-vis_ of the birth house of Mozart, which
offers all comforts to the meanest charges.
The next notice comes from Rastadt:--
``ADVICE OF AN HOTEL.
``The underwritten has the honour of
informing the publick that he has made
the acquisition of the hotel to the Savage,
well situated in the middle of this city.
He shall endeavour to do all duties which
gentlemen travellers can justly expect;
and invites them to please to convince
themselves of it by their kind lodgings at
his house.
``BASIL
``JA. SINGESEM.
``Before the tenant of the Hotel to
the Stork in this city.''
Whatever may be the ambition of mine
host at Pompeii, it can scarcely be the
fame of an English scholar:--
``Restorative Hotel Fine Hok,
Kept by Frank Prosperi,
Facing the military quarter
at Pompei.
That hotel open since a very few days is
renowned for the cheapness of the Apart
ments
and linen, for the exactness of the
service, and for the excellence of the true
French cookery. Being situated at proximity
of that regeneration, it will be propitious
to receive families, whatever, which
will desire to reside alternatively into that
town to visit the monuments now found
and to breathe thither the salubrity of the
air. That establishment will avoid to all
travellers, visitors of that sepult city and
to the artists (willing draw the antiquities)
a great disorder occasioned by tardy and
expensive contour of the iron whay people
will find equally thither a complete sortment
of stranger wines and of the kingdom,
hot and cold baths, stables, coach houses,
the whole at very moderated prices. Now
all the applications and endeavours of the
Hoste will tend always to correspond to
the tastes and desires of their customers
which will require without doubt to him
into that town the reputation whome, he
is ambitious.''
On the occasion of the Universal
Exhibition of Barcelona in 1888 the _Moniteur
de l'Exposition_ printed a description of
Barcelona in French, German, Spanish,
and English. The latter is so good that
it is worthy of being printed in full:--
``Then there will be in the same Barcelona
the first universal Exposition of
Spain. It was not possible to choose a
more favorable place, for the capital-
town of Catalonia is a first-rate city open
to civilization.
``It is quite out of possibility to deny it
to be the industrial and commercial capital
of the peninsula and a universal Exposition
could not possibly meet in any other
place a more lively splendour than in this
magnificent town.
``Indeed what may want Barcelona to
deserve to be called great and handsome?
Are here not to be found archeological
and architectural riches, whose specimens
are inexhaustible?
``What are then those churches whose
style it is impossible to find elsewhere,
containing altars embellished with truly
spanish magnificence, and so large and
imposing cloisters, that there feels any
man himself exceedingly small and little?
What those shaded promenades, where
the sun cannot almost get through with
the golden tinge of its rays? what this
Rambla where every good citizen of
Barcelona must take his walk at least
once every day, in order to accomplish the
civic pilgrimage of a true Catalanian?
``And that Paseo Colon, so picturesque
with its palmtrees and electric light,
which makes it like, in the evening, a
theatrical decoration, and whose ornament
has been very happily just finished?
``And that statue of Christopher
Colomb, whose installation will be
accomplished in a very short time, whose price
may be 500,000 francs?
``Are not there still a number of proud
buildings, richly ornamented, and splendid
theaters? one of them, perhaps the
most beautiful, surely the largest (it
contains 5000 places) the Liceo, is truly
a master-pice, where the spectators are
lost in admiration of the riches, the
ornaments, the pictures and feel a true
regret to turn their eyes from them to
look at the stage.
``You will see coffee houses, where have
been spent hundreds of thousands to
change their large rooms in enchanted
halls with which it would be difficult to
contest even for the palaces of east.
``And still in those little streets, now
very few, so narrow that the inhabitants
of their opposite houses can shake hands
together, do you not know that doors
may be found which open to yards and
staircases worthy of palaces?
``Do you not know there are plenty of
sculptures, every one of them masterpieces,
and that, especially the town
and deputation house contain some halls
which would make meditate all our great
masters?
``If we walk through the Catalonia-
square to reach the Ensanche, our
astonishment becomes still greater.
``In this Ensanche, a newly-born, but
already a great town, there are no streets:
there are but promenades with trees on
both sides, which not only moderate the
rays of the sun through their follage, but
purify the surrounding atmosphere and
seem to say to those who are walking
beneath their shade: You are breathing
here the purest air!
