EIGHTEENTH-CENTURY INNS
typical cities. Cogan gives particulars of an elaborate dinner, handsomely served, that he got at Düsseldorf, with "soups, fish, roast and boiled meats, game, poultry, vegetables, and fruits of various kinds …" for which he paid tenpence.[1] Excellent fare also was to be had at Prague; "the poultry is peculiarly good; there is a plenty of game that is astonishing; no inn so wretched but you have a pheasant for your supper, and often partridge soup."[2] But this same writer warns travelers going from Vienna to Prague that the fare along the road is indifferent, and that "it would be perhaps more prudent to carry some cold provisions with you in your chaise."[3]
Nor were provisions the only necessaries of the table that the fastidious traveler might carry. In journeying through Austria, says Mariana Starke, "We were actually obliged to purchase a couple of tablecloths and six napkins on our journey, so terribly were we annoyed by the dirty linen which was produced everywhere but in the very large towns."[4]
Balancing the good with the bad we may easily see that, to one bent upon pleasure, travel in Germany a century and a half ago seemed to offer rather more annoyance than satisfaction. At all events, comfort was hardly to be found outside a few large towns.
V
The Inns of the Low Countries
On some of the inns of the Low Countries much praise was bestowed by eighteenth-century travelers. The inns of The Hague were declared by one writer to be undoubtedly the best in the world.[5] Nugent says of the inns or eating-houses at Brussels that they "are equal to any in Europe; and a stranger has this advantage, that for less than twenty-pence English, he knows where to dine at any time betwixt twelve and three on seven or eight dishes. The wines are very good and cheap; and for six-pence English by the hour,
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