an attractive place for a sojourn. Life in lodgings is peculiar; you make arrange- ments for your rooms, say a bedroom and a sitting- room, for so much a week, which includes having your meals cooked and served to you in your own sitting-room. But you must do the marketing your- self, unless you shirk this and throw the responsibility upon the landlady, though as an experience it is well worth doing oneself. You can get acquainted with the local butcher and have a struggle to keep him from cutting off a third more steak than you order (it is never less), and you will soon get acquainted with the limitations of the greengrocer. Marketing in a foreign country has educational advantages, and when you are looking up your food each day, just for fun, it has nothing in common with the monotony of ordinary housekeeping. There is something very Dickensesque about "lodg- ings," but they are not half bad, and give the ad- vantages of a home with the omissions of a few of the shortcomings. If there are other lodgers in the same house one is not brought in contact with them in any way, but it is a constant source of won- der to the practical-minded American — this unprac- tical and labour-making method of catering to peo- ple. " Lodgings " can be made as expensive or cheap as one wishes, but their virtue usually lies in their use- fulness for small incomes. The private hotel is another British institution, and is really a glorified lodging house on hotel lines, HO THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD except, of course, one does not have to buy their provisions; meals are served to you alone in a private dining-room at any hour you wish, or privately in the public dining-room, all of which makes for the ex- clusiveness so dear to the Britisher at home or abroad. The private hotel is apt to be very good indeed, and it should be, for it is quite as expensive as any aver- age type of hotel. This would naturally be the case, where one pays for special service and special priv- ileges, and there is no question about the protection it affords to the timid woman traveller; any unpleas- ant experiences that could break through the barriers of life in one of these hotels, usually occupied by the most orthodox family parties, would have to be engi- neered by a very bold, bad and determined person. A more intimate alternative is to become a paying guest in an English family. Their advertisements are to be found in all the weekly journals for women readers. From some points of view these advertise- ments are often quaint. " A clergyman's family would be glad to take as a paying guest a lady fond of country sports, of a sociable disposition, who would lend herself to being a pleasant companion — a good tennis player " ; or, " One who is musical is preferred — and to do her part in the entertainment; prices to be mutually agreed upon, or terms arranged by letter." One is really treated as a guest and is only re- minded of her true position by the weekly or monthly bill rendered. All of this — if you avail yourself of such an opportunity — places one in the difficult posi- THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 141 tion of self-analysis. Are you social? Are you en- tertaining? What would happen if you did not fill the bill? Would your money be refunded? These arrangements seem to work, in England in a way that does not seem possible elsewhere. The French have caught the fever, and "paying guest," like many English words, is incorporated in every-day usage. You can be invited to become a paying guest in an ancient chateau in the veritable Chateau Country, where there are boar and stag hunts bi-weekly. This may be a little strong for the ladies, to be sure, but another chatelaine of a chateau will receive one and give lessons in the language as well as social advantages in addition to board and lodging. That is milder! The small English country railway station, with its neat garden, is a model of its kind in outward looks at least, but the big stations of the cities are par- ticularly unattractive. Each class has its waiting- room, all equally dingy and that of the first none too good to make use of even if one's ticket is second class. One penny is charged for use of the lavatory — a universal custom in Europe at any public toilet. The train-guard can usually be bribed with a shil- ling or half a crown to slap a " reserved " label on the window of one's compartment and thus keep out others, though the lone woman does not want too much exclusiveness- — a crowd is safer. Without a tip the guard can be made to put on a " ladies only " sign on the window if there is no compartment so H2 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD labelled already, but it is just as well to take travel- ling conditions as one finds them. At one's destina- tion you go with the porter to the van to sort out the trunks. It looks easy to go off with anybody's baggage, but it is seldom that baggage is lost or goes astray. On the through express trains there are imita- tion, or miniature, Pullman cars, satisfactory enough — as imitations — but not at all to be compared in comfort with the real thing. There are also first- and third-class dining-cars. The best trains on which to travel third class in Great Britain are the Scotch expresses, second class having been abolished and the third considerably improved. You keep warm with a primitive zinc foot-warmer filled with hot water, and even so, you frequently have to tip to get one. If you wish to convey the impression that you know your way about, you put your feet on this foot-warmer, wrap a rug about your knees and sit with the window wide open. In sum- mer the process is reversed, and the windows are tightly shut to keep out dust. When the woman traveller leaves England and crosses over to the lands of strange speech, her next stopping place is likely enough Paris and the Paris pension. The most common delusion under which the lone woman traveller labours is the ancient idea that a pension, the European boarding house, is safer than a hotel. Just what she means by safer is not quite easy to define. If what is meant is that it gives her C o < THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 143 more the protection of a home, she is wrong, for it simply increases the danger that a young girl at least would be exposed to. Life in this case is far more intimate than that of the hotel, and she is brought in daily contact, in a way that cannot be avoided, with the other inmates who might or might not be desirable, though she rarely has any oppor- tunity for knowing before she is entangled in ac- quaintances and friendships that ofttimes result in tiresome or compromising situations. The least of the objections of the pensions is that they are worth- less as time-savers, while even the best, from the very intimate nature of their arrangements, are breeding places for the most pernicious gossip, for which the average woman away from home makes the easiest of targets. The thing that commends the pension more than anything else to the economically minded, and this is a phase of interest to the lone woman traveller who often has to study her finances carefully, is that it is cheaper than a hotel. It is cheaper than some hotels, it is true, but a really first-class pension costs at least two dollars to two dollars and a half a day, and there are plenty of excellent small hotels where one can live for this sum or even less. Many even of the large purely tourist hotels make pension rates, that is, rates by the week or month, at a great reduc- tion on those for transients. The cheapest pension that could possibly pass muster would be seven francs a day, and against this is the small country inn, not too far from town, where pension can be got not only H4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD for this amount, but very often for as little as five or six francs, provided one does some bargaining, and has an understanding and appreciation of local condi- tions. There is no question as to the superiority of the accommodation offered as between the two, and one should remember that the very publicity of a hotel is certainly safer than the promiscuous intimacy of the boarding-house table, where your next neigh- mour may be a pseudo nobleman (or what is worse, a real one) who wants no better sport than acquaint- ance with one of these charming Americans for whom he spreads the net of his fascinations, a net into which she has often so readily fallen. The foreign man plays the game very differently from what the girl has been accustomed to at home. The Paris pension is an institution of its class which may fill a want, but in most cases it is an unfortunate frame to choose through which to look at the foreign picture. Many of them are conducted with considerable genius by their proprietors and a certain respectability is presumed, whatever the sig- nificance that vague term may have for the twentieth- century American woman who is quite able to take care of herself, and has been since she left short dresses and the grammar school. Travel means something else besides churches, ruins and shops. It means the life of big and little hotels, dinner at a Paris boulevard restaurant or at some little dining place that has a world-wide reputation for its homely dish of sausages, or again in some little artists' resort. Then one goes to the cafe afterwards THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 145 for a filtre, and this makes up the round which is more enjoyable than that which is the lot of the woman who lives in a pension and has it on her mind most of the time that she must hurry back for lunch or dinner or she won't get any soup; she often loses sight of the fact, too, that she has wasted hours of her time finding the way home, and the carfare which she has expended has more than made up for any difference in price which there might have been had she made different arrangements. A pension is an uneconomical and inconvenient thing. It is not for eating three meals a day with one's own compatriots in a stuffy salle a manger in a Paris back-flat that one has come across to spend maybe hard-earned wealth and gone through the mental anguish of learning new monetary systems and struggling with several languages. Oh, those long tables, or even small tables, to which one comes with tired brain and feet after the strenuous duty of having looked up everything mentioned in the guide-book! Oh, the tales that one must listen to from one's feMow-pensionnaires ! What dull ex- changes of stale impressions, as lacking often in char- acter as the food! The purely French pension (not the international kind) is cheap, cheaper usually than those run by English-speaking persons in Paris, but to tell the truth they are usually conducted on lines far too parsimonious to suit the prodigal American. The problem of food supply is worked out a little too mathematically, and one may possibly rebel at a meat 146 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD stew, a scrimpy salad, a bit of cheese and one indif- ferent pear for the midday meal. Then, too, the in- dependent movements of the American woman are often not understood by her French fellows, and that makes a perhaps not too pleasant gossip. It is far better for a young girl to go into a French family than to attempt the life of any pension in Paris, however well recommended. Just think of the good French families who would be pleased to take as a paying guest an American girl or two. At the not exorbitant price of ten francs a day she will have board and lodging en famille, be given lessons in French (real practical lessons), be chaperoned to the lectures at the Sorbonne, to such amusements as are deemed suitable, etc. This may appear a rather mild regime for the enterprising American girl, but de- pend upon it the family will take as much pains to please as if she were a real guest. They will take her shopping and see that she gets good value for her money, as few lone American women ever do; they will not take advantage of her but may even attempt to curb her extravagances and, if they are the right sort, the rigidness and simplicity of French home- life will not prove an ineffectual antidote against precociousness. It seems rather adventuresome to send the lone woman out on a quest for rooms in a hotel-meuble, but Paris is peculiarly a city of small hotels that do not furnish meals, where rooms can be had for three or four francs a day, and such, when found of a desired and approved quality, will give the woman THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 147 old enough to take care of herself a freedom of movement that she should appreciate. Especially might this prove to be the case if she were obliged to " do " Paris in a few days. The usual French breakfast would be served by the hotel, and for her other meals she could patronise any of the restaurants which she might come across in her sight-seeing. She can, in fact, do anything that she wishes in Paris if she behaves herself. She will feel most comfortable in one of the numerous Duval establishments which are so conveniently planted around the city. Here the quality of the food is of the best, and a good, if not a bounteous meal, can be had for two or three francs and a five-cent tip. Don't forget that at all French restaurants the diner pays for the convert — table linen, knives and forks — a matter of four or six cents or more. Across the Seine, over in the Latin Quarter, there are numbers of cheap restaurants, fairly good and moderate in price, many of them patronised largely by English-speaking students of both sexes. The air is thick with art talk, and the tables are usually crowded for a brief hour or two twice a day, some- times even overflowing on to the sidewalk. Other restaurants there are in this quarter where manners are more free and had best be ignored. No prix fixe meal in Paris (usually referred to by the unknowing as table d'hote) at a less price than three francs is to be considered for a moment. Any- thing less than this must be looked upon with sus- picion, and those establishments that advertise a 148 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD dinner of eight courses for one franc fifty, or one franc seventy-five centimes, wine included; or three francs with a quarter of a bottle of champagne, should most certainly be shunned. At such establish- ments it is likely that the roast beef will come from that little shop around the corner that has a gilded horse's head over its doorway; the real roast beef comes from a butcher whose sign is a gilded steer's head. The sign language sometimes speaks louder than words. The hostile attitude of the American hotel to- wards the woman who travels alone has tinged her attitude and prejudiced her against the foreign hotel, but she need have no fear of her reception in any class of European hotel. There is scarcely any class which is not perfectly proper for her to go to, whether she drives up to the great tourist Grand Hotel in an automobile, by the common bus to the hotel of the country town, or walks in to the little village inn, with her bag in her hand. She will never be looked at askance, or even suspiciously, but will meet with the same courtesy and attention as if she was most conventionally chaperoned. If she is stared at it will most likely be out of simple curiosity and rarely as an impertinence, for the spectacle of the unchaperoned young woman is still a source of amazement to the foreigner, although along the main lines of travel he has been trained to accept her presence with a good grace. Paris is as safe for the average woman as a New England village, but Berlin, in her endeavour to be- THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 149 come a competitor of Paris in the affections of the tourist, is trying hard to get up a reputation for gaiety and wickedness, seeing that Paris has been so successful in attracting trade along these lines, and life and amusements in Berlin are being modelled more and more after those of Paris. The German may be more sincerely aggressive than the French- man, but in the case of the Frenchman it is often a mischievous schoolboy desire to tease the foreign " Miss " and see if he can give her a start, rather than any real deviltry; her mixture of what he considers boldness and prudery is very amusing to him. 150 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The safety of any woman lies in her own hands, and there is no reason why she can't tour Europe with only slight annoyances of a personal nature which fade away if ignored. Railway travel anywhere in Europe is disagree- able, but especially so in France. The construction of the carriages, whether of the old type with the door at either side, or the corridor train, where the movements of one person disturb every one else, is largely responsible for this, but the travellers so hav- ing the habit of making themselves " at home " en voyage accounts for a great deal more. The American woman often says, " How rude," while in reality it is simply thoughtlessness and a lack of knowledge of the ethics of travel. The foreigner eats most of the time while travel- THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 151 ling, often removes many of his or her garments and tries to shut out every breath of fresh air. He, or she, or the pair of them, overload the rack over one's head with curious, knobby packages which they spend most of their time taking down and putting up. They smuggle small dogs in under the seat, for which they should have bought a ticket and had car- ried in the baggage car. Of course one can object to the little beast and have it put out, but as one American girl harshly put it — she preferred the ani- mal to the people who owned it. But the English- woman in her own land is the real offender with the travelling dog, for it is usually a large one. The European express train with sleeping- and dining-car accommodations, rather cynically named " train de luxe," is really de luxe only in price and could not be made to pay a profit on even the most indifferent and roundabout American trunk lines. Besides the Wagon-lit, or sleeping-car, there is an abomination known as the fauteuil-lit, which is sim- ply a stuffed chair pulled out lengthwise, three to a compartment, with a promiscuity that is horrible even if one is travelling en famille. The lavatory does not usually deserve to be mentioned and were better not even entered. Some of the more important of the International Sleeping Car Co.'s trains are a bit in advance of this, but they are generally very crowded, expensive, in- adequate and being usually so light are most uncom- fortable at high speed. 152 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Usually the best express trains on the Continent, for which no extra fares are charged, run by night, and their capacity is almost invariably overcharged. The corridor is usually full of standing passengers, and the lone woman may have to spend the night sitting on her bag in everybody's path. Day travel is preferable, and the circumstances are rarely so pressing that a night journey cannot be avoided by a stop-over. Of course some of these annoyances and the quality of one's travelling companions can be improved if one invariably travels first class on the ordinary train, but the price is double that of the popular second class. Third-class travel is really not more objec- tionable than the second that the traveller usually patronises, and not any more crowded; it is at least amusing to see the people of the country, and wooden benches or a leather-covered seat is preferable on all counts to a stuffy cloth covering. There are ob- jections, it is true, but the herded masses of human- ity one now sees on European express trains to and from the great seaports are not far different in physi- ognomy. Railway journeys in Spain lead in inconvenience and tedium and give the traveller the impression of spending most of the time at way stations, but the carriages are cleaner than many of those of France and Italy, and in many respects the reserved Span- iard is a less objectionable travelling companion. One buys drinking water at the stations in cool, moist earthen jugs, an improvement on the rasping mineral THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 153 waters that are the only liquids beside wine that can be got mostly in Europe. The woman who does not like to be stared at should not go to Spain. The expected form of ex- pressing admiration by the Spanish man is to stare into a woman's face and make audible remarks, it is to be hoped of a flattering tenor. It is a new experi- ence to walk along the streets and be greeted with laughter and lively personal comments. The Italians are almost embarrassing with their attentions, though they take the less objectionable form of a childish curiosity, but in both cases it is a re- lief to go across the Mediterranean into north Africa. Even to the most untamed outer post of tourism — Tangiers. Yes, Tangiers, too, is all right for the lone woman, who can live in a tourist hotel there for ten francs a day or a more modest French one for seven or eight and engage a "guide" to chaperon her on her wanderings in the markets and bazaars for a small sum. The same thing is true of Algiers and Tunis. Most north African hotels have a corps of native guides, one of whom can be hired for something like three to five francs a day and who for the time being will be yours to command. While by no means a necessity, such a guide will be invaluable as a cicerone and in preventing the natives from annoying one. The Englishwoman first made Continental Europe acquainted with the lone woman traveller. There are so many Englishwomen with small incomes that one meets them alone and unattached all over Europe, 154 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD She is in quite a different class from the restless- minded American who no sooner gets into a place than she wants to know " what there is to do." This phase does not bother the Englishwoman. To tell the truth, she has a clearer idea of what it is that she wants. She is either sketching in water colours, learn- ing a language or busy occupying herself by studying the people, their literature or their mode of life. TI Boy, or man, who brings bag- gage from room 50 centimes TIPS AND TIPPING 169 Man who loads baggage on bus 50 centimes Bus driver who helps with baggage at station . . 1 franc Making quite a respectable total of . . .5 francs This may virtually amount to but half your origi- nal bill, and is of course far too great a proportion. It is easy to see that the ten per cent plan is out of business here. Try and distribute a single franc, taking an average bill of ten francs as a basis, among six persons and see what would happen. Of course for two this might well be cut down to three francs, or perhaps even two francs, fifty centimes each when the proportions come a little nearer what they ought really to be, but even then they are in the neighbour- hood of the twenty-five per cent mark. To all in- tents and purposes this is what happens in any French, Swiss or Italian hotel which lives exclusively off a tourist clientele. The axiom that the slower one travels the cheaper it becomes, applies as well to tipping. For a stay of several days, where one gives five lire for oneself alone, seven or seven and a half would cover it for two, and for a week's sojourn, ten lire would add as much to the hotel servant's seeming happiness as a larger sum. Where travellers make one-night stands the tippee scores. The scale ascends rapidly to the " grand " and the palace " hotels. It is here that the brigand of old has risen to the new conditions and disguised himself 170 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD under a gold-buttoned and gold-laced uniform and becomes a minion of a great tourist caravansary. Here he finds business quite as profitable and less dangerous, and here, too, vanishes the last vestige of the old-time relation between the giver and re- ceiver, the guest and the servant. Here the gold-braided brigade is everlastingly at one's heels, giving one the feeling of being in an asylum looked after by an only too attentive staff HALL PORTER H£AD WAITER. WAITER CHAMBER /v\/9ID of care-takers. Doors fly open before one and chairs fly from under, one is bowed through corridors and up staircases as only were the kings of old. Then monarchs made their subjects pay for the privilege, but to-day it is the subject who wins. All these menials speak the American language, at least to the extent of " good-morning," for they know how the American loves the sound of his native tongue, even though doled out in limited quantities. As you walk down the line of expectant mortals on TIPS AND TIPPING 171 the day of departure and dispense commercial solace, figuring up value given and received, you see why the ten per cent plan does not always work. At many a " palace " hotel, even, one can live for twenty or twenty-five francs a day, with another ten francs to cover wine and mineral waters and other incidentals. This works out six to seven dollars a day and may be considered good value for the money paid. These tips at these great tourist hotels, for The TIPPING m LINE VALET UeCHflm&RE PORTER. BOOTS" "BUTTONS Etc- thirty-six hours, would work out something as fol- lows, provided one could not resist the " come on " look in the hungry eyes of the staff, otherwise they might be somewhat discounted. Door porter .... 2 francs Maitre d'hotel 2 " Sommelier (waiter who serves your cafe-au-lait) 1 " Bath attendant 1 " 172 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Femme-de-Chambre . . 2 francs Porter who brings up your bags Porter who brings them down Porter who brings up trunks Porter who brings them down Nondescript individual who blackens your boots . . 50 Porter who assists you with luggage at station . . 1 50 centimes 50 I II I >> 12 francs 50 centimes And this again is nearer thirty-three and one-third per cent of the bill than ten per cent, which latter proportion, three francs, fifty centimes, would not go far among the expectant horde. One solution would be to stay on a while and run up your bill to ten or fifteen times its original amount, when again the ten per cent basis would overpay these grafters. Like the " systems " at Monte Carlo's Casino, no scheme of tipping of the preconceived order can be made to work both ways — the zero of uncertainty is always against the player. No automobile tips have been included in the above schedule. The question may be asked: has the automobile increased the size of the tip? It has introduced an entirely new conglomeration of satel- lites into the planetary sphere of servantdom. What, then, are their demands? In the small foreign hotel the stable boy, hostler or garqon d'ecurie has TIPS AND TIPPING 173 the big touring car under his charge instead of the chahes-de-poste and the berlins-de-zoyage of other days. He runs around the corner to the grocer's for gasolene, or oil, fills up the water tank, and will lend a useful and willing hand wherever wanted. This service may usually be considered worth a franc, but can often be had, with an acceptant smile thrown in, for half that sum. In a big hotel garage, like that of the Hotel Univers at Tours, in the Chateaux country, the man who fills up your gasolene tank can readily absorb a franc without a quaver, while the young fellow who ostentatiously attempts to rub the varnish off your mud-guard or the lustre off your leather cushions will eye you expectantly for fifty centimes at least. If your chauffeur hands out this thirty sous himself, it will likely be increased one hundred per cent before you pay the bill. This is not much, according to the American scale, for often enough the lodging for your automobile has been thrown in free, but all the same, on a hundred days' tour, it is a round fifty dollars thrown away for service that ought to be included in the price one pays. One gallant American, on his first trip abroad, with a party of ladies, decided that he would not annoy or inflict them with the small matter of tips. He began by paying them out of his own pocket, but after a week or two of these heart-breaking dis- bursements he finally suggested to the rest of the party that a common fund be opened for such dis- bursements, of which he was to be the cashier. And 174 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD this, by the way, is not a bad method of collectively handling the tip question by all who travel in droves. Take heed from the foreigner, especially the Ger- man, and get what hints you can. The Teuton, at least, is not always seen with his hands in his pockets about to bring forth a glitter of small coin, and yet he fares as well as the stranger from over-seas, whether from over the Channel or across the Atlantic. Two sous will accomplish for the German on the Riviera what ten will do for most of the rest of us, and there will be no noticeable difference in the quality of the service. Well he knows the secret! It comes from familiarity with the situation. The solution of the problem is to go often enough. The " personally conducted " tour that can guarantee a tipless itinerary of Europe has a financial future ahead of it. If the automobile is responsible for the rise in the scale of tips, to what heights will they not soar when the aeroplane becomes the preferred mode of conveyance. Then there will be a man to push you out of a hangar and give you a shove off, or there will be a whole army holding on to the guy-ropes of your dirigible, and all these will have to be paid. There is no limit to the possibilities of the profession which lives off of tips. One thing that will help is to keep yourself sup- plied with small coin ; then a mere ripple made in the reverse direction will sometimes keep down the in- coming wave. The English started this abominable custom on TIPS AND TIPPING 175 the Continent on the same lines as they had run things in their own country, but the American came after and noisily, recklessly and lavishly cast them into the shade. Anglo-Saxons tip, it must be confessed, to show the foreigner they at least think that they are of a superior race. This is how it looks to the Con- tinental European, though more often it is really because they are on a holiday jaunt and, like all holiday-makers who are fully in the spirit of the thing, they want everybody around them to partici- pate in their good humour, so it is they scatter a golden shower, unmindful that they are sowing a crop of dragon's teeth which will ultimately spring up an armed force to demand by right what was originally given by favour. EUROPEAN S3 (sa S3 ^ SHOPPING TOUR Caisse j THE HUNDRED-DOLLAR LIMIT DENATIONALISATION OF FOREIGN GOODS THE AMERICAN WOMAN RAISES PRICES INITIATING EUROPE TO " SHOPPING " VERSUS " BUYING " english and french clerks policy of some london shops london tailor-made harris tweeds and irish homespuns laces and linens of the emerald isle scottish plaids for any clan paris a city of small shops where the frenchwoman scores woman shopkeepers of paris paris artist-milliners department stores of paris " bon marche " professional shoppers staff of a great paris department store brussels lace diamonds of amsterdam and the rue de la paix dutch silver swiss embroidery Berlin's palatial department stores VII THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR THE BRITISH ISLES A shopping tour of Europe to-day might be defined as a stroll through that portion of New York City which lies between Twenty-third and Forty-second Streets, where most of the luxuries, and not a little of the junk of foreign manufacturers is to be found within a radius of one square mile. There is no doubt but that the enterprise of the American importer, combined with the stringent application of the hundred-dollar clause, has damp- ened the craze of the American woman for shopping around Europe. At last even the most unmethodical and unbusinesslike woman has been broken in to filling out the customs declaration with a fairly cor- rect statement of her purchases abroad, though they are apt to lose their charm and ofttimes their value under the cold, impartial scrutiny of the government appraiser, for she often wonders, when she repacks her trunks on a draughty New York steamship pier, if the pleasure of possession was worth the sum of the duty paid. As a preface to a shopping chapter, it may not be amiss to reiterate the definition of the hundred- dollar limit. It must be composed of wearing ap- 179 180 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD parel, or articles for personal use, and may not in- clude household furnishings or anything not related to the immediate wardrobe and toilet of the indi- vidual who accompanies them. Having got this fact firmly grounded in one's mind it only remains to remember that the average duties levied are about thirty per cent, while perhaps certain articles that most attract the woman shopper pay only fifty per cent. This represents the highest handicap duty. That on art is no approach compared to that levied on feminine adornments, such as feathers, laces and jewelry. As for smuggling by the amateur, it is as dead as a prehistoric mastadon encased in an arctic ice drift. From a professional point of view it is quite another matter. The charm of discovering new fields in which to shop, of bargaining in the rudiments of a foreign language, can never be eradicated by any law or custom, and will remain one of the pleasant antici- pations of that episode in the life of so many Amer- ican women which is becoming almost a yearly neces- sity — a trip abroad. But this picking out of bargains is a shattered dream so far as the tourist's rush of two or three months about Europe is concerned. It is for just her class that the European shopkeeper is catering, knowing that she has not the time, nor opportunity, for discriminating in values. He arranges specious "bargains" and fixes prices on a scale that leaves him a wide margin from which to drop and still make a fat profit. THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 181 Everywhere the manufacturers and merchants alike are making their output conform to the taste and demand of the best class of buyers — the American women. The result is that the distinctly foreign article is looking less like a novelty and more reminis- cent of what she sees at home. Thus arises a vague discontent on the part of the shopper who does not realise that she is spoiling the genuineness of the European shopping ground, and incidentally her own pleasure, in insisting upon American standards — which the shopkeeper takes to mean American prices as well. This dazzle of the dollars is blinding him not a little in his summing up of the foreign woman. Souvenir buying, too, is often carried on injudiciously. A riff-raff of plunder collected from all corners of Europe, none of it in its place of origin, is apt to lose considerably in importance and value when these reconsidered trifles are opened up at home. It may be permissible enough to buy a Swiss watch in Geneva — if one really wants one — but coral and tor- toise shell, remember, are not specialties of Paris any more than they are of Vienna, nor are all so-called Swiss hand-embroideries the real thing. Shopping is quite a personal affair, and small courtesies, by which doing business is made easier, are expected. Particularly is this so if one falls in with the Continental habit of bowing on entering or leaving the small shop, doubly so in the Latin coun- tries. It is often the lack of these little observations of courtesy that so handicap the stranger in dealing with the " natives " of a foreign land. i82 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The shopkeeper abroad has been forced to recog- nise the distinction that the American woman makes between " shopping " and " buying." It went hardly against his prejudices and traditions to spread out a counter full of goods without making a sale, and he fought against the innovation, but too much money was involved, and to the credit of the American woman belongs the victory of being able to walk about the big department stores of Paris and Berlin, without being shadowed by an insistent clerk, with the same freedom as at Macy's, Wanamaker's or Marshall Field's. This is not the case in England. The mind of the English clerk is still set in motion by old-fashioned clock work. He is obliging enough in pulling down goods for inspection, and " thanks you " every time you ask him a question or answers one himself, but he does not thank you if you don't buy; and when you understand the system you don't wonder at his insistence, even forgive it. Each time a customer gets away without his making a sale he is reprimanded by the " shop-walker," who puts a black mark against THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 183 his name. Let him get too many of the damning marks and he loses his job, and losing a job in Eng- land often means not getting another. This is still the policy in many London shops. The demeanour of the French shop clerk is almost a relief by contrast. Lie demands that you state explicitly just what you want before he will take down one thing, nor does he assume the responsibil- ity of clarifying the customer's mind by suggestions. It may be good training for the shopper, but makes for difficulties, especially as the habit of featuring new goods where they can be seen does not always hold. The small shopkeeper throughout Europe still re- sents, however, the nosing around of the inquiring American woman with no intention of buying. The polite manner soon freezes up and the innocent offender is followed by uncomplimentary mutter- ings and impertinent tosses of the head when she leaves. On a par with this is the custom of having the woman clerks " live in," a relic of the old apprentice system when the articled clerk lived under his mas- ter's roof as one of the family, but it assumes a dif- ferent aspect when it comes to housing in the attic dormitory of a great shop. This is a dreary ex- istence for one who has toiled all day to the ultimate Benefit of the masters, who make a profit in addition on meagre rooms and meals. The policy that gov- erns sales makes for another exasperating habit of the English clerk, who, when you seek to buy a 184 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD yard of ribbon, insists that you buy a coal-scuttle as well, and reels glibly off his tongue a list of the entire stock in hope that it may suggest something to your mind. The English rather like this habit of having their minds made up for them; it saves them the trouble of making out a shopping list. " No lady would think of buying a ready-made dress," the London tailor used to say, with a shocked accent on the lady, but that has changed now. There is a high-class trade in ready-made suits, largely made by the rush of Americans to London at certain sea- sons. Formerly, the Englishwoman would have considered herself on a par with the servant girl (and not so long ago, either) by wearing a ready- made gown, but since it is now being confectioned on such good lines and sold at such high prices it pleases the most fastidious. If the London tailor is even given the slightest time allowance, however, he will rise to an astonish- ing rate of speed and turn out a suit " to measure," as they say. It is not always of the fastidious finish demanded by the American, but the price will be a third cheaper than at home and made of a cloth that for a tailor-made cannot be duplicated. Harris tweeds, which were hand woven by the crofter in his " lone shieling in that misty isle," around the peat fire, used to have this same peaty smell for a trade- mark. Now the manufacturers have been clever enough to imitate the smell along with the cloth. The tweeds and the soft-coloured Irish homespuns from the handlooms of the Emerald Isle, are the THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 185 two fabrics of which the British isles may well be proud. In spite of the obsequiousness of the London shop- keeper and seeming desire to accommodate, one will be asked not to come for a fitting between four and five as " our fitter, Mr. Jenkins, will be out for his tea." This is a dead hour for business in England; go through the busiest offices, and desks will be seen littered over with plum cake and teacups; or get into a private office by mistake, and a party of clerks will be gathered cosily around a tea-table. The late hour of closing — seven to eight o'clock — is responsi- ble in a measure for this. Prices in the best London shops are in guineas, the pound plus a shilling. The coin does not exist, but the extra shilling makes a " gentleman's " price, es- pecially designed and kept alive for the aristocracy and Americans. One advantage for the latter is that it is nearer the value of five dollars than the plebeian pound. Irish linen, contrary to what is usually the case, can really be bought often to better advantage in its home town, Belfast, than anywhere else, and it's worth while taking what is always an uncomfortable voyage across the Irish Channel if only to lay in one's stock of linen and Irish laces with the assistance of the pleasant Irish salesmen, full of Blarney, even though he is a long ways away from the Blarney- stone. It is preferable to shopping for the same thing in London with the cold, mechanical London clerk reeling off " thank yous " as fast as he does the lace. 186 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD In this case one can visit the cottages about Dublin, for much of the lace is still made by the cottagers at home, who are always delighted to see any Amer- icans, whom they really regard more as blood rela- tions than their cousins across the Channel. Of course it is amusing to buy some lace as a souvenir from a cottager, but, like everything else, it is well to deal with the big establishments. Certain pat- terns will be made specially for the buyer, and mono- grams can always be furnished on short notice, and at wonderfully reasonable rates. Of course there are shops in London devoted to the Irish industries that do an enormous business, largely with the Americans, but it is rather curious to the outsider, who still calls the British Isles England, to find how much jealousy there is in England regarding the Irish products. The beautiful Irish silk poplins are kept in stock by all the big London houses because they have to, but they really often require digging out, and persistence, in order to convince the clerk that you will have the real Irish poplin, not any corded silk of doubtful make. You will sometimes even be told that they will be obliged to send to Ireland for it, unless you have been forewarned, and can produce a sample of the very thing you want that had come from this very shop. No wonder the Irish want Home Rule! Only sentiment can beautify the Scotch plaid, but one can always find a plaid to suit's one's clan, and a clan to suit one's taste, if they only look for it across the border. Your Scotch friend will tell you THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 187 that nobody but Americans shop on Princes Street; the canny Scot knows where to find prices less ele- vated. If you want a plaid, — and there is nothing better for the steamer rug after all, — it is best to deal directly with the manufacturer, who gets out an excellent catalogue showing the plaids of all the clans in colour. It is possible in this way to make a choice and have your purchase sent on to meet you at any point if you do not wish to investigate the matter further yourself. FRANCE In spite of its grands magazins, and they are growing grander and more numerous every day, Paris is a city of small shops. The French are per- sonal and distinctive in all their business relations, and this is probably the reason why they still cling to the small shop and the small hotel. The shop- keeper wants to do just enough business and keep at it long enough to be able to retire as a rentier before he arrives at too advanced an age, and live in a tiny suburban villa not too far away from Paris. Nothing could be more distasteful to him than to be obliged to increase his business at the expense of more trouble and work. The French shopper wants to deal where things are not so rushed but that she can talk confidentially over her prospective purchases, take her time and thus be able to feel that she has done a little suc- cessful bargaining. 188 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Ask the Frenchwoman about the " Bon Marche " and the other big Paris shops that the American tourists so dearly love, under the impression that they are getting things " oh, so cheap! " and she will say how dear they are, because she has some little shop around the corner at which she can get real bargains. But the stranger cannot get the same prices that she does. That is why the big Paris department stores — with their fixed prices — are much safer and more satisfactory shopping ground for the stranger. Prices in the small shop, not only of Paris but of all Europe, are as variable as the barometer, on which the appearance of the American buyer acts like an area of high pressure. The small shop that specialises is the feature of Paris shopping. One goes to a trunk shop to buy a trunk, a corset shop for corsets, a glove place for gloves or a shop that deals entirely in lingerie, where any special embroidery will be done the customer may desire. These are the places where real bargains can be got, but they are found only on the side streets, in unpretentious courts, sometimes up a flight of stairs — not on the grand boulevards. "Ma cherie, you are crazy to pay boulevard prices," says your French friend; " the same thing costs double there." But a knowledge of French and the Frenchwoman is neces- sary to shop to advantage in the small shop all the same. It is the Frenchwoman who is the small Paris shopkeeper. What genius the nation has for selling, THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 189 which is not much (the French are not by instinct commercial), centres in the women. The Parisian shopkeeper, neatly dressed, not a hair of her coiffure out of place, sits behind the counter, knitting lace or doing fancy work. Beside her, on the counter as likely, sleeps a fluffy cat — a peaceful picture. Ma- dame is polite, but not too urbane; she has none of the servility of the small British shopkeeper. A cal- culating gleam comes into her eyes at one's first words of French — no matter how good. There will prob- ably be the sign, " English spoken," outside, but this means nothing very often but the ability to say " good-morning " and " good-bye," and is only put on as a bait. Madame prefers that her customer should be hampered by language rather than herself. It is not to the real advantage of the European shop- keeper to know how to speak English, though they often understand a good deal, which is well for cus- tomers to remember when discussing pros and cons among themselves. In dealing with madame one must have a fairly good knowledge of values to hold up one's end in the encounter of wits. The most satisfactory of the small shops is that of the modiste, and one that it is almost a necessity for the stranger shopper to patronise, as the millinery departments of the department shops are one of their least satisfactory features. Just a plain milliner may exist anywhere, but the modiste is a product of Paris. She is not merely a craftswoman; she is an artist, with an artist's understanding of colour and of form. A hat in her hands is not a thing of measurements igo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD and calculation, but an inspiration, born of the brains that rest in her fingers' ends. Hers is the most typical of those " delightful little shops " to be found at their best not too far away from the Rue Royale. Quite often she has gone into the business as a " career " impelled, as is the artist, by the call of genius. Sometimes she may come of an aristocratic family, who hides her origin under the patronymic of " Alexandrine," or " Pauline," or " Victorine," or some one of those names that only suggests the Parisian modiste. Often enough in the least commercial neighbour- hoods the more modest shops are up two or three flights of stairs, and no elevators either. But often as good results come out of these upper rooms with no show windows to advertise as in the bigger es- tablishment on the rez-de-chanssee with the plate- glass windows, though it is true that what is to be seen in the windows is no criterion of what may come out of a French shop. To use a British commercial expression, the French do not " put their goods in the front window." No French shop, be it great or small, will ever show its latest modes or most exclusive models in the win- dow; not even for the sake of attracting custom will the French modiste set out her choicest ideas where they may be copied. Americans often criticise the styles that they see in their survey of shop windows, and are heard to declare that they had seen the new- est thing before they left home, but they ignore the fact that madame, who presides over the destinies When the Native Lady Goes Shopping in North Africa THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 191 of the shop, must have full confidence that you are really a customer before she will bring out her best. She will never learn the open-minded American pol- icy of baiting her shop windows with her best. In England it is exactly the contrary; the window often contains the shop's whole stock, and one who is curi- ous may enter and find no greater variety inside. In general, it is this lack of a large stock which is a puzzling phase of the shopping question abroad for the American. The Parisian shopkeeper, when she is sure of her customer, when she finds that she is not just pricing things, can be the most charming of sales persons. She has the art of enveloping her customer with a personal interest that gives such a charm to the little individual shops of Paris. No one can combine tact, winning ways and business method so well as the vraie Parisienne — when she wishes. If you want to find an American in Paris look for her, and for him too, in the " Bon Marche," for the American man confesses to the usefulness of this universal provider. To this internationally known establishment is due the credit of having introduced the department store and the fixed price into Euro- pean commerce, thus simplifying shopping abroad for the English-speaking person. Modelling after came " The Grand Magazin du Louvre," that draws the American as much as the palace itself; the " Prin- temps," the " Trois Quartiers," and the " Galleries Lafayette " came after, and in all of them the cheer- THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD ful American voice can be heard almost as much as the French itself. The policy of the grm*d g BtN towards its foreign clientele is a liberal one. Goods are sent on approval in any quantity, and left for a decision for so remarkable a length of time that it astonishes the buver from overseas, who is also surprised that the boy who brings them around wants a tip for having done so. One can call for an English-speaking clerk, and make all purchases under his guidance. " There are nearly seventy oi us who speak English." he will tell you at the " Bon Marche." " and perhaps a hundred and fifty who understand it to some extent." For this reason alone one will find it easy enough to shop here without any knowledge of the Gallic tongue. Everything is plainly tagged with the price, but the clerk-guide will save time. The geography of these shops is not always the same, as they have a confusing way of shifting the position of goods. To any one accustomed to the broad spaces and sys- tematic arrangements of the American store, these big Paris magazines are crowded and uncomfortable to shop in. Confusion seems to reign on all sides. One has to follow the clerk with one's purchase up to the caisse, pay for it there and wait until it is wrapped up, which means, sometimes, standing in line, and spending more time than was spent on the actual buying. Two or three dozen excited women gathered about a desk, trying to identify packages THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 193 and make change, has its parallel only in a bargain sale at home. The " Bon Marche " has the repute of being what its name advertises — the best bargains and cheapest prices for the quality. The " Louvre " is more ex- pensive and perhaps carries a better grade of stock, but has not the variety of the " Bon Marche." The " Galleries Lafayette " have a reputation for lingerie, white goods and silks, while the " Printemps " is on much the same order as the " Bon Marche," with the " Samarataine " a trifle lower down the scale. There is a class of women making a business of hanging around these shops and coming to the assist- ance of