New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1904-12-11
TOR humor abroad one
r must first visit Paris.
While the surface of

reason full of humOr, but 1t is hidden In the 1nlStS
and takes longer dig out Then too it IS SO widely
different from our ideas of fun that it requires
educated point of view to perceive it.
What the tnthinking American first calls stupidity
he learns later acknowledge being the slow,
honest London way of arriving at conclusion without
a Jump even quiCkstep. But once on French SOIL
the delightful farceComedy of things begins to dawn
on one and from the boat-landing to the train and
then to the hotel it is all suggestive of the French
plays which know best in their translated form, in
which they appear rather siy-or the fun of France
is like its accent and will not translate we'll
Once we learn Paris life, we know that French farce
is the purest realism strained in situation always
appears in its English form 1t is not even so over
elaborated musical comedy. The uncon-
scios humor of the French people is as apparent as
that of the Irish but it is not like their abyssmally
absurd" but rather the over-ser1ous and grando-
quent order
When you appreciate the odd twist in the French
nature you learn that you laugh your way
along with them much more easily than you can
reason it.
They are impressionsts in everything and once you
get that fact through your head you know how to
But try solid American reason sound business
talk with Frenchman or a French woman and you
will get only a shrug and lift of the brows. You
seem to them abnormal and queer their eXcitabe
of taking life seems to you You must learn
to smile easily, to smirk, and you will get on,
but you try rules of right and Justice and common
sense you are apt to be left without your carriage,
without your dinner your bed
And this French bed is in itself marvellous Joke to
the unaccustomed American. 1t Is high, heavy
curtaned like throne, and covered with brocade like
an Old-fashOned sofa. 1t is decorative to degree
that makes you long for the plain brass or white
enamel of home. 1t is a delightful feature of the
new art of America that beds so exquisitely
simple sanitary, unimpressiVe and comfortable. You
must climb else vault into a high French bed,
and YOU are at in the interior of mountain OF
ornate clumsness. The sheets, blankets and counter
panes are wedged tightly and securely under and
around the mattress that athletic contOrtlons are
required to loosen them from their moorings. And
when loosened you have them your hands, so to
speak for they heavy and inclined to slip and
they are knobby with rich broCade roses and fuzzy
with fringe and the feel" of them makes you think
YOU are living in the comic supplement of a Sunday
newspaper.
Of course there and rich hotels in Paris
to-day that entirely Ser1OuSthat to say they
have not such important and uncomfortable beds
but the older houses rich in the spirit of farce,
the furniture and fittings fairly teeming with posi-
bilities
You begin to take off your hat in your ROOM and
are startled to find the apartment apparently filled
with people. But it is only the arrangement of the
mirrors that extend in endless procession of reec-
tons Looking about odd little entrance corridor,
that seems to be of necessity whatever, you come
upon little plush panel door that suggests secret
passage similar those of the palace at Versailles.
"Ahi" you think "how pretty this quaint little
cupboard for shoes a hand-SatChel perhapS-hOw
different from our frightfu American way of putting
handles on doors" Then you push it in, and find
to your amazement that it looks in on your throne
bed.
The electric light like the cake-walk, is something
that Paris has yet mastered 1t is true that the