Mexico weekly ledger., 1896-01-23
The Inn Of Death in Paris.
HAVING FUN WITH DEATH THE
LATEST AMUSEMENT OF
THE BoULEVARDs.
A Decomposing Corpse Represented
Walters Dressed as Undertakers
Say: Welcome to Death"
Drinks Are Served
On Coffins.
From the New York World


The latest and most extraordinary
of degeneration in Paris is
the Cabaret du Meant, which may be
in English as the Inn Of
Death.
It's chief attraction lies in the asso-
citation of death and its most repul-
sixe attributes svita drinking and with
life and feverish gayety. Death,
which all decent men, of whatever
belief, have agreed to treat with some
reserve, is thus made a jest and asso-
ciated with the vulgarest of pleasures.
The cabaret is situated on the
Boulevard de Clichy, the most riotous
and notorious of the exterior bouie-
wards and the site of many other
strange places of amusement. 1t is
haunt of every kind of vileness, and is
invariably visited by the foreigner
who wishes to see Paris properly.
A few steps beyond the picturesque
and vicious put now commonplace
Moulin Rouge you come to the Cabaret
du Meant. Two large and sickly green
lights, making everything and every
body in the neighborhood ghastly and
death-like, notify you of its presence"
1t is a small, dismal building.
Through door draped with dead
black curtains edged with silver, such
as are placed on church doors at
funerals in France, you enter this un-
holy resort. Here is the latest and
most satisfactory and also the vilest
and most sacrilegious effort to pander
to the craving for the morbid and the
unnatural.
DRINKING ON CoFFINs.
The room you enter is vault-ike
and filed with coffins. These are
really the tables from which you are
to drink. Walters dressed as under
takers men, IN black clothes with
long streamers of Grape hanging from
their big hats, fit about the cafe.
They are chosen for their cadaverous
aspect. The poor wretches are work.
ing for living, and haveno respons-
ibility in the ghastly farce in which
they are concerned.
The two undertaker-wa walters call
out in sad tones: sWelcome to
DEATH" and stChoose your coffin"
Having chosen your coffin and or
dered your poison (probably beer),
the waiter brings it, to you, repeating
some such formula as:
"Here is something to finish you of
Ia drink made from microbes and
grave worms"
Then he sets down your glass ana
places cierce, funeral taper, by the
side of it. 1t is hardly necessary te
say that you pay very high for drink
amid these surroundings.
Ali around you hear the undertaken
walters repeating their dreadful
phrases: "Welcome to DEATH - ''Here
is something to poison you." ''The
dead cannot laugh.' ''This will make
you rot quickly"
SKELETONS ALL AROUND,
} On the walls are what appear to b.
} paintings representing the "Wal
: purgis Night" from "Faust;" 81
Night Fete at the Moulin Rouge" ant
other subjects. From time to time al
the figures IN the pictures change int
skeletons. The effect in the Moulil
Rouge scene is especially weird.
, You are then invited to take you
cierge, and, in company with othe
t visitors, are led through long, vault
like corridors. At last you arrive i
large room, draped in black, wit
no relief whatever.
A man dressed as a monk, with
huge cowl over his head, stands at tn
door and calls for silence. At the en-
!, of long, narrow passage leadin
from the room an upright coffin
3 seen.
8 A chorister in red robes comes fol-
: ward and invites some visitor to plac
g himself or herself in the coffin. TheI
: is never any difficulty in finding
d volunteer. This is, in fact, an impol
d tant part of the amusement for man
: of the visitors who have seen the sho
before.
The volunteer passes behind a GU
tain and reappears in front of Il
: coffin, in which he is placed by Il
chorister with great care. Then he
enveloped in a huge winding shee