Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1916-09-12
New York a La Carte
BY Frederic \. Haskir

New York, Sept. 8. Eating is here
classified as sport. Dinner. which
is regarded as necessity to be sat
| isfled in the least possible time west
Of the Mississippi and largely as a
family affair south of the Potomac,
here becomes public amusement cap
,, italized at millions. Broadway, If you
can visualize the number Of restaur.
ants along. above and beneath it, is
seen as one immense feeding trough
where tens of thousands nightly gath
! er from the ends Of the earth.
The typical Broadway cabaret, from
the little one in the cellar, where a
couple Of retired chorus girls form the
entertainment feature, to the big one
on the roof. which has enough. song
and dance people to equip musical
comedy for the road. Is primarily a
system for helping the ubiquitous tin
Grant, to part from his change. The
man from somewhere else goes there
in the expectation Of being thrilled
and shocked by the night life of the
great white way, and sees little be-
sides himself in all his amazing var.
iety
But move away from Broadway. pen.
citrate inland from that main river of
the transients, land you will find that
dining is still ceremony and sport
wherever you 60. There are eating
places for every taste, pocketbook and
nationality, every degree of vice and
virtue, eating places that appeal to
every foible and weakness. i,
IT, for example, you share the al
most universal desire to consort with
, the wealthy, you can achieve the SEN
sation, If not the fact, by going to one
of those pompous Fifth Avenue places
where "subdued elegance" is the pre-
vailing note. The manner of the head
waiter the color of the furniture, the
music of the orchestra, the speed of
the service, everything except the
cost, Is extremely subdued. You can
dine in serene, attenuated and osten-
tatious boredom, your only amuse.
:ment being to look at and speculate
about the squeer exhibits that inhabit
the place. There are all sorts and
they are hard to classify You know
that the reputation Of the establish
ment is due to, the presence of some
OF them. and that the presence of 9th
ers Is due to the reputation of the
establishment. But it is hard to tell
who Is which.
The next step in your astronomical
wanderings will probably be trip in.
to the historical. The modern New
Yorker Is a crank on the subject of old
New York. 1t is hard to discover just
exactly what old New York is, or
what period Is thereby denoted, but at
any rate there are whole Libraries On
the subject, and societies organized to
study it; and like everything else in
New York, it has been capitalized and
converted into eating places How
that mythical being, the Old New
Yorker, may have talked and walked
and worked and amused himself Is a
matter for research and speculation,
but his restaurants have been album
dainty preserved and restored. You
can breakfast just off Fifth Avenue in
q dilapidated inn, the walls OF which
are fairly bedizened with relics of the
departed great; you can lunch in
tavern where George Washington
stopped, and take your afternoon tea
in a genuine Colonial coffee house,
where the local color consists Of
number of long mirrors, some very
authentic looking old oil paintings IN
which the figures are shrouded in
deep gloom. and corps Of genuine in
digenous mattresses. speaking good
English and clad in costumes Of some
period indeterminate but obviously re-.
mote. Most of these placesS however,
are only a little off the beaten track,
and you can tell at glance that ma
jority of the patrons are in your own
class. 49, @
Determined still to discover the
truly exotic phases of New York. if
you have sound digestion and truly
adventurous spirit, your next assault
will probably be upon the foreign table
d hote. You will climb the time worn
steps of an.old brownstone front and
pass through, the hallway and recep.
ton room, into what was once the
backyard of some respectable citizen,
but is now dignified by the, name OF
summer garden. Here you are GER
tainly in an atmosphere remote from
Broadway. The walters speak no Eng.
fish, and good many Of the patrons
chatter and gesticulate in some alien
language, putting their immense black
bottles Of red wine on the ground be.
side their chairs. But here too, is the
inevitable rubberneck. the man who
like yourself, doesn't really belong and
can neither tell what the, dishes ara
nor ask the walter. Furthermore,
that wild bchemianism that you read
about is still lacking. The place is as
orderly as Sunday school The,
worst shock you receive Is when the