Helena weekly herald. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1867-1900, 1888-01-26
IN LONDON HOTELS.
NO GREAT IMPROVEMENT IN THE
SYSTEM FOR YEARS.

| Iue UlVluS DeIl OpSTdJlOu 1u0 llOIe yOu
enioin these solemn personages the more
they lose either their presence Of mind or
their method As to the method, they have
but little. In the first place. they do not
rise till about or after 9 o'clock in the morn
ing, although nature shines upon their island
about 4 O'Clock. Active minded Yankees,
who feel the maning shine, rise and expect
to get even with the country. They find that
they cannot buy pill or seidlitz powder OF
an oyster The Briton rises as becomes him
about 8 o'clock or 10 o'clock-and is then
somewhat unrested if a call is made upon his
| avarice.
I am stopping here in hotel which is sup
posed to be the perfection OF recent civilza-
tion. 1t is built of white bricks on the in
side and stone exteriorly. There is more
style and method about it than is required of
a country house. You come in at the front
door and observe a man covered over with
gilded uniform. You advance toward two
or three offices near the front door. If you
strike the wrong Office they march you to
and fro. You are requested to register.
About six of these minor offices are kept up
toward the front. In the course of time you
learn the regimen, but if you are blunt or
dull you may be for a week kept sailing be
| tween office number one and Office number
| seven. When you come down from your
room you drop your key through hole into
| a sort of vat. If they neglect as they often
| do, to fish your key out of the vat you may
be ten or fifteen minutes recovering your way
into your room.
AT THE BREAKFAST TABLE.
When you go to breakfast you are required
| to give your number which has been previ-
Ously confided to you on a little round ticket
or check. You present yourself, and in about
| three minutes are required to sign schedule
as to your place of abode. They bring you
little piece of fish about two inches by
three inches. When you have done with this
! they possibly bring you second piece.
calculate during the present week that every
meal which cost me from four shillings to
seven shillings cost the house about one-half
shilling at the very highest The hotel sys-
TEN here has changed, as they suppose, for
the better and yet we would think in Amer
lea that it had hardly changed at ALL Let
me give you an example of the contrast
Fisheen or twenty years ago the Langham
ho.el was supposed to be the finest in London;
it was placed near the American minister's
residence; it was built of brick, and was a
very large and extensive building. They
made it state and offensive and exclusive. IL
you go to the hotel you see man in uniform
parading before it; his business is to observe
whether you are fit to come into the holy of
HOLES. You pass through the portal, and
there is perhaps second sergeant at arms
there to look out for your character. When
you get within the hotel becomes very ex-
pensive, containing several kinds of bureaus
containing railroad tickets, newspapers and
| what not.
You finally go up to little Office, which is
perhaps supported by boy. He assigns you
to room Most of the chambermaids re-
ceive about els year, or S75. They are
obliged to enter into articles of contract to
stay out their year. 1t need not be limited at
! that portion of them are obliviOus of the
seventh commandment. When you go down
to the breakfast or dining room you find that
almost every one there is a German. He
knows about enough English to give you
what you have to eat, and if you have re-
quest to make pertaining to your room or
your friend he shrugs his shoulders and in
sists upon feeding you. He is as a Sioux In
dian in Great Britain. These Germans to the
number of hundreds of thousands are over
running England, and though the English
dislike the juxtaposition they seem to be en-
tirely incapable of changing their methods
The solemnity of the British hotel is equiva-
lent to the solemnity of church
| CARELESS sCULLIoN.
= This morning I went to the office and
asked for my key. The scullion there said
that it was not on its hook, and would look
for it. He then began to fish for it among
about fifty keys in hole underneath the
place we had dropped our keys Having
hunted all these keys through, he said it was
not there He had overlooked it in the null
| tiplicity of keys. Had he attended to his
| business, every one of those keys would have
| been hung ON its place the moment it was
| dropped. Then their system will never stand
| the pressure and criticism of modern civili-
| zation. You enter the huge dining room OF
the Hotel Metropole and find series of pill
| lars in the middle of the reom. These pillars
| are all useless and unnecessary, and they sep
1 arate people who eat from other people who
| eat. You are told that for certain amount
| of money you shall have so many dishes.
They bring you the first dish, and it is about
one and half to two ounces in weight. 1t
| you submit this is all you will get of the first
dish. If you are an Independent person you
will demand a second portion of the dish.
| They yield without remonstrance. Then
when you come for the second part of the
breakfast you get little piece about two or
three inches. If you tell the man to take
that back and bring you something reason
able to eat he will obey like a calf. If you
submit you will get no more for breakfast.
| At the Langham hotel you ring bell for
something in the way of refreshments; some
| times man will come in and sometimes he
| will not You wonder where the center of
these houses is; who conducts them; who is
| responsible for them. As far as the chamber
maids and labor element go they are very
well attended to, but if you go to the main
| Office you are kept in a state of apprehension,
wondering whether you have a right to ask
for anything or not. On my way to London
l stopped at Brighton for almost a week.
| Every day took my sea bath. Every night
| / slept under a sheet. In the course of three
| or four days I was afflicted with strange
| kind Of diarrhea. had never felt anything
of the kind before; there was slight pain in
| the middle of my stomach, attended with
| cracking pains toward the side of my
| stomach. l went to the hotel proprietor and
| asked where the water came from which fed
Brighton He said, with great politeness,
| that it was the finest water in Great Britain.
| One morning the main waiter in the hotel re-
marked to me: "Sir, you had better go to
| London. The sea air seldom agrees with
| strangers. With many strangers it disagrees
very much You viii never be any better SO
| long as you stay here" So went on to Lon
| don. and in few hours was completely re-