{"product_id":"2940012773623","title":"INNOCENTS ABROAD Volume II","description":"CHAPTER XI.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe are getting foreignized rapidly and with facility.  We are getting\u003cbr\u003ereconciled to halls and bedchambers with unhomelike stone floors and no\u003cbr\u003ecarpets--floors that ring to the tread of one's heels with a sharpness\u003cbr\u003ethat is death to sentimental musing.  We are getting used to tidy,\u003cbr\u003enoiseless waiters, who glide hither and thither, and hover about your\u003cbr\u003eback and your elbows like butterflies, quick to comprehend orders, quick\u003cbr\u003eto fill them; thankful for a gratuity without regard to the amount; and\u003cbr\u003ealways polite--never otherwise than polite.  That is the strangest\u003cbr\u003ecuriosity yet--a really polite hotel waiter who isn't an idiot.  We are\u003cbr\u003egetting used to driving right into the central court of the hotel, in the\u003cbr\u003emidst of a fragrant circle of vines and flowers, and in the midst also of\u003cbr\u003eparties of gentlemen sitting quietly reading the paper and smoking.  We\u003cbr\u003eare getting used to ice frozen by artificial process in ordinary bottles\u003cbr\u003e--the only kind of ice they have here.  We are getting used to all these\u003cbr\u003ethings, but we are not getting used to carrying our own soap.  We are\u003cbr\u003esufficiently civilized to carry our own combs and toothbrushes, but this\u003cbr\u003ething of having to ring for soap every time we wash is new to us and not\u003cbr\u003epleasant at all.  We think of it just after we get our heads and faces\u003cbr\u003ethoroughly wet or just when we think we have been in the bathtub long\u003cbr\u003eenough, and then, of course, an annoying delay follows.  These\u003cbr\u003eMarseillaises make Marseillaise hymns and Marseilles vests and Marseilles\u003cbr\u003esoap for all the world, but they never sing their hymns or wear their\u003cbr\u003evests or wash with their soap themselves.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe have learned to go through the lingering routine of the table d'hote\u003cbr\u003ewith patience, with serenity, with satisfaction.  We take soup, then wait\u003cbr\u003ea few minutes for the fish; a few minutes more and the plates are\u003cbr\u003echanged, and the roast beef comes; another change and we take peas;\u003cbr\u003echange again and take lentils; change and take snail patties (I prefer\u003cbr\u003egrasshoppers); change and take roast chicken and salad; then strawberry\u003cbr\u003epie and ice cream; then green figs, pears, oranges, green almonds, etc.;\u003cbr\u003efinally coffee.  Wine with every course, of course, being in France.\u003cbr\u003eWith such a cargo on board, digestion is a slow process, and we must sit\u003cbr\u003elong in the cool chambers and smoke--and read French newspapers, which\u003cbr\u003ehave a strange fashion of telling a perfectly straight story till you get\u003cbr\u003eto the \"nub\" of it, and then a word drops in that no man can translate,\u003cbr\u003eand that story is ruined.  An embankment fell on some Frenchmen\u003cbr\u003eyesterday, and the papers are full of it today--but whether those\u003cbr\u003esufferers were killed, or crippled, or bruised, or only scared is more\u003cbr\u003ethan I can possibly make out, and yet I would just give anything to know.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe were troubled a little at dinner today by the conduct of an American,\u003cbr\u003ewho talked very loudly and coarsely and laughed boisterously where all\u003cbr\u003eothers were so quiet and well behaved.  He ordered wine with a royal\u003cbr\u003eflourish and said:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"I never dine without wine, sir\" (which was a pitiful falsehood), and\u003cbr\u003elooked around upon the company to bask in the admiration he expected to\u003cbr\u003efind in their faces.  All these airs in a land where they would as soon\u003cbr\u003eexpect to leave the soup out of the bill of fare as the wine!--in a land\u003cbr\u003ewhere wine is nearly as common among all ranks as water!  This fellow\u003cbr\u003esaid: \"I am a free-born sovereign, sir, an American, sir, and I want\u003cbr\u003eeverybody to know it!\"  He did not mention that he was a lineal\u003cbr\u003edescendant of Balaam's ass, but everybody knew that without his telling\u003cbr\u003eit.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eWe have driven in the Prado--that superb avenue bordered with patrician\u003cbr\u003emansions and noble shade trees--and have visited the chateau Boarely and\u003cbr\u003eits curious museum.  They showed us a miniature cemetery there--a copy of\u003cbr\u003ethe first graveyard that was ever in Marseilles, no doubt.  The delicate\u003cbr\u003elittle skeletons were lying in broken vaults and had their household gods\u003cbr\u003eand kitchen utensils with them.  The original of this cemetery was dug up\u003cbr\u003ein the principal street of the city a few years ago.  It had remained\u003cbr\u003ethere, only twelve feet underground, for a matter of twenty-five hundred\u003cbr\u003eyears or thereabouts.  Romulus was here before he built Rome, and thought\u003cbr\u003esomething of founding a city on this spot, but gave up the idea.  He may\u003cbr\u003ehave been personally acquainted with some of these Phoenicians whose\u003cbr\u003eskeletons we have been examining.","brand":"SAP","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47180797247728,"sku":"2940012773623","price":0.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/2940012773623_p0.jpg?v=1763572058","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/2940012773623","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}