Asuncion has several fair hotels; the best in my estimation being the Hotel Hispano-Americano, the property of the firm of Rius & Jorba which is rented to the present proprietors, the Grau Brothers, two Spaniards, to the tune of ten dollars a day, which, for Asuncion, is an exorbitant sum. This hotel is not recommended to strangers by the natives for the innate jealousy that the average South American has for the Spaniard, who is his business superior, is not lacking in Paraguay. The foreigners recommend to the stranger the Hotel Saint-Pierre, a French hotel, or the Cancha (formerly the Gran Hotel del Paraguay), a stock company hotel under German management.
The Hispano-Americano was built by the dictator, Francisco Solano Lopez for his mistress, Madame Elisa Lynch, and here he lived with her and here were his offsprings by her brought up. As I lay in my bed, or walked the arched galleries of this edifice, I could nearly see the festivities, banquets, and parties that took place in the great salon (now the dining room) fifty-three years ago, hear the laughter of the beautiful women in hoop skirts and the popping of corks of champagne bottles, and smell the somniferous perfume of the ñandeyara-guazús (high grade Paraguayan cigars) as their aroma was wafted upwards with the smoke. Visions came to me of officers, their uniforms resplendent with epaulettes and gold braid, brave men who met valiant deaths on the field of battle or through exposure in the soggy palmetto and mangrove swamps of the interior, of foreign diplomats, of dark, beautiful women wearing delicate, luxuriant ñanduti lace shawls, of the short and corpulent bearded dictator with the perpetual strong cigar between his lips, and of the Irish asp, his mistress, whose power and influence upon her naturally progressive and ambitious paramour was greater than that of Theodora on Justinian. J. F. Masterman in his Seven Years' Adventures in Paraguay states that Madame Lynch could drink more champagne than any person he ever knew and not seem to feel any effects therefrom. I would like to have matched her in a contest with a friend of mine, now dead, whom I saw drink six quarts of champagne one after another standing at a bar in San Francisco one evening in September, 1910.
The Hispano-Americano is a large structure two stories high of imposing appearance on a corner of Calle Palmas, the main street. It is well situated for it is near all the banks, business houses, and government buildings. It has a large patio paved with black and white tiles, where the dining tables are placed. Bedrooms open off from this patio. On each side of the entrance thirty-four marble steps lead up to the second story which has a balcony surrounding the patio, the arches of which are supported by stone Doric columns. Onto this balcony open tile-floored, high, and cool bedrooms. The balcony is paved with brick and from it rise more Doric columns surmounted by arches which support the roof. There is a second patio, this one open, which is reached by a short hall behind the first patio. On this are the cheaper rooms. On my former visit this hotel was not well kept up nor overclean, but now it was all that could be desired and the Paraguayan cooking, with its abundance of oil, peppers, tomatoes, and hot sauces, was excellent.
The proprietors own two Case automobiles, and one evening as I sat in conversation with the Señor Grau, who assumes the active management of the hotel, he suggested that I should take a ride with him for a couple of hours. This was fine and I hastened to accept. The machine was brought in front of the door, Grau and myself had got into it, when the assistant manager came out and said something in an undertone to Grau. The latter replied in a loud voice:
"Give everybody a room that asks for one except the Spanish consul. Give him nothing."
I thought this was queer but said nothing, thinking that later on Grau would explain what was up. He did not do so, however, until we returned which was about ten o'clock at night. There were about a dozen people in front of the hotel; on the threshold stood a tall, thin, good-looking man about thirty-five years old, dressed in black. When Grau got out this man approached him and said:
"What is the matter with this fellow?" pointing at the assistant manager. "He refuses to give me a room."
"My instructions!" bellowed Grau. "You can get nothing here!"
A small crowd began to collect. The Spanish consul, for he was the tall man in black, asked Grau to explain.
"Explain nothing!" yelled Grau. "You can get no more service here. You have come to this hotel three or four different times, each time with a different woman, and each time you have registered as man and wife. How many wives have you anyway? I am not running a house of prostitution. What do you take me for? Get out!"