the stranger when mired in the intricacies of a foreign language. Their motives are usually of a frankly obvious commercial aspect, and one wonders that the custom is allowed to exist. The American's reputation for free-spending has developed all kinds of Parisian parasites. The professional shopper is sometimes useful on occasions, particularly in Paris, but the pleasure of shopping, as in many other things, often lies as much in what one discovers for themselves as in the achieve- ment of possession. One class of Paris professionals can be made very useful. Almost any of the large shops will send a professional packer to fill one's trunk, with the disorder which usually accompanies a more or less prolonged hotel stay. Prices for this service are reasonable enough, but the genuine travel- ler should learn the art for herself. A curious feature of the foreign shops is the side- 194 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD walk display of their cheaper classes of goods, where sales are made by employees, who stand for ten or twelve hours a day in all weathers at these side- walk counters. They are among the minor em- ployees, and get not over forty or fifty francs a month. As they rise to the important inside depart- ments their ardour and aptitude is spurred on by a commission of one to three per cent, in addition to a salary of fifty or sixty francs, which brings their wages up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred francs a month, besides which they are lodged and fed if they have no home in the city. All this varies somewhat in the different establishments, but a capa- ble sales persons should receive about fifty dollars a month. Employees can be sent away on twenty-four hours' notice, and there is a system of fines that are likely to eat into profits. There is a fine for sitting down or attempting to, though there is nothing but the edge of a drawer that could be utilised (in England seats in the shops have been made compulsory), a fine for not putting back goods on the shelves promptly and for talking, except on business. It is a hard schedule for a day that begins at eight and ends at eight, with a half-hour for lunch and another for dinner. Where the employees " live in," the men and women are entirely separate in their leisure and work; what their morals may be when they take their evenings and Sundays out might be summed up in many cases as " mysterious." THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 195 The small shopkeeper closes his shop at midday for an hour or two for the noon meal and a siesta or a game of dominoes with a friend at the cafe. This is what one meets with all over Italy, France and Spain, even where the shops live just on the business of the tourist. At most some one can be roused from a family dinner in the back to come to wait on an exigent customer, but usually the souvenir must go unbought until signor, sehor or monsieur gets back on the job again. HOLLAND AND BELGIUM Every coachman and taxicab driver is in league to see that you don't forget your lace when you come to Brussels. No matter in which direction you drive, whether to a restaurant or picture gallery, you in- variably find yourself brought up before one of the many shops, each one of which claims to be the oldest establishment devoted to the manufacture of the fa- mous Rose Point. Indeed, they all seem to carry an equally good stock, and prices are seemingly reasonable. It has been said that the only two real bargains in Europe to-day are jewels and lace, so much has the average European shopkeeper raised his prices to meet American standards. All of Brussels seems to have lace fever, your hotel porter, your boarding-house keeper, all have a favoured house where they declare you can get the best bargain in laces. It is very interesting to visit one of the manufactories, for the lace which was '196 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD once made altogether in homes is now manufactured on businesslike and commercial lines, and in the process, as usually happens, artistic value has been sacrificed to a large output. It is not then astonish- ing that there is so much cheap Brussels lace in the shops of Brussels. There is the Mechlin lace, too, which can be bought in Brussels quite as well as in Mechlin or Malines, but all these little Flemish cities are worth a visit on their own account, whether you are hunting bargains or not. The linen of Ghent, too, is said to rival that of Dublin, though the prices are slightly higher, but the old bleaching grounds still around these old Flem- ish cities are evidence enough that the bleaching is done on the correct lines and not by artificial means. No one ever got through Belgium yet without a desire to possess a supply of the old copper and brass utensils still in common use. Enthusiastic art stu- dents are conscienceless enough to carry off their water jars in their trunks when they leave the delight- ful little village where they have spent the summer sketching, but as most of these charmingly battered brass jugs can be bought from their owners for some- thing less than a dollar one could afford to be moral. Amsterdam is the centre of the diamond industry, but for the shopper tourist more of these stones are offered in the Rue de la Paix than in this quaint old Dutch capital. There is nothing that makes such a stir in the business circles of Amsterdam as a big sale of diamonds, and if one does venture on buying THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 197 a fifty-thousand-dollar necklace of these precious stones, it is well to understand that it is like sending a wireless around the world. One's home govern- ment, and dealers alike, it is hinted, keep wonderfully correct tabs on any transaction of magnitude in Eu- rope where jewels are involved. Silver is another specialty of Amsterdam. It used to be old Dutch silver, but it is rather difficult to get the genuine article now, even at any price. How- ever, such excellent and ingenious replicas of the old Dutch spoons, ornamented with wind-mills whose sails turned round, and plump cows and quaint Dutch figures are offered, that they are quite as well worth buying as were the originals, and the prices will be quite stiff enough too. SWITZERLAND One shops in Switzerland for embroideries, for knit underwear, for watches and for furs — certainly a catholic assortment. Saint Gall is the centre for the embroidery trade, done so cleverly by ingenious machines that it might pass for handwork; it is quite possible that much of it is bought by the tourist under this delusion, but this is their own mistake. Formerly most of it was done in the homes, like so much of the product of the peasant industries of Europe, but it is concen- trating in central factories that, with constantly im- proving machines and the big output, are killing off the hand embroideries. So much is this so that only iq8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD in Apenzall is any great volume of real hand em- broideries to be found. The little girl embroideresses, who sit outside of the big embroidery shops of Lucerne, are survivals in a way, and are mostly from this canton. Their tight braids are held with the silver comb of the Apenzall, and they, like the little waitresses, wear the peasant costume, and bend above their embroid- ery frame, over the eye-de- stroying work, at the hours that the women turn out from the Luzernerhof and the Hotel National for the excitement of strolling through the tasteful and tempting lace and embroidery shops. They do also the initial work so much in demand on purchases, and the delicate ornamentation of the handkerchiefs and small articles. In the lavishly embroidered underwear the quality of the material is not infrequently sacrificed to an elaborate decorative effect; this is true of the cheaper grades at least. It is an open question as to how much more profit- able it is to load down trunks with knitted underwear, under the impression of getting bargains, which they certainly are not after the duty is paid, than buying THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 199 the same thing at home. And does one come abroad for such prosaic goods? Far better the watch of Geneva, which in price holds its own against much equally good competition at home and abroad. The watches are, to a large extent, still made in the homes of the workers by piece work, and from Swiss workshops came the in- vention of the thin, non-bulky watch, dearly beloved of the woman, some of them not much thicker than a fifty-cent piece. As for furs it is possible that one might catch up on expenditures here, for the dressing of furs, if not the growing of them, very nearly reaches per- fection in Geneva. Perhaps one buys more milk chocolate than any- thing else in what is usually a hurried rush across the Alps. There are many brands of this, almost as thin as the watches, but it doesn't make much differ- ence which mark one prefers, for most of them are in a trust. Wood-carvings are supposed to be a low-priced specialty of Switzerland, but they are quite as low- priced and equally attractive at Saint Claude, in the French Jura, and in any one of a half-dozen Black Forest villages. GERMANY In shopping in Germany one is more apt to get the real thing than in many Continental countries. There is a penalty if the shopkeeper advertises a thing other than as it is; if it is part silk and cotton 200 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD mixed he cannot sell it as all silk, nor can he advertise in the grandiose fashion of our own land and others, to the effect that a certain article is the best in the world, that there is none so good and like statements of a misleading nature. Germany is growing to be the most progressive country in Europe, and is not behind in its shops. One of the most complete department stores in all of Europe is in Berlin in the Passage Kaufhaus. It is one of a chain of great department stores, and is an exposition in itself, decorated in the ornate Ger- man taste, after the most modern development of the art-nouveau. The attractions of our department stores pale beside the glitter, electrically lighted fountains and gorgeous marbles that suggest, truth to tell, a beer-hall quite as much as a place to shop. German department stores and her beer-halls rival each other in magnificence. Both are " done up " in the gorgeous ornate modern style of German art, florid, overpowering, loaded down with orna- ment, heavy and massive, like the Germans them- selves. No matter how the most modern of art be applied to decoration the influence of the mediaeval German art influences it still. German goods and German taste do not make a strong appeal to the American taste; the Germans have not a happy sense of colour; they are peculiarly tasteless in their colour combinations. Their workmanship is of the best, however, that is, in the expensive grade of goods. Austrian novelties attract the American perhaps more than any at the present time. From both THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 201 Germany and Austria come ornamental leather work, coloured and stamped leathers, small articles for per- sonal use. The coloured, stamped designs, quaint figures and landscapes on tablecloths, on children's aprons, and the coloured table linen in blue, white and red de- signs is very popular among the Teutons; indeed it is hard apparently for the Germans to get away from staring colours, but heavens, how inartistically it is used! ITALY Florence is the shopping centre of Italy; it cer- tainly gives a fillip to the ordinary procedure of buy- ing things to make purchases in shops that have been in business, if not from Dante's day, at least back in the mists of a couple of hundred years, which fact is not a small asset with some of the shops of Italy. Of course one must bargain in Italy, and any notable bargain price simply means that you are getting some- where within sight of the original price at which the article was intended to be sold. The Italian shopkeeper is ingenious and appeals to the bargain instinct latent in the inveterate shopper by giving a commission besides on purchases to those who can bring trade to his shop. There are women to whom the treasures of the Uffizzi and the Pitti Galleries are as nothing compared with getting a lire or two thrown off of intrinsically valueless bits of bric-a-brac, which in the end they have to give away as presents to get rid of. 202 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Italy is a little too much like a big bric-a-brac shop. The lace and embroidery industries that are being encouraged in many places, such as Sienna and in Sicily, are more worthy of patronage, and if nice, white, sugar-loaf marble statues are required it is worth while to turn out of the modern Pilgrim's Way long enough to visit the quarries of Carrara, near Massa, where they originate. If Italy has one specialty it is hats — the straw hats of Tuscany that can be bought at any price in the markets of Italy, even for a few cents. Every woman and child plaits straw for these hats. One sees them in town and country alike mechanically THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 203 manipulating a handful of straw as the peasant woman of France eternally clicks her knitting needles, all this for a few cents a day. Felt hats, too, come from Italy, and there is foundation for the rumour that some of the best American felt hats with Broadway trademarks come into being by way of Italy. The American tourist is trusted abroad in all money dealings with a confidence that is astonishing and almost touching, making them blush for their home business methods. The ease with which credit is thrust upon them speaks well for the way in which Americans abroad have met their end of touring obli- gations. Of course the fact that the foreigner sees Americans through a golden nimbus has something to do with this, but certain it is that he treats them with a liberality that he does not display towards his own people. The shopkeeper will put himself to no end of trouble for his customers from over the sea, and the big Paris shop will send hundreds of dollars of goods to your hotel without any guarantee but your expressed desire to make a selection. One can have C.O.D. packages follow them all over Europe, and such have been known to turn up six days out at sea on the return voyage. A piece of antique jewelry catches your fancy in Florence, but as you will not be able to tell the exact state of your finances until you get to Rome you forego even the pleasure of thinking that you would like to own it. That is nothing; the obliging shopkeeper offers to send a clerk down to Rome with the jewel, deliver- 204 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD ing it to you there against payment. Somehow or other you get away from the shop, but somehow or other you have also impressed your name and ad- dress upon the proprietor. You forget Florence in your eternal round of the Eternal City, and go on to Naples in the same forget- ful mood, and though he may not have caught up with you as yet, the clerk and the jewel are on your trail. On the gang-plank of the homeward bound steamer he smilingly confronts you — you who have only an exhausted letter of credit left — with the package. It is easy to see what profit the transaction must represent. Just imagine a situation wherein a New York shopkeeper chased a prospective customer as far as a Boston steamship pier, on no greater encouragement than a mere glance of approba- tion. In a diligence of the Swiss Federal Post, with its six horses creeping laboriously up the Furka Pass, sat an elderly woman from a western prairie town. Her knotted hands had known the broom and wash- tub in days not so very long ago, but seriously, in- telligently and conscientiously, she was doing her European stint in the wake of a progressive daugh- ter. They had only a few scant days in which to reel off the Rhine, after Switzerland, and get to their steamer, but throughout that Alpine mountain climb the burden of the old lady's talk was that Paris must be revisited for at least two days; " for you know, my dear," this to the reluctant daughter, " before THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 205 we go back I must get me that black cashmere dress." After all, is this not what shopping abroad means — going back home with that dress bought in Paris, and for whose sake we are willing to defy even the hundred-dollar limit. am man DRESS IN HARMONY WITH SURROUNDINGS INFLUENCE OF CLOTHES ON THE MIND AVOIDING THE LABEL OF " TOURIST " THE AMERICAN GIRL AND THE SHIRTWAIST INDIVIDUALITY OF THE FOREIGN WOMAN THE HAT A EUROPEAN CLASS DISTINCTION AMERICAN ATTITUDE TOWARDS THINGS FRENCH EVENING DRESS THE CLOSE FRENCH CUT UNECONOMIC BLUE SERGE DELICATE MATTER OF LINGERIE THE " DESSOUS " PROFITABLE TRADE OF THE CORSET-MAKER CLOTHES AND THE GERMAN WOMAN THE FRENCHWOMAN'S METHODS EXPENSE ACCOUNT OF A PARISIENNE SOME FRENCH ECONOMIES " MAKING UP " DISTINCTION OF THE AUSTRIAN WOMAN WHERE STYLES ORIGINATE BERLIN ADAPTS PARIS MODELS HATS IN SPAIN SPANISH LENTEN DRESS ARISTOCRATIC DRESSMAKERS OF LONDON VIII CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN There was once an American woman with a tem- perament who made a point of dressing as nearly as was practicable in the style of the particular country through which she happened to be travelling, declar- ing that by putting oneself as nearly as possible in a mental and outward harmony with one's surround- ings, that then only could one arrive at a just esti- mate of values and get to know intimately a foreign country and its people. Acting on this theory she went to Redfern's in London for the severest of tailor-mades, while for Scotland the same house turned her out a travelling dress of shepherd's plaid, with which she wore a jaunty Scotch cap, ornamented with a pheasant's feather and a cairngorm buckle. In Ireland she wrapped herself in the long red cloak of the peasant woman, and only regretted that she could not carry a shillalah, but made up for the lack of it with even- ing gowns of Irish lace and silk poplin. Paquin de- signed her a trottoir of the approved French scanti- ness that fitted like a glove and was a size too small, but in which she could cultivate the chic air of the Parisienne, carrying at the same time a toy terrier under her arm. 209 210 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD She turned sportswoman and hunted in the Aus- trian forests with skirts to her knees, long leather boots, and an eagle's feather stuck in a green Tyro- lean hat. It was all her friends could do to keep her from embarrassing them by going about Holland looking like a " Baker's Chocolate " girl, so she com- promised by collecting silver wire buttons from the natives and sewing them on her coat and wearing as many extra petticoats as she could comfortably get about in. She plaited her hair in braids in Germany, wore a military, visored cap, and a woollen blouse, and discarded her Parisian corsets. In Switzerland her Alpine hat was always wreathed in eidelweiss, and she never went out without an alpenstock, though she never climbed higher than the embroidery shops in the village. In Italy she hung herself about with coral chains, and in Spain dressed in discreet black, with a black lace scarf in place of a hat, and dis- carded her Baedeker for a fan. With no mean ability as a linguist and much dramatic instinct she was thus able to project her- self into sympathetic relations, to her own satisfac- tion at least, with those with whom she came in con- tact. Naturally much of the lady's time was spent in tailor and dressmaking establishments, but some modified scheme on these lines might be of real assist- ance to the tourist. Aside from the scientific deduction that dress does influence the mind, it is well, if possible, not to em- phasise the fact that one is a tourist any more than J CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 211 can be avoided. The fact is patent enough and the American woman will find it to her advantage to modify, when she goes abroad, any pronounced style of dress tending to stamp her with too much in- dividuality and unduly blazon her nationality abroad. This is not by desire to discount her patriotism and undervalue her national pride, but simply in her own interests. It is not either that she should dress like the foreign women en tour — the patron saint of fashion (if there is one) forbid! No nation can send out into the world women so correctly and ap- propriately dressed for the journey as can America. The American woman's shoes, belts and neckwear are an object lesson to feminine Europe. But by studying the little differences that exist between one's own taste and that of the foreigner, adopting acces- sories of toilet that mean both much and little and eliminating any marked mannerisms of dress, the American woman can save herself from many little side annoyances that breed those complaints so often made against foreign manners and foreign looks especially. If expense is any object, to give the native as little chance to classify the traveller as possible does away with much of the overcharge and accusa- tions of extortion that are beginning to embitter the American in his relation with the foreigner. An observing Scotchman remarked once that the reason the American girls looked so much alike must be because they all wore shirtwaists. Certain it is that the American woman is less individual in her dress than the rest of femininity, and the catch phrase 212 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD of shop-clerk and dressmaker alike in America is: " Everybody is wearing it " — this is the first, mid- dle and last argument in favour of any newly- launched article of wearing apparel. No woman keeps closer in touch with the changes in fashions than does the Frenchwoman, but she can always give them a turn that is best suited to her personality, and no matter how pronounced the mode she invariably stamps it with her individuality. So does the German and English and Italian woman, though not always to their advantage, not having the discriminating taste of the Frenchwoman to be- gin with. When the American woman gets on the other side, this trait of dressing like everybody else becomes more apparent. If it is the season for green veils, a verdant streamer flies from every hat; if it is the cult of the velvet bow, every girl's chin nestles in one. The hats are all tipped at the same angle, all orna- ment is of the same family design, — with the stron- gest individuality of all feminine creation the Ameri- can woman shows it least in her outward appear- ance. The blue serge suit is almost a uniform for the travelling American woman. Thoughtfully con- sidered, it is one of the most uneconomical and unsuit- able of materials for hard wear, which fact the automobile is demonstrating, and incidentally is giving it a hard knock by bringing into favour mixed goods of indeterminate colours. The soft greenish-greys that the English affect so much CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 213 for outing clothes, the kind that one could fall into the water with and come out looking all right with a little brushing off, are fast catching on among fer- vents of the automobile of both sexes. Nothing attracts more attention than the recent fad of the bare head. When the American woman breez- ily motors through the towns or along the country roads, carries her hat in her hand in the train and bares her head to cooling mountain breezes on an outside seat on the top of an Alpine diligence, it provokes not a little comment and not a few smiles by the way. A Frenchwoman explained the situation. " Mon amie, never go without a hat, or you will be taken for a peasant woman, not even does a lady go across to a neighbour's without putting on a hat, she does not even sit in her own garden bareheaded — outside the house the chapeau est toujours de rigueur." So the wearing of a hat is a class distinction, evi- dently to be rigidly observed if one does not want to lose caste, but Americans have introduced many things abroad and they may be successful with this craze if their fickle fancy doesn't meanwhile turn to something more novel. The prevailing attitude of the feminine world is towards all things French in dress. That it is French necessarily implies always something a little overgay, something that is outre — not to say wicked — and this is a fact which often biases the usually discriminating American woman in selecting her Paris dresses. Un- less things are decidedly " loud " or bizarre she feels 214 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD that they may not be sufficiently " Frenchy " in style to be unmistakably genuine. The keen Parisian milliner and dressmaker, know- ing this, fosters this spirit, or rather delusion, and fits out his American patrons in costumes and toilet accessories that are only affected by the people of the stage and the " queens of the left hand," and while the American is getting wiser in this respect, and the sharp-witted Parisian will not be slow to follow, it is true that a certain class of spendthrift Americans has for long been a profitable joke to those plungers in the Bourse des Chiffons. Genuine French dressing is distinguished by a care- fully studied sobriety and an exquisite and harmoni- ous blending of colour. These are its real character- istics, and any combination that " hits one in the eye," to use their own phraseology, too vividly, may be set aside as being a spurious trashy thing. A lot of poor and unworthy stuff is sent out — even from Paris; there are even plenty of genuine antiques that are bad art, so it is not strange that all Parisian clothes are not in good taste. The Englishwoman has an air of " full dress " about her evening costume that is never so notice- able in the American; the latter is still averse to baring her head and shoulders in public places, while the Englishwoman goes to the theatre, to public restaurants as well as those in hotels, in a decollete evening gown and no hat. She does the same thing on the Continent and gets stared at, for while low- neck is universal, where society goes at least, the CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 215 women of other countries make a point of wearing a hat — only called so by courtesy sometimes, but still the head is covered. Under the same circumstances the American may wear richer clothes but will be more puritanically veiled, although she may too dis- card the hat. Paris is the woman's city through this same question of clothes. Paris still makes the fashions. Breathlessly do all makers and wearers of feminine garments await the edict and laws of this despotic queen who reigns by the banks of the Seine, but wisely is the American adapting them to her own style. The broad-shouldered, deep-chested American woman realises that what is suitable for the slight, small-boned Frenchwoman does not become her ath- letic lines. Fewer dresses are being made in Paris, though their workrooms are being haunted more and more if but for the snippings that fall from the scissors of those artists of the needle. And though the Parisian dressmaker is trying to give the desired American cut, sleeves are still too short, armholes too tight and backs too narrow. The tradition of the Paris woman is a question of line. The lines of the form must be accentuated, not hidden, hence everything is close-fitting; also the motive of economy enters into it and, as in most things French, cloth is scrimped to the closest possible margin. This makes for trimness and chicness it is true, and with her well-coiffed hair, slightly gummed to stay in place, the Frenchwoman does produce a harmoni- ous whole, beside whom the best-groomed woman 216 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD of other lands at times is apt to look the least bit frowsy. But it is to the dessous that belongs the real credit of the elegance of the Frenchwoman. This delicate matter of lingerie is her peculiar heritage, and in the gout des deshabilles she rightly declares lies the whole secret of the fine art of dress. A Frenchwoman spends more money on her under- garments than on her dress, and she never econo- mises on her corsets. From the woman of society down the scale to the little shop-girl, all equally recognise the importance of the dessous, and French lingerie has become the standard set for the well- dressed woman. This taste in lingerie comes not only from an innate elegance, but is made possible through the education and ability of the Frenchwoman with her needle. Her school-work is largely the science of embroidery, and rarely is the Frenchwoman, at home or abroad, without a bit of needlework in her hands, and in odd moments she makes herself much of the laces and embroideries for her garments. Even the most uncouth French peasant girl is taught the art of embroidery of an elementary kind. The under- garments of the French workingwoman are, as to quality and garniture, a revelation in comparison with those of the same class elsewhere. The Frenchwoman would as soon think of buying a ready-made dress as a stock corset; both are equally repugnant to her taste, a feeling that runs down the entire scale of feminine France. The modish woman CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 217 will willingly spend as much as fifty to five hundred francs on a pair of corsets and have one for each costume, while the petty bourgeoise will pay from twenty to thirty-five francs for corsets made to order, though she will make her own dresses and skimp on the children's food to do it. This practice is responsible for the trade of the corsetiere, one of the most lucrative professions open to women in France. Paris suburbs are full of the comfortable little homes of retired corsetieres and their husbands who have retired also on the for- tunes made in the manufacture of these " les armoi- ries des femmes." Corset shops abound all over France and in the provincial towns the general stores often do not stock corsets at all. They can be made as cheaply as the ready-made. The French department store corset, however, is more expensive than the same grades in America, and is very often either of American or German make. As one leaves France behind, the elegance of the corset diminishes. Whether to the practice of not wearing corsets, so general in Germany, is due the shapelessness of the German article of commerce, or whether it is that the inartistic lines of the home- made product have discouraged the wearing of them, the fact is that the corset has been largely discarded, a fact which puts the last accent on the unfortunate lack of taste of the German woman, and is respon- sible for that national institution — the German waist- line. 218 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The Frenchman has expressed his disapproval of the heavy calf-skin American shoe : " Pas pour les dames," he says, and the Frenchwoman listens. The eye of man is the mirror in which she gauges her at- tractiveness; above all does he admire femininity. All the same, the American shoe, or a fairly good French imitation of it, is deposing the Louis Quinze heel and unnaturally long vamp shoe that has made every one wonder how the French footwear ever got its reputation for grace and beauty. Another shattered tradition is that of the heavy English walking-boot. The English wear most gen- erally a thinner-soled shoe than the American. The American shoe is gaining in favour, though the Eng- lishwoman complains it does not stand up under the strain of getting wet most days in the year as does the more acclimatised British article. The Frenchwoman may have lost her feet to a foreign shoe, but she has kept her head. The French hat is made an integral part of the coiffure and is not simply an inverted basket of bizarre orna- ment. The secret of the Frenchwoman's hat lies really in the care which she gives to the arrangement of her hair and the accuracy with which she poses the hat upon her head. If the Frenchwoman is the fashion mannequin who promenades the world's stage before an inter- national audience of buyers, it is well to study her methods nevertheless. She spends less on her dress and gets better results than woman of any other nationality. How does she do it? Economy alone CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 219 won't accomplish it, though she is past mistress in the art. To begin with, dress to the chic woman is a busi- ness, not an amusement or the excitement of merely " buying something " regardless of its suitableness or use. Then she follows the injunction of the an- cient philosopher: " Know thyself." No vagaries of fashion can possibly lead her to fall in the pit of unbecomingness. She has catalogued her good points, and knows how to accentuate them. Like all her people she is at heart an artist, which she com- bines with a financial sagacity that is remarkable. The chic Parisienne does not always patronise the " grands faiseurs," but by a system of shopping around finds out when a " premiere " or head- saleswoman of one of the big couturiers is about to set up in business for herself. As often happens, such a one will give astonishing reductions to attract the clientele of her former employers. This is one of the ways by which feminine Paris dresses as well and more economically than the stranger who comes with- out a roadmap to the heart of this land of fashions. Just here may be put in a word of warning. Don't trust too implicitly to that class of Parisian woman who, for a money consideration, or a friendly inter- est, guides the footsteps of the tourist through the shops and offers to take them to her own dressmaker, or her special little modiste whom she can influence to let one have things so cheaply. The stranger stands a better chance of getting fair treatment at the well- known shops. The petty graft of the " Commis- 220 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD sion," which always in the end comes out of the client, taints the attitude of Paris towards the stranger with a full purse and a meagre knowledge of the language. The true Parisienne is not anxious to give away her secret economies. A Frenchwoman would commit most of the sins in the calendar rather than be demode, and one way in which she keeps keyed up to the latest harmonies of fashion is by using cheap material and following closely in the wake of new models. It is thus that she is able to appear at the correctly ordained intervals required by fashion in the requisite number of new costumes throughout the year. She prefers to do this rather than buy costly and good material which could not be lightly discarded, thus being obliged to wear them after the first bloom of style had faded. Neither has the made-over any attraction for her; "it can always be detected," she will tell you. She does though understand the art of the " res- sert " — of utilising old stuff. A gown may be sold, or even exchanged, or a ball declasse dress serve as a jupon, but the remodelled dress plays no part in her wardrobe. In this she scores over the economies of her sisters of other nations. A Parisian journalist of renown has recently com- piled, after a careful study of the question, what may be considered a fair expense account of a wealthy Parisienne. It totals seventy-five thousand francs, say fifteen thousand dollars, but its purchasing power, as compared to what the American could do in Paris, may well be estimated at double that figure. CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 221 Her tailor, milliner and coiffeur use up forty thou- sand francs of this sum, the remainder being devoted to the accessories of the toilet; she is wise enough to know that nearly half of her expenditure is none too much for minor articles. Naturally this cannot be made to include jewels, other than slight ephem- eral novelties. The capable Parisienne again can often accom- plish on twenty thousand francs what an American would usually have to spend twenty thousand dol- lars to duplicate at home. But to be a thorough Parisienne on this amount requires a knowledge of values that the American must spend years, not months only, in Paris to acquire, beside being pos- sessed of a no mean financial ability. The Parisian woman plans out a campaign years ahead, replenishing certain parts of her wardrobe each year, and an intelligent system is set into opera- tion for remaking, redying and renewing other arti- cles with each season and demi-season. One year she will buy a costly set of furs, another year it will be a handsome costume trottoir from the Maison Worth instead of a new ball gown, which has served but once or twice at the opera and can thus be considered as new for the ball this year. It's a game that the capable Frenchwoman plays and plays well, for it is her real passion. She has Napoleonic ability when it comes to money matters in spite of her naivete. Any extravagance is only on the surface; she buys nothing because she " can't do without it " ; she gets 222 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD full value according to her tastes, at least, for all she spends. Still further down the scale is the pseudo-chic Paris woman who makes a wonderfully good imitation of a queen of society on four or five hundred dollars a year. The stranger cannot hope to compete with this. The fashionable dressmaker or milliner is not on her shopping list. She gets a " working out " seamstress to come to her home at from six to ten francs a day, two meals included. Together they work side by side and turn out a pale copy of one of those creations that bear on their labels, in letters of appropriate gold, the great names of the Faubourg Saint Honore or the Rue de la Paix. She makes in the same way a satisfactory substitute for twenty or thirty francs a hat that would cost five or six hun- dred on the Boulevards, and with the exception of the obvious inferiority of material she looks as well when she promenades in the Bois as one of the vrai chic mo tide. The custom of " making-up " is universal among Frenchwomen, hence the most effective and compli- cated battery of aids to beauty originate in Paris. Such is their reputation that a French label sells anything. The Frenchwoman makes no concealment; there is no furtive " touching up " for her. She dyes her hair with henna, plasters her face and paints her lips as if she is making-up for the glare of the footlights. She takes not less than an hour for her coiffure. It is carefully given a lustre with one liquid and a CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 223 glossy smoothness with another preparation. She conceals nothing. She considers her person as an artist does his picture — a work of art, and cares not at all that the brush-marks are visible so long as the artistic ensemble is satisfactory, no matter how arti- ficial it may be. Dress elsewhere in Europe is a colourless and spiritless imitation of Parisian style spoiled by local peculiarities. A notable exception is that of the Aus- trian woman, the most distinguished feminine per- sonality in Europe. The Viennese wear Parisian modes plus a distinc- tion of their own. When the foreigner wants to pay a genuine compliment to the American woman abroad he says, " Dear Madame, I thought you must be Austrian." The Austrian women in their build and style of carrying their clothes more nearly resemble 224 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the American. They are the feminine aristocracy of Europe. Berlin, Madrid, St. Petersburg, all the European capitals follow meekly the lead of Paris in styles, while the dressmakers of Paris in turn are as cos- mopolitan a guild as their world-wide clientele. Bel- gians, Austrians, English and Americans; such is the varied nationality of those that go to make up the Paris tailor and dressmaker world — the aristocrats of the profession. Do others of the countries of Europe originate any styles? Apparently not. Berlin does an enormous trade in ready-made clothing. But how? She imports Paris models, bowdlerises them, adapts them to suit her own trade and then exports them to all points of the compass — to South America — and — let it be understood — to the United States as well. In one country the hat might be, and frequently is, discarded to advantage, and that is Spain. In place of a hat the Spanish woman wears a small black lace scarf over her head, or only a piece of black net; invariably is this the case when she goes to Mass, and as the upper-class woman when seen out of doors is either going or coming from church this sombre head- dress seems universal. If the stranger woman arrives in one of the big Spanish cities in Holy Week before Easter she will feel as conspicuous in her hat as she would in a bathing costume. It is the equivalent of having a label with the words, " I am a foreigner," bound across her brow, and passersby are not shy in letting her know how eccentric they consider her taste by remarks as well as looks. CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 225 Religious etiquette prescribes the wearing of black during this week, and every woman of every grade of society is garbed in unrelieved black with the black lace head-scarf. As the week is spent visiting all the churches the effect of the streets is an unend- ing procession of these mourning gowns, and powder-whitened faces which have much to do with heightening the effect of the sehoritas' black eyebrows. Soci- ety wears rich black satins, frequently lined with stuff of another colour, a soft rose or blue. This is an in- genious way of serving both God and the World, and produces a charming effect when skirts are lifted, though it seems rather sym- bolical of the idea that penitence has not penetrated very deeply. In London what are known as the " West End " Court dressmakers are the aristocracy of the pro- fession, and not infrequently are members of the aristocracy itself, pushed into business by necessity and often bringing with them their impecunious lady friends as assistants. 226 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD This society dressmaking sometimes makes up in style what it lacks in business ability, but if one wants the right kind of dress in which to be presented at Court, it may be well to overlook an inflated bill for the advantage of being fitted out for this impor- tant occasion by one who has been through the ceremony herself, and can thus supply hints on eti- quette as well as feathers for the hair. Indeed, it is quite a business, this making of the Court costume for the democratic American woman, anxious to bow before Royalty, but then, as every one knows, woman is an aristocrat at heart. The expense of one of these costumes is of course any- thing one wishes to make it, but the Englishwoman will place the estimate not far from $1,000 for the long Court train of just so many yards, the three white feathers, and the long floating veil. Now the aspirant must be coached for her difficult part, and this means usually a Godmother quite unlike the fairy Godmothers of old, inasmuch as she does not bestow gifts herself, but expects a substantial return for her assistance. It is said that there are not a few of the reduced nobility who have gone into the business of pre- senting the wealthy American woman at Court, sell- ing their names and position for American dollars. All shopwomen wear black, and as black is really the badge of the serving class, the Englishwoman herself keeps away from it. It is very rarely that one sees it used, unless in case of mourning, and then it is even considered in good form for the friends of the CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 227 family to put on black; the servants dressing in the same hue at the expense of their masters. In London one can dress as elaborately for the street in the afternoon as one wishes, but this comes from the habit of driving rather than walking and this is the result of cheap cabs. When one can get about for twenty-five cents a time it is economy on clothes to take a cab. The same holds good in Paris, and though the Parisian is not so prodigal in cab- fares, she is most careful of her clothes, which is the underlying secret of the fresh appearance at all times. She never wears a street dress in the house, and as she lives in her peignoir until noon, her clothes get just half the wear of the ordinary woman's. The Frenchwoman has adopted half-heartedly the tailor- made — the trottoir — but she only wears it when it can't be avoided — in her rare morning outings and for travelling. In London, too, the tailor-made is not considered the proper thing after luncheon, any more than it would be after six in the evening. Credit in England is too facile; it is easy to fall into the habit of running accounts for as long as one may wish, when it is actually difficult to get a bill presented. The usual method when an account is presented is to pay something on account only. 11 Why," says the Englishman, " a tailor doesn't want his bill paid up in full; he would think he was going to lose his customer's patronage if you paid him up; what he wants is only a few pounds paid on account and another large order put in." This is 228 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD unquestionably so. This system of holding custom reacts on both sides — the customer is charged more to cover the accommodation and the firm is often unable to meet expenses in spite of big outstanding accounts for which they fear to dun. Women will keep themselves in debt to their dress- makers not only in the matter of clothes, but will borrow money from them. The question of clothing oneself in England is a problem in more ways than one. I ^/Mon $ZJress/7?&/cer>s THE KINGDOM OF CLOTHES BOURSE OF FASHION AND BEAUTY WORTH, THE FIRST MAN DRESSMAKEB THE MAN DRESSMAKER AND HIS MET>DS CREATION OF A COSTUME " THE WEALTHIEST STREET IN THE )RLD " REDFERN, THE MASTER OF LINE LEGEND OF THE TAILOR-MADE SUIT OUTPUT OF THE PARIS DRESSMAKINESTABLISH- MENTS AVERAGE PRICE OF A PARIS GOWN WORKROOMS OF THE GREAT HOUSES DRESSMAKERS' ASSISTANTS LOW SCALE OF WAGES THE FAMOUS HOUSE OF PAQUIN HISTORY OF THE MAISON DOUCET DIFFICULT ROLE OF THE " MANNEQUIN FASHIONS AND HORSE RACES LAUNCHING NEW STYLES LITTLE " MIDINETTES " HOW THE DRESSES ARE DELIVERED THE INDEPENDENT AMERICAN SUPREMACY OF PARIS THREATENED 11 ACADEMIE DES MODES " COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCES OF PARIS I IX THE MEN DRESSMAKERS OF PARIS AND LONDON The kingdom of clothes is in the heart of Paris, a kingdom of extravagance set within a kingdom of pleasure, a territory bounded by the Rue Royale, the Rue Taitbout, the Chaussee d'Antin and the Rue de Rivoli. It is the stronghold of feminine fashions and its capitol is the Rue de la Paix, the Street of Peace indeed! rather it is the Street of Strife, a place of relentless competition in an attempt to please a fickle public. In this area, too, the majority of the money-spend- ing strangers put up, for Paris fashion-makers and Paris hotels of the super-luxurious class are in close relationship. Here, within the space bounded by a few city blocks, are quartered the world's most renowned masters of the a r t of costume, the most exclusive perfumers, soap-makers, artist-milliners and furriers, the most modish corsetieres and the most expert lingeres, the most chic, most brilliantly seductive and smartest craftsmen and women of fashion's realm. If clothes make the man, how much more do they have to do with the turning out of that highly finished product, the woman of to-day? 231 232 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Here in the world-famous establishments are those equally famous creators of feminine fashions, the artistes du chiffon, who lay their brainy talents at the feet of those women from all countries who, coming thither on a common mission, here meet on common ground, to be adorned, as only here they can be adorned, no matter what the cost. This is the world's Bourse of Fashion and Beauty, with ticker ribbons of real silk, in whose show-rooms the competition for leadership is as keen as on the floor of the Bourse of High Finance at the other end of Paris, where the juggling of gold and stocks and bonds makes possible the Bourse of Chiffons, as the French themselves name it. The sovereign rulers — for the land is a divided empire — are kings, not queens; the celebrated couturiers, the masters of the Ecole de Modes, are men. It may be that no woman has sufficient de- tachment from self to do justice to another feminine personality, though it was only recently that Madame Paquin — the spouse of " the great Paquin " — was welcomed to that exclusive woman's club, La Fran- chise, by the Duchesse de Rohan, who hailed her with an address on the art of elegance and lauded her for her generous attitude towards the working girls of the Paquin establishment. The great establishments of Doucet, Felix, Francis, Paquin, Worth and Redfern were all founded by men of astute perceptions in divining the needs of woman as related to clothes. And yet the man dress- maker is a recent development in the business of mak- MEN DRESSMAKERS 233 ing fashions, dating back only to the sixties and the reign of the Empress Eugenie. She may have been responsible for the loss of an empire, but she was the instigator of the modern style in woman's clothes. Curiously enough, it was the Englishman, Worth, who invaded Paris with new ideas in woman's dress and established there the first masculine-controlled dressmaking establishment. It was he who first con- ceived the lucrative combination of supplying the material and the confectioning thereof. From this first effort of the English draper's clerk, Charles Worth, has been built up the enormous business of the Paris man dressmaker, until to-day the imprint of one of these Paris ateliers of dress has become the hall-mark of the well-dressed woman of the world. The man dressmaker of Paris is thus seen to be an importation in the first instance, and this would seem to prove that it was the Paris atmosphere, rather than the individual, that has given the product its fame. Not only did Paris designers follow Worth's lead from the first, but other Englishmen recognised the statesman-like qualities that foresaw the necessity of using Paris as a base of operations, so that to-day the chief of the great London houses are but understudies to their Paris headquarters. Worth, Paquin and Redfern labels are sewn into gowns in London dress- making establishments and the designs of the parent house are followed, but only after the seal of approval has first been stamped upon them by a critical Pari- sian clientele. 