Essay: YOU CAN'T TELL THE COUNTRIES WITHOUT A BOOK

THERE is a certain type of American tourist who is so afraid that he will be taken for an American tourist that he refuses to be seen carrying a guidebook. If he has one at all, he leaves it in the hotel room or disguises it in the dust-jacket of the latest Taylor Caldwell novel. But he is the exception. The great majority of tourists want their guidebooks for advice, companionship and a sense of security.

Ever since travelers started traveling, they have been telling others how and where to do it. Herodotus in 450 B.C. described the wonders of the Nile, where the natives worshiped crocodiles and shaved off their eyebrows when their cats died. Mark Twain, who made the Grand Tour a century ago, wrote delightedly of the cheapness of Moroccan currency ("I bought nearly half a pint of their money for a shilling"). The package tour, credit cards and 21-day-excursion jet fares have made the wonders of the Nile less wondrous and even Moroccan currency a lot less cheap.

But as Americans succeeded the British and the Germans as the world's most tireless travelers, the proliferation of guidebooks has more than matched the tourist pace. U.S. bookstores now stock at least 50 guides to European countries, regions and cities which, despite the growing lure of Asia and North Africa, remain America's favorite tourist areas. There are also shopping guides, money guides and no-money guides; at least five paperbacks tell how to tour the Continent on the cheap. The Rich Man's Guide to Europe is due out next month, and there is already one guidebook instructing executives on how to do business in Europe while living it up on the expense account (Paris starting point: royal suite at the Hotel George V, which goes for $100 a day). Four books tell parents how to travel with their children without losing their minds—or their children. Two books tell girls how to catch a man in Europe (one ploy: look helpless). Two others tell men where to find "emancipated" girls. The advice is flexible; one guide tells the girls to travel first class, because that's where the interesting men are, while another book tells the men to travel tourist, because that's where the interested girls are.

In addition, there are guides to classic art, modern art, castles, pubs, inns and festivals, as well as to 840 gardens and 245 battlefields. There is even a bathroom guide, Where to Go in London, which meticulously rates the city's leading public facilities as "Good (*), Unbeatable value (**), Worth traveling out of your way to experience (***), or Royal Flush (****)." (Only Royal Flush: the latrines at Victoria Station, "a Xanadu of hygiene.")

From the Steam Age