for each floor, in charge of an attendant. So contrary is this system of locking doors to the habits of the English, that it is often neglected by them; so much so, that in hotels exclusively frequented by natives of our isle, such a thing as locking doors and bringing down keys would be looked upon as extraordinary. At one of these hotels, I asked a servant, upon leaving my room after arrival, where the key should be put, as I had seen no key-board. ‘Oh, just leave it in the door,’ was her reply. Foreigners always lock their doors, whatever may be the establishment in which they are; and in many places, especially in the large hotels of Paris, where nobody knows who may be his next neighbour, it is highly proper and safe to do so. In this connection I may just observe that somehow or other there are in most places hotels which are only patronized by the English, and a foreigner is a rara avis. Correspondingly, there are other hotels which they never visit. There must be some species of intuitive freemasonry which underlies and conduces to this result.
All hotels have a public salle à manger, to which both ladies and gentlemen are expected to go, and nearly all have drawing-rooms or reading-rooms, or both (salons and salons-de-lecture). A lady travelling by herself can freely go to all these rooms, and one constantly meets such dames seules. No necessity is imposed upon them to engage a salon or sitting-room. But if desirous of taking them out of the public rooms, the meals will be sent to the bedrooms, for which luxury and extra trouble, however, there is a charge made, sometimes as high, at least for dinner, as 2 francs or 3 francs per person per meal, though usually only ½ franc.
In addition to placing in the reading-rooms newspapers, which generally comprise one or more of the leading London journals (received in many places within twenty-four hours of their publication), there usually and most properly is in hotels, where visitors come for lengthened periods, a small collection of books sufficient to beguile an hour or a wet day.
The three chief meals of the day are breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
In what I shall call the English hotels, almost everybody maintains the good old English custom of coming down to the salle-à-manger to breakfast; but foreigners, consistently with their home practice, take their meagre breakfast or cup of coffee, scarcely to be designated breakfast, in their bedroom. English people cannot get reconciled to the idea of taking meals in a room in which they sleep. It is an uncomfortable and unsocial custom, essentially bad—keeps the bedrooms long from being attended to, and imposes much additional labour on the servants, who are kept flying up and down stairs at all hours of the morning with breakfast equipage.
The usual charge at all hotels, at least as against Englishmen, for breakfast proper (tea, coffee, or chocolate, with bread and butter) is 1½ francs. Occasionally, though very rarely, I have found it only charged 1 franc, and once, viz. at Toulouse, 2 francs. Eggs are universally charged 25 centimes (2½d.) each; meats and fish, according to carte, and generally expensive.
But foreigners make a more substantial meal a little later on, which they call déjeuner à la fourchette, corresponding somewhat to our lunch. This is intended to be the real breakfast, and, according to true Continental fashion, it proceeds at many places at so early an hour as half-past ten, at others at eleven or twelve o’clock. In such cases it is found to be a most substantial repast, consisting of several courses, generally three—meat courses, pudding or tart course and cheese, and fruit courses; and it is in reality an early dinner, the whole company in the hotel assembling to enjoy it, unless individually they otherwise arrange. In the English hotels they have ‘lunch’ usually at one o’clock; but this is of a much less substantial nature, the visitor having been credited with making more Anglici a good breakfast in the morning. The charge for déjeuner or lunch differs according to the hotel, but is usually about 3 francs.
The table-d’hôte dinner is a regular Continental institution, which it would be well were it made the rule at home. Meaning literally dinner at the table of the host, I presume that at one time, and before the establishment of great hotels, the host regularly presided. This, however, is now rarely seen, although I have sat down to dine at a table where he took his place. Rising as each course arrived, and putting on an apron, he would with dexterous rapidity carve what was brought in, then, putting off his apron, would sit down again and take part with the guests.
