Just such a place is the new bar in the rue Duphot, a somewhat pretentious little room smartly appointed and crowded nightly. Another is in a corner opposite the Madeleine, its narrow interior dazzling at night in a profusion of yellow brocade and electricity. Such bars as these are of the newer class, but there are others far more attractive in their simplicity, such as the one in the rue du Helder and in the rue Taitbout and the old London bar in the rue Lysly, and others in the rue St. Honoré and in the rue Louis-le-Grand, yet in none of these has the character remained unchanged, for some of them have had a dozen new proprietors in the last five years.
A most excellent establishment is Henry’s bar in the rue Volnay, the most American in its type existing in Paris. It is patronized by old and young from the incoming steamers. If you wish to shut out Paris from your mind, drop in at Henry’s any afternoon at five; it is precisely as tho you had been magically transported back to the Hoffman House.
You will hear Southern colonels there still harping on the war, and shrewd politicians from up York State telling personal anecdotes of Mr. Platt, you will find well-groomed men dropping in for a friendly cocktail before dinner, and you will learn all about the fall business in ladies’ “plain velours,” the button trust, the latest details of the corner on babies’ caps, and how Max Dindlehoofer held up Poughkeepsie with a new brand of champagne brut—but all this is not Parisian and we may dismiss it.
The annual invasion of foreigners supports the big hotels and the shops of the rue de la Paix and the adjacent neighborhood, but the foreigner makes little impression upon the average Parisian, who regards the coming of the “étranger” as a small incident in the life of his beloved city. He passes him unconsciously as one passes the corner of his street.
A QUIET HOUR
“They come and go and we are not conscious of them,” said a Parisian to me. “Besides,” he added, “there are tens of thousands of Parisians whose daily life is confined to the quartiers in which they live—big sections of the city where the foreigner seldom finds himself.”
If you wish to see every type of Parisian go by in an endless stream of swarming humanity, seat yourself upon any of the terrasses of the grand cafés that line the sides of the grand Boulevards stretching from the Madeleine to the Théâtre du Gymnase. It is of all Paris the most frequented—the broad highway of this vast city into which pour the inhabitants of thousands of connecting byways.
Its stones are worn by the tramp and scuffle of countless thousands pausing to gaze at the crowded terrasses or to stop for an apéritif. The system with which these popular terrasses are managed by the generals and their lieutenants in charge of an army of hurrying waiters is perfect. These head-waiters in command of the sidewalk portion of these establishments will note your arrival and departure with the quickness with which a telephone operator detects the dropping of one of a thousand numbers on a central switchboard. During the rush you can spend hours over a six sous bock, but when you leave, your table will be filled before you have mingled with the passing stream of humanity in front.
