The Roanoke times. (Roanoke, Va.) 1897-1977, 1897-11-04
BILL NYE HOAXED.
THE HUMORIST THE VICTIM OF AN
AMUSING PRACTICAL JOKE.

Had Heard Wonderful Tales About San
Francisco's Cheap Dinners-Took In Ono
From Soup to Coace and Was Astound-
ed-His Further Astonishment.
After "Bill' Nyc had become famous
and had taken to lecturing. he had an
odd adventure with Sam" Davis,
whom often before he had met joy.
ously and parted from sadly. 1t was
such an affair as the humorist used to
delight to put into print, and it seems
impossible that he has not told the
story. If he has the man who has
read it heretofore can skip it in this
column.
Davis was working on a San Fran
cisco paper, and Nye, meeting him,
asked if it were true that one could
get royal banquet in the Golden Gate
town for the ridiculous prices men
toned by men who had been there.
Davis said the stories were over
drawn. but still one could manage to
exist upon what was set before him,
even if he did not have kegful of
money in his possession
I'll tell you what" he said; you
come along with me to dinner this
evening and III take you to a rotis-
serie-one of these French restaurants,
you know, where you can get some
thing for 25 cents. Or, if you prefer,
a 15cent meal"
Il guess mott" said Nye, who was
spending SIS day for being allowed
to breathe in the Palace Hotel. "A
quarter meals cheap enough"
After they parted Davis hurried to
one of the finest eating houses in all
the Coast country and had a brief but
convincing conversation with the pro-
prietor. He also called in to his aid
man with whom he knew Nye had
had some pleasant correspondence, and
whom the lecturing knight desired to
meet. In the evening the three gour-
NETS approached the lair of good eat
ing. The menu card was presented.
1t was about as long as the Canadian
Pacfics timetable, and made mention
Of wonderful things astronomical.
But Davis and the other San Francis
can behaved with i'll temper when they
saw 1t. There was no variety 1t was
no better than the 10-cent meals pro-
vided on kearney street, and here
they were prepared to pay two bits
head. Finally these two impatiently
directed the walters to bring every
thing that was on the bill, and they
would select something fit to eat out
of the lot. Mr.. Nye had very little
hair, but what he had rose in spiky
way.
do you mean to say" he gasped,
that the price of such a meal as you
are ordering is a quarter?"
We'll" said Davis, in confusion,
''of course 10 cents would be about the
right price, but something seems to
be wrong with the chef to-day. Try
to make out little, and we'll go
somewhere else Tomorrow am
really filled with shame at bringing
you here to such a poor, dismal ex-
cuse for q dinner, but hadn't been
in here for month and didn't know it
had run down So"
The two coastwise men objected to
everything. The wine was not more
than twenty years old, whereas they
were paying money enough to get
good stuff. The Holsters were wrong
in some way, the salads were faulty,
they insisted; the bird, the fish, the
Misunderstanding clear through to
the fruit and ice cream and pastry and
coffee and cognac was criticised. 1t
might be considered paSsable at a 90
cent place, but at shop where the
price was 25 cents 1t was ineXcusa BILE
The worst Of it was that they had a
guest with them and he would carry
away a poor opinion of San Francisco
hospitality. They again called the
proprietor over and forced him to
apologize to the visitor for the
wretched food he had served. Then
Davis paid the checks, which were %
cents apiece, and Nye nearly tainted
when the cashier humbly thanked
him.
The next day Nye sneaked away from
all friendly hands and secretly went
around TO that restaurant. He wanted
to have just one more of those stu
pendous 25-cent dinners. So he or
dered about one-third of what he had
taken on the previous day There's
no use wasting food just because it's
provided so generously and at such
q price" he reasoned. And he called
for his check.
Somewhat TO his surprise, the check
was for $22.7O.
The Davis dinner had been a nice
pleasant little prearranged swinde
put up by Sam" and his friend and
the restaurateur