Alexandria Gazette

Continental hotels are evidently got up by persons of considerable capital: and that the proprietors are possessed of no small degree of taste, is apparent from the elegant manner in which their establishments are embellished.—The quantity of dinner plates, knives and silver forks they possess must in some instances be immense. At Streit's, in Hamburg, for example, if each of the hundred and thirty guests above mentioned had his plate, knife and fork changed ten times during dinner. Three hundred people served on the same scale, would require three thousand plates, knives and forks: but as on such occasions the apparatus first removed is, we believe, rapidly cleaned, and again served, demand must be enormous. From all that has come under our notice, we are inclined to think foreign landlords superior, as a class, to persons in the profession in this country. They are, in fact, recruited from a higher rank in society: and generally smart looking persons, in the dress of gentlemen, they may be observed mingling familiarly, and without subserviency, among their guests. Perhaps a key to the character of these men is found in the character of their servants. No two beings in a similar occupation are more unlike each other than the garcon and the waiter. Young, active, intelligent, communicative, and obliging, the garcon is prodigiously ahead of his English prototype. Dressed in a neat dark jacket and white apron, he is the impersonation of alertness. The waiter, on the other hand, has for the most part a broken down look: he perhaps wears a shabby long coat, and shabbier waistcoat, and at best he is imitative in his attire: he is always aiming to look like a gentleman, instead of what he really is, a waiter. The garcon can never be taken for any body else than a garcon: he keeps to his professional costume, appears what he is, and is therefore invariably respectable. The garcon, however, enjoys the advantage of not being looked down upon. His occupation is not degraded, nor does it degrade its professors. A young man belonging to a respectable grade in society may be a garcon, and not lose caste: the situation of a waiter is considered to be below that of a footman. Thus esteemed, the garcon knows how to conduct himself. Nobody ever saw a garcon with a red nose, or smelling of drams. A garcon speaking thick, and having some difficulty in balancing himself, is an impossibility. The garcon does not drink: he is above such abominations. Another thing remarkable in garcons, comparing them with waiters, is their want of subserviency. The waiter bows down, almost prostrates himself before you, agrees to everything you say, no matter what nonsense you utter—always looking forward to a consideration. The vision of half-a-crown in the distance will make him submit to any species of indignity. The garcon is respectful, but never in the least subservient he will commence a conversation, and chat agreeably on a number of pleasant things. We often got a good deal of information out of the garcon: for, besides observation, many of them have read the best authors of their country.

English writers rarely speak any other language than their mother tongue. The great majority of garcons speak at least two languages many of them manage to have three—French, German and English: and on a late occasion we discovered one who spoke six—French, German, English, Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian. The very acquisition of foreign tongues marks the earnest diligence and professional anxiety of the garcon. A gentleman of our acquaintance, who was lately stopping in a hotel at Strasburg, noticed that the garcon spoke English remarkably well, though in a formal way; on asking how he had acquired the language, he replied by stating that he had for some time studied it daily under a master, between the hours of five and six in the morning, and eleven and twelve at night, such being the only time he was disengaged.' —Could a more striking or pleasing instance be found of the pursuit of knowledge under difficulties' It may convince the young that where there is a will 'there is a way' that even the impediment of late hours at labor is not always a valid excuse for ignorance.

Many garcons acquire foreign languages by serving in the hotels of countries distant from home. —The Germans are most addicted to this practice. A lad who comes out as a garcon in Vienna or Berlin does not consider himself proficient till he has served for a year or two in a hotel in Paris, and as long in London, or some of our provincial cities. A few weeks ago while residing in a hotel at Leamington, we were waited on by a native of Baden. He mentioned that his father was a person in respectable circumstances in the Black Forest: that he had left his home to qualify himself for the situation of chef des garcons: first having served in a Parisian hotel for two years, he now had come to England for the sake of the language. He spoke French fluently: and already, though only a few months in the country, by dint of observation and hard study. He expressed himself in English with wonderful propriety. This young man spoke compassionately of the degradation to which a garcon's exposed in English hotels. In France or Germany," said he, a garcon has a precise duty to perform that of attending on guests: but in England a waiter is expected to help to shake carpets clean windows, scour knives and do many other menial services: a foreign garcon coming here to learn the language feels that to be very disagreeable." Of course we sympathised with this migratory garcon, so far from home, and wished he might rise to be a chef, if not an actual hotel keeper in his own country.

