The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-07-07

Prices Compared With New York
 Walters and TIps-Nothlng to Be Had
 to Eat After MIdnighr.
 London, June 21.-Among the many peculiarities of Londodn life that at- tract the attention of the American tourist. one of the most striking is the restaurants.
 E The Bostonian who has been in the habit of complaining because he cannot get bottle of wine or a glas of beer after the theaters close. although he can eat all he pleases, is surprised to find that he cannot even get anything to eat after F o'clock in the greatest city in the world. The suddenness with which every place closes up at mid night is astonishing.
 On Sunday one may walk for miles looking for place to get breakfast or dinner, but every restaurant is closed until six in the evening. Hotels and pie-shops are the only resource
 The cheapest place of refreshment in London are the A. B. c. coffee rooms, which are very much like our own lunch counters, but with the great diff ference that instead of being places which make a speciality of serving those who are in a hurry, they are loafing places for that peculiar type of Eng lishman who eats very lowly and reads the paper very thoroughly at the same time.
 After these come the chop houses and the long procession of luncheon rooms over saloons, where simple bills of fare are the rule and where all the best dishes are "off'' very soon after they are on. They are mostly cheap places for clerks and salesmen, in which from 25 to 30 cents worth is good meal.
 The women all eat at the stores, or take their luncheon with them, or go to the A. B. C.'s.
 But the restaurants that interest the tourist are the immense caravansaries of the West End, and one feels that a visit to London is incomplete without dinner at one of the big cafes in the immediate vicinity of Piccadilly Circus. Each of these has it's own peculiarities, but a description of one will give fair idea of them all.
 The American who goes into one of these gorgeous affairs hoping to find the same dishes that would be ready for him in a place of similar pretensions in New York is doomed dto sad disap- pointment. The many tempting tit- bits of an American restaurant are un- known. Everything is on the theory that you are hungry and want solid food, or that you are not hungry and want only to drink and loaf.
 At the outer door stands big man in livery with the name of the restau- rant on his hat band in gold braid. He is the porter whose business it is to help people from their carriages, whis- tie for cabs, keep undesirable charac- 'ters and take tips. Americans who do not know the ways of London give him six-pence on the theory that it is about equal to dime. A penny is quite enough.
 Immediately inside the entrance you find yourself in short hall or corridor with cigarstands and places for the sale of foreign papers and souvenir postal cards. Through swinging glass doors you enter a large room furnished with small round marble-topped tables, at which men and women are sitting, drinking and chatting.
 Through another pair of glass doors and you enter an immense hall filled with small square tables with seats on one side and chairs on the other 4a1S ;,o so close together that there is hardly room to pass between them.
 The lofty ceiling is elaborately decor $ ated and the walls are handomely fires coed with flowers and figures. This is called the cafe.
 Above this cafe and in other parts of the building are other halls, for ban quets and dancing, for private and cor poration dinners, all beautifully decor ated. Then there are grillrooms, small private dining rooms, saloons for table d'hote dinners and longing rooms.
 In the main hall on the ground floor everything is a la carte. The tables with cloths on them are for eating, and those with bare marble tops are fol drinking playing chess and dominoes and reading the papers or loafing.
 The educated Londoner knows that ir choosing a table in restaurant where you do not know any of the walters, ii is always best to turn to the right or entering, as the best walters have those tables.
 On looking round you, you find almost every nationality represented, French men and Spaniards being in the major ity, with an occasional Chinese, Turk Indian or Arab often in his native cos tune. Negroes stroll in occasionally some evidently from the States, some from Martinique.
 They are always we'll dressed anG Wlel behaved and are never objected tc except by Americans, who sometimes call the manager and complain that they are not accustomed to eat in the company with negroes. They are DO. litely told that they can move to an. other table or go into another room but the gentleman of color has the right of way and cannot be asked tc move.
 A refusal to serve any persons would ing day, when the permits for all the eating and drinking places in Londor are issued by the County Council, the restaurant would be called upon to give very good and sufficient reasons for its refusal to serve, failing which it's li cense would be withheld, and it would have to close it's doors or settle the y4o a ftpr Inv Da yinp ayarnn1ar1y do poaoae.