Wintering in the Riviera. William James Miller
which we tarry only for a night.
A similar or even greater reform has been attained in the Continental towns. The discomforts of the old houses there were no doubt much greater than they were with ourselves; and, indeed, even now, if we abandon the tourists’ highway, or run away from the larger towns, a primitive and perhaps far from agreeable state of matters is discovered, the fact being that much of the improvement which has taken place is due to studying the requirements of les Anglais. But in the leading improvements the foreigners have led the van, and we may be said to follow at a respectful distance.
The tendency abroad is, as it is at home, towards building large establishments in which the rooms are reckoned by the hundred, one of the hotels in Paris, the Grand (most new hotels abroad now have ‘Grand’ prefixed to some other and more distinctive designation, but this is ‘The Grand’ par excellence), advertising as many as 800 rooms; another (the Louvre), 700—figures which are beyond anything, I suppose, in England, unless it be (though perhaps not even there) in the Midland Railway Hotel, St. Pancras. There is at all times a greater likelihood of finding accommodation, and such accommodation as may be desired, in houses of such formidable dimensions; but the visitor’s importance suffers a shock: he becomes nothing but a number, and as such is termed by the employés of the hotel, and shouted up and down the speaking tubes.
But a more important result follows from the immense augmentation in travelling, because the intercourse thus brought about between the inhabitants of countries originally differing very widely in their manners and customs has a direct tendency to assimilate not merely their manners and customs, but their modes of living. Hence the peculiarities of each gradually, if good, are adopted—if bad, are lost. We borrow from the foreigners, they borrow from us. Odd ways and angular corners get rubbed off, and Cæsar and Pompey settle down in time ‘very much ‘like,’ specially Pompey. Yet, when one leaves the home country, he happily discerns there are still remaining considerable differences between life abroad and life in Britain. Hotels on the Continent are conducted on somewhat different principles from those which at least formerly were customary in Great Britain; and until the dead level of uniformity be reached, it may not be uninteresting to recall some of the differences, and to mention circumstances attendant upon hotel life abroad, which, to those not very familiar with the subject, may be noteworthy.
In general construction, the more recently erected hotels at home and abroad do not materially differ. Tardily we are beginning to adopt the foreign system of numerous and spacious public rooms, and especially public drawing-rooms, to which ladies can freely resort. But in one important element of comfort to the weak or weary visitor, the foreigners are behind ourselves, inasmuch as lifts (ascenseurs) do not seem to be very common; and really in these many-floored hotels they are needed. The only places where we have seen them have been in the hotels of Paris and Marseilles, and they were not always in working order. In addition to the long stairs to be ascended, there are often in these large hotels lengthy corridors to traverse, so that it is a journey from the outer door to the bedroom, in some cases requiring a study of the locale, so as to avoid being lost in the labyrinth.
Next to comfort, the matter of charges is one of primary consideration to most travellers, and can scarcely be overlooked in treating of hotel life. Generally it may be observed, that notwithstanding there has been abroad, as there has been at home, a very considerable rise in charges from former scales, the cost of living at hotels abroad is, as it used to be, still under, or on an average considerably under, the cost for similar comforts and accommodation at home.
The cost of rooms is regulated primarily by the floor or étage on which they are situated; and if the visitor desire to be economical, he ought to ask for rooms upon the higher floors, say the third, or even, where it exists, the fourth étage. First-floor rooms are always charged high, sometimes exorbitantly so. At Milan we were shown into bedrooms on the first floor, which, had we taken, would have cost us about 20 to 25 francs per night per room. In Nice as much as 75 francs, or £3 per day, have been asked for two rooms on the first floor of a leading hotel, being equal to a rent per annum of £1095. A friend who spent the winter at Cannes told me he paid 75 francs per day for the rooms he had in one of the principal hotels, but probably he had three or four rooms. In Mentone the highest I have known paid by friends has been, for a large saloon and a bedroom, both princely rooms, 50 francs, or about £2 per day, equal to a rent per annum, were they let all the year round, of £730. These, however, are season places, and such rooms would remain vacant a considerable portion of the year, and even, a consequence of the high charge, for great part of the season, as the hotelkeepers will not lower their price even for a short period.
In Italy it is always desirable, where there is an ability to mount long stairs, to take rooms as high up as possible, so as to get as far away as may be from the odours of the street; but the same rule as regards the charges for rooms prevails. Perhaps in nothing do foreign hotel charges differ more than in the charges for rooms. They differ according to the place—that is, whether it be a large or a small town; according to the hotel, whether it be first class or inferior; and according to the rooms themselves, their position, size, and furnishing, and also according as they are single or double bedded. Abroad, nearly every bedroom large enough is so constructed as to fit it for use also as a sitting-room or salon, in which friends may be received. Sometimes the beds are placed in a recess or back part of the room, which may be shut off at will by drawing a curtain. The rooms abound with mirrors; but unless in houses frequented by the English, there are for the most part no carpets on the floors, saving a rug at the bedside, thus and otherwise involving an odd mixture of splendour and discomfort. However, carpets are beginning to be more frequently introduced. To those accustomed to the warmth of carpets, getting out of bed in the morning is, when they are wanting, a chilly operation, more especially when the floors are constructed, as they sometimes are, I presume for protection against vermin, of composition.
On an average, I would say that a bedroom on a third floor, with one bed for a single person, costs from 3 to 5 francs per night; a double-bedded room, from 5 to 8 francs. On the second floor the price is advanced a little; but the first floor is always high, varying according to circumstances. In some fashionable places, such as Nice and Biarritz, during the season the charge for rooms is, in first-class hotels, as what I have already said shows, extravagantly high. The season at Nice is not, like many places, for two or three months only, but lasts the whole winter—half of the year. It ought not therefore, one would think, to be so expensive.
But lights have to be paid for separately, and are usually charged at hotels at the rate of 1 franc per bougie or candle, although I have seen only 75 centimes charged, and in some out-of-the-way places as little as half a franc, or even, as at Chateau d’Œx, 30 centimes, upon which no doubt there was a profit. I was told of the case of a visitor at an expensive hotel in Nice who was, a good many years ago, charged 16 francs for bougies for a single night. But this mode of plundering is now so far abandoned, and one has only to be careful that more candles than he desires be not lighted. The charge for bougies, if remaining only single nights at hotels, becomes heavy; but if several nights be spent in the house, the candles remain till burned down. It is said that foreigners carry off their unburnt bougies with them, and use them at next stoppage, as they carry off also, it is alleged, the sugar which they have not used, but for which they consider they have paid. These, however, are petty habits, to which English people have not yet got accustomed.
The charge for service is almost invariably 1 franc per night per person. As lights are not charged in England, the united charge for bougies and service comes, for short periods, to be very much the same as the charge in England for service alone.
Universally, abroad, the beds are constructed only to hold one person. This may be, though it is not always, because of the summer’s heat. In some rare cases the beds are found to be broad enough for two; but it does not necessarily follow that the charge is in this case as for one occupant. I have seen charge made for a broad bed as much as if the room had contained two beds. In parts where mosquitoes exist, the beds are draped with mosquito curtains.
Each room has its key and corresponding number, and the visitor is expected, upon leaving his chamber, to lock his door, and hang the key upon the key-board which is under charge of the concierge at the entrance