Year: 1873

NEWPORT. July II, 1879.


It Is one of the characteristic surs which tho
Saturday Rer;c,p casts upon the watering place
correspondent, that he will insist upon being jolly
and brilliant. No matter how depressing may be
the circumstances by which he 10 surrounded; no
matter how the season may nag, and the hotels
langush, and the drives grow barren, anu the
amusements pan, and the loitercrs dwnde on the
beach, your typical watering place correspondent
says the above mentioned censor always deems 1t
incumbent upon himself to be amusing. And what
II he does The ambition Is very laudablc so long
as the writer succeeds in carrying it out, and
long as he does so in the right direction And 1t
must be owned that watering place life, in the
main, whether in this country or Europe, gener-
ally affords sufficient opportunities for his
purpose. For the last twenty years there
has generally been something interesting
and pleasant to be said of most OF the
resorts OF this kind. Whether you wandered


amcng the splendid gambling hells OF Baden
Baden or the eccentric Swiss baths and the equally
unique ones in the slender valleys OF the Pyrenees;
whether you lost yourself in the dolce nente or


LuCca and Castellamarc or visited any OF the
quaint little resorts scattered over England or
plunged into T0plitz HeigOand or Ischl, or, finally


whether you cOn.ented' yourself at home and
restricted yourself to Saratoga or Newport there
was always something to be seen and generally
something to be written. But this year, so far as
Newport is concerned, seems TO be the exception,
and 1t would be pleasant to those who have de-
hghtful memories OF what this renowned old
watering place used to be to be able justly to
ascribe Its present failure in charms to GER
tain vague peculiaritics OF the season
easier, perhaps, to feel than to analyze. Every
hotel proprietor In the place admits that
the present Is far, one OF the dullest
mil pf xrhic
memory bears record The beating of your own
heart and the breaking OF the waves are almost
the only sounds you hear, excepting perhaps, the
occasional roll OF carriage in front OF the hotel
and the staccato clang OF the electric bell. There
are no balls and no flashing toilets; no stunning
equipages and very few dashlng bellies The three
principal hotels of the place-the Ocean House,
the Atlantic and AqGidnick-are not much more
than half lull. The expectant visitor who has
1rantlcally telegraphed for rooms finds himself in
much the sane situation as the gentleman VINO
breathessly rushed to secure a seat at the late
Robert HOudin's farewell performance In Man.
chester The gentleman attacked the box office
furiously, purchased his ticket in o transport,
scarcely took time to pocket the change, and,
bursting past the astonished doorkeeper, scarcely
hoping to be able to elbow his way to his
seat, found himself In vast audi
torium, occupied by an audience OF twol
Newport Is not quite so bad as this, but the one
thing suggests the other. There has been much
cooi weather that people have deferred their ocean
visits TO later date than usual. 1t is not necessary
to argue, from the paucity OF the present season,
that this pretty and celebrated little watering
place is in a state or decadence. That has been az
1rmed of il often without truth, that its friends
can afford TO laugh at the slander now. But still,
picture to yourself the scene, and then say whether
Or not it is particularly cxhi!arating. All watering
place life is, in essential characteristics, the same


breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper at much the
same hours. and between them nothing to do but
to Kill time in any manner deemed best, the ladies
to sit on the pazzas and eye each otscr's dresses
and read the latest novel, the gentlemen to repair
TO the fishing banks or the billiard room. Those
who battle meet together in general rendezvous at
eleven, just In time to manufacture, between
breeze and brine, splendid SPIRIT and appetite for
the next meal. But you pa urally associate
with all this ideas OF vivaciy, motion, brilliancy
and liyeliness. You hear In imagination the voice
OF society mingling with the thunder OF the ocean,
the rustle OF fashion with the gigantic murmurs OF
the deep. Many OF the shivering and lively phases
6f humanity YOU expect to sec, set OIL and framed
by sort Of rectangle OF the elements All that Is
to said is that at Newport this fancy is rot ac-
tualized. There is a hush on all things. Even the
roar OF the ocean seems scarcely roar any longer.
III appears 10 come OuJ vi tHc sed SueIi VI
going into it. The colored driver VINO waits with
his wagon to drive you to the fishing ground looks
lugubrious, through lack OF orders. lie offers in.
ducements OF bass and tautog to you In vain, and
drives with melancholy meekness to one hotel
after the other, standing shyiy % on the opposite
side of the road, whence lie casts reproachlul and
despairing gances at the hotel windows, mGch
after the manner Of an organist who has given his
pennyworth OF opera tune without receiving
the penny. The very walters go about softly as
II there was some body dead In the next ROOM 1ne
voice OF the hotei Clerk has peDsive accent as he
inauires the number OF your room, Tor which you
have been paying $S per day, and the very barber
who shaves you sharpens his razor with deep
seated detection, which sets your teeth on edge,
though not calculated to give one to the instru-
ment There is a funeral vacancy In the dining
room The unoccupied walters, about onc-hall the
entire number, stand in melancholy ranks, looking
as Though their ricnest relatives had died and lett
them nothing. 1t is easy to see that the watering
place Rachel is crying for her children, because
they refuse TO come forth In the proper NUMBERS.
You go down to breakfast and ind, perhaps,
1orty people seated at twenty tables, which would
accommodate about nve times as many. Things
are, perhaps, little better at dinner and about
tse same at tea. But even at dinner there
that sensu0us display OF dress for
which watering-placc fashion and fcminnty have
been, time out OF mind, renowned. Where are
those ravishlng toilets that Worth might have
invented and that the little troop Of per lodcals