234 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The show-rooms of the leading houses in the trade are luxurious salons de reception furnished with taste and art, served by a staff of perfectly dressed assist- ants clothed in discreet black, as a foil to the clients, and possessed of gracious manners. They are there to receive, and as much social grace and tact is re- quired of a saleswoman at Paquin's or Doucet's as of a maid of honour at court. The methods of the man dressmaker are those of a maitre 3! art. He studies his client as an artist studies his motif. Women of the chic beau monde, and of the ofttimes equally chic demi-monde, crowd his salons with fluttering hearts. Will the great designer but think them worthy of his choicest inspiration? These holders of the sceptre are capricious; not always will money do the trick. With them it is Art with a capital A and their masterpieces must have the correct setting, otherwise they will not sell. The head of the Rue de la Paix establishment studies his beautiful client as one would a painting, in the most favourable light. " Come again to- morrow, madame." Madame loses all track of so- cial engagements in this creative period of a costume and is on time the next day. The maitre shakes his head sadly; the inspiration has not yet come. Madame goes away disheartened; perhaps she is not worthy ! In a meditative mood monsieur goes for his daily drive in the Bois. It is autumn and the Bois is all golden against a sky of silver grey. " Voila, I have it ! " And monsieur hurries back to his entresol, MEN DRESSMAKERS 235 making feverish notes on the way and madame's cos- tume now begins to form itself. He summons his head designers and under his personal direction the delicate fabrics are composed into a harmonious whole. When madame next arrives on the scene a creation awaits her in gold and brown — like the autumn leaves, veiled in delicate greys — like the autumn mist that hangs over the for- est pools, " and that are deep and dark, just like madame's eyes." There has at last been produced an autumnal symphony that does justice to madame's chdtain beauty. This is one man's method of pro- ducing masterpieces. Bond Street is London's centre of fashion. " The wealthiest street in the world," say the English, a statement more complimentary to their patriotism than to their knowledge of things elsewhere; the wealthiest street of its length, no doubt. This radi- ating point for English " smartness " is a narrow, lane-like passage that connects the fashionable thoroughfare of Piccadilly with the commercial thoroughfares of Regent and Oxford Streets. It was in its capacity of a connecting link that Bond Street made its fortune. The English man designer of woman's clothes ex- cels in the composition of severe lines. It was Red- fern who popularised the tailor-made gown in Paris, and from there disseminated it throughout the world. There is a house of Redfern in London, but it is a question as to whether the Paris establishment does not do the largest trade. Whether it is that clothes 236 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD follow woman or that woman follows clothes, the supremacy of Paris is still unquestioned. This popularising of the " tailor-made " gained for Redfern the sobriquet of " maitre de la ligne " from the French. He is known by the smartest dressers as the greatest artist of all the famous men designers; that is, he occupies his talents in bringing a gown into harmony with the natural lines of the figure, rather than to the exploiting of a certain style of robe. Much of his inspiration is gained from a study of the costumes of the historic past, and as a designer of modes for the theatre, based on a careful study of periods, he stands unique among his com- petitors. The legend of the tailor-made suit is handed down like this : Queen Alexandra and the royal trunks failed to make connections on the occasion of a certain ceremonious dinner at a brilliant English house-party. The Queen, too gracious to spoil her hostess' plans, resourcefully directed her maid to cut off the skirt of her riding habit (those were the days of the trailing habit), for the royal party had ridden across country on horseback, and lightening its black- ness with a red rose thus appeared at dinner as if nothing had happened. It was in this manner that the distinctive garment that the English dressmaker still turns out better than any other was born. Sixty per cent or more of the dressmaking business done in that half-mile radius of which the Place MEN DRESSMAKERS 237 Vendome in Paris is the centre, is for a foreign clientele. The output is further categoried thus: Part is knowingly sold to commission agents and intermedi- aries of foreign private buyers; still other portions to English, German and American dressmakers, and by far the largest sale is to foreigners visiting Paris, perhaps for that very purpose. The Parisian and French provincial clientele actually buy but a bare third of the output. This of itself is out of all propor- tion to the fame of the well-dressed Parisienne, but proves that she does not of necessity patronise the makers of marque alone. It is a well-recognised fact that most of the makers have a special clientele which, for one reason or another, they serve at prices considerably below those usually quoted. Possibly ten millions of francs is a figure which to-day covers the output of each of the half-dozen most famous makers, divided among four or five thousand open accounts, some of them of small mo- ment, but others, by reason of the social or other prominence of their owners, reaching fabulous sums. Publicity is an art known well to the Paris couturier. There is, too, among them a sort of mysterious " Dun's " or " Bradstreet's " which divides the good payers into a " liste blanche," the average payers into a " liste jaune " and the bad payers into a " liste noire." It is said, too, that not all of those of the " liste noire " are those lowest in life's station, the contrary being chiefly the case. A well-defined loss has been arrived at by an actuary in the trade, who 238 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD estimates it at fifteen per cent. Like the clients of the doctors and the dentists those of the " lute blanche" of the dressmakers pay the bills for those of the lists " jaumes " and " noires." An enormous business has been developed entirely from the example of Worth. There are many clients of these establishments who spend readily enough from twenty-five to thirty thousand francs in ordering a season's gowns at one or another of these now world-famous establishments. It is even recounted that a fair American once spent the sum of three hundred and fifty thousand francs in half a day of choosing and commanding. And yet it is said that the average price of the Paris-made gown is but seven hundred francs. It must be that they make up in numbers in order to approach the fabulous sums which are accredited to their account. Into the total thus spent silks enter to the pro- portion of forty-six per cent, laces for thirteen per cent, passementeries for eleven per cent, furs eight per cent, embroideries seven and one-half per cent, feathers for two per cent, the various other ac- cessories, such as threads and linings and whalebones and what not, for the remainder. The ateliers where these famous Parisian confec- tions are turned out are the hives where many grades of working women and girls earn a livelihood, a miserable livelihood many of them, catering for the luxurious tastes of the rich. In the first rank are the coupeuses, the cutters, who parcel out the stuffs according to given measures. Next comes the MEN DRESSMAKERS 239 appreteuses, who are the first sewing hands, the bas- ters; then the mechaniciennes, the machine stitchers; and the couseuses, the hand sewers who do the finer work and are called picturesquely, " les petites mains." The making of a gown is divided further among four distinct classes of workers, the corsagieres, the garnissenses, the jupieres and the lingeres. The wealthy stranger sees nothing of this but a handsomely furnished apartment where the models are shown and an equally conveniently arranged salon d'essayage peopled by a score or more of attractively dressed employees : vendeuses, port toilettes, manne- quins, fitters, etc. There may be a hundred or more working unseen in gloomy workrooms. The principal employees, the first hands — the pre- mieres, and perhaps the mannequins and one or two of the other privileged classes, earn a fair competence as a result of their month's work, but the thousands of mere working girls who are employed in the in- dustry are scarcely better off, perhaps not so well off in many cases, as factory workers. For twelve hours or more a day the more expert may earn as much as four or four and a half francs at the maximum, though the wage of by far the greatest number hardly rises above three francs while there is work, and then there is always the dull season to contend with when the greater part of the workers are laid off. Another class which has not a little to do with my lady's Paris gown are the workers in chambers, for a lot of this work, supposedly the product of this famous capital of beauty, is put out with workers in i 240 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD a dull, frigid mansard chamber where, in many in- stances, a wage of from two to two francs and a half a day is considered normal. How indeed does the other half live? Paquin, of all the great couturiers of Paris, enjoys the widest international reputation. A gown from this famous house may be considered the apotheosis of modern woman's toilette. France thought enough of the master's services to decorate him with the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour, and now that the head of the house is dead his widow is looking for the same distinction. There are serious-minded Frenchmen who ask apprehensively, " Will the high- est honour in our land, whose badge is a bit of red ribbon in the button-hole, become a trade-mark for a couturier; are the brains of our country falling wholly to the heads of our dressmaking establish- ments? " Another of the kings of the Rue de la Paix is M. Jacques Doucet, a scholar, an artist, an elegant and a cultured man of the world, habitue of Paris' most exclusive salons. There is scarcely a literary or artistic gathering of note held in the capital but where this slim, elegant " Louis XIV of dressmakers," as Paris knows him, is not an honoured guest. He is one of the best known figures in Tout Paris. The Maison Doucet began as a little open booth, selling casquettes, or caps, on the sidewalk nearly a hundred years ago. When Worth set the vogue of the man dressmaker Doucet was one of the first in the new field and quickly rose to the premier rank, MEN DRESSMAKERS 241 It is the French elegante who is the chief cus- tomer at Doucet's, more so even than the foreigner. The master's styles are designed chiefly as a foil to the elusive charms of the Paris mondaine. Art has often allied itself with commercialism. Du Maurier designed the still used label on the bottle of Apollinaris water and the Maison Doucet has the distinction of having had its first catalogue designed by Daubigny, that most sincere of French landscapists of the men of the thirties. Generation after generation of the same families of work-people succeed each other chez Doucet. Two hundred and fifty people are employed there as saleswomen, fitters, designers, mannequins, etc., besides six hundred girls in the workrooms and three 242 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD hundred girls who do work for the house at their own homes. The mannequins play one of the most important roles in these Palaces of Modes. They are the live " dummies " on whom are displayed the costumes. All day long they must promenade the salons of the establishments where they are employed, revolving slowly before the eyes of a critical battery of cus- tomers, that the effect of the gown may be better judged on a living figure than it may on a thing of wires and papier-mache. Frequently there is a stage upon which the manne- quins play their parts, parts which call for quite as much endurance as the most tragic roles of the real stage. Endurance, tact and skill in their highest forms are all called for, and upon the ability of the mannequin to impress the buyer with the graces of a particular gown depends the sale quite as much, in many instances, as upon the skill of the designer or the insinuations of the salesman or woman. The physical and mental strain is unceasing. From nine in the morning often until nine at night the manne- quin must be on her feet, changing from one costume to another at the caprice of the most erratic of clients. Her position and advancement depend upon her ability to clinch sales. All her natural and arti- ficial charms are brought to bear. The mannequins are selected for their svelt figures and for their beauty of face as well as of form. They wear a tight-fitting, black sheath garment, over which the gowns are shown. , MEN DRESSMAKERS 243 A mannequin in a swell establishment is paid some- thing like thirty dollars a month, perhaps a little more if her reputation as a seller is particularly good. Another service which she renders is posing in public places in the new creations of her employer that a new fashion may be well launched in the eyes of the public. She may be seen at Longchamps on the day of the Grand Prix, at Armenonville, at the Pre Catelan, indeed wherever fashion congregates. On the occasion of the Grand Prix she is generally out in full force, parading in the paddock as in the tribunes, or strolling in the enclosure reserved for high society. She will perhaps be dressed in the most bizarre of creations and be followed greedily by all eyes, but she glides along, seemingly unconscious of the throng or the part she is playing, though she divides the honours with the horses and the jockeys. All feminine Paris studies the mannequins on parade at Longchamps greedily and on the verdict does a new style catch on or fail. Betting on the success of a new style is as exciting as the " Pari-Mutuel " at the Grand Prix. The little midinettes, who get their name from their habit of promenading the streets at the midday hour, are the youngest of the workers in the dress- making establishments. The midinette has taken the place of the grisette of the days of Murger in the imagination and affection of the Parisian. Arm in arm they throng the pavements of the great arteries of fashion at the noon rest hour. They earn the smallest possible of living wages, not more than a 244 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD franc to a franc and a half for a day of twelve, and sometimes sixteen, hours. This does not leave much of a margin for food and so they content themselves for the most part with a croissant or a brioche, eaten under some overhanging doorway or on a bench in the Gardens of the Tuileries, and this, with a swallow of black coffee which costs but a couple of sous, by some mysterious law of nature, serves to keep them so cheerful and ingenious of mind that they are able to costume themselves in a way that imitates the chic styles in dress with which they are so continuously brought into contact. It is a dangerous atmosphere in which these young girls live and work, spending so much of their lives in the reflection of luxury and extravagance and taking their pleasures on the pavements of a great city. Paris regards them sentimentally, as it does most feminine questions that are vital, and a society, known as the " Ligue de Mimi-Pinson," has for its object the improvement of the conditions which sur- round the little midinette. It is too weak and sentimental, however, in its motive and operation to be of much real service to the cause which it sup- posedly represents, its chief demonstration of activity being evinced in the annual ball which it gives in order to secure funds for its work. Last on the list of the army of dressmakers' helpers in Paris are the troltins and conrsieres, the former name being more particularly applied to the errand girls of the milliners' establishments, and the latter MEN DRESSMAKERS 245 to those of the dressmakers. One sees either, or both, of these little workers at all hours of the day laden with hat or costume boxes as large as them- selves. These are carried by a not too conveniently arranged leather strap, and by such means is the bulk of the completed work of the makers of fashions delivered to their clients' homes. The trottins recently went on strike for higher wages, but the only result was this little chanson with which the trottins and coursieres now amuse them- selves by singing as they trot all over Paris with their big boxes: " Que demande une petite trottin De chez Worth ou de chez Paquin 246 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Un peu plus de salarie, Moins de travail a faire Et trois coups de torchon. Vive le son, vive le son. Bis, bis, bis." A suit recently brought in Paris against one of the most famous of the men dressmakers threw some light on conditions in the trade which made such apparently excessive charges as exist necessary to the conduct of such a business. Even the most simple of " tailor-mades " is an expensive proposition in a Paris shop. This was what the evidence showed: The cloth was first cut and measured and its cost estimated, then the cost of linings, trimmings and, what dressmakers the world over call furnishings, was carefully com- puted, to which was added the cost of the hand labour involved. A certain sum was added for reputation and another for professional skill in designing and fitting, when, finally, to this lump sum, was added another sixty per cent to make up for possible errors. In reality the latter sum was added to make good the losses on non-liquidating clients. Will Paris always be able to keep in the ascendency as arbiter of the world's modes? There are signs of uneasiness and fear that their kingdom of fashion is threatened from without. These Americans, so rich and so independent, and who are asserting more and more each season this same independence, and who are demanding that styles be adapted to their MEN DRESSMAKERS 247 standards, will they not take some stand some day that cannot, or will not, be met? Has the Paris couturier reason to dread that this clientele, whose bills have been doubled (and as readily paid as those of clients of any other nationality) , may become too insistent in its demands, and finally throw down the gauntlet and proclaim that the productions of Fifth Avenue more than rival those of London and Paris. Is the Royaume de Paris threatened from Outre Merf We hear rumours that it is proposed to form an Academie des Modes to be composed only of those masters in the art of adorning and beautifying woman- kind. This association is to have for its object the safeguarding of Paris from the introduction of bas- tard fashions from across the frontiers. The list of " Immortels " of this academy will have to be in- creased beyond the original forty who now sit under the dome if the catholic plan is to be carried out of including beauty specialists, painters and all others interested in the art of beautifying and lauding the charms of woman. The keynote that is to be struck is of course that it must be French taste that continues to set the pace in the race of fashions and that there is reason to suppose that the French as a whole will be able to combat the dreaded invasion. The commercial importance of the output of Paris fashions was recently well illustrated in a startling way when a member of the Chamber of Deputies arose, in reply to a diatribe as to feminine extrava- gance, and said, " To attack the coquetterie of 248 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD woman was to prejudice a national industry." And yet we American women fondly pride ourselves on the importance of the position we hold in our own national affairs. Has ever an American legislator arisen in favour of woman's expenditure in dress? In a quarter of a century the commerce of the men dressmakers in London and Paris, those who devote themselves solely to the confection of women's toi- lettes, has made a remarkable progress and, unlike the vogue of other times, it is not a monarchial society, but a democratic one that has inflated prices — the French bonrgeoise and the American millionairess. Less than half a century ago, when Worth was court dressmaker to the Empress of the French and his " turn-over " of affairs was something like five million francs a year, it was thought an incompre- hensible sum to be squandered on dress with the con- nivance of one man. To-day the combined turn-over of Paris dressmaking establishments shows an annual business of two hundred and fifty million francs, thanks (and it is the French themselves who say the gentle word) to " les transatlantiqiies" TF^ SOCIAL SIDE EUROPE DISCOVERS THE AMERICAN GIRL INTERNATIONAL SOCIAL RELATIONS SOCIAL AMENITIES IN THE BRITISH ISLES FRENCH SOCIETY THE ENIGMATIC FRENCHWOMAN FORMALITY THE HEIGHT OF POLITENESS MANNERS OF CONTINENTAL EUROPE ENGLISHWOMAN THE BEST HOSTESS REAL CHARM OF INTERCOURSE INQUISITIVE FOREIGN MIND GUESTS IN THE ENGLISH HOUSE TIPS AT HOUSE PARTIES OPEN-AIR PLEASURES OF SOCIETY FASHION IN THE BOIS DE BOULOGNE AN OUT-OF-DOOR DRAWING-ROOM " SENTIER DE LA VERTU " COUNTRY LIFE IN ENGLAND WHERE LONDON SOCIETY TAKES ITS AIRINGS 11 CHURCH PARADE " IN HYDE PARK ROYALTY TAKES ITS TURN IN THE PARK ETIQUETTE OF CALLS IN FRANCE CHAPERON AND YOUNG GIRL THE CRY OF LIBERTY THE AMERICAN WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN MAN X THE SOCIAL SIDE Having exhausted, at least to her own satisfaction, the charms of the English castles, German schlossen, French chateaux and Italian palazzi, the American woman craves to know something of the intimate life that exists behind these ancient walls from some other point of view than that of the personally con- ducted tourist and the information that Baedeker can give her. If she did but realise it, Europe is as anxious to know the American as she could possibly be to be- come acquainted with it. The American girl has at last been discovered in Europe and the repute of her charms and her dol- lars have penetrated to the most out-of-the-way cor- ners, where a few years ago not even the solitary traveller was seen. Europe watches with interest and curiosity the comings and goings of these "dollar princesses " who make no attempt to travel incognito in their triumphal progress across Europe. Hypnotised by her independence, charmed in spite of the shocks she gives to their traditions and con- ventions, they regard her as existing outside of the etiquette that governs their own femininity as much as if she had blown in from another planet. Also 251 252 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD they are beginning to differentiate between the Eng- glish " Miss " and the American " girl," and are able to class them, which is a better proof than can be put forth by steamship travel statistics of the in- crease in American travel abroad. They are at last ready to gauge her by her own standards instead of their own, a concession which shows an enlightenment as great as the Renaissance that followed the Dark Ages of history. The entry into social life is easy enough; all that is needed is time rather than opportunity. Money makes little difference, as the belief is current among all classes that all Americans are millionaires; this saves one the trouble of exactly defining her financial position. Indeed, they could not be convinced to the contrary, for does not the American schoolgirl spend money in so lavish a way that it scandalises the head of the average European family? The lack of cal- culation that Americans display in the spending of money is one of the most amazing traits from the point of view of a people who make every cent pro- duce results in a tangible form. When curiosity has been satisfied and the novelty worn off there is little in common, the American finds, between herself and her foreign friends, and acquaintance seldom warms into friendship. Funda- mental differences exist which can never be bridged over except by a superficial and formal structure of conventions and politeness, which is not strong enough to bear the burden incidental to a lasting friendship. Social international relations can never mean much, THE SOCIAL SIDE 253 as America, in the essentials, is drawing further and further away from European ideas. This lack of assimilation is as noticeable in the British Isles as in a land where another language still further heightens the barrier. Sometimes it seems possible to demonstrate that the American has more in common with the French — at least in temperament, while again certain of us really come closer in touch with the Scotch; at least the English will tell one that what of our " Americanisms " are not to be found in Chaucer are lineally descended from the language of the Scot. English society welcomes the American, though they are as credulous about this dollar business as their neighbours across the Channel. It is but natural that the American should be most in evidence in Eng- lish society. Theirs was the shore where the wave of travel first landed the social aspirant, but all signs point to the fact that the ebb tide is in the direction of the Continent. An amusing fact is that the social amenities between English and Americans seem to flourish more genially when they band together for mutual protection, interests and pleasures on the com- mon meeting-ground of a foreign country. French social life is not only formal, but the enter- tainment to be got from it is thin. As with every move in their game of life things are done by rote and at no time is there any evidence of spontaneity. It seems impossible to be friendly with a French- woman; her blend of sophistry and childishness in the wrong proportions is confusing to any just estimate 254 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD of her character. When it is possible to pierce the veneer of formality she appears even more of an enigma. This is perhaps her real charm — her Sphinx- like quality; for what she really thinks ever remains a lock to which the outsider has no key. Conversation is cut after a set pattern which has come down from the time of the Louis' along with the arrangement of the drawing-room furniture. Be- ginning at the fireplace the chairs are arranged in two rows down the salon facing each other, the hostess sits at the top of the row and next to her the important guests, dwindling down in social im- portance to the end. It is all reminiscent of a chil- dren's game and scarcely makes for cordiality. This arrangement holds good in the most unpretentious household. If Madame is modish she will have adopted the custom of serving tea and the accompanying cakes and bonbons; if it is in the provinces it will more likely be some sweet syrupy wine and biscuits, or sweet crackers. If one gets to the stage of the causerie in time Madame will receive in her boudoir, extended on a chaise-longue. She won't mind asking the most dis- concertingly frank questions about your most intimate affairs, from the size of your income to your opinion of your husband, which is all the more remarkable as they are rarely communicative about their own personal affairs with a stranger. This desire for knowledge is on a par with the curiosity that prompts one to prod the animals in the Zoo. THE SOCIAL SIDE 255 Formality is the highest form of politeness with the French. The more coldly distant in his manner is the Frenchman the more he is demonstrating his politeness and high regard. It is not good form to stare into the eyes of a respectable woman, thus he pays you the compliment in conversation of playing his glances all about you in an impersonal way which is quite an art; in this respect his society manners and those of the Arab are the same. In European society it is still de rigueur for the gentleman to kiss the lady's hand on entering and leaving the drawing-room. It is only a stage kiss anyway, but the Frenchman and the Russian par- ticularly have set the fashion. French manners are the basis of good manners all over Continental Eu- rope, tinged though they may be by local mannerism, and the manners of the Paris salon are still the stan- dard for polite society. All French families of any standing have an ances- tor that was beheaded during the Revolution, a fact which is as useful as the prefix de in establishing their aristocracy. " Liberte, Egalite and Frater- nite " have a significance only in the political world; society and the woman, no matter whether under a president or a monarch, is never other than an aristocracy. To the Englishwoman must be awarded the palm of being the best hostess. The English entertain more intelligently than any other people. The Eng- lishwoman is accused of being cold and indifferent towards the social entertainment of her guests, 256 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD whereas instead of following up guests with atten- tions in a way that would simply emphasise the fact that they were only guests, she gives them the freedom of the house to use as if it was their own. Instead of being burdened continually by a feeling of respon- sibility on one hand, and obligation on the other, hostess and guest are mutually independent, and that real charm of intercourse — freedom — is maintained. The complaint is heard that the English house- party is as non-personal as life at a hotel; whereas the actual case is that the Englishman has freely opened his house to you and therein you have the same right for the time being as himself. One is invited to the English house for a certain number of days, told even what train to take. A carriage meets one at the station. Whether there be a house-party or not you are only first met by servants and shown to your rooms, from which you descend at your leisure, perhaps only at five for tea. It is etiquette to arrange a guest's arrival to coincide as nearly as possible with the tea hour, at which func- tion, served in summer on the lawn and in winter in the entrance hall, one first meets her hosts and any other guests. One rarely sees the host before lunch- eon, after which amusements are devised for the guests, which they can accept or not as they like, but if your hosts see you at dinner and exchange a few words in the evening it is as much as can be expected in a big house full of people. The maid unpacks one's bag and lays out what clothes she thinks you may need without any tiresome THE SOCIAL SIDE 257 questions and will further give one as much personal service as may be needed. The bugbear of English visits is supposed to be the tips. It is doubtful if their exactions are any greater than the same thing at home. English people themselves will tell one that they can't afford to visit their best friends on account of this same question of tips, and yet others who are on the visiting lists of noble earls declare that there is nothing to it; that they give the maid who fastens up their gowns ten shillings when they leave and that is all. There is something in knowing how to do it, but the guest across the water, ticketed by the sometimes incon- venient reputation for wealth, would probably not get off so easily. Some conscientious hostesses go so far as to put up notices in the guest-rooms to the effect that no tips are to be given, which suggest a cheap lunch place and is about as effective. The social season of all the European capitals extends well into the summer, and are all character- ised by open-air pleasures that do much towards breaking up the ordinary conventional round. From Easter to the National holiday — the four- teenth of July — is the apogee of the social round in Paris, when the Bois de Boulogne becomes the open-air drawing-room of Parisian society, and the green Allee des Acacias becomes the stage for the gay drama of mondaine world. From four to six every one makes for the Bois by way of the Avenue des Champs-Elysees. Private automobiles and horse-drawn turn-outs, filled with the 258 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD best-gowned women of the world, circle the winding drives of the Bois, but not so fast that the costumes cannot be noted. They make the round of the Bois, stopping at Armenonville for an ice or the customary "five o'clock/' ,The most fashionable promenade is the " Sentier de la Vertu." Only the fine essence of esprit, or the delicate sense of irony underlying the French character, could have evolved this name of " path of virtue," for a park walk. Here the cream of the two worlds of Paris comes for a constitutional before lunch. High-born ladies, and the high-priced demi- monde equally haughty, draw up in autos or low- swung victorias, descend and promenade under the fragrant blooms of the chestnuts or sit in the uncom- fortable little iron chairs. In these chairs the curious onlooker may also sit upon payment of two sous, and study the moves in the social game at first hand. Here friends rendezvous, engagements are made THE SOCIAL SIDE 259 for those flirtations that the Frenchwoman ac- complishes with such charm and discretion; there are also others not so discreet. It is this intermingling of the two elements that produce one of the anom- alies of Paris life. Not far away is the bridle-path — the " Allee des Cavaliers " — where not a few " Amazones " (to use the rather exaggerated French name) are cantering along with their escorts. The craze for things Eng- lish since the "entente cordiale" went into effect has put the Frenchwoman on horseback, but she is not really fond of it, as the Englishwoman's strenuous exercise has little attraction for her. Under every woman's arm, or running shiveringly beside her, is a tiny toy dog. These " toutous" which they invari- ably call " petite coco cherie," are as much the in- separable companion of the Frenchwoman as her hat. On Sundays the Bois is deserted by the society element in favour of the bourgeoisie. The Bois is no longer chic on that day; it is the family day, when all the middle-class world of Paris takes a camp- stool under one arm and a lunch basket under the other (no wasteful hiring of chairs for them) and literally spends the day, coming early and staying late. English social life is just the reverse of what usu- ally holds good in France. The English family makes its home in the country and moves into town for a brief period, instead of living in the city and making the country the incidental part of the social 260 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD season. Consequently the stay in London is purely a social business which the English family feels called upon to go through with as one goes to a fashionable resort, and this point of view makes possible the growing custom of simply taking a suite of rooms in one of the big hotels instead of opening a town house. Besides it makes for economy, and the sight is becom- ing common of titled ladies sweeping around hotel corridors afternoons in full court dress on their way to a " drawing-room " in the season. Hyde Park does not make such an extensive nor beautiful pleasure ground as the Bois, but no matter what may be the weather London society still uses it as a parade ground. The Englishwoman goes along Rotten Row every morning, followed by a correct groom at the regulation distance. The riding hour on Rotten Row is the most popular of the day, and here can be seen the smartest of the smart set and the best-groomed horsewoman in the world as she shows up at her best. The correct equipage, with pompous coachman and footman in powdered wigs and high-stepping pair, still remains the traditional gentleman's vehicle; the automobile by no means conveys to the minds of the crowd the same amount of pomp and circumstance as is evoked by the traditional coach and pair, par- ticularly if there be an earl's coronet emblazoned thereon. Neither is the plebeian numbered hack for hire allowed on the drive during these hours when society takes its airings. Ways are provided for the visitor THE SOCIAL SIDE 261 to get over this difficulty; the hotels will hire out to one an imitation private carriage; all livery stables provide for this contingency, and even the Blooms- bury boarding-house keeps, or can get, a " private brougham " that can be rented by its guests and pass the scrutiny of the policeman at the Albert Gate. Hyde Park on Sundays sees that peculiar Eng- lish society function — the " church parade." This is a more intimate occasion, and the " Sentier de la Vertu " of the Bois would not be out of place trans- ferred to London, for everybody hastens here after church to promenade, prayer-book in hand, among the budding crocuses and narcissi in a silver-grey spring noon. There is none of the contagious gaiety of the French crowd, but the decorous, well-bred English throng is able to hide any dubiousness under a Sab- bath-day varnish. " Look respectable and you will be happy " is the English creed. Friends sit in groups on the penny chairs, discuss plans for the coming week, engagements, temporary and for life, are manoeuvred by mammas, and the Sunday church parade is often used to introduce a daughter to the social world. After this every one goes home to a roast-beef dinner. The French course dinner is not, even in fashionable circles, succeeding in separating the English family from its favourite dish. By five o'clock the carriages are so densely massed that it is only by courtesy it could be called driving. Royalty drives out with the rest. The rumour that 262 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the King is coming causes all the carriages to line up courteously to allow the passage of the royal landau drawn by two horses, marked as to its royal func- tions only by the royal red coats of the coachman and couple of footmen at the back. If one wishes to enter the social life of a French community the burden of taking the initiative rests with the newcomer. She is expected to make the first calls, but these are promptly returned. After the second round of calls the stranger will know where she stands, for if the acquaintanceship is not desired the call is not returned. The French have a system that provides for this. The proprietor from whom the house may have been leased or bought, or, in the case of a doctor or a professional man — his predecessor, furnishes them with a list of the desi- rable people who occupy the correct social standing. Thus in the end the power of selection lies with the majority, which may be logical though it places the stranger at a disadvantage. In many respects the French are slower to open up their home to one than the English, for they rather shrink from a new element that may possibly disturb the calm routine of their domesticity. " Chez elle " — with herself — that untranslatable synonym for a woman at home in France, expresses something even more intimate than the English home. The soft cream tint of the French house, with its formal row of pale-grey shutters, always closed, the high walls that enclose the garden and the high iron gates, backed with wooden or iron doors — all seem o o Q Q o CO THE SOCIAL SIDE 263 symbolical of the closely guarded inner life of the French bourgeoisie. Even in France chaperonage is relaxing to some extent; the same is true of even its most conservative strongholds, though freedom for the young girl, as it is understood in America, does not exist as yet anywhere in Europe. In that most sophisticated social life, that of the French upper classes, the in- fluence of the young person, once practically nil, is beginning to be felt. She no longer keeps her eye- lids lowered when spoken to by a man, and at dances she boldly allows her partner to lead her out for a breath of air on a balcony — but still not for long. The old French ruling that a young girl should not walk out even with her brother — for how should the wicked world know that he was her brother — is be- coming obsolete, and family groups of brothers and sisters do go in company together on picnic outings and daylight amusements. The cry of the French girl for liber te is being heard, it is true (and that she makes it at all is a forward move), but not much attention is being paid to it. The curiosity and wist- fulness with which she regards the American girl with whom she is brought in contact is amusing and pathetic, and she is not heard criticising their bold- ness as frequently as do English girls. Young people's society is rather insipid for the American girl, once her curiosity is abated; running amuck of its trivial formalities and intricacies of language does not make for pleasure. Truth to tell, she gets on better with the European man. 264 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The American man rather expects a pretty girl to entertain him, in return for much candy, auto- mobile rides and a general putting himself usefully at her disposal. But the European man is trained to be agreeable to women and the practice of the small arts of conventional intercourse is a result of a large part of his training — in many cases the major part. The freedom and self-poise of the American woman fascinates him quite as much as his deferential attitude and charming manners do her. This, en- hanced by the golden halo that he invariably sees about her head, inspires him to put forward his best efforts to entertain her. Not a little of the interest that he inspires in the American girl often comes from a brilliant uniform and an authentic title. This, to begin with, makes him frame in so exceedingly well with the rest of the picture in her imagination, and it is the same imagination that he touches in many ways. He draws his heels together with a military click and kisses her hand deferentially at meeting and parting. No one does that at home — in public at least — and the little ceremony invests one with a certain importance. That his conversation takes a daring turn is often because of unwitting encouragement by one who is conscious of her ability to shut this sort of thing off if it passes the limits. But a radical difference be- tween home and abroad is that the American man can be made to feel ashamed of himself — the for- eigner — never. It rather worries the Englishman that the Ameri- THE SOCIAL SIDE 265 can woman talks so much. He does not understand this voluble flow of talk, whether about something or nothing, that she knows is necessary to her popu- larity at home, and it sometimes happens that he is slow to appreciate her amiable efforts to please. She is not so much of a novelty to him as to the men of Continental Europe; besides he is in the habit of tak- ing the lead and being listened to, and he finds it a little wearisome to follow the conversational thread through the mazes and quick turnings given to it by the versatile American woman. But if given a chance he will take pains and can play the part of an agree- able host. Properly chaperoned he will invite her to tea in his " chambers " in London or at Oxford or Cambridge (if he be an undergraduate) and pour tea himself; but she will not be expected to go to the hotel or restaurant alone with him for tea, nor to the theatre, without some kind of a shadowy third, though it is true that being an American cov- ers many indiscretions. But the afternoon tea is the pivot around which the social life of England revolves, a function that can be made intimate or formal at will. Tea is served in the afternoon, not for the visitor but as a part of the daily routine, and one expects it quite as much as a matter of course as the shakings of the hand. Noth- ing is quite so pleasant as the tea hour before the open fire, when the rain, the slow, sure, continuous rain of the British Isles, turns everything misty- moisty. The teapot is kept warm under its padded cosey, the buttered muffins are hot in their covered 266 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD dish, the plum cake is all plums. It is the hour when the English friend unbends to intimate talk under the shaded lamps. America is transplanting the custom, but it can never be the same as in England — the at- mosphere — and the climate — both are lacking. ^'Pleasure cult of pleasure pleasure resorts of europe biarritz, the haunt of royalty spain summers at san sebastian fox-hunting and bull-fights air line from paris to madrid spanish society trouville-deauville, the newport of france England's riviera brighton and its bath chairs luxurious ostende bathing machines dutch society goes to scheveningen gay aix-les-bains " real french vichy " lucerne and its embroidery shops mediterranean chain of winter resorts the riviera quartette the woman's paradise aristocratic cannes nice the beautiful « pexitS CHEVAUX " A COUNTRY DEVOTED TO PLEASURE XI CITIES OF PLEASURE— EUROPEAN WATERING-PLACES The Cult of Pleasure occupies an important place in the scheme of things European; with us it is only an incident which enters, like many others, into our lives. We still feel a little ashamed to be overjoy- ous at home; indeed the means of enjoying ourselves is woefully lacking, and it is not always possible to get some one to " play with us," nor are playgrounds sufficiently numerous to hold for long the mercurial American who craves the champagne-like exhilaration of novelty. Neither Palm Beach nor Atlantic City (Newport does not count for the masses) stand for anything against the dazzling array of pleasure re- sorts across the water, with their cosmopolitan cloud of revolving satellites. It is at this moment, when we crave amusement the most, that we pack our trunks and take the fastest steamer for some European port. That old English idea that the " grand tour " of Europe was necessary to complete the education of a gentleman has become modified by the modern woman to include these three things — change, relaxation and pleasure. A study of man and womankind is quite as much of an education at times, and often a good deal more 269 270 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD amusing, than to keep one's nose always buried in a guide-book amidst the malaria of stale facts. Such an elusive thing as pleasure must be hunted down with wisdom. Europe has the secret and is ready for the pleasure-seeker with a chain of pleasure cap- itals that is never ending. The English expression, " watering-place," has a rather bucolic sound. That of the French is better; " ville d'eaa " is certainly prettier and more imagina- tive, far more so than the German spa. All, how- ever, spell pleasure. The gayest, most worldly, most fashionable of these resorts are in France. This may be due to the Gallic temperament and surroundings, for France is not afraid to promote those risque amusements that add a piquancy to the frivolous life of the gadabout that a more conventional nation is apt to banish from home, though her peoples are quite ready to seek them out under the French tricolour. " Liberty, Equality, Fraternity " are words which mean what they say and are truly to be applied to French pleasure resorts. France has the greatest variety of climate of any European country. This also makes possible, and profitable, her great array of pleasure resorts. All the world must come to her exquisite Mediterranean winter resort — the Riviera — in spite of the counter attractions of Egypt, Tunis and Algeria. For all the year round watering-places there are none that rank beside those of the equable climate of the French slopes of the Pyrenees. As a summer bathing-place CITIES OF PLEASURE 271 of an ultra-fashionable type, nothing approaches Trouville. For the most approved modern " Cure," which can be taken in full dress, so to speak, Aix-les- Bains, in the beautiful French Alps, has no peer, unless it be Vichy in mid-France. There are dozens of other springs and baths here, too, whose repute is based more modestly only on their health-giving properties. Paris, for long the only great city of pleasure, still draws all classes of amusement seekers to her, and a centrifugal force throws them off again tangently all over Europe on the same joyous quest. Americans are only beginning to know Biarritz, in the Basque country, the furthermost corner of south- western France, hemmed in between the purple Pyrenees and the mists which roll up off the Bay of Biscay. Biarritz prides itself upon its exclusiveness; so fearful has it been of a contaminating popularity that it is only within a few months that it has en- joyed the luxury of direct railway communication with the outside world. Fashion first went to Biar- ritz by private carriage, then by automobile, but now it goes by rail without change of cars. From the beginning royalty, as much as any other element, has made Biarritz famous. The late Ed- ward VII set the recent fashion, for he never cared for the French Riviera; Leopold, king of the Bel- gians, of gay memory, had too much pre-empted that land of the Roulette Wheel as his own special hunt- ing ground, and it is also whispered that formerly there was a too much emphasised maternal solicitude 272 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD radiating from Cimiez' Grand Hotel, above Nice, where Queen Victoria used to winter. Thus it was that Albert Edward when he became Britain's king picked on Biarritz, with its soft, mild air, as an antidote to the raw springtime of his homeland. He also found it a congenial place to which to retire with a circle of choice friends. Where the King goes society follows; individual preference is sunk in the loyal obedience to that which has the stamp of royal approval. The English, once having got in the habit, still come in crowds to Biarritz. From San Sebastian, Spain's royal resort just across the border from Biarritz, Alfonso, the Spanish Mon- arch, used to come frequently to visit his English brother King. The royal automobiles, like shuttles, CITIES OF PLEASURE 273 ran back and forth over the international bridge be- tween Hendaye and Irun, linking up the dozen or twenty kilometres that separate the two resorts. Later, when Manuel of Portugal had greatness thrust upon him, he made the third of the royal trio at Biarritz. Grave questions of State of three na- tions were discussed on the golf links of the Basque resort, and along the winding walks, beside the red and ochre-coloured rocks that skirt the pale grey waters of Biscay's Bay. The privacy of the monarchs was respected to the extent that the crowd seemed not even to notice that they were there. It is easy to see that Biarritz was not at that time overrun with Americans; one could hardly imagine an American watering-place crowd exercising such restraint. It is only as a change from the English winter that Biarritz comes so to the fore as a " winter station." Its climate is fairly mild and even, but the grey clouds roll in from the sea, and the green combers break up on the shore, bringing in their train a superabundance of fine, misty rain which keeps a perennial dampness ever on hand. Biarritz is at its best and gayest in summer, when the Spaniards come across the frontier from the arid rocks and burning sands of their own land to bask in the balsamic odours of the neighbouring pine for- ests, or amid the sweet-scented magnolia trees of the gardens of the town. French society, too, comes in summer. " Biarritz is too English in the winter," say the Latins, with a shrug of their shoulders. Their complaint as to the 274 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD denationalisation of this little corner of their land is not without some humour. Besides, the Riviera is the chic wintering place for the French. They can do the round of the Mediterranean resorts during the chilly months, and in the late spring get around to the Pyrenees and be free from June onwards for Biarritz. The Russian aristocracy crowd in also; they are to be found everywhere but in their own country, but this they lay to their climate, though a a matter of real note, the Russians are the greatest sports in Europe, and nowhere can they get that variety of gay life which they like so well in any- thing like the degree of free-handedness and luxuri- ance that can be had in the French resorts. The Empress Eugenie first made Biarritz the fashion when summering here in the uncertain days of the Second Empire. The only remaining souvenir of her reign is a big hotel, remodelled and enlarged from the once royal villa. These were the beginnings of the Biarritz of ultra- exclusiveness, of royalties and Spanish grandees, and from this it has blossomed out into one of the live- liest watering-places of Europe. Here is sport to please all tastes. The English who carry their sports all around the world with them, as they do the cut of their clothes, have imported fox-hunting into the neighbourhood, and the red shores of the sandy Landes around Biarritz are harassed by as correct a " hunt " of red-coated sportsmen as were ever seen in an English 'shire. Thus English society when it winters abroad is not deprived of its favourite amuse- CITIES OF PLEASURE 275 ment. There is golf, of course, for nearly every resort in Europe has been obliged to lay out golf links and import a professional, usually a Scot, to look after it, as the hotel keepers have been forced to install bathrooms. Aeroplanes vie with automobiles in keeping things humming above and below. The air line from Paris to Madrid is by the way of Biarritz and San Sebas- tian. The national sport of the Basques is pelote, a charming game, reminiscent of squash, where the ball is batted to the wall by the players wearing long wicker gloves, somewhat like the flippers of a seal. At Biarritz it is at its best, and the bull-fighting is by no means third rate. The bathing is delicious in summer, which it is not on the north coast of Europe. Here one bathes in the open, not from a bathing machine. The promenade at Biarritz — always the centre of the " life " of a resort, is not the usual long, straight, windy walk. It winds picturesquely over rocks, be- tween flower beds and over rustic bridges thrown from spur to spur. Society dresses for dinner and strolls on foot or rides in some sort of a vehicle up and down before the long line of hotels. Expensive, Biarritz? Well, say ten dollars a day, if you really want to be in the swim, literally and figuratively, and as much more as you will, less if you try hard to keep the figure down. The English- woman of small income says that one can fare well at a certain modest little hotel for a dollar and a half a day, but it is not for this that one chiefly comes to 276 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Biarritz; rather it is for the life of the great hotels, and divertisements that in luxuriousness throw a glamour about things in a way that suggests cere- monious society functions more than the mere com- mercial transactions with hotel keepers. San Sebastian is the Spanish counterpart of Biar- ritz, the nation's one fashionable seaside resort. It is tucked away in a corner just sufficient to allow of a breathing spot facing the cool waters of the north Atlantic. Here the flower of Spanish society re- laxes in a manner amazing to the outsider. Spanish grandees, sehoras and sehoritas there disport them- selves. Society