The Birmingham age-herald., 1910-12-18
HOSPITALITY IN
 FOREIGN LANDS Different Ways of Entertain
 ing Guests AN ITALIAN EVENING Sofa Seat in Germnny--At n Turkish Reception-Unhappy Breakfast in Grecian Home-Disap-
 pointing Inn


 A celebrated French lady at home in every city in Europe recently wrote a very clever book in which she criticised the various forms of hospitality as prac- ticed by society all over the continent. In no country in the world. she finally summed up, is the difficult art of enter taining so thoroughly understood and so well carried through, as in our own right little, tight little islandr
 l Personally, I think the Americans sur rass us in the art. They lay their time, | their motors and their intellects at the | feet of any wandering globe trotter who | happens to possess a letter of introduc- l tion. We English on the other hand only we have met and tried and not found wanting; we are not good at promiscuous | good fellowship, whatever one French ad- mirer may say to the contrary.
 l It is amazing what a deal of difference the sea makes between us and our Euro Iean brethren That briny boundary has l indeed made us a race apart in manners, customs and ideas. Our lavish hospitality when we are really stirred up to show ourselves at our best leaves our foreign friends gaping at our extravagance. | I remember being invited years ago to bass the evening with an Italian Contessa | and her two daughters. l expected din- l ner, as did the other members of my | Earty, but no dinner appeared. Appar- ently our hostess had dined earlier in the day. At about half-past nine the folding doors of the gilded salon were thrown open and two magnificent f1unkies ap- pcared. One bore tray on which was an apparently golden goblet and three small cups of priceless china. The other carried a salver on which reposed cakes of all descriptions Solemnly, in almost legal state, they advanced to the Con tessa, while our fainting spirits slowly revived.
 Rowing stiffly, these stuffed cffigies Of men poured out some thick, nauseous looking chocolate and handed it and the cakes exclusively to our hostess and her two daughters, ignoring our starving presence altogether. Then the doors closed upon them, and we. hungry and half fainting, saw them no more. As soon as we decently could we quilted this scene of open handed revelry and has, tened to solace and sustain our dropping bodies at the nearest restaurant where solid and satisfying food could be bought. That example was certainly not qnite what the English nation would describe as generous hospitality. As matter of fact Italians as a rule are not given to much social intercourse in the way or small or friendly dinners. One big squash a year where all the world or at least the world of their special clique, are invited to listen to choice music and to discuss ha lot Int da1 ic their limit Their lat home" days arc held in the public gardens like in the Pincio at Rome, where carriage calls are made and the affairs of nations dis cussed Thus the Italians keep them selves "au courant'' of all that is going on, and no extra expense is incurred in the way of cakes and cream, etc.
 In Germany one is invited to kaffee klatsches, where coffee and the most mar vellous cream cakes of all sorts are handed round, cakes that melt crearniy iD one's mouth. They are indeed ambrosial. But being horribly absent-minded and seldom the person of greatest consequence in the room I have over and over again caused terrible futter in the dovecotes | by marching right away to the sofa and calmly seating myself and making myself | quite comfortable. only to be removed, either tactfully or otherwise, as every | one who has traveled in Germany at all knows that the sofa seat, like the seat facing the horses in a carriage, is re- served for the chief guest, or at least | for that woman who has earned her coun- try's appreciation by the fiery trail of matrimony.
 One can imagine the almost blasphe- nous presumption of an unimportant spnster who dares to nestle down costly into such seat. l have given up visiting in Germany experiences of this kind have completely destroyed my nerve.
 While I was staying in Damascus the marriage of the daughter of Turk of the upper classes took place. An urgent invition was sent across the way to our hotel to come and join in the fun. We were warned that direct refusal would
 hurt the feelings of our hospitable host and hostess, so on the second day of the
 feast we donned our travel spoiled best and crossed the road to the scene of the | fray
 We passed through two rooms filled
 with chattering crowds and across a
 courtyard in which the 'tomtoms" or
 some analogous instrument of torture
 walled and hummed all day long. We
 were finally escorted into a room thick
 with tobacco smoke and filled with women
 most gorgeously dressed lying around the
 room on couches. We bowed vaguely
 having no idea who our hostess might be,
 and as we did not possess word of
 Turkish, and our hostess. blazing with
 diamonds. did not possess a word of Eng
 fish, matters came to a. standstill while
 all interpreter was fetched.
 The Turkish ladies in the meantime
 gathered around us and examined our
 faces carefully, the way we did our hair
 and our clothes; apparently from their
 gestures and the way they jabbered
 among themselves they did not reckon
 much on any of them.
 Finally young girl arrived who had
 been to a school where English was
 taught She asked us various questions,
 which she interpreted. along with the answers, 10 an admiring audience, and
 all the time the most nauseous looking sweetmests and cigarettes were being
 passed around and pressed upon us, and,
 horrors of horrors, we were expected to eat our fill. The cigarettes were excel
 lent, but intermixed with those sweet
 meats and that awful coffee the result
 was disastrous. was III for days after that example of Turkish hospitality
 When the curiosity about us began tc wanc and flicker out our interpreters asked us if we would like to see the bride. She had retired. worn out by
 the noise and the excitement, to bed in
 the hsrem, and there we found her, a
 mere child, fast asleep in q room over
 looking the courtyard where the tom , tom players kept ID their most internal , din. Behind her pillow reposed red cushion with fez upon 1t to show that
 she was the exclusive property of q
 Turk.
 One other example experienced oi
 Hospitality fin the seats of the mighty. vas travelling through the Levant afic p fpfFa6lCfinn n 4