The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-03-13

From the New Orleans Times Democrat
 N OME-Given an unlimited bank &C., " count and the care-free life of the visitor in Rome, and few places offer so much enjoyment The modern hotels have introduced American comforts for their guests, who are largely English and Americans. The rooms are all invested with certain beauty and foreign touch so that they are unique and rather unusually attractive. In one hotel here the salons down stairs are in deep rose-red-carpets, upholstery and walls, with richly decorated ceilings, at- tractive pictures, with here and there bust or bit of sculpture; the mirrors and tables are in heavily carved and very elaborate gilt frames, long curtains of red brocade are looped back from the great windows and radiator heat and electric lights make these drawing rooms most comfortable.
 In the reading rooms a dozen or more of the leading American and London papers are on file, with several German and French papers, the Paris-New York Herald and the leading journals of Rome. The library has a very good as- sortment of novels and few other books some essays and history, and it is open to all the guests of the house without any registry, or red tape of any kind. The bookcases are always open one takes out one, or as many more volumes as he pleases, carries them to his room and keeps them as long as he likes. He is under no restrictions save those of his own sense of honor and fitness. The guests of the house are supposed to be ladies and gentlemen and as such to be trusted not to monopolize books unduly, or to be careless about returning them within reasonable time to the library. Besides these salons there is the winter garden-a pretty white and green salon with palms, a glass roof, abundance of small tables and abounding in 'cozy cor ners, where o'clock tea is served, where smoking, games or conversation can be duly enjoyed.
 The tourist life in these hotels is some thing entirely different from that of our hotel life in America. The average visitor in Rome saunters down to his morning coffee and rolls (nothing is served for
 
 and honey or marmalade) anywhere from to 9, and discusses the weather. the church feast of the day, the projected ex- curson to Tivoli or Frascati or Castle Gondolpho; the dreadful management of Italian railroads; the appalling sums he has had to pay out on his luggage from Naples, or from some more remote point; the prospect of his obtaining an audience with Plus x q observe that the more in- tensely Protestant is the guest the more intense is his anxiety to be received" by the popeD the teas he went to yester- day or will solace his afternoon with to- morrow-these are rather largely the main outline of his interests The women usual ly appear in the 75St dainty of white fancy blouses, of silk and lace, for the American tourist in Rome dresses port" with the usual perfection of the American woman After their coffee those delec- table beings who toll not, neither do they spin, stroll into the reading room, where four duplicate copies, each day, of the Paris-New York Herald are provided for their entertainment-read the news, and are then usually calling cabs to drive to their sightseeing, their shopping or their engagements.
 The lunch hour at p. m. brings them all focking back and about the social festivities set in. If you are not a guest at tea you are the hostess giving a tea It is the sacred festive hour and un- less you are "in it' you are not "it' at all, but merely wandering barbarian. Hardly even in England Is the afternoon tea so absolutely feature of life as in Rome. The driving at this season Is usually immediately after lunch, return inE by or so. for the inevitable tea. As for drives, one must take advantage of