The noble Victoria Embankment now runs where of old, in Elizabethan times, ran a glittering, almost Venetian, river-frontage of palaces. And where the old palaces stood in Tudor days, stand now enormous hotels--the palaces of our own day--each newer hotel in its turn eclipsing the other in size, magnificence, expense. The picturesque "Savoy," with its river balconies, the stately "Cecil," with its wonderful banqueting halls, and, further from the river, the spacious "Métropole," the "Grand," the "Victoria." All these hotels are so recent as to impress one fact upon us--the fact that London has really only lately become a tourist haunt. Statistics, indeed, show now that London attracts more visitors than any other great European town. Twenty-five years ago, it was as hard to find a good, clean, and thoroughly satisfactory London hotel, as it was to get a cup of tea for less than sixpence; or, indeed, a good one at all! But times have changed. Big hotels now, like flats, threaten to be overdone. We can well imagine the disappointment of the foreign visitor to London on discovering the names and uses of the fine buildings that adorn the river front between Westminster and Blackfriars. "What," he or she may ask, "is that imposing structure with Nuremberg-like green roofs, towering over the trees of the Embankment Gardens?" "That, Sir or Madam," answers politely the lady guide (for it is of course a charming and very certificated lady guide who "personally conducts" the party), "is Whitehall Court, a building let out in high class flats." "And what," continues the crushed tourist, "is that turreted, buttressed, red-brick edifice? Probably some rich nobleman's whim?" "Those, Madam, are the new buildings of Scotland Yard, recently designed by Mr. Norman Shaw, one of the most famous of our modern architects." "And what are those Venetian-like balconies, all hung with greenery and flowers?" "They belong, Madam, to the Savoy and Cecil Hotels. At the Savoy you may get a very nice dinner for a guinea; they have a wonderful chef; and in the enormous dining-hall of the Cecil, most of the great public banquets are given." "Truly, a nation of shopkeepers," the foreign visitor will re-echo sadly, as she dismisses her "lady guide." [Illustration: _Sightseers._]