apes things French, and the hotels are French in their appointments and cuisine. The only fairly good road in Spain leads from Madrid to San Sebastian, thus showing the importance of the resort in the eyes of Spain's automobiling mon- arch. Between the two Basque resorts, one in France and one in Spain, there is a constant interchange of cour- tesies. The gay world of San Sebastian motors over to dance and play bridge at Biarritz, and in return extends the honours of her royal bull-ring to her French neighbour. The Spanish women plaster powder on their dark faces until they look ashen; they dress as nearly like Frenchwomen as they can, and, it is said, gamble with zest and pocket their winnings without remorse. In spite of all this laxity, the young Spanish girl is chaperoned with astonishing severity. Society has abandoned the mantilla except for Mass, or at some *u J-i ID c O CITIES OF PLEASURE 277 gala performance at the bull-ring, when, however, only the white mantilla is the proper thing. The Spaniards have apparently no objection to setting up a gambling concession on their borderland, but it is doubtful if they can ever hope to divert the golden stream from the little principality of Monaco, which would mean changing the course of the flood of tourists, who, like an endless caravan, have got the habit of marching up to the very doors of Monte Carlo's Casino before pulling up. Between San Sebastian and Biarritz one can be as gay as one wishes. Prices are high in Spain for anything really good, and for this reason it is more satisfactory to see San Sebastian from Biarritz. Trouville, in the North, is the Newport of France. It is not so exclusive as Biarritz, for it is too near Paris for that. For two months of the summer it is Paris-by-the-sea, but it is even gayer and more dashing, and a good deal more unconven- tional. After the races at Longchamps in July, high so- ciety prepares for its summer exodus. It is obliga- tory for society to show itself at Trouville for at least a fortnight. At heart the French mondaine does not in the least care for outdoor life; she only looks upon it as a part of the social game, and her only thought of the seashore is that it is a new theatre for her activities, and that she will have an opportunity to dress for a new part. The Frenchwoman does not relax to the detriment of her looks. There is no driving about bare-headed 278 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD in automobiles, for she does not court tan nor sun- burn. She sits on the sands at Trouville, under the bright, striped awning of an umbrella-like tent, with curtained sides, in a pliant — a folding-chair — or in a hooded wicker chair, with a becoming arrangement of cushions, but all the time correctly gloved and veiled. The Frenchwoman dreads nothing so much as the sun. No sight of its kind is quite so gay as that of the sands of Trouville at four in the afternoon. Side by side with the discreet family groups and their carefully guarded, convent-bred daughters, the nota- bles of the Paris demi-monde disport themselves on the beach in the most startling and briefest of cos- tumes, of a kind suggestive of an aquatic vaudeville show. The tactics employed are reminiscent of the evening life along the Paris boulevards or in some popularly frequented restaurant. One can bathe from one of a numbered row of bath-houses, little coop-like cages, or from a " bath- ing machine," while there are on all sides sturdy Norman fishermen hanging about, whose business it is to carry the timid out into the surf and teach them to swim — of course at a fixed price. The foreign feminine bathing costume is startlingly abbreviated, frequently consisting of but one tight garment. Stockings are not obligatory and by no means the custom, though canvas shoes or sandals are always worn. This necessitates the bathrobe being worn down to the water's edge, there to be dropped in a heap on the sand, or left in charge of a maid. Once CITIES OF PLEASURE 279 in the water all deficiencies of costume are supposed to be hidden. Villa life is a feature of Trouville for those who desire any approach to quietness or exclusiveness, but the Hotel des Roches Noires is the centre of movement, and all the world and his wife is to be found there at one time or another of the day, or at the Casino, trying their luck at " Petits Cheveux," harmless enough if taken in small doses, and always a characteristic feature of a Continental resort, and one which must at least be tried once in order to fully sample the flavour of a French City of Pleasure. From Trouville one motors out to the Ferme Saint Simon for luncheon, and round about in all direc- tions is the charming Norman countryside, with thatch-roofed, half-timbered, quaint old Norman houses. At Deauville, Trouville's twin, just down the coast, is the summer capital of rank and fashion. Here on the famous seaside race-track is run the Grand Prix of the French provinces, the race attracting quite as much of the sporty, dressy element as is to be seen at Longchamps itself. This is peculiarly a phase of the summer life of Deauville-Trouville, as the twin towns are usually called. Dinard, on the Breton coast, to the westward of Trouville, tries to be exclusive, and folk on limited income here make a brave showing, which, in the comforts and variety with which they surround their summer life, compares favourably with that of their 280 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD plunging neighbours in Normandy, though, after all, the keynote of French seaside summer life is only to be heard in its most melodic form at Trou- ville and its neighbouring summer cities. " England's Riviera " is a myth. It is not for a moment to be supposed that such a thing exists ex- cept in words. Brighton, " London-by-the-Sea," as it is called, is as far as the comparison can be justly carried. So far as England is concerned, Brighton is the " Queen of Watering-places," and affords an exemplification of the tradition that the English take their pleasure sadly. English smug society considers itself on the top wave of gaiety when it spends a week-end at Brighton. Saturday to Monday at the Metropole or the Grand, off and on during the winter, used to be the fashion, but the automobile has made it possible to make Brighton the end of a day's run down and back, with dinner at the Old Ship Inn, and so that rather faded hostelry has been furbished up anew and is more than running the modern establishments a close second. Brighton is supposed to be both a winter and summer resort — patronised by society in winter and trippers in summer, a tripper being one who travels on a cheap ticket with a return limit inconveniently near. Only by courtesy, and in contrast with the London winter, could Brighton be called a winter resort. One of Brighton's chief amusements is being pushed about in a " bath chair," a contrivance on the order of a perambulator, but not so sociable as those CITIES OF PLEASURE 281 of the " Board Walks " of America, as it only ac- commodates one. Nothing is considered more exclu- sive than a daily airing in a " bath chair," the name coming from its first appearance at the one-time fashionable resort of Bath. Afternoons are spent on the iron pier. Every English seaside place has a long pier jutting out into the water, where one sits and listens to the band. Glass-covered shelters are at intervals along the promenade, allowing sitting out in the almost daily rain; by shifting occasionally one may also avoid the most contrary winds that blow. Hotel life lacks the French dash and brilliance, but the English have taken kindly to the great hotel at home as an amusement enterprise, and formality is relaxed to a degree unknown formerly. One is asked to make up bridge parties, and here the Amer- ican woman can shine, if she so wishes. A week- end at the Metropole is not a bad change from Lon- don in February — if you cannot get down to the real Riviera in the south of France. Bournemouth is farther to the westward, some- what nearer the Scilly Isles, where the warm sweep of the Gulf Stream makes bloom the narcissus in the open air when the crocuses are hardly out in the same latitude inland. Bournemouth is a resort for invalids of the real and imaginary kind, and its attractions in consequence are of the most homeo- pathic nature. A stroll under the pines, or in the pretty sunken gardens, being trundled about in a bath chair, or an afternoon visit to the tea-shop, are about 282 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD as stimulating as any of Bournemouth's amusements. As a rest-cure the place is to be recommended, but it is totally unsuited to American taste, though mid- dle-class English society desires nothing better than a month at Bournemouth. Like all English resorts it is expensive out of all proportion for what one gets. Ostende, in Belgium, and Scheveningen, in Hol- land, are the only two outlets to the sea for north Germany, which has no pleasure city on her small seaboard, nor has Russia; consequently these two nations find their way to the Dutch and Belgian re- sorts. Ostende has probably the most beautiful beach (plage is the European word) of all. A mag- nificent brick-paved promenade — the Digue — stretches for a mile or more, on one side the vast expanse of smooth sand, and on the other a line of palatial hotels, the equal in price and appointments of any on earth. A prolonged stay at Ostende would eat the very bottom out of one's purse. Its water front is most spectacular, and the little city stands alone as the most luxurious seaside resort of its type. It was in a fair way to become a northern Monte Carlo, and its proximity to London and the big wealthy cities of north Europe gave an excuse for high play. But its glory has faded since public gambling was put an end to a year or so ago by the suddenly aroused conscience of the Belgian Government. All the same, prices have not slumped at Ostende, and its unrivalled bathing facilities still attract a cosmo- CITIES OF PLEASURE 283 politan crowd to brave the rather damp bathing season which hardly extends over more than sixty days of midsummer. The open-air bath takes on a more decorous phase as one goes further towards the North Sea. This may be because of the chilling climate quite as much as a severer code of morals. One bathes here exclusively from the bathing machine, a little house on wheels; you enter, a man hitches a horse, and the " machine " is taken on the run down into the surf. The horse and driver go back to dry land while you undress and step down into the water as if out of your own front door. You enter again and dress, and, at a prearranged time, the horse and man come and drag the " ma- chine " out again. It is undoubtedly a most con- venient way of bathing, though there are stories of these sea-horses taking fright and running out to open water, setting the bathing machine adrift. One hires a bathing machine by the hour, day, week or season, and temporarily it is one's castle. Royalty often comes to Ostende, for royalty must bathe somewhere, and German princes don't care overmuch for the French resorts. The large Kur- saal — the German influence is strong here — a large concert hall, built out over the water, is a place where one may listen to the world's finest summer orchestra and partake of light refreshments. Just as an experience, a round of Ostende is amus- ing enough, though the passing traveller usually knows it only as one of the termini of a particularly 284 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD unpleasant crossing of the Channel from England to the Continent. Scheveningen being Dutch is a bit heavy and staid. Its peculiarity, at first glance, is the vast spawn of mushroom wicker chairs dotting the sands from the edge of the green-grey North Sea to the dykes which separate its waters from low-lying Holland to the rear. These chairs, like the bathing machines at Ostende, are rented for long or short periods, and such of the throng as do not find enjoyment in the rather glacial waters off-shore, are very comfortable indeed gazing at those who do from the depths of one of the curious chairs, wherein one is so sheltered from the winds that blow and the sun that burns, that they are otherwise quite indifferent to climatic conditions. Scheveningen is the seaside suburb of Holland's dainty capital of the Hague. There are hotels at Scheveningen of an excellence approaching the best elsewhere; there is a Kursaal, too, of some magnifi- cence, and an appreciably good orchestra. At the other end of the dyke is the fishermen's village, where the clumsy, broad-of-beam fishing-boats are drawn up on the beach, and tarry old salts group themselves picturesquely about the market place, where the day's catch is sold off by the " Dutch Auction " process, which is nothing more than beginning at the highest probable price that the fish might bring, with a de- scent down the scale if there are no offers at the higher prices. At Scheveningen one's bathing-box is catered to by CITIES OF PLEASURE 285 women, who go about, their arms full of towels and costumes for rent, each labelled with their name to facilitate sorting out. The charge for the bath cabin here is twenty cents for a small one and fifty cents for one more commo- dious, while the rate for the mushroom basket chairs and a foot stool is twenty cents a day. Across the heart of France, through vine-clad Bur- gundy and gripping the foothills of the Alps, one /Tbe PALRNQUINS of AlX-L£S-BfllNS comes to Aix-les-Bains, which has the reputation of being the wickedest place in Europe. Rival spas may or may not have set this gossip afloat, but one thing is certain; it sets the liveliest pace of any " cure " in Europe, and assuredly is not for that class of invalids which is in need of rest and quiet. Its " cure " is a three weeks' course of baths, douches and the usual routine which eases the pangs of gout, but the service of palanquins is an exclusive feature of Aix-les-Bains. The invalids are carried 286 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD to and from the baths in a sort of curtained sedan chair by two uniformed bearers. One can step from bed into a palanquin at any unusual hour that a bath is prescribed, be carried to the bathing establishment and returned with a minimum of exertion. Automo- biles are more plentiful than palanquins though, and a very small proportion of invalids form a part of the crowds that fill the magnificent hotels for the four months' season. One is thus tempted to believe that Aix's grand thermal establishment is only a drawing card for the world which must be attracted thither, and that the health bogey is as good an excuse as any other; to claim to be able to put one's health to rights in three weeks, under the most luxurious of environ- ments, is a good enough bait with which to catch the most sceptical. Vichy has got Aix-les-Bains very close when it comes to the purveying of amusements and mineral waters, though Vichy's thirty millions of bottles sent out into the world each year have left its rival far behind. There is no question but that Vichy is to-day the less fashionable resort, though perhaps visited the more largely. The usual attributes of a French watering-place are on their biggest scale here. The springs are State owned and controlled, and since there is no " Vichy " save the " Hopital,'' " Grand Grille " and " Celestins," it is needless to order " French Vichy," if that which has a right to the name is what is wanted. CITIES OF PLEASURE 287 Madame de Sevigne first gave the vogue to " Vichy "; since her day the wave of popularity has engulfed it as it has no other place of its class in France. The Hotel Astoria, the Ambassadeurs and the Pare are as luxuriously fitted as those more ex- pensive and more fashionable elsewhere, and though not cheap are decidedly good value. A curious thing about the life of Vichy is that you pay for your baths on a sliding scale which more or less corresponds with the price which you pay for accommodations at your hotel. There seems reason in this. Americans do not linger on at Vichy, but it is worthy of remark that one thousand five hundred of the species were registered at this most popular of French springs in the month of August of last year. Switzerland's resorts take on one complexion in summer and another in winter. Some of us who know prefer them in winter. Lucerne, of all other Swiss towns, heads the list as a stranger's capital. It has come forward remark- ably in the last few years, though it has not, however, the thin excuse for being that has many another place of its class; there are no baths, nor tours to take; pure enjoyment is Lucerne's only invested capital, and its two magnificent hotels, the Schweitzerhof and the Luzernerhof, provide the luxurious living which is its natural accompaniment. Amusements are plentiful enough, and Lucerne is the gateway for automobiles coming down from the Rhine country and the Black Forest, bound Italywards 288 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD via the St. Gothard Pass and vice versa. One can buy a season ticket and ride about the Lake oi the Four Cantons on the line steamers which are forever fussing about, as often and as much as one likes, for a very small sum. luncheon on board if desired. The only practical passenger-carrying airship yet launched soars above Lucerne, and for two hundred francs — forty dollars — one may take a homeopathic flight out over the lake and back to the landing-place, if one puts so low a valuation upon one's life. Lucerne's greatest amusement is the daily prome- nade along the tree-shaded quay, when all the middle and upper society of all nations, in the brightest and best of summer frocks, takes its airing between the hours of tea and dinner. Lucerne being about the centre of civilised Europe lends itself naturally as a meeting-place, and its August crowd is cosmopolitan almost beyond belief to one who has not had acquaintance therewith. At the tea hour the M lounges " and " halls " of the big hotels are full to overflowing. Motor launches on the lake are seemingly innumerable, and the funiculmrs, up the Rigi or Pilatus, lose themselves above the clouds. For the woman visitor there is always the diversion of the lace and embroider)- shops, for Lucerne is one oi the most important of retail outlets for the wares of St. Gall and Appenzell. As a drawing card the little embroideresses sit stitching away outside the lace shops. They serve somewhat naively their un- acknowledged purpose of drawing customers inside. CITIES OF PLEASURE 289 though in reality they may be considered as the taffy which draws the unsuspecting fly thither. The Riviera quartette, Cannes, Nice, Monte Carlo and Menton, is the most attractive battery of Euro- pean resorts indexed in the books of the globe-trotter. They are woman's paradise. One hundred and fifty miles of sea coast, from Marseilles to the Italian frontier, contains all that is superlative among the world's playgrounds. This quartette of " stations d'hiver," as the French name their winter resorts, are unequalled among the world's cities of pleasure. The original development of this strip of Mediterranean coast line as a refuge for invalids fleeing from the foggy north has been lost sight of in a flood of amusements, which has of late rolled upon its shores, almost too strenuous for those halfway ill. Americans have almost appropriated the region as their own, and whereas the aspect was formerly, and thoroughly, English, to-day it has decidedly the flavour of over the Atlantic. American trade is catered to by hotels, shops, automobile garages and tourist agencies. There are no Baedeker " sights " here, not suffi- cient to account for the throngs. What antiquities there are are discreetly in the background, and sight- seeing is not a procedure which is allowed to interfere with more frivolous social functions. Coming eastward, Cannes is the first of these winter stations, the most exclusive, most aristocratic resort in Europe. And in spite of this, Americans have 2go THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD been known to say that it was " too quiet." This means simply, if it means anything, that the real life of Cannes is not for the outsider. It is a life of villas, select clubs, exclusive hotel and restaurant din- ners, teas at Rumplemeyer's, the "high life" of yachtsmen and women and the things that Russian Grand Dukes, German Princes and English Lords affect when they are holiday-making under congenial skies. Here the aristocracy of Europe is at close range. As diversions there are golfing, automobiling, yacht- ing, polo playing and aeroplaning. Cannes is the biggest and most famous yacht station on the Medi- terranean, and the swellest craft of all nations that fly a flag are, at one time or another, to be seen moored to the Albert Edward Jetty, named for that great sportsman, Edward VII. There is a five kilometre palm-tree-lined prome- nade, more attractive even than the celebrated Prom- enade des Anglais at Nice, and in the Allees, be- fore the Municipal Casino, all the world saunters before and after the hour of tea, to see and to be seen. For the small sum of one franc you may gamble at a homeopathic roulette wheel within the casino, or for ten dollars dine in the gorgeous restaurant of the establishment overlooking the blue Mediterra- nean waves, while at Rumplemeyer's one gets ices, cakes and tea at equally inflated prices. Automobiles of the nobility and royalty of Europe are everywhere, but they carry no identifying number CITIES OF PLEASURE 291 plates like those of plebeians ; with a regal right they make what speed they will by a sort of international courtesy which grants them this privilege of the road. All the way eastward from Cannes, across the Italian frontier, even unto Genoa, is a whole string of these pleasure cities, where white marble structures and palm-tree-lined promenades predominate. The worldly capital of them all is Nice. " Nizza, la Bella," as the Italians called it when it was their own, caters for a quarter of a million strangers in a season which extends from November to May. A busy city on its own account, the tourists' capital in winter adds another population of like proportions, and there is a " movement " and a prosperity which is only to be admitted by acknowl- edging that the caring for the stranger is its chief industry. One reason for the great popularity of Nice is that it is within a half-hour's ride of that restricted little metropolis of Monte Carlo. A wave of the same worldly atmosphere as that at Monte Carlo also envelopes Nice, and when its winter population is not sauntering in gay clothes on the celebrated Prom- enade des Anglais, it is at the Casino, where, for a franc entrance fee, considerably less if you are a " subscriber," you may spend as much or as little as you will and need not feel that you are missing anything by not being at Monte Carlo itself. . A sort of glorified glass-house, or conservatory, Nice's Casino is virtually an indoor palm garden. Little wicker tables and chairs are set about tempt- 2Q2 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD ingly, and one falls naturally before them, and orders tea and toast or a " quart Vichy," or whatever one's favourite tipple may be for the moment, meanwhile listening to the orchestra and gazing at the marching and counter-marching throng who make this part of their daily round as much a feature of their existence as getting up and going to bed. In chapel-like alcoves down either side of this great glass-domed room is worshipped the God of Chance. " Roulette " and " Boule " and " Petits Chevaux " here divide the claims for attention, the latter being by far the favourite, thought it does seem childish to see grown men and women occupy themselves so in- tently on little tin horses whirling around on a central pivot, in the hope that the one which is painted red, or green, or blue, will stop nearest the winning post. Like Monte Carlo's game, the odds are very much against the player. CITIES OF PLEASURE 293 What Nice lacks in refinement it makes up in a generous display of the things that attract and amuse the winter idler, and with that one cannot find fault. All is luxurious and expensive, but not one single phase is exclusive. Money is the open sesame to all. The shops of Nice will not prove the least potent of the lodestones of this winter capital by the sea. Chiefly, they are branches of those of the Rue de la Paix and the Rue Royal at Paris, and the doors of many blazon names the most famous in the world of the luxurious shopper. Prices for really exclusive things, whether they be jewels, gowns or hats, if bought at Nice are apt to be a little in excess of what they would be in Paris. The game is one of money again, and nothing is good value for what one pays in Nice. A large part of one's expenditures here are only properly to be charged off to unpremeditated follies, but often these are worth paying for, or thought to be, so not every one will complain. There is no difficulty at Nice in supplying one's most peculiar pet taste. The little principality of Monaco, with an area scarce four and a half by one and a half miles, placed like a jewel in the centre of the chain of Riviera re- sorts, enjoys the unique distinction of being a land whose interests are entirely devoted to amusement. The reigning monarch, the army, church and muni- cipal government are virtually maintained by returns gained from the gambling concession, which itself is supported by contributions from all the world. On 294 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD this foundation the princely house of Grimaldi is built. That it is the most beautiful spot in the world carries small weight beside the fact that the roulette wheel of Monte Carlo's Casino is the whirling mag- net that draws uncounted numbers to these parts. Even the most puritanical of women will want at least to " see the inside " of Monte Carlo's Casino, and this one may do without male escort. It would seem as though it ought to be easy to walk freely into an establishment that exists only for the express purpose of relieving visitors of their money, but the formalities of the procedure here actually take fifteen or twenty minutes. At the entrance is drawn up an army of officials, imperturbable but watchful. You are turned into a businesslike office — more officials. Before a long desk, as if you were going to open an account in a bank rather than deplete one, a clerk asks for some means of identification — a visiting card is sufficient — demands your home address and as to where you may be stopping. All this he records minutely, and during the process you have been subjected to a piercing scrutiny. No girl under eighteen may enter, so if one's looks are too youthful, or her skirts too short, she may have some difficulty in convincing the administration that she has reached the age of discretion. So, too, if you are just off your automobile, and happen to be too much wrapped up in a cloud of veiling, you may be politely asked to unwrap. All this means that the officials wish to have every sure means at hand CITIES OF PLEASURE 295 of identification in case the suicide of an unknown takes place in some secluded spot in their beautiful gardens. At last you are handed a properly made out en- trance card. If you have a camera it must be checked. Minions in unobtrusive uniforms haunt your steps, and you sense the unpleasant feeling of being watched. At the entrance to the Salles de Jeu you are stopped again, while another official scruti- nises your card, finally throwing open the door and ushering you within as if it were your appearance at some private function. Once inside, your move- ments are no longer hampered. You may stroll about through the long suites of rooms, from the five-franc roulette tables to the twenty-franc trente-et- quarante, as you please. Hundreds are crowded around each table, but there is a silence as of the tomb. People stick rows deep around the golden piles on the green baize as flies about a lump of sugar, unconscious of all around them but the clink of coin and the rustle of banknotes. Where money is thrown about on a green cloth unceasingly it is only natural that one loses all sense of its value. Prices at Monte Carlo bear no relation to others elsewhere for the same thing. The res- taurant menus scorn to name prices, and the unitiated will not know if lunch at the Cafe de Paris is going to cost two dollars or ten dollars. A room and bath at the Hotel de Paris is apparently anything, in the height of the spring season, that the proprietor can get — say from ten dollars up. A sojourn at Monte 296 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Carlo is a millionaire's game, even if one never goes inside the Casino. The last of the great French Riviera stations is Menton. In many respects it is the pleasantest of all at which to make a stay. The virtual gateway to Italy, it commands the French Riviera on one side and that of Liguria on the other. Its accommoda- tions are quite the equal of the other resorts, but the atmosphere is more tranquil and the pace slower. A scarce half-dozen miles from Monte Carlo, Men- ton offers all that that little world of iniquity lacks, an English church and a homeopathic druggist. CLASSIFICATION OF EUROPEAN HOTELS PICTURESQUE ENGLISH INN SENTIMENTAL ASSOCIATIONS ENGLISH HOTEL " MANAGERESS " " LIGHTS AND ATTENDANCE " ROSES AND LAVENDER COFFEE ROOM FOOD OF THE ENGLISH INN THE " COUNTY HOTEL " AIRING THE BEDS SPORT AND THE ENGLISH INN HOTEL OF THE FRENCH COUNTRYSIDE REAL FRENCH CUISINE PROPRIETOR-CHEF " COMMIS VOYAGEURS " AND THE TABLE D'HOTE EARLY HOURS OF THE FRENCH COUNTRYSIDE TYPES OF FRENCH HOTELS ITALIAN ALBERGO MENU OF THE ITALIAN HOTEL COUNTRY HOTELS OF SWITZERLAND CHEAP SWISS HOTELS AND GERMAN STUDENTS GERMAN GASTHAUS INNS OF THE BLACK FOREST BREAKFAST AT THE DUTCH HOTEL CHEAP HOTELS OF BELGIUM XII THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE The hotels of Europe are readily classified. There is the purely resort hotel, which is only open at certain seasons, catering to a special clientele, and whose prices, on account of the various divertise- ments purveyed, are well in the neighbourhood of ten dollars a day. Tourist hotels of a similar rank, so far as excellence and worth may go, but less fashionable, cater in a similar fashion for, say five dollars a day all found, save the cost of wine or extras. The frankly second-class tourist hotels of the re- sorts, as good perhaps in quality, but less luxurious than those of the first class, are much cheaper, cater- ing at a minimum of three dollars per day per person. Those of the third class, quite good enough, if price is a consideration, begin at the equivalent of two dollars, and such are found in practically all the resorts of Europe, though partaking very little of the complexion of those of the first two classes. Without going down in scale, but of a different classification, are the commercial hotels of the towns of France in particular, which possess almost nothing of luxury, but often cater in a superior " National" manner to those establishments whose clients are 299 300 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD English-speaking people alone. On the Continent many of these are to be found, where, for seldom more than two dollars per day, one may be served of the very best that the country affords in the way of the good things of the table; in England the cost is somewhat more. Such houses may lack in what we call modern conveniences, but invariably possess a character which many will prefer to that of the tourist establishments where only " foreigners " are found. Last of all comes the country inn, lowest in price, and, on the Continent, often to be had for a dollar a day, or a little more, up to say a dollar and a half. In such quaint and charming hostelries as these usu- ally prove to be, one is sure of simple, well-cooked food, abundantly served, and the opportunity of rubbing elbows with the people of the country is not the least of their attractions. Under such conditions, deficiencies and inconveniences are made light of, and one gets a touch of individuality which vividly impresses the surroundings upon one. The American traveller accepts without question the English inn as the ideal type of the small hostelry, but regards dubiously the corresponding small hotel of the countryside of Continental Europe. Even if one does sample the modest Italian albergo, the Ger- man gasthaus or the small French anberge out of curiosity, and finds it good, the experience is looked upon as an exception. More particularly is this the woman's point of view, and still unconvinced, she THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 301 passes on the next time to the big tourist hotel with a thousand windows. The reason is obvious. The English inn has been thoroughly advertised by the time-honoured literature of its country. Poets and artists, times without num- ber, have surrounded it with a romantic glamour, so that now it stands as the very flower of the traveller's rest-house. Since we as a nation have largely drawn our ideas of hotel life from English sources, it is correspond- ingly through that same medium that we have im- bibed the English contempt of the " foreign" hotel — meaning that of Continental Europe. But this point of view is giving way before the immense im- provement in all classes of hotels, brought about by the Renaissance of tourisme that is sweeping over Europe. More especially is the change to be noted in the small country hotel of France, which the Eng- lish themselves are forced to admit as superior, in many cases, to their own country inns, if not in actual comfort, at least in quality, and this ought to mean the same thing. It is the English inn which still makes the strongest sentimental appeal to the traveller. It still stands for the glamour of the open road and a real hos- pitality of a pertinent, personal nature. The Eng- lish inn is synonomous with good cheer and comfort and a welcome still warm with the traditions of old- time travel. It is the personal service with which one meets at the English inn that makes the strongest bid for the woman traveller. No matter how small 302 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the house, one is taken in hand and made to feel as much at home as is possible when one is sleeping in a strange bed and being waited upon by strange servants. That the English inn is still our ideal of the most attractive form of hostelry, is endorsed by the imita- tions which are springing up all over our own coun- try. Just the display of that magic word " inn " is enough to assure one that patronises the establishment behind it of comfort, quality and high prices, though with this latter, it ought not to be. It is easy thus to see that the picturesquely disposed inn holds its own in the affections of the American, and why it is not the least of England's charms for the tourist. The sentimental call of the country inn to the traveller who wants picturesqueness as well as solid comforts is irresistible. One does pay though for its pictur- esque accessories, more perhaps than is really justi- fiable. The English inn is often an illustration of the costliness of simplicity, for the smallest of thatch- roofed country inns is frequently a big surprise in the matter of prices. Twelve shillings a day is about the price for meals and lodging in the inn of the average big town in England. This seems a trifle stiff for going to bed by a solitary candle and also being charged for it in the bill. It is not only inconvenient to go to bed by a candle, but galling in the extreme to be made to pay for the privilege, and this archaic custom for paying for " light and attendance " still holds good in most English hotels, the exceptions being certain THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 303 of the newer ones in London. The charge varies in the country inn from a sixpence to a shilling and sixpence, according, as it would seem, to what the traffic will stand. In most cases it is a woman who presides over the destinies of the English inn. The hotel business is more nearly a woman's business in England than elsewhere. It is the " Manageress " who is to be seen in the office of most hotels, both great and small. This has much to do with making that " home atmosphere " which is peculiarly an attribute of the English hotel. The fact that the English carry their environment, one might almost say atmosphere, about with them as much as possible, is responsible for this effort of the hotel proprietor to create what is com- monly known a " home from home." This is the English idea of hotel life. Femininity is the keynote at the little English inn. A maid in a neat dress and white apron and cap, most likely, carries your hand luggage up to your room, often to the great distress of the chivalrous American man should he happen to be an adjunct to the party. Under such circumstances he has often been known to do the porterage himself. At its best, the English inn has roses clustering about its latticed windows, and the smell of sweet clover comes floating in from the meadows below. It is delightful to rest between lavender-scented sheets in an old-fashioned English inn, and while the first- class English bed is the best in the housekeeping world, it is more often met with as a combination of 304 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD a " flock " mattress on top of a featherbed. The dressing-table takes up the best window, back to the street (the ideal place for it, by the way), and white dimity hangings look cool, too cool sometimes as one shivers through an English summer, for fires in July are not uncommon. The maid brings up hot water in a " jug," and for the bath there is a flat pie-dish-like, tin tub, unless one has sufficiently adopted the custom of the country and travels with a collapsible one of rubber, whose tendency is to fold up unexpectedly and set the floor awash. To get into the real spirit of the thing a guest at an English inn should have a cup of tea before rising. This the maid will bring up on call, and it will not be forgotten in the bill, figuring at from sixpence to a shilling, but in spite of this no English woman would think of beginning the day without this stimulant, and even the mere English man takes kindly to the custom. The " coffee room " is the general utility room of the English inn. Here one writes letters, sits, smokes, reads and takes one's meals, but whatever may be the disadvantage of dining off of one end of a table at which another is writing, the atmosphere of the coffee room is comfortably pleasing, and usually its furnishings are enough to turn the woman from " out West " into a collector if she had not the craze before leaving home. The furniture is apt to be old and massive and of good periods. On the walls, and on the inevitable British sideboard, is generally a dis- play of pewter and old English china, long out of THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 305 print, so to speak, and silver or plate of the Sheffield variety. No English inn is complete without a glass case of stuffed birds or beasts — or it may be fish; it all depends upon the sporting tastes of a long line of former proprietors, for such accessories are usu- ally hand-me-downs. There is not much use to pump the proprietor as to the purchase of these relics; antiques are well known to be an asset, and for that reason alone he will be averse to parting with them, if indeed he does not wish to keep them for senti- mental reasons. At the more pretentious inn a waiter of the old type is sure to be in attendance in the " coffee room "; solemn, with mutton-chop whiskers, a fast disappear- ing type of the old-time servitor. Breakfast costs what one wishes to pay for it. Coffee (though it is well to stick to tea in Britain), bacon and eggs, marmalade and toast are the staples. The toast will be cold, though this will not be through mistake but by intent, for it has stood in the toast-rack unbuttered, as is the wholesome way, to cool off. The cost may be two shillings, or it may rise to the city price of " two and six," more famil- iarly reckoned as half a crown. At times it may drop to one and nine pence or some such uncouth figure, but not often. On the sideboard are arranged, in that class of inn that owns to the solemn waiter, a varied assortment of those cold " joints " that so appeal to the Britisher as a breakfast dish. Thus, with a slice of cold 'am or mutton or a " bit of fish," the price will certainly reach the highest limit. 306 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Dinner at the country inn is the midday meal, and the bill of fare is as monotonous as a tax receipt — chiefly boiled mutton, potatoes, cabbage and one of the solid English varieties of pudding, that under different names bear a strong family resemblance. There are little towns where, if one happens in on market day, such a meal can be had for a shilling, accompanied with a glass of temperance ale at tu' pence, but the more usual price will be two shillings and six pence, the half-crown being the most popular and hard-worked coin in the realm. Supper at night is practically what you can get. " Whatever you like, ma'am," is only a formula in the mouth of the solemn waiter or the neat maid, and soon reduces itself to a chop or a bit of cold meat left from the dinner's " joint," and, if you are late, and the village butcher shop happens to be closed, not even the chop will be forthcoming. More often than not it is cold meat and cheese combined into a " high-tea " with the help of the ever good English brew, at a cost of eighteen pence or a couple of shil- lings. The bill of fare of the English inn is very inelastic and is apt to cool the enthusiasm of the American traveller brought up on a great variety of food. One does get used to it, but there is always a longing for something different. The automobile has been a missionary to the inn in England, and is directly responsible for the Renaissance of the country post-house, whose vogue had greatly declined with the passing of the old coaching days. The increased prices of the new era I On 4Be Cote &E/77er>ai/c>-N0RMAND THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 307 are sometimes extortionate for the return one gets, and have soared until the picturesque inn of the small town is often as expensive as the more ambitious " county " hotel of the larger communities. There is always a " county " hotel in each county town. It is an establishment which is supposed to be patronised by the swell element of neighbouring country houses when perforce they have to remain in town. Here the bill of the stranger will fluctuate between twelve and twenty shillings a day, especially if the proprietor is ambitious enough to attempt to get you up an evening meal sufficiently pretentious to be called a dinner. Happily the rule of the old coaching days, " four bottles of port to four horses," does not have to be imitated by the owner of a 60 H.P. touring car, but one pays in other ways for the privilege of being treated as a " gentleman," which, according to the tradition of the British innkeeper, is that you must be served, as nearly as possible, in the manner in which you are supposed to live at home. You also pay for this in the bill. If one will not expect too much from the food and is not looking for modern conveniences, the English inn will serve one very well. In winter the cosy coffee room of an English inn is a most attractive spot as one comes in out of a November fog and huddles around the blaze of an open fire, the tea kettle singing on the hob, while the maid is hurried off to " air the beds," — damp sheets are the bogie of the English housekeeper, and the opening up and 308 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD warming of the bed amounts almost to a religious ceremony in the humid little isle. What a pleasant antidote this is for the chills outside ! In some inns that hold to old customs, the long-handled, brass warming-pan, filled with glowing coals, is still passed under the bed coverings in an effort to dry them out before the guest retires. In England one can often vary a stay at some quaint little riverside inn, if there is a desire to sample the fishing, for the proprietor usually has manorial rights which cover the taking of fish for a mile or two along the stream. You can hire a rod, a small boy and a boat and be lucky enough, perhaps, to bring back a trout or a pike for dinner. In any of the great hunting 'shires one can hire a mount at the local inn and follow the hounds of a famous hunt, a free and democratic amusement open to all under certain conditions. If a good golf links is in proximity to a comfortable inn an ideal combination is made for one who would like to take his, or her, pleasures quietly. All these things are possible to the stranger once welcomed under the hospitable roof of the English inn. The English inn has long overshadowed its coun- terpart on the Continent, but the small French country hotel is coming into its own, largely through the Touring Club de France, which has done great work in improving the French hotel of all grades. Espe- cially has the small hotel of the countryside benefited under its tutelage in the past ten years, and even if it has not always risen to the height of installing the chambres hygieniques, advocated by the beneficent THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 309 T.C.F., the whole tone and aspect of things has been put on a more livable basis, while those cabalistic letters " W.C.," opposite the name of a hotel in the hotel guide of the T.C.F., indicate improved san- itary arrangements of a kind that scarcely existed a few years ago. The country hotel or auberge of France (the word inn does not lit in for the nomenclature of a small French hostelry) has quite as much charm on inti- mate acquaintance as its counterpart in Britain, though its exterior is often plain, and, at first glance, unattractive. For all this the lone woman traveller may drop into any French countryside hotel, no mat- ter how humble it may appear, with perfect confi- dence and propriety, and be assured of finding a good bed, good cooking, good food and reasonable prices. However you may arrive at the French hotel, by the hotel 'bus from the station, by the omnibus of the ville, or in your own automobile, you will most fre- quently drive into the courtyard — sometimes a gar- den, but more often paved with cobblestones, with the stables lined up on one side. The expectant garcon rings the big bell that hangs beside the en- trance and the patron comes to the door to welcome you; as likely he is the chef, too, in white apron and cap; the proprietor is usually the chef himself in the country hotel in France, in which case you may count upon it that the food will be good. The rooms may seem bare after the plethora of furniture of the English inn, but its warm, waxed floors, as in the 310 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD north, or the glazed tiles of the south, are more hygienic than the carpets under foot that the English insist upon at home. The bedroom is as severe as a convent cell, and the bed resembles a sarcophagus, piled so high with many mattresses that it takes a gymnastic turn to get in. The sheets are of linen, sometimes old, hand-woven heirlooms of fascinating softness, sometimes unbleached and of a board-like thickness. The frugal French housekeeper counts on the life of a sheet being a quarter of a century and buys sturdy stuff. The washing arrangements are usually microscopic, and the bathroom non-existent. A demand for hot water meets with but slow response, but this is only because the kitchen fire has to be made up and a casserole or broc of water heated. The man cham- bermaid one must put up with; there is no reason for getting shocked over it, he takes it all as a matter of course, so why should not you. There will be only a solitary candle for light in the bedroom, in spite of the fact that most country hotels in France have electric lights on the ground floor. On a table in the hall is ranged a long row of candles in shining brass candlesticks, which you set aglow from the little night lamp — a wick set in a cork, floating, lighted, in a receptacle of colza oil, or by the more dangerous expedient of a cotton swab dipped in alcohol, being first lighted at a whale-oil lamp. Matches are quite as much of a luxury in France as hot water. There will be no sitting-room, rarely a reading- room, smoking-room or the like. The cafe, attached THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 311 to the hotel or located nearby, supplies all these wants. For the woman traveller the French hotel lacks many things, but this arises from the fact that Frenchwomen as a class travel only on rare occa- sions, and seldom for pleasure. It is quite possible that you will be the only woman at the long table in the salle a manger, but do not let that disconcert you, for though there is a long line of commis-voy agenrs , or commercial travellers, down either side, the chances are that they will not so much as waver an eyelid in your direction. The provincial European — the Frenchman in particular — when occupied with his dinner preserves an Oriental oblivion to the presence of woman; he makes a seri- ous business of eating (the objectionable quality be- ing that he does so noisily), and he is not easily diverted from this purpose, not even to stare at the unchaperoned American girl. The commis-voyageur has his uses; when in doubt as to the choice of a hotel, follow the French commercial traveller and his brass- bound trunks, for he picks out the best cuisine as unerringly as a divining rod points to hidden water. The dinner will be excellent, of a quality far superior to that of the usual tourist hotel, and it is to French hotels of this class that one must go for typical French food. It is not the cooking of Paris, which, with all its excellence, is monotonous. Throughout France each petit pays has its special dishes, and, the French being patriotic above all else, it is but natural that the proprietor should take pride 312 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD in setting before his guests the plats which are cele- brated in the neighbourhood. Dejeuner and dinner are always on the table d'hote plan; even in the most modest village hotels they are always meals of ceremony, of from six to eight courses, dejeuner being the more pretentious of the two. There is only one complaint to be made of such bountiful and uniformly good meals; it is that the two are too much alike in variety and quantity, dejeuner differs from dinner only in the omission of soup and the inclusion of cheese. In the cider country of Normandy and Brittany carafes of golden cider are included at each meal; elsewhere the wine of the country — white or red, as may be the most plentiful cru of the region — are served ad lib, or at least, a discretion, without extra charge. After-dinner coffee must be sought at the cafe, never far away from the hotel, perhaps even located under the same roof. Early hours are the rule in a small French town, and by ten o'clock the great portal of the hotel is locked up tight. More than one automobilist has had to sleep in his car under the windows of a wished-for hotel in France because no one would be disturbed to let him in, though he tooted his horn like the last trump. The French landlord is not so keen to corral the stranger and his purse as his Teuton, Swiss or Italian neighbours across the Alps, so that it is well to arrive early at one's stopping-place for the night. Some of the most interesting of small French THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 313 hotels are those of Normandy and the valley of the Seine. Old Norman timbered hostelries with medi- aeval facades, garden courtyards and waxed floors are at their best in towns like Les Andelys and Louviers. Out in Brittany, the westernmost point of France, the passing tourist is less frequent than elsewhere; it is, furthermore, the poorest part of France, and for these two reasons the country hotels are not up to the standard of appointments and cookery of the best of French traditions. Across mid-France, from Paris south to Lyons, and from the Bay of Biscay to the Alps, are found the 3H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD best provincial hotels of Europe, with the vraie cuisine Francaise. In the region of the Pyrenees the country hotel is all that it should be, and often highly modernised in some respects because of the radiating influence of a chain of watering places which stretches out prac- tically the whole length of the Franco-Spanish frontier. Along the Mediterranean coast one finds the worst class of purely country hotels in France. It is not that they can be termed bad, but it is certain that the hotels of the Midi lay themselves open to