Wintering in the Riviera With Notes of Travel in Italy and France, and Practical Hints to Travellers — Inside the Classic

Practical Beginnings: Railways and Hotels

The first two chapters anchor the reader in the logistics of 1870s travel. Miller dissects railway arrangements—billets, salle d’attente, guards, porters, and carriage peculiarities like dames seules and smoking rules. He then turns to hotel and pension life, describing construction, lifts, charges, bougies, and the rhythm of meals from breakfast to table-d’hôte dinner. His advice on gratuities, bills, and Cook’s coupons is precise, reflecting firsthand experience.

Notably, he includes amusements such as tarantella dances, charades, readings, and amateur performances, showing that leisure was as much a concern as lodging. The section on furnished villas and servants extends the practical scope for longer stays.

Local Conveyance and Postal Quirks

Miller devotes a chapter to local means of conveyance, covering private carriages, horses, whip-cracking, and cruelty to animals. He details Italian cabs and cabmen, horse bells, fares, and the custom of pour boire and buona mano. Drives beyond town and crossing Swiss passes are described with an eye for both scenery and difficulty.

Postal arrangements receive similar scrutiny: post rates, underpaid letters, registration, post cards, delivery, poste restante, and pillars. The specificity—such as the premium on Italian paper money and the bundle of little notes—grounds the advice in actual transactions.

Sunday Abroad and First Impressions

A chapter on Sunday abroad examines native observance, English influence, public music, museums, carnival, fêtes, and elections. Miller notes Protestant churches for English visitors, including Presbyterian and Episcopal chapels, and comments on ritualism abroad and growing liberality. He offers a practical suggestion about service hours.

The narrative then shifts to the first winter in the Riviera, tracing the journey from London to the South of France via Folkestone, Paris, Fontainebleau, Dijon, Macon, the Rhone, Avignon, Nîmes, and Marseilles. Cannes is described in detail: the bays, Estrelles, Grasse, Lord Brougham, the eucalyptus, and the Croix de Garde. He mentions mosquitoes, snakes, and lizards as local realities.

San Remo: Women’s Burdens and Botanical Riches

In San Remo, Miller includes a striking excerpt from a guidebook describing women carrying up to 220 lbs. on their heads while men walk empty-handed or ride mules. The anecdote of an English lady told to dismount her donkey so a man could ride illustrates local gender norms. Miller wryly suggests the Women’s Rights Association might find a field here.

He also notes a photographer, P. Guidi, who produced over 150 life-size botanical specimens coloured from the plants themselves. The flora of San Remo is thus documented with unusual care. Miller’s own experience exchanging a circular note for Italian paper money at 27.20 francs per £ reveals the practical financial landscape.

Miller’s guide rewards readers who attend to its layered structure: the early chapters equip one with the mechanics of travel, while later sections offer vignettes of local life and landscape. The personal dedication and occasional dry humor—as in the women’s rights aside—add character. For a first reading, moving from the practical chapters to the travel narrative allows the advice to animate the places described.