The English flatter themselves with the idea, that wherever they go on the continent, improved hotel usages follow in their train. They have certainly introduced tea in many places, nor will we deny that their dragooning as to certain points in cleanliness has had its effect. But the true missionary of English comfort is the wandering garcon. Coming to England, and seeing a multiplicity of oils and ends essential for cleanliness and comfort in our system of living, he carries away a knowledge of them to his own country, and at the first opportunity effects their introduction into hotels. Acquainted with what the English like, he tries to please them. In this way foreign hotels have added various English comforts to their own peculiar arrangements.

It is at the table d'hote that the garcon is seen exhibiting his proficiency as a waiter. One of his clevernesses consists in carrying a tray covered with dishes on the palm of his hand, and this, elevated above his shoulder, he brings into the saloon as soon as the guests are seated for dinner. A troop of garcons, carrying trays poised on the upturned hand, is a sight worth seeing. The most accomplished practitioners whom we have seen are the garcons in the Hotel de Flandre, at Brussels, where, apropos of table d'hotes, about the very best and cheapest dinner in Europe is to be obtained. It is impossible to go through the operation of dinner here without acknowledging that John Bull is still vastly behind in the arts of cooking and eating. And why will not John take a lesson from the French' Is it not monstrous that you should pay the good and sufficient sum of three shillings at an English hotel for a beef steak, or a slice from a leg of mutton in either case called dinner: while at any hotel in France or Flanders (where markets are as high as in England) you will get a choice of twenty dishes for less money? The charge for dinner at the table d'hote of the Hotel de Flandre is three francs and just look what sort of a dinner it is. The following dishes were one day served round—Soup, 1st course—soles of braun, mutton chops dressed, fricandeau of veal, volau-vent sweetbreads, breast veal, roast lamb, stewed pigeons, stewed fowls, goose liver, (a most recherché dish, which we tasted for the first time.) salad, ham, creils, (a kind of very small toasts,) dressed peas, cauliflower, new potatoes, Italian cream, straw berries, pudding, cherries, preserved ginger, cheese and various sweetmeats and cakes.

Such a dinner as this, paraded at any London tavern, would cost ten or twelve shillings a-head, and set the English survey or would probably have but a small profit. The wonderful cheapness and profusion of the table-d'hote dinners is traceable to one circumstance—the French do not cook large joints: the trick of their fine dinners lies in preparing small dishes —a little of this and a little of that—just so much as will be eaten. When a large dinner is served in England, the house has cold meat and hashes which we detest—for a week— Would it not be a great saving, and more consistent with common sense, to cook only what is likely to be used? At present, variety is sacrificed for the sake of huge expensive joints, the bulk of which leave the table not the tenth part eaten.

One more last word on dinners. According to the continental plan, all the dishes are first We hear any one utter the other landed news, who are continually going about for the purpose. A dinner of this sort, in good houses, lasts about an hour and a half. Go we to a moment compare these methods of carving and England, where amid the hurry-scurry and confusion, every one is glad to get anything that can be got at his plate, or which some good natured soul is willing to carve for the sake of his neighbors? At such dinners we have known half a guinea paid for what was not worth a shilling or eighteen pence. One cannot but wonder that the English, with all their profound sagacity in the matter of the stomach, should continue to tolerate these stupidities. As all so childish now succeed whose fame begins with duels, we propose the institution of an Anti-ball public dinner Association.--(Londoners Jour.)