Casino Spa

Overview

The casino of the Belgian spa town of Spa: ballroom, billiard room, reading rooms and concerts, the social centre of the season where the Bashkirtseffs spend the evenings from 24 June to 10 August 1874. Marie finds the rooms «superbes, plus beaux qu'à Bade et à Monaco, à Bade excepté les nouveaux salons qui sont très beaux» (020.0399). Dances are held on certain evenings (Saturday, 022.0346); she leaves before «les danses qui étaient fort misérables» (020.0407). The director, M. Kirch, «un homme utile ici», is disliked by Marie as «ce paysan de Kirch» (020.0434, 020.0467). The Spa casino's founding date (1763) is given by only one tourist source we found and is not repeated here.

In Marie's diary

• 1874-06-25 (020.0399): first impression; 06-28 (020.0419): billiards with Paul; 06-29 (020.0437, 020.0445): the evening dance with Basilévitch and Viviani.
• 1874-07-04 (020.0541): the ball; 07-07 (021.0040): Paul introduces Miss Row, «une charmante petite Américaine»; 07-12 (021.0168): empty, so they hire a pianist and improvise a dance; 07-19 (021.0433): the Merjeewsky countess beside her mother.
• 1874-07-22 (021.0520): her first gift, a fan, shown at the casino; 08-06 (022.0430) and 08-10 (023.0074): the last visits (on 10 August she dresses in the casino cloakroom and goes on to the theatre in travelling dress).
• 1874-08-17 (023.0186): Doenhoff said at Spa, seeing her enter the casino, «voilà une enfant comme il faut».

See Spa, Pouhon, Kirch.