The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1905-02-04
RECKLESS LUXURY OF HOTEL LIFE.
What Money Will Do In An Up-to-
Date Hosiery for the "Man Who
Would be King Even for Few
Days.

Would be King Even for a Few
Days.
Grace Margaret Gould in woman's Home Com
panion.
The most obscure man in the most OBJ
scure corner Of the United States today
may live even better than king-while
his money lasts If he would be king for
a time, let him come to New York and put
up at one of the latest expressions in hotel
extravagance-the management will do the
rest. His widest dreams Of luxury will
be obliterated by the surprises he expe-
riences The hotel of today is adapted to
the multimillionaire, and he requires, as a
matter of course, the Injuries which the
most powerful monarch in the world might
envy in vain.
This is no exaggeration. Limitless
money is back of the great New York ho-
tells, and it is spent without limit.
What then are some Of the surprises
which money can give to the one seeking
regal luxury?
He can live in apartments hung with
gobelin tapestries and spread with the most
costly Persian rugs.
He can eat from a solid gold service.
He can breathe filtered air, from which
every microbe has been taken.
He can battle in perfumed water.
He can regulate the light to his mood.
He can sleep in bed of carved tulip
wood-an art treasure, an heirloom from
an old French castle, marvelously carved,
and hung with silk after ancient style, yet
representing the latest ideas in comfort and
ease.
He can eat-What can he not eat =?
The world $ bill of fare is at his disposal
He can be attended by a retinue Of train
ed servants who anticipate his every wish,
And incidentals? There is no modern
convenience which is not at hand and in
exactly the right place
His clock is regulated by Washington
observatory. He talks through private
telephone, and executes business over a
private wire. He has all the comforts not
of home, but Of the world.
At what cost is all this Undesirable
luxury furnished? 1t is only possible to
give few items out of an unlimited ex-
penditure of time, thought and money.
One Of these hotels cost seven million
dollars.
The decoration of its royal suite of six
rooms cast seventy FIVE thousand dollars.
The decoration of his royal suit of six
rooms cost seyenty-fve thousand dollars.
The plant to filter the air cost three
hundred thousand dollars.
The tulip-wood bed from the old French
chateau cost ten thousand dollars, and so
did the piano which adorns the adjoining
reception room.
The solid silver fittings for each bath
room in the hotel cost twelve hundred dol
lars
The paintings, marbles and bronzes
which decorate the house represent an eX
penditure of half million; aud, on the
other hand. each door knob in the hotel
cost ten dollars.
The daily amount of money spent for
flowers Is at least FIVE hundred dollars.
There is servant and half foT every
guest, and some guests may have half a
dozen if they wish.
What, then, viii it cost the man who
would hive Ike king to enjoy those more
than regal Injuries?
To occupy the royal suite for day costs
one hundred and twenty five dollars. But
this is without anything to eat Food suit
able to be served on gold service by
retinue Of hyered attendants comes high,
For instance, one portion Of turkey costs
FIVE dollars; aud cantaloup to begin With Il
one dollar portion, and the grapes to end
with are one dollar and fifty cents. Green
turtle soup is one dollar and twenty i've
cents a portion, and simple little salad
two dollars What would game cost Il
might leave some change from ten dollar
bill, but nothing worth talking about.
One small portion Of grouse, for example,
costs three dollars and fifty cents. Does
one care for cup Of tea lie can have
it aud welcome for sixty cents. Suppose
some bucolic longiuss come 10 our friend
from the country. The butler hooks dumb
founded at first when he asks for butter
milk, but money can DO anything, and 50
he gets a glass at the cost Of forty cents
And fees-they are always with hlm, or
rather they are always going away frum
him. The merest page would be insulIed
BY fifty-eent piece, though he might sc
willing to accept FIVE dollars--on account
1t is safe to say that to live like king
in one of these New York hotels viii eost
the one in search Of that experience at leaa
two hundred dollars day, and cheap al
that
Times have changed, indeed, in New
York city, aud money has changed them.
Less than halt century ago, when the
Fifth Avenue Hotel was opened at the
ruling rate of five dollars day for room
and board. the judicious held their hands
in horror. Men not too old now TO fash
up twenty stories in an express elevator 70
smoke their cigars on the roof-garden can
well remember the excitement caused by
the first passenger-eleyatOr TO crawl up to
the fifth story Ii was really thrilling ex-
perience, as they recall it, and good long
one, too.
Even twenty years ago 1t was an unus-
ual thing to have music with hotel din
ner, and when the Waldorf Astoria fur
nished the first adequate promenade for
hotel guests, women put on their finest IN
order to be fttingly arrayed for it. Be
fore then there was little for women to do
in hotel except sit around great barren
parlors or secrete themselves in their rooms.
These rooms, too, who does not remem-
Der their diseomforts The essentials were
all right enough, of course, but no taste
was displayed nor luxury lavished. They
were, in fact, places to sleep in, or if one
remained awake, to think of ones latter
end.
Only yesterday one paid extra for CRATE
fire in hotel room; today one sets the de-
gree of the thermometer to ones mood OF
state of health just touch the button,
and the trained officials in charge of the
hotel atmosphere will do the rest.
The difference, in fact, between this
near past of moderation and this present OF
excess is that in those days there were mil