SIMPSON’S DIVAN.
A Characteristic English Restaurant.—A good, plain, thoroughly wholesome English dinner is served in an appetizing way by English waiters at Simpson’s, in the Strand, next door to Terry’s Theatre, opposite Exeter Hall. You get a bowl of good soup, a course of fish, a cut from the joint, a salad, two kinds of vegetables, with bread and butter, a biscuit and a bit of rich Gorgonzola or dry Wiltshire cheese to wind up with, and your whole bill will be four shillings, to which add threepence for “attendance,” which is charged in the bill, and about threepence more which you will hand to the waiter. A feature of the place is that the hot joint, over a chafing dish and on a small table, is wheeled round to you, and it is there cut before your eyes and transferred to your plate. You can get a lower-priced dinner in London, and higher-priced dinners where you please, but none of a better quality and none that is more satisfactory unless you demand fancy fol de rols, indigestible entrées and French dishes made of little or nothing.
Simpson’s is justly celebrated for its “fish” dinners. Both these and the meal above described are served in the middle of the day and in the evening also. On Sunday the evening dinner only is served; the place is closed until 6 P.M.
Simpson’s enjoys the patronage of Henry Irving and of other people famous in the theatrical world, just as it did in the last century. Henry Irving’s Lyceum Theatre, by the way, is in the Strand, near Simpson’s, but on the opposite side of the street. In the summer of 1890 I saw D’Oyly Carte enjoying his dinner at Simpson’s. This is a special compliment to the place, because that magnificent hotel, the Savoy, in which this theatrical manager is interested, is just around the corner from Simpson’s, on the Thames Embankment. During the summer of ’91 I met at Simpson’s another theatrical manager, our own Augustin Daly, with his wife. Mr. and Mrs. Daly occasionally left the Hotel Métropole, where they had apartments, to partake of one of Simpson’s substantial, well-cooked and appetizing meals. There’s no Simpson now, the founder died long ago, but “Simpson’s” is there yet, as it was a hundred years ago, although it is now a limited company. Howard Paul eulogizes this place, and Stephen Fiske recommends it. Besides being a brilliant writer on dramatic matters, Mr. Fiske has made a study of the gastronomic art, and he lived in London continuously during nine years. The reading public put faith in Stephen Fiske’s dramatic criticism; his intimates also trust to his good taste and judgment in ordering a dinner.
It is a well-known fact that changes in the employees at this establishment are seldom made. Some of the waiters have stood at the tables for nearly two decades, and the head waiter has been there (probably not always as head waiter) for more than thirty years. The name of this head water is Charles Flowerdew, so he informed me, and I can impart this piece of information—that this same Flowerdew is a character worth studying. There is nothing of the “Yellowplush” type about him, but he is such a character, courteous and civil (yes, seemingly servile to an American’s eye), such as Dickens delighted to draw.
Mr. Flowerdew knows all the old customers at Simpson’s, and, what is of more consequence to a hungry man, he knows all the choice cuts. He will suggest the best dishes, the rare bits, and he will serve you from the joint, ad libitum, as he proudly remarks. When next you go to London, go to Simpson’s, 103 Strand. You will be sure to meet a few London notabilities, you will be sure of a good dinner, and last, but by no means least, you will see the polite and dignified Mr. Charles Flowerdew. Managing director, E. W. Cathie.
RAILWAY TRAVELLING IN ENGLAND.
While our facilities in railway travelling have wonderfully improved in the past ten years, it must not be supposed that in conservative England they have stood still entirely. But the improvements in carriage accommodation there have been so steady and gradual that passengers hardly recognize how much more they get for their money now than they did a generation back. For instance, the old first-class carriage of forty years ago was fifteen feet long, six and a half feet broad, and less than five feet high, and this was constructed to seat eighteen passengers; in other words, each person had about twenty-six cubic feet of space. In the carriages built to-day to accommodate ten first-class passengers, each one has ninety cubic feet.
Nor because we in America have such luxurious Pullman and vestibuled cars must it be imagined that the English railway carriages have not comforts and luxuries of their own. Some of them, for example, are built to seat only two or three persons, thus securing complete privacy to a party of that number.
I have never occupied a more comfortable railway carriage than in going, as I did, last September, from Edinburgh to London over the lines of the Caledonian and London and Northwestern railways, on the world-famous train called the “Flying Scotchman”—and a flyer it is. The distance is four hundred miles, and it is run in eight and one-half hours. You leave Edinburgh at 10.15 A.M. and reach Euston square before 7 P.M. As there are several important stations between the two cities at which long stops are made, the train must make between many of the stations much more than fifty miles an hour. The speed was so great at times that it caused unusual vibration, and at times it gave me a slight reminder of sea-sickness.
The carriage was built to seat two persons only. In it there were two large, softly-upholstered, sleep-inviting arm-chairs, one on each side of the car. Between the two chairs at the back was a door leading to a lavatory for the sole use of the two passengers. It was supplied with iced water, washing water, towels, mirror and all the etceteras and conveniences that are desirable in travelling. The car had in all six windows—two at each side and two in front. Between the two front windows was a handsomely-framed bevelled mirror. The floor was richly carpeted and the carriage was supplied with a number of brass brackets and hooks for the travellers’ impedimenta. But more than this—across the front, breast high, was a shelf about six inches wide to hold books and papers, and below this another shelf about the same width for a foot-rest.
The carriage was seven feet square and seven feet high. Here a man and wife or two friends can make themselves about as comfortable as if they were at home in their own drawing-room. You exchange your shoes for slippers, don your smoking jacket and if your companion does not object, you can enjoy a fragrant Havana. To be sure this is against the rules of the company and your indulgence in the weed would cost you forty shillings if you were found out, but the distances are great and the stops few on this “flying Scotchman,” so there is ample time to enjoy a smoke undisturbed. No extra fare is demanded for this most luxurious vehicle; it is simply ranked as a first-class carriage, but you had better write to the station master and engage such a carriage a day or two in advance of your intended journey, for not more than one of these small private cars is by chance attached even to a “flying Scotchman.” No extra charge is made for this engagement in advance.
The complaint years ago that passengers were locked in the cars can seldom now be made. The custom is almost entirely abolished; it caused so many accidents. The aim of each and every passenger on a British railway is to secure a seat with his back to the engine. In this way he avoids draughts of air: draughts from a bottle they never object to. In fact both men and women drink often and deeply during a journey, but it does not seem to affect them.
Time tables are not given away as with us: the charge is a penny, two cents. You never hear “all aboard” at railway stations, but the much pleasanter sounding words, “take your seats, please.”