One gentlemanly
greenhorn, who wishes us to think that "_il connait son Paris_," talks
of "suppers of Bignon's" (which must be some entirely new dish),
and informs us that, "at the Hotel de l'Athenee, the staff esteem it
rather a privilege, and a mark of their skill in language, to grin
and snigger when sworn at in English." Oh, sweet and swearing British
greenhorn! now I know why the French so greatly love our countrymen.
But why, oh why do you imagine that you have discovered Monte Carlo?
For the details of the journey, and the instructions to future
explorers, are set out with a painful minuteness which not even
STANLEY could rival. As for Monaco, dear, restful, old-fashioned,
picturesque Monaco, whither the visitor climbs to escape from
the glare and noise of Monte Carlo, the greenhorn dismisses it
scornfully, as having "no interest." How much does this ten-per-center
want? He "waggles along the Condamine;" he mixes with many who
are "pebble-beached;" he speaks of his intimates as "Pa," "The
Coal-Shunter," "Ballyhooly," &c., and declares of the French soldier
that "the short service forty-eight-day men don't have a very
unkyperdoodlum time of it." There's wit for you, there's elegance!
Then he becomes Jeromeky-jeromistically eloquent on the subject of
fleas, throws in such lucid expressions as "chin music," "gives him
biff," "his craft is thusly," and, altogether, proves himself and
his fellow-explorer to be a couple of the slangiest and most foolish
greenhorns who ever put pen to any sort of paper.
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