``There display the houses plenty of
the rarest sorts of marble. Out and
indoors rules marble, the ceilings of the
halls, the staircases, the yards command
and force admiration to the spectator,
who thought to see only houses and finds
monumental buildings.
``Join to that a Paseo de Gracia with
immense perspective; the promenade of
Cortes, 10 kil. long; some free squares
by day- and night-time, in which the rarest
plants and the sweetest flowers enchant
the passengers eyes and enbalm his
smell.
``Join lastly the neighbourhoods, but a
short way from the town and put on all
sides in communication with it by means
of tramways-lines and steam-tramways
too; those places show a very charming
scenery for every one who likes natural
beauties mingled with those which are
created by the genius of man.
``After that all there is Monjuich, whose
proud fortress seems to say: I protect
Barcelona: half-way the slope of the
mountain, there are Miramar, Vista
Alegre, which afford one of the grandest
panorama in the world: on the left side,
the horizon skirting, some hills which
form a girdle, whose indented tops detach
them selves from an ever-blue sky; at
the foot of those mountains, the suburbs
we have already mentioned, created for
the rest and enjoyment of man after his
accomplished duty and finished work;
on the lowest skirt Barcelona in a flame
with its great buildings, steeples, towers,
houses ornamented with flat terraces, and
more than all that, its haven, which had
been, to say so, conquered over the
Mediterranean and harbors daily in itself
a large number of ships.
``All this ideal Whole is concentrated
beneath an enchanting sky, almost as
beautiful as the sky of Italy. The climate
of Barcelona is very much like Nice, the
pretty.
``Winter is here unknown; in its place
there rules a spring, which allows every
plant to bud, every most delicate flower
to blossom, orangetrees and roses, throughout
the whole year.
``In one word, Barcelona is a magnificent
town, which is about to offer to the
world a splendid, universal Exposition,
whose success is quite out of doubt
determined.''
At the Paris Exhibition of 1889 a
_Practical Guide_ was produced for the
benefit of the English visitor, which is
written throughout in the most astonishing
jargon, as may be seen from the
opening sentences of the ``Note of the
Editor,'' which run as follows: ``The
Universal Exhibition, for whom who comes
there for the first time, is a true chaos
in which it is impossible to direct and
recognize one's self without a guide.
What wants the stranger, the visitor who
comes to the Exhibition, it is a means
which permits him to see all without
losing uselessly his time in the most part
vain researches.''
This is the account of the first
conception of the Exhibition: ``Who was
giving the idea of the Exhibition? The
first idea of an Exhibition of the
Centenary belongs in reality not to anybody.
It was in the air since several years, when
divers newspapers, in 1883, bethought
them to consecrate several articles to it,
and so it became a serious matter. The
period of incubation (brooding) lasted
since 1883 till the month of March 1884;
when they considered the question they
preoccupied them but about a National
Exhibition. Afterwards the ambition
increased. The ministery, then presided
by Mr. Jules Ferry, thought that if they
would give to this commercial and industrial
manifestation an international character
they would impose the peace not
only to France, but to the whole world.''
The Eiffel Tower gives occasion for
some particularly fine writing: ``In order
to attire the stranger, to create a great
attraction which assured the success of
the Exhibition, it wanted something
exceptional, unrivalled, extraordinary. An
engineer presented him, Mr. Eiffel, already
known by his considerable and keen
works. He proposed to M. Locroy to
erect a tower in iron which, reaching the
height of three hundred metres, would
represent, at the industrial sight, the
resultant of the modern progresses. M.
Locroy reflected and accepted. Hardly
twenty years ago, this project would have
appeared fantastic and impossible. The
state of the science of the iron
constructions was not advanced enough, the
security given by the calculations was not
yet assured; to-day, they know where
they are going, they are able to count the
force of the wind. The resistance which
the iron opposes to it. Mr. Eiffel came
at the proper time, and nevertheless how
many people have prophetized that the
tower would never been constructed.
How many critics have fallen upon this
audacious project! It was erected,
however, and one perceives it from all Paris;
it astonishes and lets in extasy the
strangers who come to contemplate it.''
The figures attached to the fountain
under the tower are comically described
as follows:--
``Europe under the lines of a woman,
leaned upon a printing press to print and
a book, seems deeped in reflections.
``America is young woman, energetic and
virginal however, characterising the youth