Each hotel has its fixed hour for this dinner, varying in time from six to seven o’clock. I have also seen a special table-d’hôte dinner at eight o’clock, to suit those arriving by late trains. In places frequented by Germans, such as Interlachen, they have two dinner hours—one at two o’clock, for the Germans chiefly; and the other in the evening, to suit those who prefer dining at a later hour. The hotel people are frequently disturbed and put about by visitors, usually English people, inexcusably coming tardily to table. The charge for table-d’hôte dinner varies a good deal at different places, 4 to 5 francs being about the average rate, though occasionally it is less. In Paris some of the large hotels charge 6 francs—wine, however, included, as is customary in Paris.
The dinner, which is served à la Russe, consists of many courses, and is not, generally speaking, of the substantial character of an English home dinner. The routine is everywhere the same, and consists of the following courses, which the waiters present at the division assigned to each quietly at sound of finger bell:—(1) Potage or soup; (2) Fish, when it can be had, otherwise a substitute; (3) Entrées; (4) Vegetables by themselves, such as cauliflower, French beans or peas; (5) Poultry or game, or otherwise roast beef or roast mutton, accompanied invariably by salad or lettuce, and water-cresses; (6) Pudding or tart; (7) Fruits; (8) Sweet biscuits. In some of the grander places there is a course of ice-cream, and in other hotels ice-creams take the place of pudding on Sundays, or sometimes on both Sundays and Thursdays.[8] Such is the invariable routine, the only variety being in the specific description of the articles in each course. The great want in these dinners is of a good supply of vegetables; bread, not so wholesome, being supplied at discretion. It would be better if some of the viands were dispensed with, and more vegetables given. Such a thing as a good dry potato, what they call au naturel, is hardly known. Potatoes are served up greased in every conceivable way, or, if presented dry or in their skins, they are accompanied by a separate plate of butter. One course often excites remark by English visitors. It is where the game course consists of small birds, especially thrushes. These afford a miserable bite apiece, and, for a party of 40 or 50, as many birds fall to be sacrificed, the rule of the table being that every guest is, or has the opportunity of being, served alike. At Cannes, at one of the hotels (season 1876–77), a round robin was subscribed by the English of the party, protesting against such use of thrushes—I do not know with what effect. They were to be sometimes seen hanging in bunches at the poulterers’ doors. It seems a cruel use of such song-birds, which are fed upon grapes to fatten them for the table; yet all the grapes they could swallow, even though in quantity enough to satisfy the grape cure, would never make them more than a miserable picking.
The quantities of eggs, fowl, and game which are needed to supply so many tables must be enormous; and as one sees very few live poultry anywhere, it has occasioned me surprise to think how they can be procured. The only feasible explanation is that the country is ransacked far and near for food to supply the luxurious tables of the hotels, and the wants of town populations. In a book published in 1857 by Dr. Frederick Johnson,[9] it is stated with regard to Paris alone—
‘That the great Metropolitan maw occupies 712 bakers, and daily consumes 479,015 loaves and rolls (we abandon verbal computation in despair), and annually 6,849,449 poultry, 1,329,964 larks, 26,000 kids, 9,937,430 kilos of fish (the kilo being 21/5 lbs. English), 5,006,770 kilos of confectionery, 150,223,006 kilos of pears; that yearly each Parisian swallows 69 oysters, 165 eggs, 137 quarts of wine, and 14 quarts of beer among his other luxuries; and that among them, in their little enjoyments, they gossip over 3,000,000 kilos of coffee, 350,000 kilos of chicory, 2,000,000 lbs. of chocolate, and 40,000 kilos of tea, assisted by 109,221,086 quarts of milk. Teetotallers may be alarmed for the public sobriety when they learn that, besides the wines and brandies, our Parisian pleasure-seekers dispose of 1,267,230 quarts of liqueurs, to say nothing of 350,000 kilos of brandied bonbons, and that they cool the consequences with 500,000 quarts of ice.’
If such be the consumption of Paris, and this is more than twenty