criticism. THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 315 It is the influence of the Southern temperament that is prone to take life easy. A lack of water is every- where noticeable, and the tiled floors seem cheerless, after the waxed parquets of the north, while the cuisine of garlic and olive oil is distasteful to many. Thus it is that an otherwise fascinating country suf- fers through the deficiencies of its hotels, and until the Riviera is reached, with its great hotels catering largely to foreigners, and which for the most part are nothing French at all, the hotels of southeastern France are by no means to be classed with the many good things that are French. The small Italian albergo, or the more humble trattoria, has not the endearing qualities of the Eng- lish inn, nor of the French country hotel. It may have far more picturesqueness, it might once have been a palace or a convent where one may even dine in the old cloister, or it may possess a crumbling marble loggia, or a classic garden with a carven fountain and much battered sculpture, but it rarely inspires one with the desire to end a wandering, ex- cept to gain a brief respite from a strenuous exist- ence as a tourist. Things are casual, in Italy at the best, and in the countryside one gets the lack of order and method, unsoftened by any modernity. The comfort that even the most modest English inn pro- vides is entirely lacking. The country hotel of Italy is like Italy as a whole, delightful to see and to add to one's recollections of experiences, but hardly suit- able for making oneself at home and settling down. The people add not a little to the restlessness that 316 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD pervades the Italian country hotel. They are charm- ingly bright, and greet one with a spontaneity and genuine pleasure that is most agreeable, but stranger people who wander about the world for pleasure only are never ceasing objects of curiosity, and when one leaves the beaten track the scrutiny and unceasing attention that one gets becomes tiresome, no matter how good-natured and well meant they may be. These attentions are met on all sides, from willing but incompetent hotel help, from the loafers in the village, from every one. It is not ill-natured, but annoying, sometimes even embarrassing. The word cosy, or even comfortable, cannot be applied to the Italian albergo. As a rule it is bare and gaunt, with stone or marble floors, no place to sit, not even a cafe attachment as in France. The Italians have not the cafe habit except in the cities and big towns. There is no swinging inn sign in Italy. A little shrine beside the entrance, holding a statue of the madonna, takes the place of it, or it may be that there is a sacred picture frescoed on the wall with a swing- ing lamp before it. Invariably, across the facade, in bold, black letters, will be blazoned the name of the hotel. One must do in Italy what is never done in France or England — bargain for prices, not so much for the reason that there is danger of extortion, though there is a tendency everywhere in Italy to advance prices to English-speaking people, as from the fact that there are no fixed charges. The proprietor of a little THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 317 roadside albergo often does not know what to give one, in other words, how much one is willing to pay and what would be considered a proper equivalent. On such a basis of reckoning it is natural that the traveller is obliged to help him out. Usually there is no table d'hote, or tavola rotunda, in the Italian hotel of any grade, but the highest usu- ally serves meals a la carte, although sometimes there may be a luncheon or midday meal which one can order as a whole, or from which one may select only a dish or two. Often you wander into the kitchen and see for yourself what is forthcoming in the way of food. The great stone-flagged room seems full of people, relatives of various degrees and ages, with a grandmother or two hovering over a cop- per brazier of char- coal if the weather be cold. In Italy it is al- ways safe to ask for a veal cutlet and some form of past'i — maca- roni, tagliatelli, spa- ghetti or what not, and this with a long, thin- necked bottle of Chianti and Gorgonzola cheese makes as ample and excellent an Italian meal as can be got, and ought not to cost over a franc and a half. The sleeping-room of the humble Italian albergo usually has a portrait of Garibaldi and chromos of 318 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the reigning royal family on the walls. One's bed is made up after arrival, which is not a bad custom. The washing outfit is precariously hung on an iron stand that suggest a jardiniere, and is of tin. A chair or two and a small rug about completes the furnish- ings. On each window ledge is a flat, red cushion, which is convenient for following the Italian fashion and spending your spare moments hanging out of the window, the cushion thus protecting your elbows. In spite of a look of general disorder, things are actually clean enough, and while in sanitary necessities the small Italian hotel is primitive, Italy all around is improving in this respect, and is perhaps no more backward than many other parts of Europe. The Italian hotel of the towns is fully a third dearer than the French establishment of the same grade. A dejeuner that in France usually costs two francs, fifty centimes, in Italy becomes three, and even four. There are some five, six and seven lire a day Italian hotels to be found in many places, which tourists rush on top speed, but the general impression that Italy is cheap does not hold good when com- pared with what one pays for the same sort of thing in France. The trail of the tourist is over most things Swiss, but there are good, genuine country hotels in Switzer- land, patronised principally by Swiss tourists. The Swiss really do tour their own country, and do it economically, by foot or on bicycle, leaving it for the visitors to support the big hotels. It is on a walk- ing tour that one comes across these little hotels in THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 319 villages that have no too well advertised mountain background to draw the summer rabble. One type is a square, low, two-storied building, with a top- heavy roof of weather-stained brown tiles and solid wood green shutters to the windows and a big brass handle on the door. It stands on the village square, the church to one side with a big tree shading the door, against which lean a half-dozen bicycles. It is neat, plain and attractive, and though perhaps within sight of a great fashionable resort its inclusive prices hover between five and seven francs a day. The food is a bit monotonous and there is always an odour of string beans and pork in the air. This is a dish that can be counted upon with almost daily regularity. The universal Swiss breakfast of coffee, rolls and honey is apt to be the most agreeable meal of the day. Barley soup is another staple that loses its value by repetition. The truth is, Swiss cooking is not good, but there is always milk and the real Swiss cheese of Gruyere, and, as a last resort, the cheap and nourishing milk chocolate with which to fill in any deficiencies. It is possible to get a pension rate at a Swiss coun- try inn for five francs a day, and be comfortable and well-cared for, but this would be in one of the little villages on some of the high plateaux, such as the pastoral country where the Gruyere cheese comes from, one of the most charming, unspoiled corners of Switzerland. It may happen though that the little rural inn may refuse to take you in during the haying season on account of a scarcity of help. The pro- 320 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD prietress will shake her head and say how sorry she is, but servants, family and everybody have had to stop work to gather in the hay, which, next to tour- ists, is Switzerland's main source of revenue. If one will browse around the larger Swiss cities there are modest hotels to be found hidden away in tiny squares, patronised by country people who still wear the stilted coiffes and laced bodices with plas- trons of clanking chains, the insignia of some far off mountain canton. Walking parties of German students, who do Switzerland on the closest margin of all tourists, find these places out readily enough. A room for a franc or a franc and a half, dinner for but little more and supper for a little less, brings the round figure to something less than a dollar. Such THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 321 a hotel may be a picturesque old Gothic house, dating from the fifteenth century, the windows bright with growing plants. Everything will be clean, for this is not the least of the virtues of the Swiss, and while the meals will be what the French call unsympa- thetic they will likely enough be eaten in company with a party of gay young folk on their way down from a week's climb over some mountain pass, with their alpenstocks and their Tyrolean hats wreathed with Alpine wild flowers, the girls with nail- shod boots, sweaters and knee-length skirts, who, like their male com- panions, are loaded down en tour with heavy ruck- sacks strapped over their shoulders. The prevailing characteristics of Swiss inns are German. So much is this so that the same conditions are met with in the small inn of the Bavarian High- lands and in the picturesque Black Forest. The German country hotel is not so pliable as those of other countries in adapting itself to the stranger. A lone woman on a tour of exploration 322 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD will find less geniality here. Germany, however, is making a big bid for the American tourist, and the de- sire to attract American dollars their way is spread- ing to the countryside from the cities and watering places. Nothing can be more picturesque than the German gasthaus, with its ornate swinging sign, its front cov- ered with half-defaced paintings, scrolls, dragons and flowers, with the name writ large in decorative Ger- man script. You go to bed in a lofty chamber, chilly even in midsummer — stone flags form the flooring — and you need the fat featherbed which is the coverlid in order to keep warm. The bed is vast and fully four feet from the floor, and the heavy linen sheets feel clammy to the touch. The big porcelain stove of blue tiles blocks up an entire corner, and coffee and rye bread is your breakfast. German food is good on the whole, if one likes cold meats and a variety of excellent salads, stewed fruit with duck and, of course, sauerkraut and sausages of all lengths. There is nothing lightsome about the speiskarte of the small German hotel. An unprejudiced, travelled German will tell you that there is nothing in Ger- many so good as the country hotel of France, though he himself may appreciate German food and the manner of its cooking far more. The mark being valued at twenty-five per cent more than the franc, prices, too, in Germany are higher than in France, Switzerland or even Italy. The country gasthaus of the Black Forest does not THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 323 usually get a big tourist clientele, but if one wants to get in touch with the life of picturesque Germany — where legends are still a topic of conversation and there still exists a belief in fairies — in contrast with the rapacity that has filled the valley of the Rhine with factory chimneys, they will do well to lay out some Black Forest inns on their itinerary. Their architecture is much the same as is seen in the peasant homes of Switzerland, of the Bavarian highlands and of the Austrian Tyrol. A low-spread- ing gable forms a frontage which is broken with rows of narrow windows, and the stables are usually found under the same roof. In the public room, partly a sitting-room and partly a drinking hall, the walls are of a blackened wainscoting, and one sits on a carved oak bench with a high back before a table as massive as a monument. The proprietor usually serves himself. He wears a skullcap of embroidered velvet, home-knit grey stockings, knee trousers and an apron. He smokes a pipe that might have been handed down from his ancestors with the house, and his manners are brusque 324 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD and independent, though for all this he is sincere and will not overcharge. He and his family run the hotel with the help of an extra girl or two from the village. Women servants are the rule outside the larger towns, for the business is too poorly paid to attract men. The maids clatter about in high- heeled wooden shoes, in the ugly dress of the women of the Black Forest, woolen skirts to the knees, a laced bodice over a white chemisette and a stiff wire coiffe of black or coloured ribbons. On Sundays one can study local conditions, if one can stand the smoke, in the big room. Here the peasant folk meet and dance and eat and drink coffee and beer. The fun is boisterous, and sometimes dis- turbs the live stock, as there is only a half partition between the stables and the apartment. Holland has the most expensive small hotels and Belgium the cheapest in the comparative European scale, but the country hotel of the land of big wind- mills and small houses gives the biggest breakfast of any. You enter the dining-room of a real Dutch hotel and find the long table set out with various Dutch cheeses, an assortment of Dutch sausages, brown bread, white bread, sweet rolls and excellent coffee — which is spoiled by the serving with cold milk. The Dutch hotel proprietor after all gives you something for your money, and all the other meals beneath his roof are in proportion. In Belgium one gets on the trail of the table d'hote again. The French influence is paramount THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 325 here, but with a slightly German flavour to things, beer taking the place of wine at table. The beer, however, is included in the price of the meal, and at from five to eight francs a day, Belgium, one of the cheapest but one of the wealthiest countries of Europe, cares for one very well indeed. Those two old Flemish cities, Bruges and Ghent, have long been favourite summer places for the Eng- lish who want a cheaper holiday than that afforded by many places in their own country. Dollar-a-day rates were once not uncommon and are still to be had, but too much popularity has had a tendency to boost prices. The American woman doing Europe will have to become more of a hardy traveller than the average before she will want to rough it in the countryside of Spain. The old custom of carrying one's food about with them to be cooked at the particular place at which they might arrive for the night is giving way to the more precarious method of depend- ing on the supplies of the primitive fonda, which at its best, in the large towns, is often not bad, but which is awful in the country. The hotels of the larger Spanish towns are con- stantly improving— there is a " Ritz " even at Tn C^+aloni2 326 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Madrid. Often the small Spanish hotel begins on the second floor, to which you arrive by entering through a courtyard filled with country carts and mules, finally mounting a long stairway to the hotel proper. You just order " dinner," without specify- ing what, and you get a good meal at four or five pesetas. You raise your eyebrows over the bill, but it is your own fault. You could have ordered half of the bountiful meal for half the price if you had known. In hotels, as in life, most of our troubles come as the result of not knowing. s£-£ HOTEL AN AMUSEMENT ENTERPRISE CHAINS OF GREAT TOURIST HOTELS COSMOPOLITAN CLIENTELE WOMAN'S INFLUENCE ON EUROPEAN HOTELS EXCLUSIVENESS OF THE FOREIGN HOTEL GERMANS THE BEST HOTELIERS GERMAN-SWISS METHODS HOTEL AMUSEMENTS MUSIC A DRAWING CARD HOTELS AS PEACEMAKERS CATERING FOR ALL NATIONS BATHS AND " LIFTS " CHARM OF ALL THINGS FRENCH FRENCH HOTEL PROPRIETOR INDIVIDUALITY THE KEYNOTE IN FRANCE ENGLISH HOTELS SCOTCH " HYDROS " " GRAND AND PALACE " HOTELS ROYALTY AS AN ADVERTISEMENT PARIS A CITY OF SMALL HOTELS MODERN HOTELS OF PARIS USEFUL TERMINUS HOTELS A HOTEL OF THE SAHARA HOTELS OF BISKRA EGYPT AND ITS MODERN HOTELS XIII WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL The great modern hotels of Europe differ funda- mentally from the same thing in America in being primarily great amusement enterprises. Their com- mercialism is subordinated always to entertainment of a pleasure-making kind, and their edifices have been designed especially for the demands of society en tour, as well with regard to luxury as a divertisement. There are chains of these big tourist hotels, such as the Bertolini establishments, the Ritz's, the Carl- ton's, the Gordon's and the like, as well as combina- tions that do not openly proclaim their allied identity under one name. The object of founding hotels in series is that they may be planted around so as to catch the same clientele in the different stages of its journeyings. The policy of their owners is to pass a client along from one affiliated establishment to another, and by this well-thought-out scheme the traveller can do a large part of Europe, and some of Africa, under the same hotel management, if ingenious and planful, and if the enterprise, in its various branches, was success- ful in the first instance in making the right impression. This is a combination that works to the advantage of both the hotel and the guest. 329 33Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The season for most of the big hotels is limited; it would be impossible for such to run continuously at the high pressure of comfort and service demanded for one short season of but two or three months, as is often the case. The resourceful European hotelier, beside whom his American confrere is in the Kindergarten class when it comes to the science of tourisme, simply transfers his staff from his summer hotel in the Alps to his palm-shaded winter house on the Mediterranean, and baits it with the same attractions, when, sooner or later, the same school of patrons comes nibbling along. This pleases nearly everybody, for the reason that a large majority want their amusement purveyed to them with a minimum of effort. The cosmopolitan type of hotel simplifies the lan- guage difficulty also. It is in a position to stand between its patrons of many lands and the friction which might arise by their coming in contact with a strange tongue in a " foreign " hotel. So intimate has become the function of the great hotel that to visit one or another is like going from one big house- party to another. Friends arrange to meet at the same hotel whilst travelling, and congenial parties link up with one another as they go from some 11 Grand " hotel to some " Palace " hotel, whether at the Golden Horn, Gibraltar, Cairo or Copenhagen. The woman tourist is largely responsible for the present status of the great hotel of Europe, if not, in many cases, for its actual being. To a large extent many have been designed for woman's convenience WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 331 and pleasure. Their salons and corridors are prac- tically the show-rooms for the creations of the dress- makers and milliners of London, Paris and New York. Members of the elite society of the four quarters of the world are but mannikins who exhibit and advertise the wares of those who have fashioned their charms. All the resources of one's wardrobe are taxed to meet the dress parade of the great Europeon resort hotel. This is not absolutely neces- sary, but the custom is growing every year more com- plicated, and larger supplies of luggage are needed than ever before if one would make the tour of the Grand Hotel in commensurate style. The English demand comfort, but the American goes farther and demands luxury, and to the Amer- ican woman may be given much of the credit for the luxe that the modern European hotel proprietor is showering upon his guests. The foreign hotel is designed first of all for attrac- tiveness and for comfort, in spite of the fact that it is lacking in many of the mechanical conveniences of America, though these are replaced by a highly trained and efficient staff of servants which is always on hand to render personal service with an outwardly polite respect. This is a very soothing state of affairs after an experience in a Broadway restaurant with a bootblack from the basement who has been elevated to the position of a waiter on the first floor. The entrance hall is always a lounging place, called appropriately in England, " the Lounge." Then 332 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD there is the highly ornamental salon, perhaps two, and a reading-room — the salon de lecture of the Con- tinent — where the world's leading newspapers and pictorial magazines are to be found. The more am- bitious hotels of this class will have an attractive courtyard, often masquerading as a palm garden, a pleasing and useful adjunct to any town or country hotel. The foreign hotel invariably insists upon a certain air of exclusiveness. In this lies its charm. The public is not allowed the free use of the European hotel, wearing out its furniture and using up its stationery, as in liberal America. One cannot get by the watchful porter at the door without a definite object which potentially tends to benefit the hotel. Things are figured on too close a margin on the other side to permit of the free and public use of hotel privileges. It is in this class of hotel that the individual pro- prietor has given way to a syndicate with a Directeur as a go-between. What is gained in comfort has been lost in those elements of a personal character which old travellers loved. The average hotel of to-day is on too big a scale to be influenced by per- sonality; the stockholders in the syndicate want only dividends, and all that the average guest wants is to be able to travel with the smallest amount of ex- pended energy and friction, caring nothing at all as to whether it is a German, an Italian or a Swiss who may be caterer. The disadvantage of such a hotel regime is that one's impressions of a country ?mci ¥ "■'JkiMCtseA

,* ' or coffee, but it will not only be undrinkable, but cost more than a better, fresher infusion to be had at a cafe. Do not hesitate, then, to patronise the local cafe of the small French town where you may be " do- ing " a cathedral or a chateau. Its general aspect may be lowly, but it may possess a grimness coming 382 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD of many generations of smokers, but its tiled, or, perhaps, sawdust strewn floor is probably cleaner than it looks, and one will find compensating amusement in the study of the local types to be seen there, as well as the opportunity of partaking of the refresh- ment one desires. One fares best at the French cafe in the warm season, when all the world sits outside under the awnings on the terrasse, which may be even a real terrace shaded with vines and screened from inquisi- tive passersby by evergreens in tubs, or, more fre- quently, merely a part of the sidewalk for which the proprietor pays a tax or a rental to the municipality for the privilege of putting out his tables and chairs. Here is another problem solved — after a fashion — for the woman traveller. A sitting-room of any description is practically unknown in the French country hotel, and even in many of those of the larger towns where tourists of convention do some- times happen along. What is the indefatigable woman sight-seer to do, then, when she wants to gather strength for another round? Stay in her bed- room? Shades of Saint-Hubert — the patron saint of hotel-keepers — forbid. Fancy the tired traveller resting or writing in the bare, chilly, bedroom of the average French country hotel, with never an easy- chair of any kind. Writing on one's knees may be feminine, but it isn't comfortable. There is really nothing left but to do as the French do; use the cafe for a sitting, reading or writing- room, according to one's needs; and one can do this WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 383 for as long a time as they choose for the price of a cup of coffee or tea, or a glass of milk (hot or cold), if tastes are more simple. Often there will be a cafe attached to the hotel, but conducted quite as a separate establishment; if not, the hotel proprietor will direct you to the one you should patronise, considering that what you may want is a certain recognition as to its propriety. Any- way, when in doubt, fall back on common sense, and use your best judgment, which will soon become trained and able to scent the cafe best suited to your needs as far as you can see its name on the sign over the door. To the woman traveller with scruples, who thinks she will be obliged to drink only alcoholic beverages if she goes to a cafe, the following may tend to relieve her mind. There will always be coffee on tap, black, black as strong coffee can be, and blacker yet sometimes when an undue amount of chickory has been added. It will be served either in a cup or a tall glass, as you prefer, the latter, known as a mazagran, being its most acceptable form. To women, the custom seems to be to serve it without question in a small cup, this seemingly being a spontaneous concession to the pres- ence of the fair sex and their desire to drink coffee any way, which, indeed, many Frenchwomen do not, except in the early morning. Whether one takes it in a glass or in a cup, the quantity and the price are the same. If coffee with milk is wanted, you should ask for 384 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD cafe-creme, and not for cafe-au-lait. In either case it is the same thing, save that in the former instance it is generally served in the tall glass, and in the latter it will generally be accompanied by another glass in which reposes a jauntily rolled serviette, or doily, for which adornment you will perhaps pay TH£ FR€NCH CUPOF CpFFfce double the regular price for the same coffee and the same milk — not crime, though it be called such. One finds good tea now at almost any important cafe in any French town of eight or ten thousand in- habitants. The French, within the past few years, have become quite confirmed tea drinkers, and while the English afternoon tea habit is only an adjunct of the " high-life " whose members ape foreign ways, the provincial Frenchman often takes a cup of tea after meals instead of coffee. Tea ordered in a French cafe is always served " nature," without milk. If milk is wanted it must WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAF£ 385 be asked for, and in addition, an increased price is paid usually, the combination costing perhaps fifty centimes, whereas otherwise it may be but thirty or thirty-five. One can also get hot or cold milk at a cafe, though the latter will most likely have previously been boiled, and thus in warm weather will lack a certain fresh- ness of taste which will not be agreeable to every- body. All cafes serve a remarkable assortment of " tizanes " on order, infusions of most of the leaves and blossoms of the herborists' encyclopedia. They taste, all of them, like the medicines at which we used to revolt in our youth, but are supposed to be beneficial for real or imaginary nerves or other slight indispositions. And they probably are; or at least they are probably harmless. The most frequently called for of these " tizanes " is that made of tilleul, the leaves and blossoms of the linden tree. Verveine is made from what is popu- larly called the lemon verbena, and so on down the list. There is cammomile, mint and many more, which truth to tell often do not look inviting, what- ever may be their virtues. They are served in the same manner as tea, always in a cup, and boiling hot. Lemonade, the kind you really want, in a French cafe is known as citron press e, or citronnade, never as limonade. In the former case you are brought a cut lemon, a glass scraper, or pressoir, and the other accessories necessary to make the lemonade yourself; and in the latter, you are served a horrible abomina- 386 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD tion out of a bottle, made probably of a solution of citric acid, and not in the least related to lemonade, save as the name appears on the label on the bottle. You may not always be able to get real lemonade, and the American girl must not as a regular thing count on ice, though if ice (glace a refraicher) can be had anywhere in town it is at the cafe, though usually only in the heated term. In summer, the cafes of the cities and large towns make a specialty of ices — creams and sorbets. They are small in quantity, and large in price, and rather thin for the American girl's taste. They are served in single flavours, or as a melange or panachee, that is, two or more kinds to a portion, but must be so ordered, unless indeed you order one of each flavour, as many an American girl has done before now, to the astonishment of the usually placid French garqon. All the celebrated French mineral waters can be had at any cafe with any pretence whatever, though you will be forced to order a bottle, or in some cases, half a bottle ; though recently the tiny quarter bottles of Vichy have appeared, and the drinking of them as an aperitif by the supposedly blase Frenchman has become quite a fad. Prices are usually marked on a saucer, which accompanies the article ordered, and range from thirty centimes to seventy-five centimes as a rule. The misuse of the word " cafe " in our own country as applied to an eating place often misleads the traveller into the belief that the cafe abroad is also a restaurant; but this is only the case when the WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE" 387 sign reads " Cafe-Restaurant," otherwise nothing eat- able is to be had in the usual cafe. The one excep- tion being, that in the larger towns, if one wishes to take their morning cafe-an-lait or chocolate at a cafe (which is frequently preferable to taking it at the hotel), it is possible to order a roll or a brioche with it, which the garqon will bring in from the nearby pastry shop, or boulangerie; but beware of complicating the order by a demand for butter — you may have to wait half the morning for it to arrive, but more often it is not forthcoming at all. The cafes of the great resorts, like Aix-les-Bains, Trouville, Nice or Biarritz, are got up principally for their strange clientele, and consequently provide for all tastes, with perhaps less that is French about them than any other cafes in France. Here women are expected, and are usually to be found in as large numbers as the men. Their tastes are especially catered for, and here one can get afternoon tea, a V Anglais, with cut bread and butter and all the rest, jam if you like it, and plum-cake, which they know as " peekfreen," after the name of its maker. A word at the end : as our French friends say. The usefulness of the French cafe for the woman traveller will be greatly enhanced by a discreet man- ner and an unobtrusive one in the part she is playing as a globe-trotter. The American girl will do well to observe and copy closely the feminine manners and customs of the country in which she may be touring. Then when she must defy convention it will be with as 388 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD little foreign cachet as possible. This will go far to smooth the way. Much is forgiven the etrangere to be sure, and her presence at the French cafe is the least of the " shockings " that will be remembered by her French critics long after her radiance has passed away. " Les dames etrangeres sont toujours gentiles," has come to be a commonplace with the French. What- ever else they may think depends entirely upon the acts of the individual. mew&vmm FRANKFORT A CENTRE FOR SPAS FASHIONABLE HOMBURG CURES GOUT DRINKING WATER ON SCHEDULE COSMOPOLITAN BADEN BADEN WIESBADEN FOR RHEUMATISM POPULAR SPA OF THE GERMANS NAUHEIM CURES ALL HEART PANGS BUT LOVE UNIQUE EMS FOR THE THROAT HISTORY MADE AT EMS NEUNAHR'S FAMOUS APOLLINARIS SPRING MUD BATHS OF KREUZNACH SCHWALBACH, THE WOMAN'S SPA WILD BAEDER OF THE BLACK FOREST BADENWEILER OF THE ROMANS FAMOUS SPAS OF BOHEMIA KINGLY MARIENBAD MARIENBAD REGULATES AVOIRDUPOIS A MILK CURE VOGUE OF CARLSBAD CARLSBAD FOR HIGH LIVING PUPP'S HOTEL XVI SOME GERMAN SPAS It is in the Valley of the Rhine and its tributaries that are grouped the world's most famous springs and baths. Supposedly this is a condition born of internal volcanic eruptions, and a spot is said to exist at Homburg, where only fifty metres separate the surface of the earth from the unquenched convulsions which are continually going on within. Nauheim, Wiesbaden and Ems are also sizzling on the same hot-plate. The beneficient effects of the waters of these springs come from something more than their chemi- cal constituents, else the chemists with a handful of salts could fabricate oceans of it — which they can't. The ingredients are known and their proportions, but they won't mix, at least after they are mixed they will not produce the same results. Around the financial capital of Frankfort centre the chief of these German spas. A high or low or swollen liver, gout in its most rabid form, and many other fashionable diseases of the wealthy are treated at Homburg; rheumatism at Wiesbaden; palpitations and heart weakenings, from any cause but love, are nowhere so efficaciously cared for as at Nauheim; and a smoker's throat is sure to find relief at Ems. It 391 392 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD is thus that diseases and their cures are specialised, though doubtless under a certain regime the same thing might be accomplished at Homburg where, at the Elizabeth Spring, according to Justus von Liebig, is found a water with many of the attributes of, and superior to, all oth- ers, with the newly opened Kaiserin Au guste- Victoria Quelle a close second. Besides all this, Homburg is a re- sort, and an ex- pensive one, with super-luxurious ho- tels, but not gaudy, and abounding in comfort. One drinks and bathes, commencing with the early hour of seven and continuing to the accompaniment of the or- chestra in the park all through the day. Your drinking glass at the spring is numbered, and for the time being is your property, and you sip your quota, walk briskly a bit, then go back to breakfast, when by following a sort of time-table, or schedule, you are kept more or less at it, drinking and bathing all through the day. It should be said SOME GERMAN SPAS 393 that you put yourself in the hands of a doctor imme- diately on arriving — as you do at other spas — and you drink just what and just the quantity he pre- scribes, eat accordingly and bathe to the same tune, in hot, cold or tepid water, or in an adhesive mixture of mud, as the case may be. This is Homburg, with tennis, golf, croquet and what not interspersed during the day, and bridge and bacarrat all night if you are brave enough to face the doctor the next day and tell him of it. Baden Baden, too, is fashionable, its waters effica- cious and its prices Eiffel Tower high and something more. An overseas clientele in the majority has done this, so if you want to keep up the reputation of your countrymen you must do your part. Hotels at Baden Baden outbloom those of Homburg for luxuriance, and there is no anti-semite feeling against residents of St. Louis, Frankfort, Vienna or the West End of London. It is very cosmopolitan, but the complexion is manifestly American. Beside the luxurious hotels of Baden Baden there are many villas which are rented for short periods, and with the culmination of "high-life" at the International Horse Racing Game in August, one of the most buoyant and rapid scenarios of American life abroad is here annually unrolled. For baths the most fa- mous are the Freiderich's Bad and the Kaiserin Auguste Bad, the former for men, and the latter for women, as their names will indicate to any one who gives them half a thought. Wiesbaden is the really popular German spa, in the 394 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD eyes of the German at any rate, and he ought to know. Outsiders though are not noticeable by their absence, quite the contrary. The place has been called the Newport of Germany, but by what reasoning it is difficult to see. It is certainly chic in all its aspects, is modern, well-kept and does actually rank as the most frequented of all German spas, but not as much by Americans and English as it will be some day when it comes to be appreciated. It is a resort and a residence city in one. Its dead season is mid-summer, but spring and autumn sees it as crowded as Baden Baden in August; as a matter of fact, the climate is the finest all-the-year-round climate of any resort of its class in Germany or out of it. Palatial homes, large, roomy and architecturally imposing; innumerable and wonderful hotels, and a Kursaale with what is accounted one of the finest of German orchestras, as well as an opera troupe which ranks almost as high, gives Wiesbaden a cachet and a more distinctive flavour of things and institutions German than many of the more popular resorts. The new Kurhaus cost a million dollars or more, which shows the liberal hand that is planning for Wies- baden's future. The waters here present themselves in a couple of score of hot springs bubbling up all over the place as through a sieve. They attack rheumatism and sciatica in all their forms with a vigour known of no other European waters. The Goldenen Ross and the Schiitzenhof springs possess radio-activities. So- SOME GERMAN SPAS 395 ciety at Wiesbaden is as varied as mixed pickles — one should progress slowly. Nauheim is an overgrown, expanded village with great avenues and tree-bordered public squares. Shops of a certain fascinating aspect line one of these broad thoroughfares of the " new town," inter- spersed with hotels and villas which contrast in a story-telling manner with the old-time German archi- tectural forms, which, in the " old town," present a calm and tranquil aspect of picturesqueness that mod- ernity knows not of. Thousands come to Bad Nauheim for heart troubles which nowhere else can be treated so well as here. It is not so much a question of the waters 396 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD as the installation and conveniences which exist here that makes the Bad the preferred haven for those looking towards a restoration to health. A sort of stimulating prickling or bubbling of the waters en- courages the heart to take up its normal functions or continue them with regularity, and once in the able hands of the Herr Doctor and the Herr Pro- fessors of Nauheim almost anything but an actually broken heart may be mended. Neurasthenic patients, too, find Bad Nauheim beneficial, and popularity in a mild way and of a most serious kind has descended upon it to a far greater degree than was thought likely when its first salt baths were opened in 1850, though we have to go back to the year 1255 for its first historical mention. There have been those looking for a gayer life who have reviled Nauheim as desperately monoton- ous and uninteresting, but it has its virtues as has been shown. Twenty marks are levied on the visitor, whether for health or for pleasure, for the care of the garden walks and the roads of the park, whatever may be the length of sojourn, and each peach or pear or picture postcard that is purchased pays its quota of tax as well. The cost of baths varies from a couple of marks to six or eight, which, with extras, such as towels, drinking water, weighing machine privileges, etc., demonstrates that the procedure is not a cheap one. A dozen of these resorts centre around Frankfort, which is a sort of open door to all the region, and SOME GERMAN SPAS 397 which as a clearing house presents a cosmopolitan animation unknown elsewhere in Europe. The mer- chants of Frankfort cater to all classes of strangers; you may buy your favourite snap-on buttons and hooks and eyes made in Philadelphia, tooth powder from St. Louis, and the genuine American shoe, be it for men or women, though the German manufactu- rer does make an imitation of it for his countrymen and any others who will buy. Frankfort is mani- festly commercial, financial if you will, but it lends also the aspect of the resort in its leafy avenues, squares and boulevards, and, above all, in its en- vironment, whose landscape is not spoiled by belching factory chimneys as in the Rhenish provinces. At Ems the local colour changes, things are more workaday in their purport, but its slimy, unpleasant tasting waters work the wonders with diseases of the throat that only the imbibing of alkaline-muriatic water will, and Ems is the only spa of its kind in Germany. You inhale as well as drink at Ems, and whilst the procedure is not wholly agreeable it brings results, and that is what the practical man, or woman, of to-day wants. If it is desired to mingle worldly divertisement with one's cure, Ems falls off sadly, but there is always music, and the theatre after nightfall, which is better than bridge or dancing. Another treatment at Ems is that of compressed air. You might as well be in the grasp of the " iron maiden " herself so far as the sensation goes after you have been half an hour in an air-tight steel tank with a motive force of some kind, which may 398 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD be steam, electricity or gasolene, pumping in air until the pressure is so great it would seemingly crush an egg-shell if not indeed your ear-drums; actually they stop short of this, but you experience the same sensa- tions that a mountain climber has at an elevation of ten thousand or more feet, and a pussy cat with her tiny lungs would probably die in half an hour. It must be a curious sensation indeed to be shut up, fully clothed, with books, papers and dominoes and chess at hand, in a steel-bound vault, awaiting an air pressure so great that life may suddenly leave you. The situation of the spa by the banks of the turbu- lent little river Ems is not exactly idyllic, but it will clo, and for a fact is a happy blend of much that goes to make up a conveniently situated resort, but a very business-like one. It is a sort of concentrated civilisation set down in the midst of a park. And now for a bit of history. A stone slab flush with the ground in the public square at Ems reads as follows : 13 Juli 1870 — 9 Uhr 10 Min. Morgens How precise these Germans are! Freely translated it means that a certain, now historic, personage turned his back on another, now historic, personage, over the discussion of a subject which should have meant nothing to either of them. One was German, the other French, and the Frana>Prussian war re- sulted. This is how Germany makes a note which all who run may read. The Emperor William — the SOME GERMAN SPAS 399 Great William — was fond of Ems, and it was here that was unrolled the first act of the drama which the plotter Bismarck so deftly engineered. There is also a monument to the Emperor at Ems — of course; another to the slain in battle, and yet another to Bismarck. Lest you forget ! The municipality of Ems is highly organised, the spa, commerce in general, the hotel industry in par- ticular, all benefit from a sane, astute oversight by the city fathers. Thirty thousand or more visitors come to Ems each year and together they must spend a couple of million dollars all told. It pays a muni- cipality to cultivate a wave of prosperity like this, which otherwise might flow by its doors. But after all Ems is not very worldly. Neunahr and Carlsbad treat diabetes, but if with heart complications, Neunahr, with the only alkaline hot spring in Germany, comes first, whose waters are sovereign also for cirrhosis, which, if vulgarly trans- lated from the German manner of naming it, is rather inelegantly to be called also " drunkard's liver." Neunahr is not greatly the vogue, but it is exclusive and has most luxurious appointments in all things that relate to the amusement and comfort of invalids who have not as yet approached the stage of incapacity of enjoyment or indifference to sur- roundings. To Americans and English, Neunahr ought to mean much, or suggest much, for it is here that is located the famous Apollinaris Spring which made a publisher, an artist and an author famous and wealthy. 400 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD As a money-making enterprise of the first rank a popular bottled water is undoubtedly ahead of the writing or publishing of books, or the painting of pictures. Bubbling naturally from the ground, water, whatever its chemical constituents may be, costs but little in the first instance, and relatively but little more to put in bottle — the buyer pays the freight. Seven hundred employees do the work, and in a twelve- month 32,000,000 bottles of " polly " are shipped to all the ports of the seven seas; several bottles are drunk every minute, in one place or another, from January 1st to December 31st. Its a good deal bet- ter than a coal or a gold mine, for it comes to the surface through the impulse of nature's own forces. You don't have to hire Italians or Slovaks to mine it. Kreuznach possesses wonderful waters, and is quaint and picturesque on its own account. The waters, or the mud, here cures rheumatism and pos- sesses a radio-activity strong enough to be impressed upon sensitive photographic plates and paper. It is small wonder that such slime should have some effect on the epidermis. This spring and another in Bo- hemia are almost the only commercially exploited sources for the supply of radium. At Munster-am-Stein, a few miles from Kreuznach, is another spring of a similar nature. Near Frank- fort, too, is Soden, with warm springs whose waters are impregnated with salt, iron and carbonic acid gas, which are beneficial in bronchial affections and pulmonary diseases. For the automobilist this comparatively restricted SOME GERMAN SPAS 401 area, where are located the most famous of the German spas, is a paradise. Seldom is there to be found a continuity of such park-like roads as those following the sinuosities of the Rhine, the Ems and the Lahn. Schwalbach or Langenschwalbach, to give it its full name, is celebrated afar as a resort, but its chief value to the economic universe lies in its value as a bathing place for the ills that women's flesh is heir to. Charged to profusion with free carbonic a plunge in these waters is like the famous bath in champagne of which the yellow journals told a few years since, but one is less sticky on coming out. It's an experience, if you happen to need that sort of treatment, and if ever such was efficacious, it must be so here. The place is gay, cosmopolitan and crowded. The springs, the Weinbrunnen and the Stahlbrunnen, are half a mile or more apart in the Kurhaus gardens. These are the springs whose waters are used internally; the others are for bathing only. Males are notable by their absence ; a few may be seen at the Herzog von Nassau, the Allesaal or the Villa Gartenlaube, but smoking is verboten at the springs and in the gardens where the band plays, so poor man is perforce obliged to give this delight- ful Bad of the Taunus the go-by. It is an Adamless Eden, if indeed there can be such a thing. What few men are to be seen, usually hie themselves off to the trout fishing at sunrise to return only to the hotels for supper. Schlangenbad, which is ugly enough in name and 402 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD meaning (Snake Bath), has a water which in con- sistency is midway between aqua pura and a good stiff pea soup. There are from seventy to eighty per cent of non-mixing elements therein, and it is good for countless complaints, of which the doctors will tell you when you ask them, but which will burn your hair to the colour of reddish tow in a very short space of time. The town is delightfully sylvan on the banks of the little river Waldaffa, a tributary of the Rhine. Throughout the Black Forest are innumerable of these Wild Baeder. Not far from Baden Baden is SOME GERMAN SPAS 403 one which bears the name of Wildbad itself. Its springs bubble forth a hot alkaline water, and the tiny town is a forest village in fact as well as name. Herrenalb nearby is called the paradise of the Schwartzwald, and is chiefly famous as an " after cure." Towards the Alps, along the southern bor- der of the forest range, off toward Switzerland, is Badenweiler, whose popularity and efficacy in pul- monary and nervous diseases was known to the Ro- mans, who established the first baths here a dozen centuries ago. To-day the bathing establishment is built upon Roman lines. Marienbad is a kingly resort; it was popular with the late King Edward, and the Emperor knows the Hotel Weimar here as well as the Kaiser does Herr Krupp's little chalet at Kiel. King's weather is usually the rule at Marienbad, and its summer climate and temperature is certainly all that could be desired. Folk do all the things that they are supposed to do at a spa; Bohemia is not different from Germany in this respect. The manifest complexion of all things is Austrian, but the Bohemians would have you know that it is Bohemian and nothing else. Lunch at the Rubezahl restaurant is quite the thing, as also is an afternoon assistance at the concert on the terrace, seated in a stuffy wicker mushroom chair lined with Turkey red calico, which is all right for the beach at Scheveningen, but manifestly quite in- appropriate here. Some unthinking person started the custom and it grew. There's another establish- ment called the Cafe Nimrod, which is a favourite 404 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD resort of the Tzar of the Bulgares, and you are quite as likely to dine at the table opposite, as you are to meet Alphonse of Spain on the terrace at tea time at San Sebastian. Marienbad is two thousand feet above sea level, amid a forest framing which makes its worldliness delightful, for it is worldly, as worldly as any of the real European resorts, and has many big hotels with their satellite attractions, restaurants, casinos, music, theatre, opera and what not. Marienbad claims for its waters that they will make fat people thin and thin folk fat. Marienbad is a place of miracles apparently, though that claim has not yet been put forth. The place has a milk cure too, and is the home of a local sweetmeat which if partaken ad lib will annul any beneficial effects which may have been derived from the cure. The latter are cakes, or tartines, or gaufrettes, or something of the sort, heaped up with whipped cream, which half bury a half-dozen round, luscious cherries, the whole drowned in what tastes, and looks, like thinned-out honey, but which may be mere treacle. The diet will probably not make one thin, but it's pretty sure to put on fat. Carlsbad and Marienbad are the vogue; not that they compel one to stay on and on as do many other Continental spas, but that they are included in every- body's little tour of watering-places, or should be. The season at Carlsbad spins out to a greater length than formerly and now its visitors, augmenting in numbers by thousands each year, can scarcely find a SOME GERMAN SPAS 405 room in any of the big hotels from June to Septem- ber, unless booked in advance. Stomachic and in- testinal diseases account for the coming thither of some of the seventy odd thousand visitors each year, but the far larger numbers are here because it is the vogue ; it sounds well when you get home to say that Carlsbad was included in your itinerary, and unless your stomach is actually a superior organ to that of most mortals, Carlsbad's sodium-sulphate, alkaline and carbonic waters will do you good if you don't object to the taste. Pupp's Hotel is world famous and its clientele cosmopolitan. Ferdinand of Bulgaria, two brothers of the Shah of Persia, the Persian ambassador at Vienna, Prince Orlaff, Prince Victor Dhulep Singh and the Duke of Teck all paraded before our eyes on one occasion on the terrace of this celebrated hotel, The cure, sylvan walks abroad, golf and the usual social functions of hotel drawing-rooms and casinos put Carlsbad in the very front rank of resorts of its class. Every visitor pays eight crowns as a kurtax, but it is paid willingly for the advantages given and the privilege of tarrying a while in such a well-ordered resort. This pays for the public amusements, bands, illuminations, etc. Why not? Who should ob- ject? Bad Gastein, like the Bohemia spas, is fashion- able, popular and costly. As late as October the Hotel Straubinger may be crowded, and the day may yet come when the place will bloom forth as a winter 4 o6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD resort. It is a tiny village perched at an elevation of three thousand five hundred feet above the sea, admirably sheltered from the north and not subject to winds in winter, and furthermore its January and February climate is proclaimed as something astound- ingly mild. Bad Gastein's springs are hot, bubbling cauldrons, and are supposed to quiet the nerves, and do. Everywhere are signs of expansion and progress, and the labour is seemingly all Italian. There is no class of house-builder living to-day that is better at stucco than the Italians; they alone seem to know how to build such houses so as to stand the ravages of time and rigorous winters, and actually at this moment Bad Gastein is being enlarged, rebuilt and remodelled by trans-Alpins. One objection there is to a stay at Bad Gastein, and that is the noise interminable made by the rush- ing waters of many waterfalls. Usually such phe- nomena of nature fall silently, many even fade away in a mist, but here they are seemingly more turbulent than Niagara. 