Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-11-01
THE RHONE VALLEY
Americans and Their Goods
in Silk Country.
YANKEE DRUGS USED
HOW OUR COCKTAILS MAKE
JOHNNY cRAPAUD SMILE.
Claret at Four Cents a Bottle and
Champagne at Twenty-A
Three-Cent Bath.
Special Correspondence of The Evening Star.

Special Correspondence of The Evening Star
LYONS France.
This Rhone valley is one of the richest
parts of the French republic. Its products
amount to hundreds of millions OF dollars
year. and there is scarcely family which
has not a hoard stored away in wooden
stocking under the rafters. II already buys
many American goods. but the field Is not
half worked. Lyons, where l am wiring,
has populati of 5OO,00O 1t has excellent
stores but they are filled with French, Eng
fish. German and Belgium goods, ana the
chief American products to be seen are Cal
ifornta fruits Chicago bacon, typewrlters
and sewing ma hines And still the American
shoe would walk rapidly into the hearts OF
the better classes, and our ice cream SODA
would soon make its way into the affections
of the Lyonnese maidens. found American
soda fountains doing a good business in
England. There are none in Paris and only
a Jew in Berlin and Hamburger
Openings for American Drugs.
We should have a good trade here IN
American drugs. We ship many to Eng
land but none to speak of to France Inc
French drugs are poor. They are mace
nv the natives of diluted extracts and
aduIterated solids. You have to take doses
the size of horse powders to accomplish the
desired result, and the medicines as RUE
are nut up on the homeopathic plan our
consul at Lyons recently sent out Tor
dozen two-grain quinine pills, representing
the word grain by the letters sr Ihe
druggist interpreted this to mean gram, anu
the result was that the dose taken was big
enough to kill an ordinary man. The qui-
nine was so weak. however, that II only
made a buzzing in the consuis ears he
complained to the druggist and tried TO nave
III American SD6ciaNiSS, Dut SO
far has only succeeded as TO porous pas
ters The druggist says that chemical pro-
ducts will not stand the voyage across the
Atlantic, and he intimated that the french
goods surpass the American
The American Bar.
There is one speciality in the drug line
however that the Frenchmen concede to
be worth imitation. This is the American
drink. You see the sign American bar
over one or more saloons in every continent
al city The principal hotels of Europe ad-
vertise American drinks. and the genuine
American bars have plenty of custom. The
American cocktail makes the FreDchman
smile and he rises responsibility to the Ken
lucky high ball.
The most of the bars, however. are
frauds They keep no American liquors and
the drinks are manipulated by French bar
tenders who cannot speak English. The
other day an American drummer dropped
into one for drink and called out in loud
tones: Il want a glass of American whls-
ky"
Comment" said the waiter, with a puz-
lied look on his face.
Bring me a Manhattan cocktail said the
drummer.
Comment
And thereupon the drummer got angry
and cursed the Frenchman for putting up
an American sign, when he had no American
drinks and could not even understand
American language,
There is a real American bar in Lyons,
and it is the most fashionable drinking
place In the city. 1t was started by New
Yorker. who thoroughly understood the
science of making the insiduous but destruc-
tive American cocktail, and who did 1t SO
well that he has made fortune out of the
business.
Champagne at 90 Cents a Bottle.
And still 1 don't why the French
should care for American liquors. when they
have the best and the cheapest wines of
the world. You can get good claret here
by the barrel for four cents quart, and
champagne which is not at all bad for 20
cents a pint or 10 cents a glass. A fair
ciaret is served in the restaurants at 16
cents a bottle, and all sorts of wines are
remarkably cheap
This is not far from some of the chief
wine-raising sections. 1 passed train loads
of Burgundy ard elaret on my way from
Paris 70 Lyons The wine was carried in tank
cars, just we carry coal oil, and some
trains were composed of great hogsheads on
trucks. each hogshead marked wine.
rode for miles through vineyards, every vine
having Its individual stake. the whole coun-
try apparently growing poles about which
green vines were climbing.
Send Elevators to France.
1 would advise our elevator factories to
systematically work the European trade.
Every one here lives in fat. Lyons Is a
city of flats. and this is so throughout the
continent Paris is a gigantic beehive of
living apartments. Marseilles is all fats, and
so are Orleans and Bordeaux
The chief cities of Switzerland have fats
In Berlin and the other places in Germany
the government prescribes the strictest of
buildings regulations. There is a limit to
the height of the houses and small houses