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; ; t i - J ;; i 1 1 1 v 0 a g it 1 - g e I n - u - - - d a s il r - v l. - 1 i- it d SARATOGA PAST AND PRESENT. Graphic Pen Picture of Conditions Now, as Compared with Those of Ten Years Ago. Old Saratoga, famed as a resort long before the Civil War, has come back into her own. A few years ago Saratogas obituary notices were being written, said a writer in the Xew York Times, near the close of this years meeting. During the last month, according to hotel men. there have been more guests at Saratoga than during any other season in the groat resorts palmiest days. Canfield is gone, and the games which made spectacular one era of the resorts fame are gone, but most of the ieople concede that the crowds that flocked then; during tin; season just ended were "moneyed crowds" even to greater extent than during the rosy days when fortunes were lost and won daily over Cantields roulette wheels. This is the schedule of a typical day at Saratoga during the race season. In the morning the springs are visited. From 0:30 until the races begin at 2:30 in the afternoon, an interesting sight is to be seen at any of them. In the "state drinking hall," adjoining the public park in the center of the town, for instance, four different kind of medicinal water are served. Outside, except on the park side, there are shabby streets and shabby buildings though the state officials hope to improve the external appearance in a short time. Inside the building one sees a large white room filled with little white tables. The room is packed with men and women of all ages, sitting at the tables sipping from paper cups. The gay colors of the short costumes and the laughter of the patrons at first makes it seem impossible that all of these persons are drinking but "water. The water from each of the four springs has a different taste one rumor is that the chief interest in the game is watching the strange expressions on the faces of the newcomers when they first taste the medicinal waters. After breakfast crowds start off for the tennis ourts and golf links of the club on the outskirts of the town; others motor; others swim, canoe, or fish in Laka Saratoga. These are the principal diversions. Shortly after noon the mecca is the race track. Motors and old-fashioned hacks jam the streets. You get into the grandstand for if youre male; womens tickets are .50. The admission to the clubhouse is more. Many go a couple of hours early, and for these luncheon is served under the stand or in the clubhouse, while the band plays the latest hits from Broadway. Its a gayly costumed throng that gathers at these Saratoga races. Today 10.000 were present; a week ago there were 18,000. The laws against gambling closed the track for their first two years and sent hotel proprietors elsewhere for their summer vacations, for there was no use staying home if they lived in Saratoga. Then they created "oral betting," and since then the proprietors have found increasing necessity of staying home, until this year they say they hardly had time to go to sleep. In "oral betting" somebody introduces you to a sanctimonious-looking individual, who is standing about in what used to be the betting ring. There are no longer any charts posted conspicuously to tell what odds are being offered. The sanctimonious-looking person solemnly shakes hands and orally agrees to wager you that such and such a horse wont come in first, second or third, as some friend has told you it would. You dont give the sanctimonious-looking person anything tangible, but the number on your ticket, anil if you win you come around the next day. He is usually there, they say, but there have been instances in which too many persons beat his juilg-; ment and he failed to reappear the next day to balance accounts. However, it has worked both ways, according to persons who have been here all mouth, and the night trains back to Xew York have done fairly good business. In the grandstand above there is the usual race-: track crowd the youths and the old men, the modestlv -dressed, middle-aged women, who cling excitedly to the back of the bench and beg some horse they have never seen before to run like the mischief; the young girls in varied colored awning stripes, who declaim that its simply ripping good sport; the grim, silent, "obviously race-track men." whose expressions are changeless, no matter what happens. At night the crowds flock to the great court of the Grand Union Hotel and to the Casino, when; they mav dance until any hour of the morning tliev wisii. At 10::s oclock, in deference to any- bodv in the hotel who wishes to go to sleep, the dancers in the Grand Union court adjourn to the ballroom of the hotel, and the ubiquitous Hawaiian orchestra follows: The waiters uoint out the celebrities. Among the ones they designate are moving picture stars, "regular" actors, millionaires, heiresses and diplo-s mats. This year there are more distinguished Latin-Americans than ever before. They have come from all narts of South America, bankers and financiers who"" formerly went to Europe for their recreation and particularly have they come from Cuba. It is the same class that ordinarily went from the United States to the European resorts, In the Casino the scene is much the same. Here it is the surroundings that attract special atten- ton. This was the splendid structure which Can- field made famous. Its dining room is still ex- actly as it was when the roulette wheels filled the adjoining room. There are the same remarkable stained glass windows, and in the European room, formerly the roulette room, there is the same 810,000 "nig, bigger than a tennis court, For several years this extraordinary building was nothing but a curiosity. Two years ago the management of the Biltmore Hotel in Xew York agreed with the town of Saratoga, which had bought the place, and the surrounding garden for 00,000, to try the experiment of running a restaurant in the Casino. For two years the company has experimented without having to pay rent, that being the original agreement. Nov." the city fathers here hope that the rentals will soon exceed the cost. The park about the place is as Canfield left it: also, the Italian garden with its statutes has all of its earlier splendor, and adjoining the building is still the pond in which fish were kept, swimming in nets, to be served to Canfields "guests" when ordered at the dinner table.
