SALUBRITIES ABROAD.
Hotel Continental, Royat.—Our party here (which, somehow or another, Puller has contrived to get together and introduce to each other by the simple means of inducing M. Hall to give us a room to ourselves for a small table-d'hôte at the un-Royat-like hour of 7.30) consists of La Contessa Casanova, the English wife of an Italian merchant, the head of a large house of business in London—she is Marchesa or Contessa, I am not certain which, but Puller styles her Miladi and Madame. She is devoted to the serious Drama, and her pet subject is Salvini in Othello. Her daughter, an elegant young English girl, lively, amusing, and with a bias in favour of the very lightest forms of theatrical entertainment.
Then we have Madame Metterbrun and her daughters, Anglo-Germans, thorough musicians, with Wagner at their fingers' ends,—literally, as they are accomplished pianists. There is Mrs. Dinderlin, who was here last year, and is taking the waters seriously, and who knows when to put in the right word at the right moment. Cousin Jane who is taking the waters still more seriously and who is an excellent listener: myself an impartial referee: and Puller the Solicitor out for a holiday, who is alternately in the highest of spirits or the lowest depths of depression, according as the waters and weather affect him. Outside our party there are others whom I meet occasionally, consisting of the lady who finds fault with everything French, the gentleman who laughs at everything French, the grumbler whom nothing satisfies, the contented man who is pleased with everything, the man who after being here a day is intensely bored, the man who from the moment of his arrival is always studying Guide-books and indicateurs to see what is the best and easiest way of getting away again: the patient who has come all the way here to see the Doctor and then refuses to do anything he tells him: the patient who has come to find out what on earth is the matter with him: the man who doctors himself, and two or three ladies of my acquaintance of whom I only catch occasional glimpses as they issue from Sedan-chairs or muffled up like the Turkish women, merely recognise me with their eyes, incline their heads and pass on their way with a little drinking-glass in their hands.
To me Royat is an amusing place: it is certainly a pretty one, and its waters in most cases are decidedly of lasting benefit. What those "most cases" are, the patients themselves best know.
For expanse there is nothing like the sea, and for grandeur the snow mountains. Unless I go up to the Puy de Dôme—which I do not mean to do, for I have been up there once, and never, never, never will go there again—I cannot see either. And even from the top of the Puy you can only discern the sea, or Mont Blanc, with a very good glass, on a very clear day.
M. Boisgobey's description of a Parisian Club in his latest book (I delight in Boisgobey now that there is no Gaboriau) called Grippe-Soleil will amuse London Club members. The only two Clubs in Paris I ever saw were not a bit like Boisgobey's description.
When anyone who has been under treatment a week, unexpectedly meets a friend here, he stops short, stares at him, examines him from head to foot, and then exclaims, in a tone of utter astonishment, "What!! you here!!" as if the new arrival were either an intruder or a lunatic. The person thus addressed immediately retorts in an injured tone, "Well, what on earth are you here for?" and then he adds maliciously, "there doesn't seem to be much the matter with you." Now to say this is to utter your deliberate opinion that the person you are addressing is at Royat (or any other Salubrity Abroad wherever it may be) under the false pretence of being an invalid, and is therefore, to put it plainly, a shammer, an impostor.
After this greeting, explanations follow. The first man has to prove his right to be at Royat, and the second man has to admit the evidence to be incontestable, on the condition, implied but not expressed, of his own case being taken as thoroughly warranting his taking the baths and traitement generally at Royat.
Then comes the question of Doctors. "Who shall decide when Doctors disagree?"—but who shall decide when patients disagree about Doctors? "Whom do you go to?" asks the suffering Smith of the invalid Brown. "Well," says Brown, apologetically,—because he is not sure, this being his first visit, that he might not have gone to a better man, "I go to Dr. Chose," and noticing the astonishment depicted on his friend's face, he hastens to explain, "Squills sent me to him." The suffering Smith professes himself puzzled to know why on earth Squills always sends his patients to Chose. "Dr. Rem's the man for you, my boy," says Smith. But Brown feels that he is in the toils of Squills, and that it would not be fair to him or to Chose, if he suddenly left the latter and sought the advice of Dr. Rem, on the sole recommendation of Smith who, after all, is not a professional.
Then two habitués meet. "I always go to Chose," says eczematic Jones, dogmatically, "first-rate fellow, Chose. All the French go to him. They know." "Ah!" returns gouty Robinson, with conviction, "I never have been to anyone but Rem. He's the chap. All the English go to him. Best man in Royat." And if it weren't the hour for one of them to go and drink Eugénie water, and for the other to take his second glass of St. Mart, they would have a row and come to blows.
Puller tells me that there's one London Doctor, describing himself as a Gynæcologist ("A guinea-cologist," parenthetically remarks Puller), who always sends his patients here. I think he says his name is Dr. Barnes. "He sends so many," says Puller, "that I propose changing the name of the place from Royat-les-Bains into Royat-les-Barnes." I see why he introduced the name of Barnes. Fortunately he is so delighted with this jeu de mot, which I fancy I've heard before, that he is off to tell his friends in the Parc, and, as I pass a group, I overhear him explaining the point of it to a French lady and her husband, with whom he has a speaking acquaintance. For Puller likes what he calls "airing his French," and is not a bit shy.
The Band is performing another new tune! How is this? I can account for it. It rained nearly all yesterday, and so the musicians didn't come out. How did they occupy themselves? In rehearsal. Well here's one good effect of rain at Royat, it brings out the new tunes.