LIVING ACCOMMODATION.
There are numberless licensed places in Adelaide, where drink,
varying in quality and unlimited in quantity, may be obtained, and
there is one Hotel--the South Australian. It is distinctly promising,
and I am glad it does not call itself “The Adelaide” Hotel, because
that would damn it eternally--“South Australian” is so much more
comprehensive. Whatever small element of rank and fashion there is in
the Village, congregates in those spacious halls and early-Victorian
reception-rooms--early-Victorian in the stiff-backed dignity of the
furniture, and the scarcity of carpets. Moreover, one occasionally
meets there persons who have been rash enough to leave better places
to visit Adelaide. Let us be charitable, and hope that sternest duty
brings them here. Surely no other motive could induce their presence!
And let us remark, as a warning to others contemplating the same folly
(especially theatrical managers), that if they come here in the hope
of amusing, or being amused, bitter will be their disappointment.
Those who visit the city of many whited sepulchres on business, are
forgiven--those who come on pleasure bent should be relegated to
asylums for the insane. However, should they remain here long enough,
the insanity will follow.
The hotel itself is really charming--the staff is good, which is not
surprising when one remembers that most of the employés hail from
other places. The fact that _is_ surprising is that they can be content
to work and serve so long here. This, however, is a tribute to the
untiring kindness of the proprietress and the manager.
To keep servants long in any part of the world is both creditable and
clever--to keep them long in Adelaide shows positive genius.[A]
[A] I except my own servants to this rule--no genius is exercised
to keep them, because none is required--as they, with one
exception, come from Melbourne, they have some faint idea of
their duties.--THE AUTHOR.
The liquor in the only hotel is passing good, save that it gives
preference to South Australian Wines, which is criminal. But of
Australian wine, more in another chapter. The hotel has, as I have
said before, a charming proprietress, a capable manager and a
splendid staff, and it has other virtues of a first-class hostelry. A
substantial improvement might be effected by weeding out some of the
permanent and usual boarders (mainly female) modernizing the rooms a
little, and building vast quantities of additional bathrooms. Then add
to the stock some good French Burgundy, some three-star Brandy that
isn’t Hennessy, some Dewar’s Imperial Whisky, and a greater variety
of liqueurs, and the “South Australian” would be a veritable oasis in
the desert of Adelaide. As it is, it rivals the best hotels in the
Southern Hemisphere, and to all who contemplate residence in Adelaide,
we issue this warning--don’t be induced to stay elsewhere. (N.B.--This
advertisement is not paid for.)
Of the other licensed houses there is little to be said; they are
mainly patronized by country farmers, who are uninteresting people
at best, and therefore deserving of little consideration. I once had
the misfortune to spend a few days at one of these so-called Hotels
on North Terrace, and among many minor inconveniences one heard the
screams of delirious patients at the Hospital, the yells of the inmates
of North Terrace Asylum, and the roar of the wild beasts from the not
far-distant Zoo--it was distinctly a thrilling experience.
Some Adelaide hotels are kept by single women, who, presumably, obtain
their licences in a married name; and this is obviously a serious evil,
and one which should be looked into, necessitating, as it does, a more
or less undesirable trade.
There are boarding-houses, too, many of them enormously respectable,
and occasionally they are fortunate enough to have some of their rooms
occupied. They are much the same as other boarding-houses all over the
world--that is to say, food indifferent, drinks difficult to obtain,
and attendance nil. I have never lived in an Adelaide boarding-house,
but I once lunched at one. The rats had eaten most of my hostess’
clothes, which wasn’t surprising. Having sampled the food, one couldn’t
blame those discriminating rodents for preferring the boarders’
garments.
There are many more or less charitable institutions which provide
living accommodation in some cases free, but these appear to be
inaccessible to the people who really need them. At the “Queen’s
Maternity Home,” for instance, the marriage lines are the necessary
qualification for admittance. No doubt the institution is excellent in
its way, but Charity cannot draw distinctions of that sort, and so the
home in question simply misses the primary object of such places.[B]
There are also Benevolent, Destitute, and Blind Asylums, and several
asylums for lunatics. The latter are, I understand, fairly well
filled--which is easily understood.
[B] A small sum of money is paid by patients, according to their
means, but the home is distinctly a charity, and calls itself
one.--THE AUTHOR.
Flats, most desirable of modern conveniences, are as yet unheard of in
Adelaide, which shows a deplorable neglect of personal comfort--indeed,
a lamentable ignorance of all comfortable living accommodation is
manifest. A flat comprises the largest amount of comfort in the
smallest possible space--may the deserving originator of the scheme be
blessed or sainted. May undeserving Adelaide never know the blessings
of such luxury.
The dwelling-houses are, for the most part, cheaply built, badly
fitted, and execrably furnished--there are a few notable exceptions,
but these mostly err in the opposite direction, being lavishly vulgar
in their gaudy upholsterings. Inwardly, Adelaide cannot esteem
cleanliness a cardinal virtue, judging by the bathrooms in most of the
available houses. A furnished house is very rarely to be had, and the
few I have seen would preclude any desirable tenant from taking them.
Ugh! The cheap and nasty furniture, china dogs, gaudy wall papers
and architectural horrors of the Adelaide house! To those who must
sojourn here, and who cannot afford the expensive seclusion of the
only hotel--bring your beds on your back, or bring a tent and camp in
the park lands, for woe unto ye who trust to the doubtful hospitality
of the village boarding-houses, or of the “house to let.” We doubt if
it is possible to be really comfortable here--certainly to be even
tolerably comfortable, it is necessary to select--no, to bring--one’s
own furniture, wall papers and other house trappings.