2y*-».3u.^? , r3i -u-n."^. ARTIST A PRIVILEGED CHARACTER DOLLAR A DAY RATE FIG TREE OF MARTIGUES PAINTER AND TOURIST CLASSES SKETCHING-GROUNDS IN FRANCE PAINTERS' HAUNTS ABOUT PARIS FONTAINEBLEAU AND BARBIZON ALONG THE VALLEY OF THE LOING daubigny's COUNTRY " TYPE " FROM THE LATIN QUARTER BOHEMIAN PICTURE-MAKING COSTUME MODELS OF BRITTANY PONT AVEN AND " JULIA'S " AMONG THE WINDINGS OF THE SEINE HOTEL BELLEVUE, PETIT ANDELYS IN MID-FRANCE PROVENCAL SCHOOL OF ART PAINTING IN SPAIN sorolla's OPEN-AIR STUDIO MEDITERRANEAN SKETCHING-GROUNDS XVII ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD Those who travel with a paint-box and a white umbrella slung over their shoulders are a privileged class in Europe, and not the least of the concessions which are tacitly bestowed upon them is the right to pre-empt certain little corners and stake them out as their own, with the understanding that they have the first claim to the beauties by right of discovery and appropriation of these charms to the domain of the Republic of Art with a capital A. The original inhabitants are usually proud of the distinction, and encourage the artist in his proprietary attitude towards their country, thus forming together what might be called an artistic co-operative society, though this tends sometimes to place the plain, every- day tourist somewhat at a disadvantage. Let one come with a painting outfit, no matter from what land, or of what school of art they may be the followers, whether they set their palettes up- side down, — as do those latest radicals, the Post Im- pressionists, — draw everything on curves, give a porcelain finish to the interpretations of nature, run to a riot of colour, or paint everything in a scale of grey, she, or he, will be welcomed with a camaraderie and a genuine warmth, while the artistic possibilities 409 410 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD of the neighbourhood will be mapped out ungrudg- ingly. It is this which makes for the appeal of these artists' sketching-grounds scattered about Europe, though they are in danger of being spoiled by the laymen, who often come here to loaf, because of BBS Hotel Chabas the sympathetic qualities so different from those of a banal existence in a community whose occupations are of a purely social nature. There is no better way to travel cheaply than to carry a paint-box. The white umbrella is a passport that calls for moderate charges, and the artist can ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 411 usually get into a hotel for five francs, while the casual traveller often pays double. Is this undue discrimination? No; it is but a rightful tribute to the profession. The word " artist " does not always say genius. Modesty forbids, for it is true that the more readily an artist can sling paint with ability, the more unassuming he usually is. No, the con- sideration is demanded in the interests of Art and a slim purse, and usually it is granted without ques- tion. Does he, or she, establish a scale of conduct based on the cut rate of five francs? No, indeed; the best that is to be had is demanded, and no one is disappointed. The landlord may snap his fingers and mutter " sapristi " under his breath, but he will give in to the privileged class sooner or later and be glad of the opportunity of doing so. As an illustration of local pride and artistic priv- ilege, the following will bear quoting: One summer from fifty to a hundred artist folk were sketching in a little Mediterranean fishing port — Martigues — in sunny Provence. It is one of those artists' sketching-grounds of which those Americans engaged in the serious business of touring have never heard, but to which the artists flock from all over Europe — French, Belgian, Austrian, Russian, all the cosmopolitan brotherhood. The Grand Hotel Cha- bas is the artists' headquarters in La Venise Pro- venc,ale. Martigues was originally brought into fashion by one of the greatest of modern colourists — Ziem — and its vogue has since become great. 412 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Here these artist men and women were busy put- ting on to canvas the picturesque life of the canals, the lateen-sailed Mediterranean fishing boats and the fisher people at work among their nets. These fisher folk, of Martigues have become inflated with pride at the distinction that Art has conferred upon them. Have not pictures of themselves, their boats and their houses decorated each year the walls of nearly every art exhibition in the world? They take as much pride in keeping up their end of the artistic standard as the artists themselves; they see to it that the mellow tints of their houses and boats are not dis- turbed by fresh coats of paint, and have learned to pose at their work in the manner most approved by the artists. There was one classic motive at Martigues which every one painted, one of those perfectly composed subjects, forming the keynote to one of the most picturesque corners of the town. It was a fig-tree that had sprung up from a crevice in the foundations of an old stone house overhanging one of the principal canals. One morning, to the consternation of the group of artists painting the " fig-tree house," as it was called, a crash was heard and down fell the tree into the water. It was learned that the house had been rented to a stranger, who, finding that the tree completely darkened the north side of the house, not unreasonably had it cut down. Townspeople and artists were alike horrified at the sacrilege. The artists hurried to the principal cafe to hold an indignation meeting and threatened to leave town ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 413 in a body. Such a slight could not be put upon the municipality. The mayor could not put the tree back, but he would wait upon the unfortunate new- comer. The result was that an apologetic statement was published in the local paper to the effect that the stranger did not realise how much of an artistic asset the fig-tree really was, and that it would be permitted to grow again as speedily as the laws of nature would allow. The artist is the last lineal descendant of the gen- tleman vagabond of old. He is almost the sole sur- vivor of an uncommercial guild of workman. He goes on his summer outing with rolls of canvas in- stead of a dress suit, and with " stretchers " in place of boot-trees. He looks upon the automobile as his greatest curse, principally because it has been the means of bringing the ordinary tourist in droves to spy upon the beauties of many of his own particular painting grounds, and has been known even to refuse to sell a picture to the owner of one of these beasts of a machine, though he is not averse to riding in one when asked. Baedecker tourists the artist re- gards as his natural enemies, for are they not directly responsible for the advance in prices at the little inn which had for so long been content with his modest patronage? With every fresh batch of tourists that comes along he threatens to leave and look for an unspoiled location, though as a matter of fact he comes back year after year. The same little coterie of painters is usually to be found gathered together in some quaint inn on the 4H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD bank of some Dutch canal, by the olive and orange groves of the Mediterranean, in some barbarian moun- tain hamlet, or in some little Norman townlet in the valley of the Seine. Each year they discuss the same old theories with the same enthusiasm, and so it goes on from year to year, and will go on in spite of the comings and goings of the world that travels. The suffragette would find these artist communi- ties match up very nearly with her ideals of equality. The woman painter, if she is serious, if her work is worthy, is welcomed. Her status in the little com- munity is fixed, and she enjoys goodfellowship, both in work and play, to the utmost. To these sketching-grounds, too, come that bete noire of the serious-minded artist, the class of ama- teurs herded together under the supposed artistic guidance of some commercially minded maitre. Usually these classes are composed of women, sen- timental aspirants, willing enough to follow some leader, but too timid to strike out boldly for them- selves, either in art or travel. In this way they are able to enjoy a little of both, but invariably mixed in homeopathic proportions. For a stipulated sum, which usually includes their tuition and living ex- penses, they can paint under the eye of their teacher, for the term for which they have enlisted. It may be that for a certain sum they are allowed to study methods in the shadow of some master's easel, whilst their " keep " is a thing apart. Such classes may be composed of students of both sexes, but it is the un- attached woman, with a taste rather than a talent ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 415 for painting, who forms the bulk of such followers, and water-colour is the medium in which she mostly sins. These international artist sketching-grounds are most numerous and most popular in France. This is but natural in a land which has given expression to the best of the painter's genius, and is responsible for the highest development of the " plein air" school of painting. Here art is officially recognised, is practically encouraged by the State, which yearly devotes a certain sum of the public funds for the purchase of pictures independent of the artist's na- tionality. The Nation even has its Ministere des Beaux Arts, who is a member of the Supreme Council of State, the Cabinet. No wonder artists possess the land, or at any rate some of its choicest spots, and that the stranger can wander about with a paint- ing kit and find always that truly warmest welcome at an inn. As soon as the Paris salons are closed the last of June, and the artists have recovered from the verdicts of success or failure which have been doled out to them, the studios of Montmartre and Mont- parnasse empty themselves out into the favoured haunts of the countryside. There are dozens of these about Paris, not too ex- pensive to reach or too expensive at which to stay. This makes for the popularity of the nearby places. Fontainebleau, with Barbizon as a centre, might be called the master school of modern outdoor paint- ing, though Barbizon to-day is more of a cheap 416 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD trippers' resort than anything else ; not even the sacred association of the great Barbizon quartette of painters can draw the artist now, in the height of the tourist season. Instead he goes to one of a chain of little towns that skirt the southern border of the forest or the valley of the Loing, that has a summer clientele of artists, picturesque, old-time villages, un- touched by the near influence of Paris or the holiday- makers who haunt the forest proper. If old-time Barbizon, with its memories of Millet, Corot and Rousseau, is no longer the fashion, it is but a step across the forest to Moret, the centre of the present-day cult. Here Moret's ancient bridge, its water-mills, its town gates and walls and Gothic church — first made famous on canvas by Sisley — form a galaxy of motifs irresistible. Montigny, on the southern border, is one of the best of the forest gateways, and Bourron, with its quaint little Hotel de la Paix, is a great relief after more populous neighbourhoods. At Marlotte nearby a number of artists have built homes, and domesticity and art flourish together in many a picturesque little villa in this happy Valley of the Loing. Then there is Nemours, a bustling market town, and Larchant, with a ruined church sitting on a hill- top surrounded by lonesome pines. Not far away is the popular Grez and Crecy-en-Brie — where the cheese comes from. At all of these the artist, if she works it right, may be taken in at almost any small hotel for not more than five francs a day. T3 < CQ X ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 417 Up the valley of Oise, north of Paris, is Daubigny's country, with Auvers as its capital. Here on the walls of the Hostellerie du Nord are some of the master's sketches of this soft, green, pastoral country, but Paris' Sunday crowds rather ruffle the equanimity of the artist, and the real atmosphere of the place is sadly contaminated for one day out of seven. Just outside is Ville d'Avray, where one can paint, if not the same trees that did Corot, at least others that look the same. To one or another of these haunts comes the typi- cal Parisian artist of the velveteen corduroy suit, slouch hat and black, floating tie. He settles down for the summer, bringing not much else besides his painting kit, though occasionally some " unconven- tional " will bring with him his bon amie, a little model, perhaps, who may, or may not, at the same time keep studio for him in Paris. The life they lead will likely enough be decorous to view, she sit- ting beside him at her fancy work as he assumes to fabricate his masterpieces, and washing his brushes for him at the end of day. It is this sort of thing that is apt to give the lone woman artist a shock when she first drifts in on many of these little artists' sketching-grounds, and it is even true, sometimes, that there are gay doings in between periods of picture making, when the bohe- mianism is apt to be of a very genuine Montmartre quality, or again it is the atmosphere of the Quartier Latin which is transplanted to the open country. On 418 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the other hand, there are quite enough of the other elements to preserve propriety, though no sketching- grounds enjoy such a cosmopolitan freedom as do those of France. The social life of such places is thus apt to be a little disconcerting, and sometimes composed of startling elements, but as an old artist's model once said, " The American woman knows well the art of keeping the disagreeable outside her range of vision." The company one sees is as a congress of all na- tions. The English are there, painting decorously in company with their wives, and there is the sandy, canny Scot from the Glasgow school, and of course innumerable Americans — whom all foreigners regard rather jealously as the aristocrats of the profession, chiefly for the reason that they usually spend treble the sum that they need to. There are representa- tives from all northern lands; rabid German Seces- sionists, Austrians, Finns and all the strong army of Scandinavians. The one language which they have in common is that of art. Usually one dines out of doors in the pleasant country fashion in the courtyard of the little artists' inn, or on a terrace overlooking a river, and meal times are always the occasion of much " shop talk," the courses punctuated with impromptu picture ex- hibitions as canvases representing the day's work are propped up on chairs and exposed to the hot and merciless criticism of the party. What difference does it make if the soup is cold, or that a stray wasp drops into the confiture? No ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 419 one grumbles except the ostracised tourist who may happen along. Further away from Paris one somewhat loses cer- tain objectionable features in connection with artists' life in easy reach of the capital of bohemianism. Brittany may be called the great " costume model " sketching-ground of France. Nowhere else in west- ern Europe do the inhabitants so tenaciously cling to old-time dress and customs as in this land of fetes and pardons. Pont Aven takes precedence over all other artists' towns of Brittany. It was the first to become a cen- tre for a little band of Parisian painters who were attracted here by its unique collection of water-mills and pretty girls. This was long ago, and the painters who first made Pont Aven famous are grey-headed, and the girls perhaps a bit faded, though others have come to take their places. Without " Julia " and her Hotel des Voyageurs, Pont Aven might never have become the world-re- nowed sketching-ground that it is. " Julia's " is still the chief gathering place for artists in all Brittany, but her clientele is chiefly of the younger generation. Concarneau is next door to Pont Aven, and usually takes the second place in popularity. The great Bay of Concarneau, dotted with the brown-sailed sardine boats, draped in their blue fishing nets, is a veritable symphony of blue and brown, and though the smell from the sardine canneries often drives the artist away, it is a fact that the ready-made motifs of the little fishing town are superlative of their kind. Then 420 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD a little further westward is Quimperle. Who has not seen the washerwomen of Quimperle? They figure in every salon of every year. A few choice spirits prefer Poldhu, also on the shore. It is not so overcrowded, not to say amateur- ish, as Pont Aven, and the pretty fishermaids are not so nearly spoiled as those who have been longer in the profession as models. Camaret in Finistere, almost at the western point of France, is reminiscent of Cottet and his famous Luxembourg picture of its brown-sailed sardine fish- ing boats. After comes the bleak, black C6tes-du- Nord, a mysterious region of black rocks and sad, grey houses. All of Brittany has that touch of mel- ancholy about it that comes from the fight with the sea and hard conditions of life generally, but here it is more pronounced than elsewhere. Not the least of Rochefort-en-Terre's attractions is its Hotel le Cadre, and the artist who strolls along that way as he does the round will well remember the two little Breton sisters who preside over this neat and attractive little hotel of wild Brittany. On the north coast of France, not far from Boulogne, is Etaples. Its dirty streets are offset by the excellent Hotel Joos. At Etaples, a little artist colony has been formed by buying up, or renting, the fishermen's cottages at nominal prices and turn- ing them into studios. Such is the popularity of art that the native fisher people importune one to be taken on for models with as much insistence as the beggars of Naples appeal to strangers for money. ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 421 A few miles away, but still within sight of the flashing twin lights on the dunes beyond Etaples, is Montreuil-sur-Mer, where, within the old town walls, at the sixteenth-century Hotel de France, or outside the walls at the Bellevue, you may live and be well taken care of whilst painting the charming gentle landscape of this region of tidal streams and poplar- lined banks. The same is true of nearby Picquigny, and little more than a dollar a day should cover the cost. There are some delightful painting centres hidden away in the windings of the Seine below Paris. No one part of France has been so painted as this silver- grey, serpentining ribbon of water edged by thin trees. Claude Monet is the lodestone that draws artists to Giverny. The place is just a little village of frame and stucco houses, with a few other dwellings a bit more pretentious sandwiched in here and there. The great modern impressionist has made his home here for years and received much of his inspiration from the tranquil charms of the rural neighbourhood. Giverny has become popular with " classes " of late, so prices have soared somewhat above what they were in a former day at the little Hotel Baudy. Baudy's is the one hotel of the place, and in season you may pay city prices. Further down river from Paris, below Giverny, are the Norman twin towns of Les Andelys. The artist goes to Petit Andelys, the town by the river, for the combination of the chalk cliffs and the grey 422 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD walls of Chateau Gaillard towering high above the Seine, also for the privilege of living for a space at the Hotel Bellevue, one of the most characteris- tically excellent country inns of France. M. Thiriet, the proprietor of the Bellevue, can still be persuaded by his old, long-standing artist clientele into granting its members the traditional five-franc-a-day rate — if he likes you he will do any- thing for you, even lose money, — but for the masses he will hold up his hands in horror at the mere sug- gestion of such a figure. " Pas possible! Pas possible," he will say in a high treble. And judging from what one who is thus favoured gets for the money, it is not difficult to believe this in these days of increasing prices. Below Les Andelys, in another bend of the river, is Pont de l'Arche. It has for a unique attraction the only church in all the world dedicated to the ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 423 cause of art and artists — Notre Dame des Arts. The Hotel de Normandie, by the old stone bridge with many arches, is a pleasant place to stay if one can get foot within the portal. Its capacity is limited, and it is popular with those who like to paint in tranquil, simply disposed surroundings. The salle a manger of the inn is decorated with panels, sketches which have been left behind by artists who have gone before as remembrances for the kindly proprietor. Caudebec-en-Caux, still by the banks of the Seine, is almost too popular as a sketching-ground. Its crazy old houses, whose foreheads almost touch each other over the meanderings of a tiny tributary of the Seine, are reminiscent of the architecture of the school drawing-books of olden time. Northward, sitting high on a bluff overlooking the sea, is Etretat, now no longer fashionable as a re- sort, nor popular as a painter's paradise. Isabey, Hamon and Fromentin all gave it a vogue among connoisseurs of canvas, and Alphonse Karr, the ecrivain-jardinier, sent its widespread fame abroad. All this is changed, but there will always be a scatter- ing of artist folks to be found here painting the won- derful effects of sea and sky and shore. Across the estuary of the Seine, opposite Le Havre, is Honfleur, the pays of Eugene Boudin, a painter whose vogue with a former generation was classic and whose motifs have been left behind for others to fabricate if they can, sturdy fishermen and women, all sorts and colours of boats, queer old tumble-down houses and quaint seaside churches and chapels. Nor- 4 2 4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD mandy, take it all in all, is one of the most varied and delightful of sketching-grounds. Down through mid-France are some delightfully unspoiled sketching-grounds known not to the scorch- ing globe-trotter who jumps crazily about Europe from one great capital to another. The lower valley of the Loire, that of the Upper Seine and Marne and those of the Indre and the Cher are quite in a class by themselves. In the Department of the Creuze is a vast, purple, heather-blown plateau which has made the fame and fortune of Didier-Puget. He alone has made it the basis of his riots of colour on canvas, and the land will certainly be exploited by his followers, who may be expected to come quickly on his trail once his stamping ground is located. In the valley of the Yonne, an upper tributary of the Seine, at Joigny and Villeneuve, are little artist colonies of men and women working quietly away, unrecognised as yet by the world at large, but carving out for themselves something new, a thing which is difficult in these days of over- exploitation. Down along the shores of the Mediterranean, painters — those of a new school — have already be- gun to make themselves at home. They are seek- ing something different from the greenness of north- ern latitudes and are falling desperately in love with the parti-coloured marine life of the busy little ports, none the less than the white, dusty, cypress-lined roads, olive groves and a sad, morne aspect of earth's ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 425 topography which is as much of the Near East as Greece or Arabia. First in favour among these French Mediterra- nean sketching-grounds is Martigues of fig-tree fame. Artists work here quartered in one or another of the town's three hotels, or, hermit-like, hide away in a cabanon in the hills, a tiny, windowless house set among vineyards and olive groves, as lonesome as the Sahara. On towards the Spanish frontier is the half-French and half-Spanish Collioure, quite at the end of the world as far as conventional travel goes, and withal a bit crude and uncouth, but a heaven for the artist. A step farther, almost into Spain this time, is Banyuls- sur-Mer, with a local colour which is remarkable 426 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD from all counts, and especially so in the vintage time, when the town is overrun with Spanish muleteers, men and beasts covered with the gayest trappings one is likely to see outside of a circus. There are Catalan fishermen, too, and boats as gaudy as the mules, and there is an excellent hotel which, while lacking anything pretentious or even picturesque, knows well what it is that the artist wants, and so it is a sort of a Mecca for those who are in the know. Crossing into Spain one enters another sphere of unworldliness. The round is not to be described here in detail, but from Palamos in the cork forests, and quaint Gerona in the north, to Seville and Al- gecjras in the south are to be seen on every hand things for the artist to paint which may not be found out of Iberia. Then, too, there is Tangier, just across the Straits, in Africa, the nearest of all the painting grounds affected by the " Orientalistes." Wielders of the brush are looking forward to the exploitation of Valencia as a sketching-ground, since it is found that Sorolla used its beach as a background for the chief of his figure studies. Life here in the hot Spanish seaside sands is somewhat free and re- laxing, for all things in Spain relax with the heat, even custom, and not the least of all — etiquette. Spain sees nothing out of the ordinary in bathers undressing and dressing on the open beach, nor in the artist posing an " academic " model en plein soleil. Spanish artists in droves are hastening here to get in touch with the methods of the modern master. ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 427 Around Marseilles is Cezanne's country. At the pottery town of Aubagne, backed up with the foot- hills of the Maritime Alps, at Estaque, at Allauch and in a dozen other little nearby corners of old Provence one sees Cezanne's motifs scarcely without looking for them. It was he who really gave this filip to a new school of art — the Provencal school, a method which is being carried on industriously by Galliardini, Montenard, Dauphine, Nardi, Olive and a dozen others, not to say the old-school master, Ziem, though he really belongs to the Venetian school, Provengal and Martigau though he be. Eastwards, towards the real Riviera of the tour- ists, there are to be found a half-dozen little exploited sketching-grounds between Toulon and Saint Tropez. There is Cap Brun, overlooking the great Rade de Toulon, a rival of Naples Bay in all things, and there is Carquieranne with its rocks and pines, until finally, going eastward by the coast, one sees the quaint Saracen tower of the church at Saint Tropez looming ahead. Here lives Paul Signac, the apostle of the newest of the new manners of painting, the president of " Les Independants," those secessionists from the old salon who have nearly upset the Paris art world. The town is half-aquatic, half-terrestrial, and, from the excellent Hotel Sube on the quay, one has scarcely to go the proverbial stone's throw to find motifs ready-made. There is the luxuriance of the lazy southerner's life in all its aspects forming groupings as fleeting as the clouds ever about, and there is 428 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD as wonderful a panorama of the life of seamen in little Mediterranean coasting vessels as may be found between Gibraltar and the Piraeus. Saint Tropez indeed runs Martigues a close second in popular favour, and the excellence and variety of what it has to offer the artist with the facile brush. Art as well as trade follows the flag, and across the Mediterranean, in the French province of Al- geria, as much French as Algiers itself is a Little Paris, the best traditions of French art are being followed. At Bou Saada, away down in the Sahara, is an incipient sketching-ground. Here, under the protection of a French army post, easels are set up in the sands, and the attempt is being made to lure onto canvas the torrid, exotic charms of Sheiks wrapped in burnouses, and barbaric dancing girls in not much of anything at all. It is the little Hotel Bailie at Bou Saada that pro- tects the life of the painter here in this little desert town quite as much as the soldiery. It is not bad when the surroundings are considered, but according to European tastes it has its limitations in the food line. One eats first class with the officers or second class with the natives, lives at the hotel, or hires an adobe hut, with a servant to watch it, for the sum total of about a franc a day all told. Life is not particularly strenuous, but it is varied and would be a rather hard proposition for the woman painter who liked her ease. The diet is principally that of stewed goat and chicken, made into the national couscouss, and while filling and supposedly nutritious, ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 429 is decidedly monotonous. The alternative is thin, scrawny chicken alone, chicken fattened principally on the sands of the desert. Meanwhile, the few artists that come to Bou Saada chuckle with glee. There is no danger of Bou Saada becoming too pop- ular, considering that its food supply is what it is, and that one has to ride two nights and a day in a stuffy, smelly, Arab-crowded diligence to get there. The artist tilts at the windmills of Holland with the impunity of a Don Quixote. The Pays Bas is a happy hunting ground for the painter. Holland, with its pines and dunes of the northern provinces, quaint customs and gay little houses, and Belgium, with its tree-lined canals and its low-roofed farm- houses, will strike a new note in many an artist's song of art. Dordrecht and its maze of canals is one of the best known of Holland's sketching-grounds. White um- brellas are as thick along the canal banks as are tubby boats on their surfaces. Almost any house- holder at Dordrecht will take in an artist and lodge and feed him in an ample and not too expensive fashion; some even have made over their lofts and attics into studios, looking to every white umbrella and painting kit that they see coming down the tow- path as a possible tenant. One thing they insist upon, these householders of Dordrecht, and that is that the painters whom they may shelter beneath their roofs shall not be allowed to plaster their palette scrapings on the walls. The Dutch housekeeper, with her passion for cleanliness, absolutely refuses to take as 43Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD an excuse the fact that the procedure is custom im- memorial and comes as a natural consequence of the artistic temperament. Laren is a tiny Dutch village which is the capital of Mauve's country. Here come his disciples in droves to copy, as near as may be, the style of the Dutch landscapist. Israels, too, had not a little to do with making Laren famous. All these artists' sketching-grounds have some tutelary genius who is the prime drawing attraction, the central sun around which the lesser lights revolve, but here there were two arcs, or at least a sun and a moon. It may be a question as to whether Dordrecht or Volendam, the latter on a tiny island in the Zuyder Zee, is the chief of Dutch sketching-grounds. The English and American elements seem to prefer Volen- dam, and it is they who have made most of the profits for Spaander's little red-roofed, red-walled inn. The thrifty Dutchman saw the wave of pros- perity coming long years ago, and has even fitted up a studio where one may work indoors. At Volendam, which one reaches by boat from the mainland, one sees the quaintest and most nearly un- spoiled of all the old-time Dutch costumes, those of the women and girls being, if not the most remark- able, at least the most attractve, tight-fitting white caps with spreading wings on either side, short- sleeved bodices and voluminous skirts. Mynheer Spaander's little inn is not in the dollar-a- day class; it is expensive, and costs four or five florins a day, whereas the same accommodation could ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 431 have been had in a former day for half as much. Models can be had cheaply enough, for the frugal Dutch still consider that money earned in this way, with no apparent expenditure of energy, as light work and accordingly profitable — the idea of being paid for doing nothing. It is much better than being harnessed to a tow-line and pulling heavy boats along canals or carrying two heavy brass jugs full of milk, three or four gallons to each, across the shoulders, swung on the end of a pole. The old Flemish city of Bruges entertains a cos- mopolitan crowd of artists each year. A five-franc- a-day rate is possible at certain hotels, for Belgium is cheap on all hands. At the Hotel de Flandre and the Hotel du Commerce are sure to be found a very considerable artist clientele in summer, but if you are not wary you will be charged more than the others if you are a late comer. The artist's life here may be made very enjoyable, and there is a specious variety of paintable things about Bruges' deserted old squares and its solitary canal banks which are as much of yesterday as to-day. The artistic life of England is much more con- ventional than that of the Continent. It runs in oiled grooves almost as easily as an ordinary exist- ence, for the English soil is not suitable to the giving root to Bohemianism, an eccentric plant which re- quires a peculiar form of foothold in order to flourish at its best. Bohemianism in England died out with those giants of English art who founded its great- est school of outdoor painting — Moreland, who 432 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD swapped his masterpieces at horse-trading and drank away his art appreciation in carousing with pot-boys, and others of his ilk and time. The life of those who pursue art in England to-day is as well-ordered in outward appearances as that of a country gentle- man. England has some charming sketching-grounds, but they are exploited on conservative lines, and only patronised to any extent by the English themselves. A cosmopolitan atmosphere is wanting, and the only section that has anything of an international reputa- tion is the Cornish coast. Here the mild winter climate and the paintable qualities of the rugged, storm-swept shore have attracted many artists, so that they have formed themselves into groups and colo- nies and given to Cornwall, the Land's End of Eng- land, a world-wide fame which it never would have known otherwise. The trade of the fisherman seems always to have a great fascination for the picture maker, and the south coast fishing villages of Saint Ives, Penzance and Polperro, afford glimpses of him at work which are unequalled. Saint Ives is the nucleus of an artists' colony, and as journeys to London are long and expensive, most of its members have built comfortable houses with studio attachments and settled down. These same painters were responsible for the booming of Saint Ives as a resort, for their pictures first drew the outside world thither, and coming for curiosity, first to see, they stayed on because they ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 433 liked it and could hang on to the fringe of a life which was so different from their own. The artists first deplored this popularity, but found it profitable to rent their studio-houses in summer to the people who came from out their own sphere, and hie themselves away to Continental sketching - grounds, coming back to paint the mists and storms of winter when the crowds had gone. The fisher peo- ple of Saint Ives resented the coming of the artists as a pertinent intrusion, of which they did not the least under- stand the purport. When easels were first planted before the grey-slated walls and roofs of the fishermen's cottages not a few were bowled over, but the artists persevering, the native got used to the procedure and went about his work as of yore, which was exactly what the artists wanted most. To-day many a fisherman and woman of the early days has forsaken their former trade to become a model at a more lucrative wage. In Kent and Sussex and Surrey are charming old The. Englishwoman Turns To Art - 434 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Georgian architectural groupings posed quaintly in the midst of wold and rolling downs. In the his- toric old coast town of Rye, one of the celebrated " Cinq Ports," one gets a really foreign composition and colouring, the most " foreign " combination to be seen in all England, the roofs and gables of the town in all their variety and quaintness being in strong contrast to that usual variety of English background which one associates with leafy lanes, whimsically pretty rivers or Norman Keeps and Castles. There is a Sussex school of art, as there is a Glas- gow school of art, but in the southern county the background composes itself of green-topped chalk cliffs instead of misty braes and burns peopled with long-horned cattle as in wild Caledonia. Up in East Anglia, as the east coast of England is familiarly known, is Constable's country. Here was really originated that free and large method of outdoor painting which was later so highly devel- oped across the Channel at Barbizon. Great cumulus clouds still sweep over the land- scape of East Anglia as they did in Constable's time. There are lazily turning, decrepit old windmills still, and there are the classic " Oaks " and " Mills " and " Hay Wains." Little is changed in general out- lines from what it was generations ago except the public taste, and this is the real reason why the East Anglian school of painting no longer ranks high. Surroundings and accessories are much as they were. Modernity has not tempered the atmosphere — nor ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 435 the climate, nor changed the slow-going methods of life of a bucolic population. Crome and Cotman, too, worked not far away, and Norfolk and its Broads and their famous wherries form an interlude in landscape composition which is not to be met with elsewhere. They are still moving incidents in a pageantry which has not quickened its pace for centuries. One cannot ignore the charming little artists' vil- lage of Broadway, least of all an American, for here first settled the late Edwin A. Abbey and Frank D. Millet, two Americans who have led the best tradi- tional methods of the New World across the seas and, as one may put it, made them flourish on an alien soil. For this reason hundreds, thousands doubtless, perhaps tens of thousands, have already paid their respects to this shrine of art. ^Sxvli&er/an A WINTER PLAYGROUND " WINTER SPORTS " FOR WINTER TOURISTS A FORTNIGHT AT ST. MORITZ ON ALPINE SKATING RINKS SWISS WINTER HOTELS INTERNATIONAL SPORTS SWITZERLAND A CENTRE FOR WINTER SPORTS WINTER AMUSEMENTS ELSEWHERE PIONEER WINTER RESORTS WINTER SEASON IN THE SWISS ALPS SKI-RUNNING CAUX FAVORS THE " BOB SLED " MONTREUX THE TOURISTS' CAPITAL CENSUS OF WINTER VISITORS IN THE ENGADINE WINTER SPORTS FOR THE WOMAN COST OF FUN AMONG ALPINE SNOWS MODERN BOB SLEIGH TOBOGGANING AT ST. MORITZ CRESTA " BOB SLED " RUN CLUB DUES AT ST. MORITZ KLOSTERS' DANGEROUS CURVE KEEPING UP AN ICE RINK XVIII WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND Why not Switzerland and be done with it, we asked ourselves one glacial January morning when our Paris studio " cloche " had gone out over night and the water pipes had frozen tight and all but burst? The sun does sometimes shine brightly there in win- ter and the snow is hard under foot, and, we were told, the hotels were most comfortable with calori- feres and great wood logs ablaze in the hooded chimneys, and " hot and cold " laid on, as our Eng- lish cousins have it, referring to the water of their baths. In Paris we had scarcely seen the sun for four weeks — fog, rain, more rain and more fog; and now a freeze with the prospect of a muddy, sticky thaw which would hold on another month. We had known what it was to freeze in mid- August beside the Rhone Glacier: midwinter couldn't be colder, and those super-heated hotels and the sun- shiny climate appealed to us greatly. At the Paris office of the Swiss Federal Railways an employee gave us a skeleton map, traced our route in blue pencil and made up our ticket in accordance with our vagaries. We left the Engadine Express the next morning at Bale, leaving the rest of our fellow-voyagers to 439 44Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD go on to Davos, Coire and Saint Moritz whilst we dropped down to the shores of Lac Leman (which a former generation called erroneously Lake Geneva) at Montreux, and at midday were taking our coffee on the open-air terrace of a great hotel in a warmth and brilliance that was tropical after Paris' winter gloom. Snow and ice, hard-packed, were all about us, not only on the distant mountain peaks and slopes but in the streets of the town as well, and a hard, glassy surface covered the little lake at Les Avants up back of the town. " Winter sport " is the new-coined, hyphenated nomenclature for the divertisements of what was for- merly accepted as the dull winter months. The sig- nificance of the word is known from the Trossachs to Tyrol, from the Alps of Switzerland to the purple Pyrenees of the Basque Provinces and from Norway to Roussilon. The bark toboggan of the red Indian gives place to the Swiss variety, the luge and the bob-sled, and the snow-shoe and the " crosse " to the ski and the curling stone, hockey and bandy. Most of the sports are, as is obvious, importations from other lands. Skating on artificially made rinks may be obtained in almost all parts, and frequently on natural lakes which are kept in the best of condition. Notably this applies to that chain of lakes between Saint Moritz and the Maloja Pass; those of Silvaplana and the Silsersee, though the latter are of such great depth that they freeze over only late in the season. From Paris to Saint Moritz for a fortnight, in- WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 441 eluding everything needful for one's comfort and en- joyment, transportation (second class), food, lodging and a participation in such sports as strike one's fancy, ought not to exceed three hundred francs (sixty dollars) , and for a month not more than five hundred francs (one hundred dollars). It may look a round figure to pay but the expense of getting there and back is included, for Switzerland is not exactly at our front door, even if we do live in Paris, and at least one hundred and twenty-five francs of this ex- pense is for railway fares. At Adelboden, a newly-opened resort, you may get an inclusive rate that will cover a ticket out and back from London or Paris and a stay of a certain length with nothing to pay once you have regulated the price of the account presented when you buy your ticket. You lose a good deal of your freedom of action, some personal pride and, maybe, seriously inconvenience yourself by such a procedure, but you may expect to gain twenty per cent on the total cost, which is something in these days of high prices — and they are still soaring upward even in Switzer- land. A curious phase of the cost of hotel living in Switzerland is that in many places it is more costly in winter than in summer. With everything snowed- up and the conditions of transport and distribution more difficult, this readily explains itself with respect to food and drink. What is not so readily explained is that in Switzerland, summer and winter alike, the casual traveller often pays as much for a single meal 442 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD as does a pensionnaire for his food and lodging for the round of the clock. That Switzerland is a nation of hotel keepers, and successful ones at that, is the only possible explanation. Another considerable item of expense in the run- ning of a Swiss hotel in winter is that of heating and lighting, for nowhere else among the resorts of Europe is so much attention paid to the heating of hotel public rooms and private apartments as in this land of mountains. One is not cold indoors here in the heart of the Alps in winter, and the still, out-of- door cold (even should the bise be howling) is not to be feared with proper clothing protection, for there is absolutely no dampness. On account of the high winds which frequently blow down off the Maloja Pass there are fewer consumptives at Saint Moritz, which is farther away, than at Davos, and for that reason is to be preferred as a headquarters in the Engadine. Bad weather in Switzerland in winter usually means snowy weather and thus it continues until the season of spring rains sets in. Snow seldom brings a tem- perature below freezing; and when this — either the clear, dry, still cold, or the dry, bracing wind and hillocks of drifting snow — is found in conjunction with bright sunshine, the combination is very attrac- tive indeed. The English have sought to introduce into Switzer- land as winter sports football and hockey. For the latter there is some excuse, for played on the ice it becomes " bandy," but for the former it is as ridicu- WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 443 lous as if it were cricket or baseball. The Scotch game of curling is also extensively played, and for this, too, there is some reason for being since it is played upon ice. Skating is of two varieties in Switzerland — the English and the Continental styles. They differ greatly and seldom are the two practised in any one resort. The Dutchmen are the best European skaters, but not many come to Switzerland — they are too frugal a race to spend their money excursioning. By contrast it is the English figure skater who is most often seen on the newly flooded rinks, even before Christmas, when the snow sports of winter, the chief of which is " bob-sleighing," be- gins in the Swiss mountains. Switzerland is the head centre of les sports d'hiver, more than fifty stations being devoted to them, The game is an international one, however, so far as par- ticipation therein is concerned, and even France, in the Vosges, the Alps of Dauphiny and Savoy and in the Pyrenean provinces, has succumbed and has seri- ously taken up with the new idea as a means of attracting winter tourists to places that hitherto were bereft from November to May. The mountain regions of central Europe are no longer merely sum- mer playgrounds. In Styria, Tyrol and elsewhere in Austria, winter sport has taken on immensely well also. At Chamonix and certain spots in the Vosges an initiative is to be remarked, though in general the French Alpine resort authorities say: " Give us the clientele and we will establish winter hotels, rinks and toboggan runs." The winter tourist is apt to 444 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD reason otherwise and reply, " Give us the conveni- ences and the divertissements which we demand and we will come." And so it is that Switzerland has won out. The former Alpine sport of Whymper's and Sir Martin Conway's day is giving way to bob-sleighing, lugeing and skiing, as was destiny when the flanks of the Jungfrau and Mont Blanc came to be pene- trated by cog-wheel railways. Only the eidelweiss is left of the Switzerland of old, that sacred, star- shaped flower which is a paternoster in the religion of the montagnard of Switzerland and Austria. The diligence has not wholly disappeared, but it is only in the Canton of Grisons and on the Furka, Grimsel and Oberlap Passes that the drivers are safe from surprise by some mad, rush- ing automobilist. As far back as 1882 the proprietor of the Kulm Hotel at Saint Moritz de- cided to leave his latch string out all winter. Up to that time Switzerland's season had been summer; since that time it has run from the rise of the first to the decline of the year's last moon and the prosperity of the Swiss hotel keeper has pro- WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 445 gressed in the same ratio, Davos, Saint Moritz and Grindelwald being the pioneer winter resorts. The winter season is not long, for except in the highest stations, it scarcely begins before January and is over by March. The majority of stations at a greater elevation than three thousand feet have the shortest season and begin to empty towards the end of January, their height of attraction being around Christmas time, though the ideal month for ski- running is undoubtedly February. By ski-running is meant long excursions on skis, a climb upwards some two thousand feet or more above the hotel-peopled slopes and valleys, in company with a Swiss guide. There one rests in some Alpine club hut, lunches and swoops down again like a bird on swift-gliding skis over the virgin snow and under a sun as vivid as if one were on the shores of the Mediterranean instead of those of Lac Leman. This really makes skiing worth while, though most who affect the sport merely hop about before the terraces of the hotels and hurry back for a " hot scotch " or tea at frequent in- tervals. To-day the season at Chateau d'Oex, at Les Avants above Montreux, at Davos and Saint Moritz in Grisons, at Disentis, at Grindelwald, at Diablerets, Champery, Montana, Kanderstag, Adelboden and Engelberg is quite as much a winter season as a summer one. The hotels are most nearly full in winter and it is then that one pays the highest prices for accommodations. It is open house now all the year round in most of the high Alpine valleys of 446 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD hotel-keeping, tourist Switzerland. The air is pure, clear and cold, the sun hot in the valleys for a brief moment at midday from before Christmas until the end of February, and one is as comfortable without wraps here as in a latitude many hundreds of miles further south. At sundown, which may be at two or three o'clock in the afternoon if a high mountain in- tervenes to the southwest, all is glacial, and what little thaw there may have been on the skating ponds, the skiing ground and the toboggan runs congeals again for the morrow's sport. Sometimes, even, it is a moonlight game, this winter sport of Switzerland, and sometimes a ten or twenty mile sleigh-ride by night is a variation. But usually it is a case of tea and dinner and bridge and a hot grog and then to bed in the great white palaces of the Alpine slopes overlooking some silent, glassy valley or the cold blue-grey of Leman's Lake. The Engadine, the Oberland and the High Valley of the Rhone are a very cinematograph of life and movement in winter. Here are new worlds to con- quer for the conventional traveller who has previously done Switzerland only in summer or Algeria in win- ter. Things should be reversed, the latter in May or September and the former in January will give one a new outlook on things. At Caux, which the former tourist ignored, are now great hotels with bob-sleigh garages, which are as much a necessary adjunct to this modern twentieth century life as an automobile garage in a main road town. A three kilometre run, commencing at the WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 447 Cret d'y Bau high up in the mountains, finishes at the very door of the Palace Hotel. How desirable an attraction the run and its attendant line of trucks to take the coasters up hill again was thought to be by the hotel administration is best realised when it is stated that its upkeep costs annually fifty thousand francs. Besides this there is a run for luges, or single sleds, and two ice rinks. Caux is a winter rival of Luna Park and considerably more exclusive and luxurious. On Mont Pelerin, above Vevey, a similar enter- prise, with the addition of a skiing ground, has come into being. Meanwhile trade follows the flag and the Swiss are so happy that they have got an all-the- year-round occupation that they are no longer emi- grating. Some one once wrote an anthology of prose and verse describing the delights of Switzerland under all its varied aspects and at all seasons. It ran from Gesner to Longfellow, Rosseau to the Williamsons — ■ who wrote the " Lightning Conductor." There was Miss Braddon and John Ruskin and others. It was a good anthology as anthologies go, but whilst spring, summer, autumn and winter, sky and lake and moun- tain were all pictured, practically nothing was said of winter sport. Chateaubriand was about the only one among these contributors who did not laud the praises of the mountains. He protested that mountains fatigued one to the point where he could not philosophise going up, and that one's natural fear when coming 448 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD down so monopolised attention that nothing else mat- tered. This is not the point of view of the lover of winter sports of the mountains as they have been developed in the Switzerland of to-day. Just what it means to Switzerland to have all four seasons full ones is best realised by the contemplation of a few statistics. Montreux, for instance, is a town of hotels of all ranks and conditions and full at all seasons. Visitors have increased fifty per cent in five years, partly because of the quality and quantity of the hotel accommodation offered, partly because of its accessibility and proximity to the multifarious, all- round amusements of that part of Switzerland of which it is the stranger's capital. Switzerland's tourists are, like its speech, princi- pally German. Out of each thousand of its hotel dwellers three hundred and ten are Teutons, two hundred and twenty-two are Swiss themselves, one hundred and thirty-five English, and one hundred and ten Americans. The list tails off with twenty-four Italians and eighteen Austrians, with the French, Russians, Hollanders and Belgians in between. In the winter season Americans and English seem to predominate, and the former are quite as much in evidence as the latter, if not actually in numbers, at least in appearance. That is a question of na- tional temperament one may rightly suppose; the American is usually in evidence wherever he may be. The Germans come to Montreux mostly in the spring. To nineteen thousand Germans in 1909 there were WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 449 six thousand two hundred and twenty-seven Ameri- cans. The French come chiefly in August, as do the cheap trippers from London, bound to or from the Oberland or the Engadine. During the same year forty thousand strangers stayed at, or passed through, Montreux, those who actually stopped there for any length of time being those who came for the winter sports. It is not dull travelling in Switzerland in winter, not even by contrast with what one may have known of it on some summer journey. A deep blanket of snow is everywhere, and the Jungfrau and the Wen- gernalp, Mont Cervin at Zermatt and old Mont Blanc itself (which is not in Switzerland but in France) , are a few shades whiter with the snow deeper on their lower slopes; that is all. By the wonderful Albula railway one reaches Saint Moritz in winter with the sensation of a locomotive and its following train skating on ice. Before the line was opened (from Thusis to Saint Moritz) it was a matter of two or three days getting into the Engadine over the Julier Pass. The former method, in a great sleigh with from three to six horses, was picturesque and amusing but inconvenient. It was so in Robert Louis Stevenson's day, when he and the boy Lloyd printed those famous little " Davos Book- lets " now worth their weight in gold. To-day by a train-de-luxe one travels more quickly, more com- fortably, and takes his, or her, winter sport at the journey's end rather than in the joy and adventure of getting there. 