1936 On the Continent

that if the boat sinks on route the price is only payable up to the day you go down.
VILLEFRANCHE
    If Nice is the sea, then Villefranche is its port, and the most beautiful and picturesque of the whole coast along with Cannes and St. Tropez. This little town of 6,000 inhabitants, not quite 4 miles from Nice, was discovered, thanks to its particularly valuable location, first by the French Navy, which made a naval port out of it, and then by a few Parisian painters and writers. The big Italian liners call at Villefranche on their way to the United States or South America.
    The first writer to discover it was Jean Cocteau, and he and his followers established their headquarters in the Welcome Hotel (rooms from 15 francs upwards,
pension
from 40 francs). They mixed with the picturesque and cosmopolitan population of the ports (there are two of them), and began building their own boats and canoes. Then a swarm of American, Chinese, Hungarian, Portuguese and even French painters invaded the town to sketch and paint the French and foreign naval officers, the colonial soldiers and sailors, dancing at eleven in the morning in the small bars and cafés of the port with handsome Italians,
Nicoises
, or the beauties of Villefrancheitself, while the poets and writers wrote feverishly, in a dozen or so different languages, novels, odes, tragedies and picturesque tales culled from the life of Villefranche.
    There are some famous names among these writers and artists: Michael Arlen, Foujita, Picasso, the decorator Vincent Korda, Van Dongen. Sometimes even the aged Kipling himself would leave his retreat at Mentone to join the group in Villefranche. Sooner or later a legend grew up around this set of artists, and in Paris, London and New York they were dubbed the Villefranche School.
    Unfortunately, the depression has scattered this curious community of writers and artists, and to-day only Cocteau and a few friends keep up the tradition of the Welcome Hotel and the Villefranche School.
    The climate of Villefranche is the hottest of the whole Riviera. If you like to eat your bananas freshly picked, you can do it easily enough in Villefranche, where there are almost as many banana trees as orange trees.
    As for the famous Naval Battles of Flowers, look up what we have already said about the Carnival of Nice … and don’t fail to see them, preferably accompanied by a friend.
FROM VILLEFRANCHE TO MENTONE AND VENTIMIGLIA
    About 3 miles from Villefranche, going in the direction of Mentone, you come into Saint Jean-Cap-Ferrat, where you will find one of the smartest hotels on the whole Riviera with restaurant, dancing, tennis courts, and swimming pool: the Grand Hotel Cap Ferrat. Full
pension
can be had there from 50 francs.
    Not far from the Cap lies Beaulieu-sur-Mer, part of which is very appropriately called “Petite Afrique,” where the climate is nearly as hot as in Villefranche (Hotels Bristol and Bedford, rooms from 30 francs).
    I’d have to write whole pages if I merely wanted to list all the famous people who possess, or have possessed, one or several villas around Cap-Ferrat and Beaulieu. The great Spanish writer, Blasco Ibanez, whose charming villa, where his widow still lives, is just a little farther East,once said that “with the wealth of the people living between Villefranche and Mentone you could buy half Europe.”
    To realise that this is merely a very slight exaggeration you have only to remember that the king of armament vendors, Sir Basil Zaharoff, lives not far from Beaulieu, and that going round the Cap you are as likely as not to run into at least one of the Morgan or Vanderbilt families, not to speak of the big writers and artists like Maurice Maeterlinck. One of the loveliest estates on the Riviera is the only too notorious Château Thompson at Cap-Ferrat, which Pola Negri is said to have bought last summer for the bagatelle of over £300,000.
Political Associations
    Before reaching Monte Carlo you are bound to fall in love with the charming Cap d’Ail and Eze, from the heights of which you get a unique view of the whole Riviera.
    Beyond Monte Carlo there is Cap Martin to be reckoned with. This used to be the favourite spot of the Empress Elizabeth of Austria, and even the austere Emperor Francis Joseph came to join her there from time to time. At present the luxurious Hôtel Cap Martin has been turned by Mr. Titulesco into the chief meeting-place of the diplomatists, a kind of Riviera offshoot of the