When traveling with a lady, always carry her bag and assist her in and out of the trains. Your behavior is on its mettle under these circumstances, and traveling is very apt to be like a mustard plaster, bringing out both the good and evil attributes of a man.
The subject of foreign travel also needs a few words as well as a bit of general advice. English customs and our own are so much alike that it would be strange, indeed, if an American could not get along in the land where his own tongue is spoken. One of the first difficulties which once beset traveling Americans in London was the regulation in theaters that the audience, or that part of it occupying the best stalls, should be in evening dress. As evening dress is now also the rule in New York, this quandary is a thing of the past. Programmes at many of the English theaters are now free, where some years ago it was customary to sell bills of the play for sixpence.
The feeing of servants at hotels, however, continues, and we yet have the charge on hotel bills for service. You are expected to give something to the hall porter, to your waiter, to the boots, and to the chambermaid. The amount of these fees differs according to the length of your stay. I should say a half crown to the porter and less sums to the others.
In London a shilling a mile is the accepted price for cabs within a certain metropolitan radius called the "circle." "Thrupence" or sixpence extra is the tip "to drink your health."
Afternoon dress is the correct attire for the park after midday, and cabs and hansoms are not seen on the Row during riding and driving hours.
In Paris you may wear a blue blouse and make the turn of the Bois in a fiacre. The tariff there is two francs an hour, or two francs fifty per course, from one place to another. The pourboire is fifty centimes.
In France the pourboire is a veritable tax, as it is in Italy and in the Latin countries. In Germany the mark is equal to about twenty-five cents of our money, and it will go a long way. Ten marks will fee a houseful of servants.
At the station in Paris fifty centimes is given to the porter. The "commissionnaire" at the hotel expects fifty centimes. Waiters' pourboires are eighty-five centimes at breakfast, and at dinner a franc. In a café they are twenty-five centimes.
The woman at the theater who puts a footstool under your feet expects one franc, and at many of the playhouses she must be feed for a reserved seat.
In Paris the orchestra stalls are occupied only by men. At the opera during the season evening dress in the boxes and stalls is, of course, de rigueur. At the Comédie Française on Tuesdays and at the Odéon on Thursdays you must be in evening dress in order to gain admittance.