450 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The coming of the railway to the Engadine has meant the coming of the crowds, and even the aspect of the visitors has changed. To-day they are more transitory than formerly. If on a former winter's day at Saint Moritz or Davos you met a party group that you saw there a month before, you thought nothing of it; to-day, but thirty-six hours later, the same party may be met at Montreux, at Aigle, at Sierra or Montana. Winter sport in Switzerland is a sort of movable sport. You bundle up your skis as you did your umbrella and your alpenstock on a summer tour, and after the Engadine has palled, make your way to Grindelwald, and luge, and ski and skate amid a new environment until the spirit warns you to move on again. Swiss winter sports are as much for women as for men, for though they are vigorous and bespeak agility on the part of the players, as well as a love of the open, they are in comport with the new order of things which has come to recognise the virtues of exercise and fresh air. Such as go to Switzerland in winter enjoy great advantages over those who put in their time at the merely fashionable resorts of the Riviera or the tepid, tea-drinking winter colonies of Cairo and Biskra. Routine gives place to free- dom of movement and unconventionally, inanition to exercise, and frills and furbelows to sensible and practical health-giving, health-sustaining cos- tumes. An outfit for Switzerland in winter is easily and cheaply conceived, and if of the quality that it ought WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 451 to be it will possess a durability that will assure it long service. The winter days are short in Switzerland and the evenings long, so if one wants to mix social flippancies with lusty exercise, she may still have the opportunity to don frocks of fashion at the musical evenings, dances and bridge parties of the great steam-heated, electric-lighted, palatial hotels which are now found in close proximity to the half a hundred winter-sports stations of the country. One may not do the round of all these winter re- sorts in ten days, but the point is that whereas winter visitors to Switzerland usually stayed weeks, they now come for a ten-day plunge into the clear, cold, rarefied atmosphere at some of the great resorts whose attractions have been widely advertised, and go back again to Paris, to Dresden or to London, their lungs and hearts full of new vigour and emotions. Davos, Klosters, Landquart, Coire, Thusis, Cresta and Saint Moritz were but vague, humble place- names a generation ago, but to-day, taking Saint Moritz and its Grand Hotel as an example (it offers four hundred beds to visitors), their fame is some- what more considerable. At the foot of the Cresta snow run is Celerina, with another newly opened enormous caravansary, on whose open ice rink is held the English Public Schools Skating Championship for the Challenge Cup now held by Malvern College. Here in the upper Engadine, chiefly on that chain of lakes extending from Samaden to Maloja, at an elevation approximating six thousand feet, skating is 452 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD at its best. Artificially made rinks are everywhere, too, water being flowed over depressions in the frozen ground and they, as well, for the less venturesome skaters, fill a want. In the most popular of the Swiss winter resorts one pays on an average of twelve francs, say two dol- lars and forty cents a day, and the pursuing of the sports themselves is a cheap enough amusement. The cheapest are skiing, skating and tobogganing. For these one pays a small sum, varying from a half a franc for a seance to two or three francs for a day's sport on the specially prepared tracks or rinks. Bob- sleighing costs a good bit more, rising from twenty to fifty francs, four dollars to ten dollars a day, an expense which would naturally be divided among several. The " bob-sled," as it is known in Switzerland to- day, was originally imported from the United States in 1889; at least it developed from a species of " double-runner " which, by the time it had crossed the ocean and climbed up into the high Alps, had become known as a " pig-sticker." The modern " bob-sleigh " is scientifically constructed and is a thing of four spring runners, much hardware trap- ping in the form of hand rails, foot rests, steering- gear and the like, and possesses a general business- like air which would seem to make the conduct of it more a profession than a sport. The name of Mathis of Saint Moritz or Beek of Davos on the dashboard of a " bob," is what Renault or Panhard is on an automobile. WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 453 Sleighing in general is even more expensive, par- ticularly with respect to lengthy excursions, but again this is a sort of community affair and ought not to cost the individual more than a dollar a day, say thirty per cent more than the " bob-sleigh." One of the most popular of these Swiss sleigh excursions is from Samaden, through Saint Moritz and Silvaplana, to Sils and Maloja and their deep water lakes. The lakes, though often freezing to a depth of three solid feet, crackle and detonate like a cannonade as one glides over their surface. " Crackling ice is the safest," is, however, an axiom that holds good in the Engadine. For a dozen or fifteen miles from Samaden the narrow ribbon of the post road winds up to the table 454 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD land from whence, a little beyond Maloja, it plunges off into the Lombard plain of Italy. Those to whom the skating is not the prime object of the excursion may climb the height back of the town, see the won- derful, wide-spread panorama for themselves and still get back to the Bernina hostelry at Samaden to sleep. Taking Saint Moritz as a centre, tobogganing is usually practised in the morning before the sun has melted the ruts of the coast into holes. The " bandy " game is an afternoon amusement. It is only in February that " bob-sleighing " is at its height, and at Saint Moritz it has a special track lying paral- lel to the famous Cresta toboggan run. " Bobbing," as it is called, is also an afternoon sport and is quite the most social, and perhaps the most dangerous, of all. A steersman and brakeman are the only really skilled and sporty individuals of a " bob-sled's " crew. The rest, fellows and girls, are sandwiched in be- tween, on the plank of this refined double-runner, and are told simply to sit tight, and if a spill comes to devitalise themselves that they may suffer no broken bones nor run the risk of being killed. They are the ballast of the craft; those at either end the crew. The word " bob " thus applied comes from the swinging backwards and forwards by the crew and the ballast whilst coasting, a movement not unlike that of the crew of a four- or eight-oared shell. The Cresta " bob-sled " run is supposedly the finest in existence. It was scientifically built to begin with and is kept in the best of condition. An American WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 455 once steered a " bob " over the entire length of the run, including all its high-banked curves, one thou- sand four hundred and fifty yards, in sixty-three sec- onds, and that is not far from fifty miles an hour. Why, it's the next thing to aeroplaning! The Schatz-Alp " bob-sled " course at Davos is over two miles long, with many sharp curves. A snow course offers the best opportunity for display- ing the skill of the steersman of a " bob " and is less fraught with danger in the case of an overturn than an ice run. There is one "spill-over" curve, virtu- ally a great horse-shoe, on the Schatz-Alp run, which would be reckoned a marvel of engineering if it was an adjunct of a dirt-built road. Then there is the " made run," iced practically throughout its length, and banked so high at the corners that it is almost impossible for any self-respecting " bob " to shoot off comet-like into space, though the thing has been known. At Klosters, on a course nearly two miles in length, is another famous curve known as the " Cabbage Garden," which sees frequent spills and some really dangerous accidents. It was at Klosters a half a century ago — at the instigation of John Addington Symonds, old stagers will tell you — that the Swiss variety of toboggan came into being. For a fact, the toboggan has more or less evolved itself into the " bob-sled," but by the way of the American double- runner. The Saint Moritz International Skating Club is a formally organised and elaborately constituted insti- 456 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD tution. Formerly one became a member by the pay- ment of a five-franc fee, became a life member in fact. To-day things are different. It is a much more serious affair. One now pays an annual sub- scription of ten francs for merely becoming a member of the club for a season, and this only if staying at one of the hotels which is a party to the organisation. If you lodge elsewhere the subscription is doubled to twenty francs. For this one has the use of a private, superbly kept ice rink, so the charge by no manner of reckoning can be called an onerous one. The keeping up of a Swiss ice rink is a costly and continuous performance. The slightest fall of snow has to be swept, or scraped, from the surface before it freezes into roughness or hummocks, a labour which, curiously enough, is, in many places in the Engadine, performed by sunny-faced condottieri from Italy who at other seasons work at railway building or grape picking in the vineyards of Piedmont. SOME SWISS WINTER RESORTS AND THEIR ALTITUDES Adelboden Andermatt Celerina . Champery Diablerets Engelberg Gastaad . Grindelwald Goldiwill 4,500 feet 4,738 " 5,577 " 3,5°° 3,940 3,300 3,490 " 3,468 " 3,H7 " WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 457 Kanderstag Klosters . Lauterbrunnen Saanen Samaden . Saint Moritz . Wengen . Waldhaus-Flims Zweisimmen 3,835 feet 4,090 2,625 3.773 5,670 6,090 4,190 3>7°° 3. 2 i5 g%PWOM AN Qg/2^£ THREE WAYS OF MOTORING ABROAD RESOURCEFUL WOMAN TRAVELLER TWO MOTORING BOGEYS THE WOMAN'S IDEAL TOUR MOTORIST SEES A NEW EUROPE GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH EUROPE AUTOMOBILE SIMPLIFIES TOURING COST OF TOURING BY MOTOR CAR HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF HIRING A CAR ABROAD LUXURIOUS TRAVEL BY AUTOMOBILE RESPONSIBILITY OF JEWELS COMPARATIVE MERITS OF CHAUFFEURS MOTORING IN THE BRITISH ISLES FRANCE, THE MOTORIST'S PARADISE COUNTRY INNS AND THE AUTOMOBILE SPAIN PRESENTS DIFFICULTIES INHOSPITABLE SWITZERLAND SPEED SLOWS DOWN ACROSS THE ALPS AS THE MOTORIST SEES ITALY ABOUT THE ITALIAN LAKES XIX THE WOMAN AND THE CAR There are three ways of seeing Europe from an automobile — to take over one's own car and chauffeur; to hire an automobile and chauffeur, or to depend on short, circular tours, from certain centres, where a hotel or some enterprising tourist agency provides automobile runs about the neighbourhood, varying from a day to a week, all included. This last is the most feasible plan for many, for everything is arranged without effort on the part of the traveller; it is the modern means of extending the radius of the old-time local carriage drive, which still adds to the time and costliness of sight-seeing in many localities. This latter arrangement often affords just about as much motoring as many women want — for as a class they are not hardy motorists; it bears, however, about the same relation to real automobile touring as a sandwich does to a course dinner. The obvious reply is that one might just as well take the sandwich if she can't get the dinner, but perhaps if the woman, who has been so resourceful in getting about in other ways, will turn her ingenuity to the question of travel by automobile she will perhaps be able to get the dinner made up of a dish from each leading nation. Two bogeys discourage travel by automobile for 461 462 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the woman abroad. One is that supposedly it can- not readily be done without male escort, and the other that it is too expensive for the average touring allow- ance. As to the first, for say three or four, it is the woman's ideal way of touring. Here is the possible way of gaining that exclusiveness that so many women crave, and as for protection, she does no more need a man along than does the twenty-five or forty horse- power car need a real horse to increase its effective- ness. To probe deeper into the subject, one questions how much women really care for touring by auto- mobile, that is, real touring, rising early, keeping at it all day, being delayed for meals occasionally, spending half the night by the roadside on that day when every one of the tires blow out with unanimity. This is a bit different from using the big touring car for running around town or out to the country club, as so often is the limit of the practice at home. In a few words, motoring, which is popularly sup- posed to be such a luxurious sport, calls for a lot of endurance and staying qualities, and quickly weeds out the pseudo-traveller and shows up the sporty char- acteristics of the woman who cares for things for their own sakes and not just because they are the fashion. The automobile has opened up a new Europe. It is like following " Alice Through the Looking-Glass " and entering a land, surprised to find it real, which seemed always not unlike an imaginary, painted THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 463 panorama, viewed as it usually had been through the dusty frame of the window of a flying train. The lesson is being learned that by means of the facile automobile is the only way to see a country; more than this — it's the only way for the passing traveller to ever get to know a foreign land. One can never know Europe intimately until she has felt the joy of the open road, reeled off at least some considerable length of the long, straight, won- derful roads of France, has glided along under the shadow of the Rhine castles, followed by the side of Dutch and Flemish canals, braved the dangers of an inhospitable Swiss pass, and the almost equally dan- gerous leafy lanes of England, the dust and pictur- esqueness of Italian highroads, and has followed in the trail of the camel over the desert sands to Biskra. Such experiences will tend to place the English-speak- ing pension, with its banal chit-chat, in its true posi- tion in the scheme of things abroad, and give one a broader and more comprehensive understanding of foreign things. For that most industrious traveller — the American woman with two or three months at her disposal — the automobile is invaluable as a means of covering ground and sight-seeing at the same time. All the methods of procedure set forth above are to be considered, but perhaps the most practical is to hire a car abroad, though if the woman wishes to take her own car and chauffeur, which, in her case, is better than depending on the foreign driver, it is even a less expensive arrangement than to hire the 464 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD same combination on the other side if one's time ex- tends beyond three months, for say five or six. Four women, a car and a chauffeur can tour the motorist's Europe for one thousand dollars a month, comfortably and easily, including the cost of ocean transport. Carefully figure up the approximate cost of the ordinary tour for that same period, and the chances are that the motor trip will not figure up appreciably higher than the other. Two hundred and fifty dollars a month is about as close a margin on which any but an exceedingly knowing and care- ful person can travel on day after day by automobile in Europe, visiting all the stock sights, big and little, THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 465 This necessitates of course that finances be studied and that there be no leakages. The thing that mostly affects the cost of the automobile tour abroad is the disposition everywhere to put motorists in a class by themselves and make them pay for this distinction. Motorists themselves are largely to blame for this discrimination, for they have rather taken that same view of themselves. The modern automobile has brought about condi- tions similar to those that were the outcome of the period when the Englishman made the grand tour of Europe in his private coach and four, accompanied by a retinue of servants, maids, lackeys, mountains of luggage and his whole family. History has repeated itself with emphasis; the Anglo-Saxon still leads the van of luxurious travel, but it is the younger race from overseas, and it is the automobile in place of the lumbering coach that now swings up to the hotel and deposits its conglomerate load. All over Europe have sprung up hotels whose luxuriousness is a direct result of present-day touring conditions and are designed to match, the luxury that comes driving up to their doors, much of it by the automobile. What follows may apply for the most part to any of these methods, though certain it is the freedom that one has with their own car and chauffeur is something more considerable than if tied down to a schedule bargained for in a renting garage or the whims of a stranger chauffeur. At all events, in France, Ger- many, England even, or in Italy one is sure of getting 466 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD fair treatment even in the latter case, if one arrives at a clear understanding in the first instance at any one of a half-dozen of the leading garages of cities like London, Paris, Berlin or Milan. In the prov- inces, too, one could doubtless do equally well, and for twenty to twenty-five dollars a day be practically the owner of an automobile for the period for which it is contracted, with no responsibilities except for the payment of the bills as rendered. You will have no question of repairs to consider, nor of the re- placing of tires, nor the cost of oil or gasolene, which latter becomes petrol in England, benzina in Italy, benzin in Germany and essence in France. Usually the chauffeur's keep is at the charge of the hirer, but this could probably be arranged for by a lump sum which allowed a dollar and a half a day therefor or a little more. Assuming that it is the European tour in general that is to be undertaken, it matters not so much as to whether the object of the tour be for luxurious enjoyment or pleasurable edification. The point is what one may get for the time and money expended. Actually one does get more in Europe than at home, and therein lies not the least of the charms of foreign travel by automobile. It is for the woman traveller that the luxuries of the automobile have been created. She can tour Europe as comfortably as she can sit in her own boudoir. There is the specially constructed tea- basket, with thermos bottles, if she wishes to have " five o'clock " en route, reading-lamps, telephones, THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 467 racks for books and papers, every conceivable device for intricate baggage arrangements. It is possible in the present automobile trunks to stow away in perfect safety a good-sized wardrobe, such as is called for by the modern exigencies of fashionable travel. European travel is as much of a society event as Newport in summer or the Horse Show in winter, and the lady in the car needs a varied lot of garments (or she thinks she does) ; anyway, they are usually the chief accessories of the big tour- ing car. A trunk, a suitcase, a dressing-case bag, a large handbag ought to satisfy madame en route, but the question of hats is a burning one. " Where can I put my hat-box? " is woman's first question, and the chauffeur spends many anxious moments trying to adjust the relation of tires and hat-boxes. For really comfortable travel the car should not be overcrowded; two make the ideal touring party. Then if there is the maid, who, as a rule, sits beside the chauffeur, her luggage can be got down to a large suitcase, another being ample for the chauffeur's needs. Extra baggage and heavy trunks can be sent on ahead to the points where elaborate clothes will be needed, such as the large cities or the resorts, Aix- les-Bains, the Riviera, the German spas, and the Palace hotels of the fashionable watering-places. Thus will madame be prepared for the social round when she arrives on the scene. This method is pre- ferable to overloading the car with luggage, which always interferes with one's personal comfort. 468 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD The thing that will worry the woman at the head of a retinue such as this will probably be as to how she shall carry her jewels. Indeed, this is a real problem ; also it may become a real danger. The automobile may attract the old-time brigand to go into business again if this keeps up. Still madame needs her jewels to match her Paris costumes, and the Palace hotels expect one to live up to their names. It is a bad thing to intrust the jewels to the care of the maid, who, as is the habit of maids, will be apt to lose her head and the jewel case at the same time in the many flittings to and from the car that are necessary in the course of the day. The responsibility of a lot of diamonds is enough to handicap any pleasure tour. A suggestion might be made. Have a small safe built in under the seat of your automobile for your jewel case and other valuables. This would certainly be better than leaving them to the uncertain handbag care of yourself or your maid. Naturally they should be taken into the hotel at night. It would be, however, the part of wisdom if the display of jewels were limited to only such articles as might be of actual use for the voyage. One of the principal objects of pleasure travel is to get rid of responsibility. One does not need a five-foot shelf for the guide- books to be used en tour, but the woman who inaugu- rates a convenient little book-case for the automobile will do a real service to the cause of travelling. There is, of course, the table, which can be let down not only for the tea-basket, but also for the more im- portant duty, on which to spread out the maps. One From the Point of View of the Cook THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 469 always wants to follow the route oneself, or ought to, for this is one of the chief joys of motoring. If one is touring between the great resorts in the height of season it would be well to wire ahead for accommodations. If no maid or courier is along — and in truth there is no reason why there should be — the chauffeur — if he be a foreigner — could attend to this as well as arrange for the desired assortment of rooms on arrival. With regard to the foreign chauffeur let a word be said right here. His very acquaintance with the in- tricacies of foreign touring gives him the opportunity to add indirectly to his profits at the expense of his employers. He knows all the subtleties of the " commission " end of the European game, which but means that his employers pay for a number of things that they have no need of and at advanced rates. The American chauffeur, with his ignorance of the language and of conditions generally, will not be led into these temptations; he will not, in most cases, understand the hints thrown out to make money off of his employers; moreover, the strangeness of his position will lead him to siding with the owners of the car in a common cause in a foreign land, in preference to conspiring against them with the wily foreigner. If he can't act as courier he will at least be more faithful to his employer's interests. The automobile has made possible many combina- tions of tours abroad that the stage coach alone in a former day made accessible. The coming of the railway killed much of the romance of travel, but it 470 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD has revived wonderfully under the regime of mechan- ical H. P. England is lovely as a touring ground from all points of view, but it soon palls on one after they have toured the west to Clovelly, south to Canterbury and Brighton, up the Thames Valley to Oxford and Warwick, and north or west — about, even so far as the Lake District or the Trossachs. After that, what? Nothing but the round over again. And the country inns? They have been de- lightful to look at in many cases, less delightful to sample in many more, and expensive every one, be- sides being exceedingly limited in what they have to offer. The leafy lanes of England are stagily pretty and road surfaces are almost invariably good in Eng- land and Scotland (less so in Ireland). It has been a pleasure indeed to roll over the modern Pilgrim's Way, the great North Road of coaching days and ways, the Bath Road of storied romance, or to climb Snowdon in Wild Wales, but after all, this hallowed ground is already so familiar that the automobile tourist, even woman, in England unconsciously pines for a larger horizon, a grander scale and more quaint, exotic surroundings than can be in Britain. Sooner or later things are bundled on board a cross- Channel packet — one is not even obliged to crate the automobile — and you fetch up in the delightful land of France, certainly the most practical touring ground for automobiles in all the world. You have been driving to the left in Britain, as is the English way, and now at last think you will THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 471 get back to right-handedness. This is not so. As these lines are being written the powers that be, those who are responsible for the making and the upkeep of the good roads of France and the laws governing them, have come to the English way of thinking, and reversed the order of driving. In France a whole new set of conditions impose themselves upon the owner or the driver of an auto- mobile. But you do not have to pay a tax for having a device painted on the doors of your automobile, as you do in England, nor another tax for " employing a male servant " if you have a chauffeur along — as you must do in England — neither, as in England, do you have to pay an internal revenue tax for driving a car on the roads. You are free to do what you will in France for four months, and may even make what speed you like so long as you do not bowl over any- thing in your path, for the speed limit has just recently been abolished, too. This means something in the land of good roads par excellence. Supplies for the automobile are dearer in France than in England, but hotels are cheaper and better, the food most decidedly so. You are stuck less in this land of the " foreigner " than you are in Anglo- Saxondom, or indeed in any other part of Europe. From ten to twelve, or the utmost, fifteen francs a day you may be comfortably fed and lodged almost anywhere along the highways and byways of France, excepting, of course, in the resorts like Trouville, Aix-les-Bains, Nice, Cannes or Biarritz. The chauf- feur will be catered for at a considerably less figure, 472 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD and you will have no charges for garage for the night in the majority of instances. Normandy and Brittany by automobile are a de- lightful fortnight's itinerary, and the hotels and roads are better in the former than in the latter. Along the valleys of the Seine and Marne and Loire (the latter comprising the "chateau country") are many surprises in the way of country inns and their attend- ant delights, to say nothing of historic and romantic sights and scenes which will give the woman in the car a new outlook on life from what she may have had before, even though she may have had some acquaintance with the same, arrived at by a more antiquated mode of travel. Again does fashion repeat itself. Just as in the old coaching days passengers and luggage were taken on in the courtyard of the inn, so does one often enter and leave the automobile in the courtyard of the country hotel, away from the fussy crowd that usually gathers and gapes around in the open street. Many a big and little country inn has its cobble-stoned in- terior court. It is almost the universal arrangement in France, in the old towns of Germany and indeed all over Europe, where the present-day hotels are direct descendants of the old posting houses. In England there are many inn courtyards still un- changed since the days when travel was by the over- balanced " mail-coach," which swerved perilously along over hill and dale and through narrow village streets, drawn by its four or six horses. Paris and its environs usually form a part of any THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 473 European automobile itinerary, but there is little pleasure to be derived until one is well free of the ^WIGNON SZhcT OLT>/rs S%ic2 ifo toe Wr^ssvecer* STIMULATOR OF MODERN EUROPEAN TRAVEL BENEFITS THE AMERICAN GROWTH OF THE CLUB NATIONAL GOVERNMENT INSTITUTION WORK OF THE T. C. F. INFLUENCE OUTSIDE FRANCE ORGANIZATION OF THE T. C. F. BENEFITS TO THE WOMAN TRAVELLER SCHOOL FOR THE FRENCH HOTEL KEEPER CAMPAIGN OF HYGIENE " CHAMBRES HYGIENIQUES " T. C. F. THE TRAVELLER'S FRIEND ITS HELP TO THE AUTOMOBILIST GUIDE-ANNUAIRE THREE THOUSAND T. C. F. HOTELS ITS PARIS CLUBHOUSE TRANSFORMING FRENCH HOTELS SIGN OF THE GOOD HOTEL PRESERVATION OF LANDMARKS AID TO GOOD ROADS BUILDING A ROADWAY T. C. F. AND THE SMALL HOTEL THE WOMAN MEMBER TOURING INFORMATION GUIDE MAPS, ETC. XX THE TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE AND HOW IT AIDS THE TRAVELLER The famous Touring Club de France has been the great stimulator of modern travel in that happy land. Incidentally it has encouraged and braced up the languishing fortunes of the country innkeeper by a beneficent administration whose blessings have fallen upon the traveller and Boniface alike in a manner that gives each much to be thankful for. It was quick to see that the custom of travel by road of the days of the malle-poste and the post-chaise was return- ing with the advent of the bicycle and the automobile, and forthwith the innkeeper of the country town was encouraged to meet the conditions imposed by his new clientele in an adequate manner. The innkeeper himself might not have known how to read the signs of the times unless the formula was given him, but he embraced the opportunity that offered gladly, and to-day three thousand of him and his fellows scattered all over the country have a ready, new-made set of customers calling at their doors, and paying liberally, though not extravagantly, for the good cheer that is offered them. With the coming of his new fortunes there might have been danger that he would kill the goose that had just 483 484 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD begun to lay golden eggs again, but he was encour- aged to believe that his best advertisement would come from this new clientele, and up to now he has treated his members more fairly than the hoteliers of any other nation. The Touring Club de France is an association of public-spirited Frenchmen whose prime devotion is the development of le tourisme in their own delightful land, though by no means do their efforts stop there, for they seek to make plain sailing for their fellow- Frenchmen when they go beyond the frontiers and across the seas. In this connection it may be inter- esting to note that Americans, by a simple formula, may affiliate with this admirable organisation, with the result that they will have reason to bless the genius who instigated it for the real service that it will offer them, whether they be mere tourists or clwellers in the country. Originally the club was of most modest propor- tions, but, with the avowed object of making travel- ling easy and economical for its members, it has, in twenty years, grown like the proverbial snowball, from a meagre three thousand members at the end of its first year of existence, to a membership of nearly one hundred and fifty thousand. It has for its honorific head the President of the French Repub- lic, and has become a national government-recognised institution by decree, by which it is known as an Association for the Public Good. This means that it has all the backing and political influence which is, or ever will be, necessary in order to make known the TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 485 glories of France to travellers of all the world. The paternalism of the French Government is much to be appreciated as a noble motive, but actually the saga- cious French know that it will return its cost tenfold. France, outside of Paris, the " chateau country " and the Riviera resorts, has not been "toured" to the limit as have Switzerland and Italy, though the utter- most corners are fast becoming known to genuine vagabond travellers, until to-day one is as likely to see at Saint Jean Pied du Port, in the heart of the Basque country, Americans singly or in couples, as they are to find them footing it over the Tuscan hills. The paternal interest of the Government in en- couraging the development of the T. C. F. is not a phase of communism, but a sort of national backing- up of the projects of a nation-wide institution, even though it was born in the brain of an individual. The club owns to a virtual government organisa- tion in miniature, with a Cabinet of Executives, who set the machinery of various departments in motion and launch from time to time projects tending to ameliorate touring conditions in France, going so far even at times as to enter the field of politics and do a little lobbying in legislative halls. There has never been a suspicion of graft attached to its methods, and this is in its favour, too. The club was one of the prime movers in establishing that French classical school for hotel keepers which is intended to forestall the rising wave of German-Swiss methods, which are fast engulfing the hotels of many of the resorts even in France. This it combats also in another way, 486 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD handing out freely much practical advice and assist- ance intended to better conditions for the country hotel keeper, and add to the satisfaction and comfort of the traveller who lodges beneath his roof. It suggests and aids in the betterment and upkeep of roads, going so far in some instances as to actually designate a prolongation of a mountain road which would add considerably to the prosperity of the region, but which has hitherto been neglected, owing to less needed but more insistent demands elsewhere. The preservation of historic sights and monuments has been not the least commendable of its works, and solely by its own initiative the club has caused to be developed that famous National Park of the Esterels, bounded by a forty kilometre strip of ocean side roadway on the Riviera, known as the Corniche d'Or, a shelf-like, cornice-built roadway, overlooking the blue waters of the Mediterranean between Saint Raphael and Cannes in southern France. This road- way is the paradise of automobilists in the region of the world's most famous winter playground. The club has recently published the detailed plans of a mountain chalet, a hotel of modest proportions, which may be readily erected in any undeveloped Alpine beauty spot. It is hoped that the ultimate adoption of the scheme will some day result in the Alps of Dauphiny and Savoy rivalling Switzerland in the facilities and accommodations offered the tour- ist. Three prime features impose themselves upon such a scheme; that these modern mountain rest- houses shall be frequent, reasonable in price and ex- TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 487 cellent in what they have to offer, if not luxurious. To this end the club has often gone to the trouble to find capital for some enterprise which hitherto lacked funds for exploitation. It is readily seen from this that the labours of this formidable organisation are not for the benefit of one class of individuals alone, but for all, not for the innkeepers of one region, nor for travellers of French nationality alone, but for the benefit of all France and for the traveller from the utmost corners of the world when he crosses the land by rail or road or aeroplane. The ramifications of the influence of the club go to the farthermost French colonies and, if you are a member therof, you will reap the benefits as greatly in Cambodia as in Touraine; furthermore, its affiliated hotels and delegates are found in all the chief centres of Continental Europe, even at Cairo and in Constantinople. The various club committees are so numerous and potent that they are doing the work which in many other lands is being done, or ought to be done, by Governmental Departments devoted to the same end. The spirit is national through and through. There is never a question of local interest arising in France but that the T. C. F. will voluntarily lend its aid in furthering that solidarity of patriotism and the love of " la belle France " which shall assure its ultimate success. The woman traveller benefits as largely as any other class from the good work that the Touring Club de France has done with respect to putting the 488 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD country hotels on a plane where they are wholly to be appreciated. Their best aspect has ever been that their fare was admirable as to quality, excellently cooked and the price therefor most reasonable; when it came to the accommodations offered the wayfarer, the lone woman traveller often had misgivings as to the propriety of lodging beneath its roof. This was born of misunderstanding, which was in part justi- fiable, though actually the question of propriety with respect to a French country hotel ought never to have been raised. A certain disorderliness, not to say shabbiness, was often apparent, and this worked to the detriment of many a really excellently endowed small hotel. The T. C. F., seizing upon this, sought to bring the various attributes of the century-old hotel of compromising countenance up to the level of the product so temptingly prepared in the great hooded fireplace of its kitchen. The problem was solved in the twinkling of an eye, and very few small hotels of France to-day on the beaten track, and not many off, will offend the most exacting of travellers, who will make due allowance for the fact that things are not as they are at home, nor can they be expected to be. One department of the club studies the question of the hygienic fitting up and installation of the country hotel. In this respect it had practically virgin soil to work on in France, for the deficiencies of the small country hotel were a marvel of disgust to the much travelled person of a generation or so ago. The club has invented, or at least developed, the " ckambre TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 489 hygienique" a sleeping apartment furnished on the most modern of sanitary lines as contrasted with what it was before. Gone is the old-fashioned coffin-like bed, heavy-draped windows and mantelpieces which were depressing even in design, and doubly so when faded, old and dirty — and they were impossible to keep clean. There was perhaps not filthiness, but there was a disorderly aspect that amounted to about the same thing as far as its effect upon one was concerned. The hotel correspondence bureau of the club turns out twenty thousand letters a year in response to inquiries, and also prints an enamelled tin sign which it presents gratis to any hotelier who may ask for it, admonishing the users of the toilet rooms to leave them " aussi propre " as they may have found them. This may seem ridiculous to the American at home, but not so to he or she who has travelled in France. The T. C. F. sign hanging before the doors of more than three thousand affiliated French hotels is an eloquent argument of the principles laid down by the club. To pass to the sentimental side, no historic spot is desecrated by vandal picknickers, no celebrated shrine of history or art is torn down or turned into a rag-shop or a bar-room, nor are the great trees of some classic wildwood, where roam the stag and boar yet, as they did in the reigns of Henri IV and Francois Premier, pillaged to make firewood or cottage fur- niture, but that the T. C. F. protests and puts a stop 49Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD thereto. The extent to which the club may yet go with regard to proposing, or solving, burning ques- tions which seem to concern the various departments of the national government little or not at all, can hardly be foreseen if its powers gain strength in the next decade as rapidly as they have in the past, and the membership reaches the quarter of a million mark, as is likely. The Touring Club de France offers its members for a dollar a year the privilege of patronising its three thousand affiliated hotels at a special " prix de faveur," a certain discount varying from five to fifteen per cent being allowed members in good standing. It secures also certain reductions for its members on trains and boats, eliminates Custom House difficulties and dues when crossing the frontiers, and by the celebrated "tryptich" — which it invented — passes the automobilist across first one European frontier and then another, after his once having deposited the " guarantee " with the club that he will ultimately bring his machine back again. The club publishes a series of beautifully designed and printed road maps, perhaps the finest works of their kind ever produced, and supplies, at a substan- tial discount, any and all maps, plans and guides wherever published. Its Guide-Annuaire, or hotel directory, is a most useful book for the traveller in France. It is worth all the Baedekers, Joannes and Murrays rolled into one so far as the quality and quantity of information A Country Hotel of France TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 491 as to French hotels is concerned. It gives prices in detail of all the affiliated hotels, a little zig-zag imi- tation of a ray of lightning signifies that there is electricity, a little black rectangle that there is a dark room for the photographer, a monkey-wrench that there is a pit and a work-shop and garage at the dis- position of the autoist, and a crossed knife and fork that the hotel is noted for the excellence of the table, with a similar distinguishing mark denoting good beds. It notes further where certain specialties among the good things of the table for which France is noted are to be had. One may, by the aid of this excellent guide, before starting out, make up a sort of gastronomic tour of France. One goes to Rouen for duck and peas, to Dieppe for fried sole, to Toulon for mussels, to Concarneau for fried fresh sardines, Bayonne for its famous hams, Marseilles for bouillabaisse, Toulouse for capons, Pithiviers for lark pies and Perigueux for truffles, and so on. It is another reason for being for the little tour in France which was made popular by Henry James a quarter of a century ago, and is in no way of losing its popu- larity. Besides all this the club, by the means of its magnificent library and its staff of librarians at its imposing club house on the Avenue de la Grande Armee at Paris, can give one world-wide travel in- formation, or may consult yourself its exceedingly complete collection of road maps and guides in a manner far more comfortable than in any other 492 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD library in the world, more comfortably even than in the British Museum in London or at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. A few years since the gossiping world of Paris was in an uproar over the notorious " Humbert affair," wherein one known as " La Grande Therese," got inextricably mixed up with a certain number of mythical millions, and became so involved that her magnificent town house, her hotel prive in the Avenue de la Grande Armee, was forced upon the market by an unfeeling decree of the court, and actually went begging for a purchaser. This was perhaps caused by the fact that the decree went into operation during the silly season of August, when everybody but three and three-quarter millions of the population were out of town. A few of the club officials hap- pened to be enjoying Paris in summer, and as at a meeting held just previously it had been decided to look for a new location, as a change from its crowded quarters in a couple of tiny rooms over a cafe in the Place de la Bourse, they bethought themselves of acquiring this pretentious but very elegantly appointed Paris mansion. It was rather a large and soiled parcel of linen that the court set about to bundle up, and thus, with a little ready cash to spare, the club was able to buy in the property for a mere nothing. Actually, the creditors of the Humberts got very little little, but the court fees and the lawyers were paid, and the Touring Club de France, with membership at a dol- lar a year, came to be housed more luxuriously than TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 493 many a club that has difficulty in collecting its hun- dred-dollar-a-year dues from delinquent members. To-day where once the pseudo-fashionable crowd of Humbert hangers-on once stalked through marble halls, the plebeian members of the T. C. F. assemble and call their own town house. You may be a mere globe-trotter, a bicyclist, an automobilist or a yachts- man, but all the same, once elected a member, you may get here for five francs a year, or six if you are a foreigner, what you may not get elsewhere on earth. France is the land of good cooks, and we know it and love it for that, if not for other things as well, and to this end the Touring Club de France is making it more attractive than ever with the precepts which it is distributing broadcast to the innkeeper. It was not enough to counsel him to keep up the traditions of the table. The doctrine of cleanliness and airi- ness is being preached on all sides, and reasonableness in price ; above all, not to exploit the stranger because he is a stranger and may not come that way again. With all his ability at turning out a meal of ex- cellence the French country chef often did it formerly under most disagreeable, uncomfortable and incon- venient conditions. Now all is changed in the French countryside, and in many of the large towns as well, where deficiencies were often quite as much to be remarked. The good work of the club has made itself felt in many quarters, and often in the tiniest of towns one or more innkeepers vie with one another as being privileged to hang out the sign of the T. C. F. before 494 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD their portes-cocheres. This has made competing es- tablishments brace up, too, and now the ill-kept, dingy and unappealing inn frequently met with in the French town as late as a decade ago is a thing of the past on the beaten track, and mostly is this true farther afield as well. The hygienic sleeping-rooms (the chambres hygien- iques popularised by the T. C. F.) were needed badly all over France, both in the cities and towns alike, where only too often a bedroom was but a mere cup- board opening on some dingy, unsanitary courtyard. Now, where the club's admonitions have been fol- lowed, all is white lacquer on the walls, scrim curtains at the windows, with iron or brass beds replacing the upholstered abominations of other days. The house- wife will appreciate all this, and those who have studied the necessity of well-living as an adjunct to well-being will appreciate the fact that the club has printed for free distribution a series of specific rules for hotel keepers who can be induced to remodel their establishments as to the volume of cubic contents of each sleeping-room as well as the area and position of the windows, the height to ceiling, nature of wall decorations, floor coverings and even the size of the wash-basins. Frequently an old hotel has built on an addition conforming to these requirements, or, as far as possible, remodelled its old form. Trade follows the flag as well in the hotel business as in the affairs of the nation, and let a good country inn be found midway between Macon and Dijon in the famous Burgundy wine district, and the touring TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 495 automobilist bound for Switzerland or Rivierawards will stop there for his dejeuner instead of pushing on to the next large town, which he often wrongly assumes as able to supply something more to his liking than can be found in a place lettered less large on the maps. The hotel industry all over France is, by the earnestness of the efforts of the Touring Club de France, conforming to the new order of things, and prosperity which had languished for generations is now coming to many a quaint old posting inn of some market town in the Cote d'Or or by the banks of the Rhone, which since the advent of the railway and the days of Monte Cristo had fallen into desuetude. Sometimes, where the thing was needed badly, the Touring Club has gone ahead at its own expense and established up-to-date sanitary fittings in some likely hotel in a much-travelled region, as in some little town in the " chateau country " of the Loire, with the result that the knowledge of the existence of these things in their midst has given other innkeepers an inducement to brace up for fear that business would pass them by if they, too, did not meet the new con- ditions and demands of