The Gayest City.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 21 April 1911, Page 4

The Gayest City.

« — WHY PARIS SMILES. (By 6. V. Williams, in tlic London Daily Mail.) Pari* needs no pen to defend her charms. Her gaiety is of the kind that ago cannot wither nor custom stale. Year in year out, Paris, the eternally fair, the eternally gay. soreney sustains assaults on her renown as the capital of the world's pleasures. Her old lovers are the worst offenders, bub at their protestations that Montmartre, given over to the amusement of the foreigner, lias lost its character and that the glories of the joyous, Latin Quarter lvnve departed l , Paris smiles and says nothing. Berlin, tlio youngest sister in the family of world-capitals, is now snatching at the laurels wreathing the SUN-KISSED BROWS of tlio loveliest maiden of them all. Buxom Berlin, spotlessly clean and bright a 9 a new pin, lias laid out an elaborate system of night resorts for tlio delectation of the stranger with the same precision as sho nas laid out, swept and garnished open spaces and a model racecourse which for newness looks for all the world like a potits chevaux hoard. Vast restaurants with monster orchestras, sumptuously decorated ball-houses, and palatial hotels break upon the view of the visitor to .Berlin with the full force of a discovery. Therefore. your Berlin correspondent suggests in his word painting of Berlin by night that the laurels of Paris are passing to Berlin, and Montmartre is to bo deserted for the Friedrichstrasse. But is not the GATTCTY OF A CITY rather in its atmosphere, in the character of its citizens, tliiin in the merrymaking facilities provided? Spontaneity is the root of that mirth which springs from the rejoicing heart, and if there is a sight more depressing than a nation which takes its pleasures sadly it is a people taking its pleasure earnestly. Here, as it seems to me, lies in a nutshell the fundamental difference between the gaiety of the three great European capitals—'London, Paris and Berlin. The observant correspondent of the Taegliche Rundschau is depressed at the nightly spectacle of theatre-going London's rush to holt a six-course supper in twenty - five mimics or by the melancholy " ginrrawTing" of the callow youth: of the metropolis. ißut he has. T wager, never witnessed the gaietv of an Eton v. Harrow match or the bounding high spirits of a Saturday night market crowd. So, too, visitors to Berlin, who are profoundly impressed hv the gymnastic ardour wherewith the phlegmatic Berliners iiurl themselves into a

NIGHTLY ROUND OF PLEASURE in their metropolis, fail to see the reverse of the medal: the bitter, nerve-racking strain of the ill-dress-ed. jostling crowds of Berlin by day and the tawdriness of the night resorts in the mornig nlight. "Neither in London nor in Berlin can the visitor find amusement at all hours. In Paris the gaiety never ceases, for it is not generated, in bubbling champagne or luxurious upholstery: it is rooted deep down in the heart of the Parisian. When the weary waiters in some world-famous Montmartre resort switch off the last, electric lamp paling in the rays of the morning sun, the hands of lighthearted girls, gathered about the boulevard florist for their penny bundles of violets or mimosa on their wav to work, carrv on the note of caietv which elsewhere vanishes with the dawn.

Paris, it is true, possesses no sixstorcv restaurants with walls of marble and alabaster where the masses may eat and watch their fellows eating in time to a,

POWERFUL ORCHESTRA. But then the Parisian is not gregarious in his habits. He believes i?l the gaieiv that comes from within, and not tho variety supplied by the management. Tho prospect of being able to have his petite marmite, bis sole dieppoise, and his poulet cocotto in company with 3999 other diners would not attract him in the least. He would distinctly resent a band of sixtv-five performers drowning with Wagner or Lehar his witty table talk. Staggering statistics of the numbers of lunches or dinners served dailv at his restaurant, instead of swelling his manly bosom with national pride, would probably incite a feeling of distrust as to the precise amount of care bestowed in the kitchens on his own particular dinner.

Tho gaiety of the crowded eating palace or of'the noisy promiscuity of the ball-house he would not understand. His idea, of gaiety is wittv conversation, prettv women, wellmannered and well-dressed neighbors, and good food carefullv served. Tho inattentiveness of the waiters in Berlin's

COLOSSAL RESTAURANTS, whore the appointments are undeniably magnificent and the food uniformly good and chean, would provoke a riot in a Parisian establishment.

Gniet-p- is the soul of Paris. Certainly Montmartre has degenerated into a. kind of Continental Coney Island where vulgarity dons tights and poses as French wit for the edification of raw strangers shopherded by

guides. But the "gaiety"' dispensed at these depressing establishments is as,false as tho leaden.money with which the obliging waiter liberally interlards the visitor's change. They Borlin, but tiho crudity of tho wit in have been extensively imitated in its German form is certainly worse than its equivalent on Mi© Sacred Hill. At tho .night restaurant and in on« or two cabarets which still retain some of that Gallic salt which immortalised the " Chat Noir" under the never-to-be-forgotten Rodolohe Snlis gaiety reigns supreme, hut it is spontaneous and infecting. Prices are high, but tho company is amusing. BEAUTIFUL FROCKS, superb furs, silvery laughter; and, generally, speaking, decorous behaviour eom'bine to make the Surroundings pleasant. There are professional dancers who perform the acrobatic antics peculiar to the modern music hall raise to the strains of a redcoated band of Tziganes. And as Paris is the city where the unexpected always happens, some unawaited event may occur to divert the curiously mived company. Detectives may arrest some wanted person, or tho heroine of a cause celehre, only acqnittcd that afternoon, may sail triumphant in, but whatever it is the incident is sure to give rise to a perfect orgv of humorous comments.

Yet it is not on Montmart-ve that the true Parisian gaiety is to be sought. For so long has La Butte been associated with the idea of pleasure that there "is something of a forced note in thte merrymaking there. To find Parisian gaiety go out into the streets and open places. You will find it on the busy boulevards, in the throngs on the terraces of tho cafes at the hour of the aperitif, among the riders and strollers in the BOTS DE BOULOGNE. among the Sunday crowds at the little bourgeois haunts along the -smiling 'hanks of the Seine. The Rue de la Pai.v at the lunch hour is an orgy of radiating gaiety. Old -roo'ie himself would smile out of pure lovo of humanity at the sight of these bevies of midinettes. sauntering along with arms interlaced, songs on their lips, flowers at their breast.

Down in the Latin Quarter, too, gaiety is not (load. The cafes there may be neither sumptuous nor spacious, but there is some artistic association attaching to nearly nil. Nightly the youth of the Quarter crowd about their stained marble tables and chaff and talk art with the same l arrogance and insouciant as the dead and gone generations who sat there before them. Other cities vaunt their surpassing attractions. Paris can afford to hole! her peace. Paramount, now as before as the capital of the world's delights, she is snro of her charms to bring back to her feet thos-> Wilm are now proclaiming the passing of her glory.