In strange contrast to the smart Parisian café is the Hotel Spaander in quaint Volendam, and if it is not the season you may be alone on the piazza which is swept by the bracing winds from the Zuyder Zee, and where the picturesque hospitable people give you a cordial greeting. And palatable as were the marvelous cakes of Paris, they were no better than the Dutch raisin bread, Edam cheese and mild beer that forms your luncheon. Volendam is but next door to Edam, the home of the popular cheeses, and the thin shavings seem to have been made to accompany the delicious raisin bread of Holland. The Spaander is a popular rendezvous for artists, and the big rooms have been adorned with paintings and sketches by the men and women who have enjoyed its hospitality. The bright-faced girl, who serves you, was taught to speak English, perhaps, by some artist who may be a member of the British Royal Academy now, and she loves to tell you of the notable people who have come and gone, and she fairly carries you away to see the homes of the fisher folk. She explains their marvelous clothes, and declares that the huge silver buttons worn by the men and boys were used as a mark of identification in case of drowning, for each district in Holland has its own design. She calls your attention to the old china, pewter and brass, and giggles approval when you pass the school and slip a copper into each of the wooden shoes at the door. Everybody takes at least one ice at Florian's on St. Mark's Square in Venice for at Florian's you are sure to see the world and his wife, especially, if you are there on an evening when the band plays in the square. Florian's ices are world renowned, and its patrons are as cosmopolitan as Rumpelmeyer's, and, as you eat your way through the pink or chocolate cone of sweetness, you will find the price of it in the bottom of the dish. There is no room for argument over the charge, for in the bottom of every dish, in plain figures, is its cost, two francs or two francs, fifty. And after you have paid the reckoning, the waiter turns over the dish as a sign that your debt is canceled, and you are at liberty to sit and listen to the music and watch the people for as long as you wish.