3-053-854 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Kroll's Gardens, Berlin, 1873. 'On Sundays, Kroll's establishment in the Thiergarten, is the Berliners' Mecca, and on that day it is the place of all others to study the middle classes to advantage. The charge, two shillings, includes admission to the grounds...at no hour of the day or night does beer seem to come amiss to the droughty Berliner. At dusk, when the gardens are lighted up with artistically-arranged, fantastic jets of gas and thousands of coloured lamps, something of the effect of a studied stage transformation scene is produced...it is peopled with a thirsty crowd...the band, perched like stage brigands among a mass of counterfeit rockwork, are playing favourite airs from famous operas. The scene is generally enlivened by the presence of numerous officers, whose varied uniforms contrast with the bright tints of the toilettes of the Berlin belles, who wear their Rabagas chapeaux jauntily on the backs of their heads'. From "Illustrated London News", 1873.