The aegis & intelligencer. [volume] (Bel Air, Md.) 1864-1923, 1864-09-23
American Hotel Life.

The Especial" correspondent of the
London Times in this country has at least
the originality to lay aside the old con-
veutional way of describing American
manners. Being at Chicago he says:
However high the wages of the COM
mon laborer may be, however easy and ex-
travagant the earnings of professional and
commercial people, the Americans life
must be dogs life, except in the few
instances of men achieving boundess
wealth. I need no other proof of my as.
sertion than the preference almost univer-
sally given to hotel and boarding life in
this country over private domestic ar
Engagements. There is economy in this
public life, a sort of shabby, hurry scurry,
phalanstere like economy, which, perfectly
hldeous as it is, suits it to men and fami-
lies of limited incomes better than pri.
waite household with lemons at ten cents
I piece, house rent at fabulous prices and
Irish female helps, wasteful and slattern-
ly, with no inclination or aptitude for
work, ard no end Of pretensions as to
wages. .n..
The hotel life of these Americans has
something more disgusting than even the
cafe and reStamatew habits which seemed
to me the bane of Italian society. The
gong has been abolished from most "insti.
tutions," as big hotels are called, and the
rush to the dinner hall at mealtime, which
converted the fremont or Aston Houses
into menageries of wild beasts a quarter
of a century ago, has completely gone out
of fashion. The American goes down to
his breakfast, dinner, tea and supper,
calmly and leisurely; sits down delibe-
rately, pores over his printed bill of fare
for eight or ten minutes, and at last is
sues his orders to the obsequious blackey,
whose hot breath and steaming jacket
have been RECALLING his olfactories ever
since he thrust the chair under the fas-
tidious guests legs, and showed him into
his place under the mahogany. Between
the ordering of dinner and seeing it
spread before him, between soup and fish,
aud meat and dessert courses, an Ameri-
cans dinner never absorbs less than an
hour or an hour and half's time. D..
Places are appointed to the convives at
the negroes convenience or caprice. No
acquaintance is sought; little or no con-,
versation is attempted. Indeed, whatever
his social propensities may be, the Amer
can is rather silent animal at table he
makes his dinner too much of business
to have any time to waste in friendly in
tercourse. Such host of little dishes
and plates, hot and cold, roast and boiled,
fish and fowl, sauces and vegetables, en-
trees and relishes, game, pastry and ice,
such an awful hodge podge of eatables as
the waiter lays before the American, and
he undertakes to discuss, no continental
table d hote in old Europe ever exhibited.
The stufing is simply disgusting, aud
when you see that out of 300 to 500
guests at one table not quite two or three
have wine bottle before them, because
wine is of course paid extra, and the poor
est stuff is not to be had for less than So
a quart, you cannot help coming to the
conclusion that there is deadly war be-
tween host and guest, and that the latter
is bent on having his moneys worth, no
matter how lead-achish he may rise from
his seat, no matter how dyspeptic and
sallow hiszvoracous habits may make him
for all his lifetime. -