The Lover's Baedeker and Guide to ArcadyWells, Carolyn
General
The Lover's Baedeker and Guide to Arcady
Wells, Carolyn
Love
In the interior of the town is Halcyon Hall, owned by the Lovemore
Company. This is a new and sumptuous hotel, fitted up with a careful
attention to detail, which combines eighteenth-century romance with
nineteenth-century convenience. Among its advantages over the older
hostelries are:
An Express Elevator to the Seventh Heaven, and a Dream Interpreter Call
and United States Valentine Chute on every floor. It is also lighted by
an Automatic Electric Moon.
Other important hotels are Orchid Court, Honeymoon Hall, and Violet
Villa.
The Grand Union is an old and well-known hotel for married lovers. Less
pretentious hostelries are the bijou Villa Beaubelle, Starlight Cottage,
and Cupid’s Court.
There are many Inns, both quaint and interesting. Their swinging
sign-boards announce such appropriate appellations as “Arms and the
Man,” “The Moon and I,” or “The World is Mine.”
The St. Valentine Apartment House, situated on Good Times Square, is a
residential building of the first class.
* * * * *
RESTAURANTS: These institutions are not specially popular in Arcady, as
the inhabitants rarely have large appetites. Indeed, waiters often set
artificial viands before their patrons, and the difference is not
observed.
Guests are always overcharged, as the true Lover has no thought of what
he is paying and settles any bill without a murmur.
A very popular table d’hôte service consists of Bread and Cheese and
Kisses, and the partakers thereof drink to each other only with their
eyes and leave a kiss in the cup, so that wine is never asked for.
* * * * *
SWEET SHOPS: These shops are well patronized and their wares include
nectar, honey, angel-cakes, taffy, kisses, and sweets of all sorts.
Orders are filled also for wedding-cakes, and very soft drinks are
served in loving-cups.
HEARD IN ARCADY
MUSIC IN THE GRASS
I
In the summer of the summer, when the hazy air is sweet
With the breath of crimson clover, and the day’s a-shine with heat,
When the sky is blue and burning and the clouds a downy mass,
When the breeze is idly dawdling, there is music in the grass—
Just a thistly, whistly sound
In the tangles near the ground;
And the flitting fairies often stop to listen as they pass.
Just a lisping, whisp’ring tune,
Like a bumblebee’s bassoon,
In a far-away fantasia, is the music in the grass.
II
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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