
Although altered, having lost the gallery that once ran across the second floor, the Tarde is unusual for its physical scale. It was one of only a handful of two-story pre–Civil War buildings in the town. Frederick Law Olmsted called it “the best inn we saw in the state” in A Journey Through Texas (1859). He continued, “How delighted and astonished many a traveler must have been, on arriving from the plains at this first village, to find not only his dreams of white bread, sweetmeats and potatoes realized, but napkins, silver forks, and radishes, French servants, French neatness, French furniture, delicious French beds, and the Courrier des Etat Unis; and more, the lively and entertaining bourgeoise.”