Page:Twentieth Century Impressions of Hongkong, Shanghai, and other Treaty Ports of China.djvu/696

688 TWENTIETH CENTURY IMPRESSIONS OF HONGKONG, SHANGHAI, ETC. a bathroom adjoining, all of which look outward, lacing either the city or the Whangpoo River. Easy access is gained to the various floors upon which they are situated by means of electric elevators. The hotel, which generates its own electricity and has its own refrigerating plant, gives employment to 254 persons. The most scrupulous care is taken over every detail of management, and the house is one that can be thoroughly recommended. Improvements are continually being made as opportunity offers. The oldest portions of the hotel are now being rebuilt on modern lines, and the dining room, facing the Soochow Creek, is to be extended along the whole front of the building. Winter gardens are being constructed, the writing and smoking rooms, and the private bar and billiard room will be enlarged, and the kitchen will be placed upon the roof. By such enter prise as this the proprietors keep everything up to date, and endeavour to meet the requirements of an ever-increasing number of patrons.

THE PALACE HOTEL.

Standing at the corner of the Bund and Nanking Koad. within a few minutes' walk of the banks, post offices, and consulates, and in the very heart of the European business quarter, the newly constructed Palace Hotel occupies the finest possible position in Shanghai. It is lighted throughout by electricity, and storey is connected with storey by means of eledric elevators. On the fifth floor there is a lofty and spacious dining room, well lighted, finely panelled, and adorned with numerous paintings. It affords accommodation for three hundred guests. Adjacent to it are several dining rooms for the use of private parties, and a banqueting hall, capable of seating two hundred guests, which can also be utilised as a hall-room. A fine lounge traverses the whole length of the building. Above is the roof garden, where a quiet hour may be spent amidst fine palms and foliage plants. The view from here extends from W'oosung, on the coast line, to the Quinsan Hills far away inland; while, immediately below, are the public gardens, where the town band may often be heard discoursing music. The hotel contains, altogether, 120 rooms, each of which has a bathroom attached. The cuisine is excellent. The chef enjoys unique advantages, for the hotel has its own dairy farm, so that the freshness and purity of the milk used are guaranteed, and owns a large kitchen garden, in which vegetables for the table are grown under European supervision — a very important consideration in this part of the world. Everything is done by the management to promote the comfort and convenience of guests, and the high popularity of the hotel with tourists is beyond question. All incoming steamers are met by the hotel commissionaire, who relieves passengers intending to stay at the hotel of all anxiety concerning their baggage.

HOTEL DES COLONIES.

The Hotel des Colonics, the principal hotel in the Krencli Concession, was the first estab- lishment of ils kind to be built in Shanghai. It owes i(s existence to Monsieur A, Michel, who came out to China sixty years ago, and from this fact it derives its Chinese name of Mi-tsay-lee. Originally it consisted of a single building containing about twenty rooms ; now it comprises three separate buildings on opposite sides ol the Rue Montauhan and Kuc du Consulat wilh well-equipped dining and drawing rooms and a sufficient number of bedrooms and comfoitable apartments to accommodate a large, continuous, and steadily growing stream of visitors.

THE NAVAL CLUB. THE ASTOR BAR. [See page 686.]

After a time the hotel passed into the hands of Mr. Scisson, who turned it into a limited liability company some twenty years ago in order to obtain the capital necessary for carrjing out Ihe extensions and improvements that were required. Owing to depression in business, however, the hotel was sold to a private company. In 1898 there was another change in the ownership, and in 1901 a syndicate was formed to take over the management. In every department the greatest care is exercised to make the hotel as comfortable and attractive as possible. The cuisine, particularly, is excellent, the Motel des Colonies being the only establishment of its kind in Shanghai in which the kitchen is under the charge of an experienced French chef.

Mr. J. M. Tavares has been the general