1936 On the Continent

marquises, counts and grand-dukes, seated in arm-chairs or stretched out in deck-chairs along the Promenade.
Chit-Chat
    Let’s sit down here on the
terrasse
of the Café de France, sip a drink, smoke a cigarette and chat idly about the people around us and passing us.
    “Talking of duchesses, whoever is that darling little Japanese opposite? I’m sure I’ve seen her before in Biarritz.”
    “Nothing more likely. She’s the new ambassador—or should one say ambassadress—of Japan in X … She’s a first-class golfer and has even been woman golf champion of Japan three times.”
    “And that attractive young man over there, with his brief-case crammed with papers, talking so earnestly to the older man beside him?”
    “That, my dear lady, is the Archduke Francis Joseph; one of the most assiduous visitors of the French Riviera, and at present a publicity agent. He is talking to the Director of …”
    “And those two girls, dressed like a couple of sisters, with such typical Slav faces?”
    “You’ve hit it first guess. They are two Greek princesses, cousins of the Duchess of Kent. You’ll find them tomorrow presiding over the Carlton Gala in Cannes, which has been organised for the benefit of the Russian widows and orphans of the War. I believe the Queen of Italy is going to be there in person.”
Shopping
    “There is a great deal to see and do in the afternoons. There are fashion shows, the International Horse Show, in which the finest riders in Europe take part, the races, the regattas, not to speak of the casinos which open at 2 o’clock in the afternoon.”
    “But perhaps you will manage after all to get an afternoon free. In that case, you’ll just have to do some shopping, won’t you? You’ll find all you can possibly want in the subsidiaries of the big Paris shops. The shopping centre is the Avenue de la Victoire, while the Nice’s Rue de la Paix, with its dressmakers and jewellers, is the Jardin du Roi Albert 1er, just behind the Hôtel Ruhl.”
    “Well, it’s ever so kind of you to give me all this useful information. Just before I go, do tell me who that old man is over there, just getting into that lovely limousine. I’m sure I’ve seen his photo in the papers.”
    “I should say you have! That visitor, who as a matter of fact is very rarely seen in public and prefers to take solitary walks between Mentone and Monte Carlo, is noneother than Sir Basil Zaharoff, the most mysterious man in Europe.”
Some Hints for the Sightseer
    By now you will certainly have come to the conclusion that Nice is just nothing more than a collection of dance places, restaurants, casinos, theatres, cafés, and fashion shows. Are there no museums, churches or historical monuments worth seeing in Nice? Quite a neat answer to that question has already been given by Paul Valéry when he said that “Nice’s richest museum, finest monument and most beautiful statue … is the sea!” But that is not, of course, the whole story or the only answer.
    Nice has plenty of museums, monuments, picturesque sites, and curiosities of art or nature to be seen, and perhaps I am not going beyond what my rôle of guide warrants when I add that you really should see them.
    “But whoever wants to shut themselves up in a museum on such a marvellous day?”
    “There’s something to be said for that too. And yet, perhaps you don’t know that a few years ago an American woman crossed the Atlantic with no other end in view than to see a single picture in a Nice museum.”
    “You’re beginning to make me curious.”
    “… and that, inspired by the same picture, a Japanese professor composed a poem of three thousand verses which had a striking success in Japan when he got back.”
    “Curiouser and curiouser! Or rather, call a taxi and take me off immediately to look at this extraordinary picture.”
    “Here we are now. This is the Villa Cheret. Don’t jump out in such a hurry, you’ll bang your head! It’s on the first floor. This is the room. You see, the
Salle Marie Bashkirtcheff
, and over there is the famous self-portrait painted by the unfortunate Moussia whose ‘Journal’ has been translated into thirty-two languages.”
    “It’s not bad. But really, I don’t see what all the fuss is about!”
    “Look more closely. The lips still carry the marks of a revolver bullet fired by Marie Bashkirtcheff herself. She was seriously ill, only twenty-four years old, and a fewweeks before her death she tried to destroy