Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 18 October 1907 — HOLIDAY FEVER IN LONDON. [ARTICLE]

HOLIDAY FEVER IN LONDON.

CoitfrmongrM a* Well aa Arl«torrata August is a month which might just is well< be cut out of the calendar so far as anything besides pleasure is toncerned, says Town and Country, fluslnessdurlng that timC' -eomes to more bf astandstill than erer. The” most popular books are those containing the time tables of railway and steamship companies and the general conversation turns to shooting, fishing, yachting, golfing and out-of-door subjects In general. Lest it may be supposed that I am referring only to a portion of the people of these islands, I hasten to add that everybody—man, woman and chlld--has the holiday fever so badly that there is little use in doing anything that may at al| be compared to useful work. The costermonger as well as the aristocrat insists on having his annual rest from toil. The one goes to Scotland on the moors to shoot grouse; theother hies himself with his family to Margate and Souftiena to sheet glass bottles off jl string_orto make- himself thoroughly miserable by going off in a sixpenny sailing barge for a “cruise.” Britain rules the waves, but on 'the other“hand, the waves rule a . good many Britons, particularly those who make London their home.' London Is supposed to be the greatest seaport in the world, and yet the average Londoner knows less about .the _ sea. ihan-tlie-Parisian, -w4iich -4ssaying a good dbal. The Parisian, at least, goes to the seaside and bathes, in battalions at Trouvillek at Dieppe, at Havre, at E.taples, at Etretat and Boulogne. He Spends his time —between bis dejeuner a la fourcbette, bls dip in the- sea (it is the most wonderful sight in the world to see a Frenchman bathe) and the playing of petits chevaux in the Casino. Not so his brother across the channel. The Englishman has not time for bathing in the surf. He rides the festive donkey, shies the cocoanut,~ drives about in charabancs, eats winkles with a hairpin and listens to the “coon” songs of the most impossible “niggers” that ever infested a wave-sxvept beach. But it is the holiday spirit nevertheless, and there is no escaping it in London. Sloane street, Bond street and Piccadilly look as if they had been visited by the plague. There are few promenaders * an<M fewer equipages. The pavements are empty save for people who are fettered to business—and American tourists. The parks might as well be closed, for all the fashionables are away. We are close on “the 12th,” St. Grouse’s day, which marks the beginning of the shooting season, when the moors will with the crack of the sporting gun, and all Scotland will be overrun with people from the south who are either

devoted to sport or attending shooting parties at country houses.