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EXPLANATION
O those readers who may wonder at the Grown over
the letter N with the wreath surround a short
explanation is necessary.
The Crown is a copy of the Imperial Crown of France.
The letter N is not the initial letter of Napoleon III, but is
the initial of the second name of the founder of the Cafe
Royal.
When Daniel Nicols Thevenon arrived in London in
1864, a fugitive from the fierce bankruptcy laws of France,
with his wife, of cash they had none, and they worked at
anything they could get until they had saved a few pounds
with which they opened a small Cafe Restaurant in Glasshouse
Street. This modest establishment they named the " Cafe
Restaurant Nicols." With tireless energy they built up their
business until it expanded over the site occupied by the
famous building to-day. As soon as the financial tide had
turned, Nicols repaid every penny he owed to his creditors
in France.
It was not until the eighties that the name " Cafe
Royal " was chosen, and this was due to a suggestion from
the son-in-law of Nicols that a better sounding name than
Cafe Restaurant should grace the portals of a restaurant
that was the meeting place of the fugitives from their beloved
France, and, what was more, an establishment where the
cooking was a byword for excellence and the cellars beyond
reproach.
The decision that the crown surmounting the letter N
should be chosen for the design and the premises rechristened
Cafe Royal satisfied both the proprietor and his somewhat
chauvenistic son-in-law, for the former considered that the