The Argosy — page 389: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

366 Letters from Majorca. There would be no accommodation here for visitors, but for the goodness of the Archduke. His Royal Highness has built a house, or Hospiteria, where anyone who wishes to do so may go and put up fora time. It is furnished in the simplest manner. ‘There are many bedrooms, and one large sitting or dining-room, which reminds one more of the refectory of a monastery than of anything else. ‘There are servants to do your bidding; and everything is just as you might find it in a country inn, except that on leaving you have nothing to pay forall this accommodation. In other words, in coming here, you are accepting the silent hospitality of the Archduke, who has built the place solely for the use of strangers. ‘The domestics who wait upon you are even forbidden to accept any gratuity you might wish to offer them for their trouble and excellent goodwill. Only two conditions are attached to the use of the Hospiteria. One, that, in the season, when it is likely to be crowded, visitors are not expected to stay more than three days. ‘The other, that every visitor must bring with him his own provisions. Both these rules are wise and necessary. In this out-of-the-way spot, it would be impossible to cater for arrivals which one day might number five, and the next ten, and the third not one. It is unneces- sary to speak of the cost such a proceeding would entail, or of the delicacy one would feel in availing oneself of what would be too much goodness. It is already a singular and graceful act of consideration that this Hospiteria should have been built at all, and that it is kept up and provided with every reasonable necessity, for any number of people, most of whom never see the Archduke, and can only thank him for this unseen and impersonal hospitality by using and not abusing it. But this is anticipating. We are still in Palma. We sat in our room, surrounded by our Lares and Penates, wondering where and how everything would be stowed away in the barouche. H. C. looked like an image of poetry on Mount Parnassus, wrapt in sublime visions. I like to put things delicately, but probably if he had been writing this about me he would simply have said I looked ridiculous. In one hand he held his drawing portfolio ; in the other he clutched a ream of foolscap paper. The windows were opened to the hot air and bright sunshine. Imagine that in November. Imagine, and envy. The jeunesse dorée of the club opposite, lounged luxuriously also from open windows, watching us and wondering as to our destination. Or perhaps too lazy to wonder, they only watched. Francisco was all excitement. We were, of course, calm. It is the prerogative and privilege of great minds to be calm. Francisco had seen to the packing of our hamper in conjunction with our good jandlady. But though working conjointly, they had packed separately, by which means forty-eight eggs were stowed away instead of twenty- four: a fortunate circumstance for us, as it turned out in the end. CORMICLOOOKS, 0) m