twentieth-century travel. The bathroom is still chiefly wanting in French hotels, excepting those of the cities, the big towns and the resorts. Beyond these it is still considered as a sort of super-luxury, and when found, wherever found in France, in fact, one pays the price, almost the level of American prices. There is nothing cheap about 496 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD a bath in France. Perhaps it is for this that one still sees an occasional Englishman crossing Paris from the Gare de Nord to the Gare de Lyon, with his tin dish bath-tub strapped tightly down with his trunks on top of his taxi-auto. This is not exagger- ated fancy; one may see the same ludicrous sight almost any day. The force of example was never better exemplified than in the transformation of a certain aspect of the French hotel industry as brought about by the T. C. F. Its sign before the door of a hotel means to the traveller, even though he be a stranger in a strange land, good beds, good cooking, cleanliness, reasonable prices and generous treatment. And all this without the loss of the picturesque element of local character, which is what many of us travel for. The ancient posting inn has been cleaned up, re- painted and remodelled a bit, but its artistic out- lines are still there, and the stable yard and the stables, if peopled less romantically by automobiles of steel and brass and aluminum than in the days of the coach and four and the berlin-de-voyage in which our grandfathers travelled, serves its purpose quite as well as of old. This came but slowly, but the ultimate transforma- tion, or at least modernising, of the old houses which bore such names as the " Ecu d'Or," " Grand Mo- narque," or " Belle Etoile," which abounded in the good old monarchial days of the empire, has banished stuffed chairs and sofas of horse-hair or mangy red plush or green rep, as well as the moth-eaten bear or TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 497 wolf skins which served for descents de lit, for some- thing more hygienic and more cleanly and pleasing to gaze upon. As before mentioned, the wash-basins even have been given a thought. A certain size sufficiently ample to be useful has been ordained to replace the diminutive chocolate service which once did duty, but which can no longer serve to clean off the dirt and grime of travel by the new locomotion. Carpets on the floors and fuzzy wall-papers have been banished, and heavy window lambrequins, through which only filtered a dim religious light not strong enough to show the microbes to a former generation, who, to tell the truth, thought little enough about such things. To-day we are more en- lightened, but in France the educating process is still in its busiest stage, and the Touring Club de France is in the thick of the fight. The three thousand Touring Club signs are posted before the doors of as many hotels all over France, from Douarnenez in Finistere — where the sardines come from — to Biarritz, the playground of princes, and Nice and Cannes and Monte Carlo on the Rivi- era. One and all of these signs stand for the plat- form upon which the T. C. F. is founded. Let one of these hotels so much as take the slightest undue advantage of a member of the T. C. F. in good standing, and the full force of the influence of a quarter-century old organisation, a hundred and fifty thousand members strong, falls upon him, with the ultimate result that perhaps the sign which has drawn to him the bulk of his business is taken away and 498 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD rehung on the porte-cochere of his competitor across the way. Occasionally in travelling about France one sees in some famous viewpoint, where a widespread pano- rama of sea and sky unfolds, a great massive oaken and iron bench with the initials T. C. F. graven deep therein, and a further intimation that it is delivered to the care of the public. This is another of the public-spirited innovations of the club, and on a more elaborate scale are the Tables d' Orientation, great circular tables of porcelain, or enamel ware, whereon the striking topographical char- acteristics of the horizon are graven. They are an admirable aid to the tourist, and much appreciated, as for instance, the one on Mont Boron at Nice, on the Riviera, which in one direction points out that Corsica may be seen, on the other the Maritime Alps, etc. Another of these wonderfully interesting aerial signboards, as they may be called, has recently been placed on the terrace of Henri Quatre's natal chateau at Pau, overlooking the colline of Juranqon, from whose vineyards came that famous wine which the infant Prince of Beam was made to drink within twenty-four hours of his birth. There is another on the height of Bon Secours, near Rouen. In all, there are some fifty of these plaques scattered about France. The greatest monument of all to the initiative and powers of the Touring Club de France is, however, the magnificent Corniche d'Or of the Esterels, a forty kilometre stretch of superb roadway on the French TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 499 Riviera following the contours of the coast line, up hill and down dale from Frejus to Cannes, through Saint Raphael, a municipality which has done the club the honour of naming its principal thoroughfare the Boulevard du Touring Club. At least two great and prosperous hotels, non-existent a decade ago, owe their establishment, and the trade which keeps them going, to this new-born idea of making a new entrance by road to the beauties of the Riviera. Each month the club issues, gratis to members, a monthly illustrated magazine giving information as to hotels, innovations of travel of interest to its mem- bers, sketch maps, illustrated itineraries and what not. It has recently instituted a competition for hotel keepers who are conducting an establishment for tour- ists at an all-in price not to exceed nine francs a day, about one dollar and eighty cents. This should sound good to the traveller who has already been plucked at some popular super-luxurious resort and bring home again more forcibly than ever that the best of the good things of this world are not to be found in the footsteps of the throng. With such inducements the hotel industry in France, so far as many of the establishments of the small towns are concerned, is on the qui vive as it never has been before. The nautical section of the club, recently founded, has undertaken to build landing stages for automobile boats along the Seine and some other of the French rivers, and has appointed, here and there, waterside hotels as headquarters, with the result that motor- 5oo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD boat touring in France is a growing pastime, an ideal way of travelling, by the way, reasonable in price (even to the acquiring of the motor-boat), with ever the assurance of finding a Touring Club hotel at convenient distances on the chiefly travelled French waterways. Thus another source of revenue for the hotel keeper has been tapped. He could not have done it alone, but the club, as much for his benefit as that of its lay members, has encouraged the thing, and thus it was born. Who can now say that the French know not how to travel? When indeed will Anglo-Saxons know so well how to play the game of the comfortable non-conventional method of travel, the kind that does not mean blowing yourself at the first hostelry that you come to, the kind that means that the traveller and the innkeeper who caters for him are bound together by a common lien, the one not to expect too much and the other to make the way easy and the price reasonable for what he has to offer the traveller on his way. Abroad, on the Continent, the American and Eng- lish traveller usually rushes about madly and demands bath- and sitting- and smoking-rooms in most unlikely places, whereas our Gallic brothers and sisters take things easy, pay a great deal more care to the kind of food that is served and how, and above all, how it is cooked, and thus gets the maximum of pleasure and satisfaction as a result. The participation of the woman traveller in the benefits to accrue from association with this admir- TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 501 ably conducted, indeed wellnigh omnipotent, Tour- ing Club de France, and contact, as occasion presents itself, with the exceedingly affable corps of librarians and officials, will give her a better source for the procuring of reliable information about many of the things that matter to the woman abroad than all the renting agencies and ticket offices that were ever con- ceived to befuddle the person of modest desires and means. In its contact with the stranger the part played by the T. C. F. is, first of all, to be as well-informed as possible on the ways and means of getting about France. For a stranger in a strange land there is no other source of supply at all to be compared to this. Bureaus of one kind or another there are in Ger- many, but as they are charged chiefly with local in- terests they can never hope to fill as plentiful a role as that played by the Touring Club de France, which, recognising that France is at once the best and the least known of all foreign lands to the English- speaking peoples, seeks to make its delights better known. 'oreigners^ LEASING AN APARTMENT BOARDING-HOUSES AND PENSIONS tradespeople's ACCOUNTS BANKS AND BANKING PAYMENT BY CHEQUE MARRIED WOMAN'S BANK ACCOUNT IMPORTANT PARIS CONCIERGE DEBTS OF THE FOREIGNER PAYMENTS ON ACCOUNT DRESSMAKERS' CLAIMS FOREIGNER IN FRANCE " FORWARDING MAIL RESPONSIBILITY OF HOTELS HOTELS AND GUESTS' EFFECTS HOUSEHOLD EFFECTS OF THE STRANGER LAW OF LIMITATION WEIGHTS AND MEASURES MARRIAGE AND MONEY TITLES OF NOBILITY PROPERTY OF FOREIGNERS TELEGRAMS AND TIPS XXI FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS ANIMALS PROTECTION OF In Paris a Societe Protectrice des Animaux concerns itself with the prevention of cruelty to animals. No- tice should be given to any agent or policeman. APARTMENTS The question of sewage should be especially in- vestigated on taking a house or apartment, for very many of the modern houses are not connected with the main sewage system. They should have a direct connection ("tout a I' e gout") for one to feel sure that a very important series of prospective troubles are thus to be avoided. Water taxes, or rates, are usually paid by the owner of the building, though by a common under- standing they may be included in the monthly rent bill. A lease of an apartment may be verbal or written ; in the former case the receipt for rent paid (quit- tance) should explain the conditions. A lease (bail) should be registered by the lessee, at his ex- pense, unless otherwise provided for. In general, rent is paid once a quarter and in advance. Certain 505 506 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD repairs (reparations locatives) are at the charge of the lessee, but not, for instance, window panes broken by wind or hail, or anything that gives way purely from old age. The difficulty is to prove all these things; the landlord usually has his own ideas. It would be well to have all these set out in the lease, if possible. The lessee usually agrees to care for the premises as a " bon pere du famille." Sub-leasing, unless forbidden in the original lease, is a common practice. APARTMENT KEYS The keys are by custom given up to the concierge when the lessee leaves, and if lessee is absent for any length of time, after notice of quitting is given (by registered letter usually to the proprietor or his agent), the keys should be left with the concierge, that the apartment may thus be shown to a prospec- tive lessee. Whatever inconvenience this may sup- posedly incur must be borne, and may be considered obligatory, as it is usually provided for in the lease or bail. DOGS IN APARTMENTS Do not keep a barking dog, which may annoy your neighbours, in your apartment; don't keep a dog anyway in Paris. A flat dweller in 1910 was fined fifty francs for keeping a dog in his apartment which barked at night and annoyed others living under the same roof. Three separate convictions en- sued, and the dog was finally got rid of as being too expensive a luxury. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 507 AUTOMOBILE REGISTRATION The conductor of an automobile must have a cer- tificate of competency, and the automobile be regis- tered with the civil authorities, besides being " de- clared " at the Mairie, or town hall, in the place where one is domiciled. Various taxes are imposed, and even the foreign-made automobile of a foreign tourist is subject to these taxes, after four months sojourn in France. BROKEN WINDOWS If the window of your apartment is broken by a stone thrower, by a careless passerby — one assumes a small boy — the proprietor is bound to replace it, not yourself, as locataire. If it is broken by stones thrown during a riot, it is a case of force majeur, and the locataire pays — this is according to article 1755 of the Civil Code. BICYCLES Bicycles must be fitted with a plaque de controle (a new one each year), or badge, which may be had at any tobacconist's at a cost of three francs. Those only are exempt who remain less than three months in France. BOARDING HOUSES AND PENSIONS One may not conduct a boarding house or pension in Paris without a permit from the Service des Garnis of the Prefecture of Police. Identity as to national- ity, personal and family details and an explicit de- scription of the dwelling or apartment to be so used must be furnished by personal application and inter- view. A list of boarders must be kept in formal 508 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD written-up order for inspection by the police at stated intervals, or indeed upon any occasion demanded. BIRTH CERTIFICATES A birth certificate (acte de naissance) should be procured at the nearest Mairie, or town hall, of all children born in France, and this upon declaration within three days of the event. In case of children of American parents, they should be registered forth- with at nearest American consulate. BOOKS AND BOOKKEEPING A tradesman is obliged to keep a daily journal, a letter-book and stock-book. All of these must be signed or initialed by the proper authorities once a year, who take notice that no pages have been re- moved or others substituted, and that no manifestly fraudulent additions or omissions are to be noted. These books of account are obliged to be preserved for ten years, and a client may force a tradesman to show his books in case of dispute. Another regula- tion which affects the tradesman is that he must pub- lish publicly his marriage contract before starting in business, that furnishers may know just how far he may be responsible financially, for often a man will have passed over certain rights in this world's goods for the sole benefit of his wife and prospective chil- dren ; such a procedure will also show to what extent his wife's fortune, if any, is available for use in her husband's business. BANKS AND BANK CHEQUES Banks and banking, as the words are known in the United States, are hardly of the same significance FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 509 in France, save as one may patronise one of the avowed American institutions located in Paris. Pay- ment by cheque in France is not at all the common procedure that it is in America or England. A French cheque is dated by writing the date and month in letters, not in figures; each bears a ten centime stamp, and the same may not afterwards serve as proof of the payment of an account, save through the courtesy of the bank officials, for cancelled cheques are not returned to the drawer. A cheque must be signed the same day that it is drawn, and must be payable on sight — a vue. It may be payable to bearer (porteur) or to order (ordre), and the entire text of the cheque must be in the handwriting of the drawer. The holder of a cheque must present it within five days, if payable at the place at which it is dated, or eight days, if payable at another place, otherwise payment may be refused by the bank upon instructions of the drawer, and the holder loses even the right to claim its sum against the drawer if there are no funds in the bank with which to pay it after this delay. The responsibility of payment on a cheque being made to the right person devolves entirely upon the drawer; the bank assumes no responsibility. A Letter of Credit, or any of the various forms of Travellers' Cheques issued by responsible concerns, like the American Express Company, the Hamburg- American Line, etc., are useful for travellers, but a deposit subject to cheque in the Credit Lyonnaise, the Comptoir National d'Escompte or the Societe 5io THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD General at Paris, is the most convenient method of having funds at one's ready call if settled down in France. A married woman may not have a current bank account, except with the written consent of her hus- band. " CITIZENSHIP " AS RELATED TO " DOMICILE " In any dealings with French officials, or United States diplomatic or consular officers in France, or indeed anywhere abroad, do not confuse the questions of citizenship (nationality) and domicile and resi- dence. The confusion of these points may be fraught with great importance in any legal discussion which may come up. CITIZENSHIP IN FRANCE French citizenship belongs by right to legitimate children born abroad of a French father; children born in France of unknown parents or of a French mother whose father is unknown; children born in France of a foreign father who has neglected to es- tablish his legal status as a foreigner — in the case of Americans by registration at an American Consulate between their eighteenth and nineteenth birthdays. Citizenship may be acquired in France by a foreign woman when she marries a Frenchman, by children of a foreigner resident in France by election and by naturalisation. Frenchmen may lose their French citizenship by naturalisation under a foreign power; a Frenchwoman who marries a foreigner by becoming a widow, or a FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 511 divorcee may recover French citizenship under certain conditions. CITIZENSHIP AND REGISTRATION OF AMERICANS AT CONSULATE Americans living abroad should register at the nearest American Consulate in order to preserve their citizenship. Children born abroad of American parents should be registered at the American Consulate before their nineteenth year. CHILD LABOUR Child labour in France is controlled by law. They are forbidden to work between 9 P. M. and 5 A. M. CONCIERGES The concierge of a Paris dwelling is a very im- portant person. His duties and responsibilities are many. Foreign residents should make friends with their concierge, otherwise he may be very disagree- able indeed. He receives one's letters, parcels and telegrams, and delivers them at your door three times a day, takes note of the names of callers and must tell them if you are " in " or " out." At any hour of the day or night he must respond to a call at the door or grande porte, must forward letters, etc., if one is away temporarily, and for one year after one has vacated an apartment. He must keep the stair- ways, halls and dooryards in a state of cleanliness, etc., etc. He is the agent of the landlord, in many cases, for the collection of rents, and expects a sum equal to two per cent of the yearly rental as a New 512 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD Year's gift from the tenant. Curiously enough there is a custom, usage, or right — but it is apparently a dead letter — whereby the concierge may appropriate one faggot every time a tenant gets in a supply of wood. The concierge, when he rents you an apart- ment, demands a denier a dien, or payment on ac- count, of his future pourboires, often a trifling sum; a domestic servant is also entitled to the same thing upon engagement. If the concierge of your apartment deliberately annoys you — as taking advantage of the particular occasion when you are about to give a reception to paint the handrail of the staircase, you may sue his employer for damages, and, if your case is well- founded, win it. This, provided you want to take the trouble. If your concierge is really so disagree- able as all that you had better move. He will not of course try the same trick again, but might con- ceivably try one something similar. If the concierge of your Paris apartment house (and this is local custom rather than law) goes off and leaves a small child of six or eight in charge, and a burglar breaks in and steals, his employer — the proprietor of the building — is responsible. French law recognises equality of sex, and a man or woman may be concierge, but they " must be capable of carrying out the duties so entrusted to them." DEBTS Debts due from foreigners can be collected by restraint upon the effects of the foreigner who may be temporarily resident in a French hotel, house or FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 513 apartment. It is called a Saisie Foraine, and can only be put into execution by the creditor after appli- cation to the Judge of the Tribunal du Premier In- stance, or a Justice of the Peace of the District where the goods of the debtor are to be found. DEATHS Deaths after being declared at the Mairie, or town hall, and a " certificat de Deces " issued, may be followed by an immediate funeral, usually arranged direct with the Bureau des Pompes Funebres at a fixed tariff, according to the elaborateness of the cortege, etc., such charges being regulated by law, and ranging from forty francs upward. DEPOSITS OR PAYMENTS ON ACCOUNT Arrhes is an unusual word which you may meet with in your dealings with your milliner or dress- maker. A cabman even may demand his arrhes in case he is taken for a long journey across town, or under circumstances by which he has no assurance of being paid his fare. Sometimes arrhes are asked for in taking a lease of a house, apartment or studio. In these cases the payment and acceptance of arrhes binds both parties, though the lease or bail may not have been signed. DISGUISES One is not allowed to wear publicly costumes of another sex, nor any uniform, medal or decoration without being entitled thereto, exceptions being made in the first case at the seasons of Mardi Gras and Mi Careme. 5H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD DOCTORS AND DENTISTS Doctors and dentists may only practise in France if possessed of diplomas issued upon the completion of certain courses in Government-appointed institu- tions. A degree from a foreign institution, of what- ever rank, carries no right to recognition in France save that these first conditions have been complied with. Such is the law as it exists to-day, though certain privileges and exemptions of certain formali- ties are sometimes made upon representation to the proper authorities. DIVORCE AND SEPARATION Separation is granted husband or wife by the courts by reason of the same causes as are admitted for divorce. This may be a concession to the Church, which does not admit of divorce, though in this con- nection there is, it must be remembered, no State Re- ligion in France; Catholics, Protestants, Jews and Mohammedans are alike before the law, though in the latter case a Mohammedan living in France may not practise polygamy, as he is allowed to by the tenets of his creed. DRUNKENNESS Drunkenness in France is punishable by fine if in public, and fine and imprisonment if repeated. The law differentiates though between occasional exuber- ance (ivresse) and habitual drunkenness (ivro- gnerie) . It is also punishable by fine if one sells drink to a person already the worse off for it, or to minors. A coutume, or local custom or usage, is current in most parts of France, which allows one the FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 515 privilege of retracting within twenty-four hours any agreement made in a public drinking place. dressmakers' claims A dressmaker must give a customer a good and proper " fit." The higher price one pays, and the more exclusive the establishment patronised, the more exigent one is entitled to be as regards all details of style, workmanship, material, finish and fit, and the French courts may be expected to uphold any reason- able claims of a customer, a foreigner even, as against an establishment of this class. It is a question as to whether such a case is worth taking to court; pos- sibly not with regard to a small dressmaker working on her own account, but with regard to an establish- ment of undoubted financial responsibility, one has a fighting chance — if the case is well founded. A sine qua non is that you shall have agreed to pay what may be called a " fashionable price " for the garment in question; this implies (because in general such are admitted as excessive) the best of everything. If the couturier so much as substitutes satinette for silk, or bone buttons for ivory, if the former were agreed upon, his case may be expected to fall to the ground. DIVORCE Divorce in France is allowed for statutory causes on the part of husband or wife, violence, cruelty or insults, or the sentencing of either party to death, exile or penal servitude. Collusion in divorce pro- ceedings annuls all hope of judgment. Divorce evi- dence is not allowed to be published, and only public notice that divorce has been granted is allowed. A 516 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD divorced person may not afterwards marry the co- respondent, and may not marry again in less than ten months. Children and grandchildren are not allowed to give testimony. DEATH OF A FOREIGNER IN FRANCE The death of a foreigner in France often causes much difficulty for friends and relatives in the time of most poignant sorrow. The American Consul should be advised immediately, thereby much annoy- ance may be saved. Death duties are payable to the French Government in some cases and not in others. Only one versed in such matters can decide the pro- cedure. If death occurs in a hotel, an indemnity is due the hotel keeper for derangement, or moral preju- dice, according to circumstances. This may be much or little, and may often be made a matter of arrange- ment. The personal belongings of the deceased are immediately put under seal by the Justice of the Peace, a formality which usually gives way before the representation of the authority of an American diplomatic or consular officer. DEATH DUTIES (DROITS DE SUCCESSION) Stocks, bonds and valuables of whatever kind, if kept in a safe deposit vault to which the original owner had a key, are not liable to the French death duties. Once the succession is regulated and the ex- ecutor having rights is recognised by the French authorities, the key and other property (which may have paid death duties) is turned over. What further fortune the turn of the key may bring to light is no concern of any one but the executor. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 517 FOREIGNERS IN FRANCE All persons living in French territory are subject to the laws of France, except with regard to personal property and his or her power to dispose of it by deed of gift or testament. FORWARDING OF MAIL MATTER Letters are bound to be forwarded to your new address by the concierge upon your leaving the build- ing where he is employed; he is also bound to reply to inquiries and give your new address to those who so demand, for a period of one year. As an extra precaution with regard to letters the Receveur Prin- cipal des Postes et Telegraphes should be notified of your change of address. FAMILY RIGHTS A Family Council may be instituted by law to safeguard general interests. The same institution is known under the Code Napoleon in Louisiana. The presiding officer is usually a local Juge de Paix. The rights of the paternal head of the family are absolute; a child remains under his authority until majority, and may not even leave the house (legally) without permission. Guardianship of the father over the personal estate of minor children is implied. If either father or mother dies the survivor becomes the guardian, who, upon decease, will presumably have appointed a legal guardian if the children are still minor. The ward's interests are not guaranteed by a bond, but by hypotheque legale of the property of the 518 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD guardian, which amounts to practically the same thing. HOUSEHOLD SILVER If you choose to bring household silver to France for use in your Paris apartment, you must pay two francs a hundred grammes. Household effects in general should have a certificate of origin from the nearest French Consulate in America. HOTELS AND THEIR RESPONSIBILITY TOWARDS GUESTS Hotels and auberges are responsible depositories of the effects of their guests. The hotel keeper is responsible for theft or injury thereto, whether com- mitted by his employees or an outsider. Burglary, as an act of " superior force," gives a legal exemption. The hotel keeper has lien on the effects of the traveller for lodging and food and drink supplied, but only on the effects which the traveller may have brought with him to the hotel. The Statute of Lim- itations annuls the hotel keeper's claim after six months. The hotel register is bound to be kept by law, and is ever at the call and inspection of the police. The same regulation applies to lodging or boarding houses. A hotel keeper may not lodge more than twenty-four hours one who proves to have committed a criminal act during that time. The hotel register is thus re- quired to have the details of the guest inscribed thereon immediately upon arrival, name, age, nation- ality, profession, where last from, where bound. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 519 HOLIDAYS French legal holidays are Sundays; January 1; Christmas Day; Ascension Day; Easter Monday and Whit-Monday; Assumption; Toussaints, and the Fete Nationale — July 14th. HOTELS Baggage left at a hotel as security for a bill may be sold by public auction six months after the depar- ture of the traveller, any surplus being deposited for the latter's account in an appointed depository, where it remains for two years, after which it is acquired by the State. HOUSEHOLD EFFECTS (IMPORTATION OF) The bringing of household effects to France by a stranger who expects to reside there is possible only under certain restrictions. Household furniture, books, linen and clothing once used abroad are ad- mitted free for one's personal use. If any consider- able quantity is involved a visit should be paid to the French consul at the point of departure and a certificate of service, which will cost but a trifle, be taken, if one can be obtained. This will, in a way, establish origin and bona fides. The assay rights on household silver and gold will have to be paid if any but the slightest volume of such is brought; twenty francs a kilo on silver and three hundred and seventy- five francs a kilo on gold. EDUCATION Education is obligatory in France for boys and girls from six to thirteen years of age. Instruction 520 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD may be at public or private schools, or even at the home of the father. GAMBLING DEBTS Gambling debts are not admitted to process of law, save with exceptions referring to " sport." Bil- liards and card playing do not come in that category. INFECTIOUS DISEASES In case of suspicion of an infectious disease having taken place in an apartment about to be hired, the landlord may be compelled to have it disinfected by the public health authorities, otherwise you are privi- leged to cancel your lease. IDENTIFICATION The average American travels, and often lives, abroad without any official documentary identifica- tion. A passport should be in the possession of every one travelling or living abroad. This, in the absence of any other pieces d'identite, for which the French authorities so often ask, will prove useful and even valuable on many occasions. LEGITIMATISING OF CHILDREN A father may recognise and legitimatise a child without even the tacit admission of the mother. The French law is liberal and simple. Recognition is made legal by an Acte Authentique de Reconnaissance , which is stamped and registered by the authorities free of charge. No woman may claim paternity for any child born out of wedlock; this with exceptions. The subject is a vast one, but not complicated. The law favours the better instincts of humanity and is generally so recognised. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 521 LOST AND FOUND Lost property if found is supposed to be delivered in Paris to the Bureau des Objets Trouves, elsewhere at the Hotel de Ville. A form is filled up, a receipt given, and affairs run their course, when, under cer- tain reservations, the object is ultimately given to the finder, if no owner appears. If one buys lost prop- erty, he must, in case the owner appears, give it up on reimbursement of the sum paid. This presumes that there has been no collusion or fraud, and that the article was bought in good faith. LAW OF LIMITATIONS The French Law of Limitations — after which one may not be sued for debt — varies as to whether the dealings are by persons in trade or between a trades- man and an individual. A milliner or a dressmaker produces one of those ravishing confections for an American customer, who, living on her income, occu- pies an apartment in the Etoile quarter, and for some reason or other, because it was not as ordered, because the dress did not fit or what not, refuses payment, the individual may not be sued for the bill after two years have passed. The French Civil Code (Feb. 26, 1911) thus "outlaws" such transactions. This applies as well to doctors' and dentists' bills. Between merchants doing business along similar, or different lines, prescription comes under another ruling. Notes and Bills of Exchange, etc., are only outlawed after five years. The accounts of a professor or teacher of the sci- ences or arts, for lessons given, are outlawed in six 522 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD months, as are also those of hotel and restaurant keepers, for board and lodging furnished, and of labourers and work people for their day's wages and material supplied. The accounts of servants who hire themselves out by the year, and of boarding-school teachers, are out- lawed within one year. Within two years, limitation applies to the bills of doctors, surgeons, dentists and chemists. The bills of doctors are legally due when a patient recovers, or dies. This would seem to offer much subject for discussion, but the fact, as it is generally understood, is stated nevertheless. Lawyers' fees are, according to the same reasoning, or custom, due when judgment is obtained, or a compromise between the parties interested arrived at. A general statute provides for general limitation at thirty years, but legal matters in which judges or lawyers are appointed as trustees and the like are supposed to be settled within five years, at which date, notes, bills of exchange, etc., signed by merchants or traders, are annulled by automatic prescription. LEASES OF HOUSES OR APARTMENTS — (BAIL) One salient point should be observed first of all, and that is the condition of the house or apartment {etat de lieux) upon taking possession. Unless it is so expressly stated in writing, the lessee is supposed to have received the property in good condition, and must so leave it. The expense of a survey, or the act of compiling an etat de lieux is usually shared equally by the lessee and lessor. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 523 The rent (loyer) is supposed to be guaranteed by the lessee having possession in his own right and in placing in the apartment sufficient furniture. The landlord, through his concierge, or by other means, may forbid the removal of any furniture if any por- tion of the rental remains unpaid. Sureties may be entered into for the amount of the rental, or a deposit may be made by the lessee in some bank in the name of the lessor, as a guarantee, in which case, by local custom — not law — the interest on the sum so depos- ited belongs to the lessor. A hired piano or other article of furniture could secure exemption by an agreement in writing, signed by all the parties concerned, but such an arrangement would not apply to a general outfit of hired furniture, unless the lessor was otherwise secured. MOURNING The periods of full mourning in France (Paris) are one year for a widow or widower; nine months for father, mother, father-in-law, or mother-in-law; six months for a child, son-in-law, daughter-in-law, grandparents, brother, sister, brother-in-law, sister-in- law. Half mourning follows for nine months in the case of a widow or widower; six months for father, mother, father-in-law, mother-in-law, and three months for other members of the family. MAJORITY, OR COMING OF AGE Majority comes automatically to boys and girls at the age of twenty-one, when, so far as all civil acts are concerned, they are no longer minors. As to 524 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD marriage, all males must have completed their eigh- teenth year, and females their fifteenth, but consent of the parents must be obtained in the case of the man up to twenty-five years of age, and of woman up to twenty-one. Failing the latter, the formality known as an acte de respecte absolves them from the necessity of parental permission. METRIC SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES The metric system is alone legal in France. Any one who may expect to have general dealings with French tradesmen or institutions should provide him- self with a set of these tables and their American equivalents in weights and measures. The system is simple, practical and thoroughly applicable to all transactions whereby are usually applied our own rather complicated system of computation. MONEY (CURRENT COINS AND BANK NOTES ) The gold of Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Austria and Tunisia passes current in France, and the gold and silver of Belgium and Switzerland. Papal States coinage is no longer current, nor is the divi- sionary coinage of Greece, as was the case until quite recently. Small silver coinage, certain of the Napo- leon effigy without the laurel crown, the coins of the reign of Louis XVIII and some others, are now demonetised. In general all the five-franc or five- livre pieces of the European powers are current in France, but no bank-notes except those of the Bank of France. An English sovereign is usually accepted by shops and hotels at twenty-five francs, and a five FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 525 dollar gold coin ought to bring between twenty-five francs fifty centimes and twenty-six francs. Copper coins are not legal tender beyond five francs, and no one is obliged to make change for a bank-note. MONEY (COUNTERFEIT) False money is a thing for strangers to beware of in Europe. Once accepted you have no redress against one who gave it to you, but he must not refuse to give you another piece for any you may be justly suspicious of when you are actually completing a transaction. If he refuses it is an affair for the police. MARRIAGE The institution of French marriage is based on the family. The question of the mercenary " dot " is not to be considered here, but the endowing of a daughter, and often a son, is a tenet of the French family creed. It is not obligatory by law, but is usual. Marriages between brothers and sisters-in-law, though tacitly forbidden, is often to be arranged by personal appeal to the President of the Republic. Marriage is a public institution and must be cele- brated before a civil officer, the Maire of the Com- mune; whether a religious marriage follows or not is optional. Public notice to the effect that a mar- riage is to take place must be posted on the notice board of the Mairie, or town hall, and the exhibit- ing of a birth certificate, or an " acte de notoriete," in the absence of the former, is necessary, as well as the written consent of the parents (or its substitute 526 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD in case the former is not possible), as well as a public acknowledgment of the terms of the marriage settle- ment. American diplomatic or consular officers may not officiate at the marriage of those of their nationality, as may their colleagues in the British service, but they may, upon request, be witnesses of the marriage, at an appropriate fee, which is regulated by the legal list of consular fees, and the same may be recorded in the records of the consulate upon the payment of the legal fee as well. A woman married under the French law must obey her husband, is obliged to live with him, and where he may decide. With the authority of her husband she may carry on business and make con- tracts as if she were single, but may not go to law except with his specific consent or that of the courts. If her husband is poor and she has financial means, she is obliged to aid him, and she cannot, as an in- dividual, transfer any property which she may pos- sess without his assent. The subject is a very vast and important one, and any one interested, for any reason whatever, should take every means of supplying themselves with thor- ough information on the subject if they would avoid pitfalls and unthought-of circumstances and condi- tions. From a sentimental point, the French law does not recognise a breach of promise; only in case of material loss, as for the purchase of a trousseau, expense of a journey, or what not of a like nature, has a jilted FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 527 young woman any recourse or hope of the gain of " damages." NOBILITY The French titles of nobility are a hereditary dis- tinction. Such existing titles as one meets with are descended from a time anterior to the meeting of the National Assembly of 1789 — which abolished them by decree — or from the new nobility erected by Napo- leon in 1806, or the Restoration of Louis XVIII. Various abolishments came into operation, but cer- tainly such things as existed cannot be abolished, and so with some reasoning descendants put forth their pretensions, which, however, are not legally recog- nised, and may practically be considered courtesy titles. NEWSPAPER STATEMENTS — LIBELOUS OR NOT Newspaper mention, by error, of any act or fault improperly attributable to an individual, is bound to be corrected by the owner of the paper upon request of the grieved party, by gratuitous insertion of the correction within three days after having received such request. NEWSBOYS A newsboy in France may not shout false news in order to sell his papers. A leather-lunged newsboy (of perhaps twenty-five years of age) shouted: " Great Catastrophe on the Underground," when there was nothing that had happened to justify such a procedure. He was arrested, admonished and fined. 528 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD NATURALISATION A foreigner may become naturalised a French sub- ject, and enjoy all the privileges of the French, but he may not be eligible to legislative assemblies until ten years later. Naturalisation applies only to the individual, not to his wife and children, without a separate procedure. NOTARIES A Notaire in France does not exactly correspond to a Notary Public. Protests are made in France by Huissiers. A French Notary may, under certain conditions, administer an oath to be made use of on a document in the United States, but his signature and seal should be certified by a United States diplo- matic or consular officer located in France, under which circumstances it would have been better to have had the notarial act performed by such officer in the first instance. LOST AND FOUND PROPERTY Treasure trove, i.e., objects found on one's own property belong to the owner of that property; if found on the property of another — in a hired house, apartment or garden — half value belongs to the finder and half to the owner of the property. PROFESSIONAL SECRECY Professional secrecy is provided for by law. A doctor, lawyer, clergyman, etc., may not reveal in- formation which has been confided to them in the way of their professional duties, except as to liability to a fine or imprisonment, or both. FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 529 FRENCH PROPERTY A foreigner owning property in France is subject to attachment in law if a suit goes against him in France. PROFESSIONAL ENGAGEMENTS Actors, musicians and singers are engaged upon written agreement, with usually the right of the im- pressario to annul said agreement if the artist does not " take," a fine distinction and one fraught with considerable possible difficulty. After the first ap- pearances, and assuming that they are successful, the engagement holds good for the full term of the agreement, and the salary has to be paid whether the services are made use of or not. If hired for a cer- tain role, and once having played it, an actress cannot refuse to play it further without abrogating the con- tract. Continued illness releases the manager from the obligation to pay salary, but not a temporary ill- ness. Pregnancy is not recognised as an illness under normal conditions. PAWNSHOPS (MONT DE PIETe) The government pawnshop, or Mont de Piete, is a well organised and well conducted institution, though of course there is the same sense of personal fall in pride in dealing therewith, as with the most rapacious usurer. Loans are made for one year, with interest at three per cent, plus another three per cent for expenses, and a further tax of one per cent, in all seven per cent. Sales are made upon the claim of the borrower after three months, or by law, during 530 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD the thirteenth month, if the pledge is not redeemed, any excess going to the borrower after the deduction of the additional expenses which are provided for and regulated by law. TELEGRAMS Telegrams, the sending of which is a government monopoly in France, may be written on the forms supplied at the post-office for the purpose, or any white blank paper. Cablegrams may be written on the printed forms supplied by the cable companies, and should be accepted by all post-office telegraph bureaux, though they are sometimes wrongly refused. TIPS (POURBOIRES) These are regulated more by custom than anything else, and are only treated here as they apply to domi- cile, or residence, rather than for the thousand and one occasions — restaurants, tea-rooms, the paying for personal service wherever expected, and the like. From the domestic side, then, the coachman who takes you from the railway station to your house or hotel expects a tip of twenty-five centimes above his legal fare. When you pay a bill of the grocer or the baker, you are supposed to give the employee who presents it at least two sous. Servants at coun- try houses where you may be invited are grateful if remembered at the rate of a franc a day, or five francs as a total if the stay is but a few days. The withered old party who shows you to your seat or box at the opera expects from fifty centimes to a franc. Your concierge will expect from ten to fifty francs as FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 531 etrennes at the New Year, and all employees of tradesmen who have served you the previous twelve- month, personal servants and domestics, will expect also their New Year's gift of from ten to twenty- five francs and upwards. TAXES Taxes for the foreigner in France are a compli- cated procedure. One pays an indirect tax on salt, matches, etc., and a direct tax on automobiles, dogs, real estate, house rent, for doors and windows, for doing business, for the founding of a club or society, etc. There is also the octroi tax, which is paid on all comestibles, and many other things besides, which are brought into most of the cities, towns and vil- lages of France. This is a very considerable tax in Paris, though it seldom is levied against the individual personally, save as you may have made an excursion to the country, and the happy idea struck you to bring back a dozen really country eggs. Then you pay as you leave the railway station, or pass the Porte Maillot, or by whatever means you may enter the city. The tenant's tax in Paris is one per cent on the rent value and is imposed upon the tenant. Rent value of less than five hundred francs secures exemp- tion. These taxes are payable by twelve monthly instalments, or as a total, at the choice of the tenant. STORAGE OF FURNITURE OR PERSONAL EFFECTS There are government-recognised warehouses where goods, and under certain aspects, personal 532 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD effects, furniture, trunks and the like, may be stored against a proper receipt or warrant. This docu- ment, under certain conditions, is negotiable, and on it money may even be borrowed. This is quite apart from the function of the government pawnshop, or Mont de Piete. STAMPED PAPER ( PAPIER TIMBRE ) Legal documents and petitions are generally re- quired to be drawn up on Papier Timbre. The doc- ument is invalid otherwise. Such stamped paper is usually to be had at the larger tobacco shops, and, like stamps, tobacco and cigars, is sold as a govern- ment monopoly. STOCKS AND BONDS Gifts of stocks or bonds, real or personal property, etc., between living parties (inter vivos) should be registered under some form of notarial act. Gifts from hand to hand, of a watch or jewelry, of an automobile possibly (dons manuels) , require no such document. A married woman (a Frenchwoman or any other living under French law) may not receive an inter vivos gift save by her husband's consent, or the authority of the French courts. SUNDAY LAW Sundays are public holidays in France, but private business so transacted, including formal agreements, etc., are valid if performed on that day. SHOPS AND SHOPPING Avoid disputes, their settlement is a seemingly in- terminable affair. Receipts should be taken for FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 533 every payment or purchase made, above all from a dealer with whom you may at one time or another have had a credit account. These receipts are valua- ble records. Keep them. A ten-centime " quit- tance" stamp is required by law to be placed on all receipts, and involves a fine against payer and payee in case of omission. A dealer is bound to deliver the same goods which he offers, and to guarantee them as represented, though if offered " with defects," and so accepted by the purchaser, they cannot at a later time (of delivery) be refused. In the case of unseen defects — vices caches — the responsibility rests with the seller. All big establishments have a " claims " de- partment, but it is conducted in their own interests, though nominally bound by certain observations of impartiality imposed by law. SERVANTS The servant question is not easily or briefly han- dled. Female servants from the country are very numerous in Paris, as are Swiss. One may often learn of servants looking for engagements at the Mairie, or town hall, of the Arrondissement, and there are also private employment agencies (Bureaux de Placement). Domestic service seems to be at a discount for young girls, who, in Paris as elsewhere, are taking up with shop and factory work. Wine and washing are usually supplied a servant, or, in lieu thereof, a cash indemnity is allowed. Servants pay the Bureau de Placement a fixed fee, after a situ- ation has been obtained, and after a sufficient time has 534 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD passed to allow of her having been able to earn the sum in her new position. Servants remaining away from their employer's establishment overnight may be summarily discharged. Servants are generally en- gaged under verbal agreement, but it is incumbent upon the employer to keep a strict written record of money transactions with servants, as his word is usu- ally accepted as final if supported with plausible book- keeping records. An engagement can be broken, for cause, with a servant, on eight days' notice, usually by the payment of eight days' wages and packing them off. In case of bad service the servant cannot de- mand a written character, but may demand a certifi- cate giving the date of entrance and leaving his, or her, employer's service. A servant may not pledge the credit of his employer for even necessaries for the house. WINDOW BOXES FOR FLOWERS If one keeps flowers on balconies and in window boxes, the watering of them, or the knocking of them or their pots off accidentally into the streets, incurs liability for damage by the offender. WILLS A holograph will — one wholly in the writing of the testator — if witnessed by three persons, who should give their addresses, should be acceptable for probate to authorities in the United States, and would be recognised by the French authorities, if need be, under article 970 of the French Civil Code. lBMy'26