Two or three of us hastened to a restaurant. I sat down at a little table, and waited. So did the others, but we were making a mistake, for there were no waiters. We had as yet to learn the mechanism of a "Quick Lunch" shop; there was a certain procedure to be observed and followed, we must learn it if we wanted a dinner. I watched the first American citizen who came in, and did as he did. First I went to the cashier and got a paper slip on which were printed many numbers 5, 10, 15, 25, and so on in intervals of fives. These represented cents, and were so arranged for convenience in adding and for solid profit. At this restaurant nothing cost less than five cents (twopence halfpenny), and there were no intermediaries between five and ten, ten and fifteen, and so forth. The unit then was five cents, and not as in England two cents (one penny). Obviously this means enormous increase of takings in the long run. That five-cent unit is part of the foundation of American prosperity. I obtained my slip so numbered. Then I took a tray from a stack of trays and a glass from an array of glasses, a fork and a knife from the fork basket, and I went to the roast chicken counter and asked for roast chicken. A plate of hot roast chicken was put on my tray, and the white-hatted cook punched off twenty-five cents on my slip. I went to another counter and received a plate of bread and butter, and to yet another and sprinkled pepper and salt from the general sprinklers. I went and drew iced water. Then, like the slave of the lamp working for himself, I put the whole on my little table. When I had finished my first course I put my plate aside and took my tray to the cook and received a second, and when I had finished that I fetched my coffee.
"Well," thought I, looking round, "no waiters, that means no tips; there is not even a superfluous mendicant boy in charge of the swinging doors." So I began to learn that in America the working man pays no tips.
My companions at the other tables were getting through with their dinners and looking across at one another with congratulatory smiles. We would have sat together, but in this shop one table accommodated one customer only—an unsociable arrangement. I waited for them to finish, so that we could go out together.
Whilst doing so a man came up to me from another table and said very quietly:
"Just come over?"
"This morning," I replied.
He brightened up and asked:
"Looking for a job?"
"You don't mean to say I am being offered one already?" said I.
"That's about it, two dollars."