Chapter I: Paris (2)

Among them in the later times was included the skull of St. Louis himself in a golden reliquary. Two angels at the summit of the large center arch of the arcade bear a representation of the Crown of Thorns in their hands. Above the tabernacle rises a canopy or baldacchino, approached by two spiral staircases; from its platform St. Louis and his successors, the kings of France, were in the habit of exhibiting with their own hands the actual relics themselves once a year to the faithful. The golden reliquary in which the sacred objects were contained was melted down in the Revolution. The small window with bars to your right, as you face the high altar, was placed there by the superstitious and timid Louis XI., in order that he might behold the elevation of the Host and the sacred relics without being exposed to the danger of assassination. The visitor should also notice the inlaid stone pavement, with its frequent repetition of the fleur-de-lis and the three castles. The whole breathes the mysticism of St. Louis; the lightness of the architecture, the height of the apparently unsupported roof, and the magnificence of the decoration, render this the most perfect ecclesiastical building in Paris.

In returning from the chapel, notice on the outside, from the court to the south, the apparently empty and useless porch, supporting a small room, which is the one through whose grated window Louis XI. used to watch the elevation.

The Hotel de Ville and the Conciergerie

By Augustus J. C. Hare

[Footnote: From "Walks In Paris." By arrangement with the publisher, David McKay. Copyright, 1880.]

It was Etienne Marcel, Mayor of Paris, who first established the municipal council at the Place de Grève, at that time the only large square in Paris. In July, 1357, he purchased as a Hostel de Ville the Maison aux Piliers, which had been inhabited by Clémence d'Hongrie, widow of Louis le Hutin, and which afterward took the name of Maison du Dauphin from her nephew and heir, Guy, Dauphin de Viennois.

In 1532 a new Hôtel de Ville was begun and finished by the architect Marin de la Vallée in the reign of Henri IV. This was so much altered by successive restorations and revolutions that only a staircase, two monumental chimney-pieces in the Salle du Trône, and some sculptured doorways and other details remained from the interior decorations in the old building at the time of its destruction.

Till the time of Louis XVI. the history of the Hôtel de Ville was entirely local; after that it became the history of France. It was there that Louis XVI. received the tri-colored cockade from Bailly, Mayor of Paris, July 17, 1789; and there, in the chamber called, from its hangings, Le Cabinet Vert, that Robespierre was arrested, in the name of the Convention, during one of the meetings of the Commune, July 27, 1794. After the fall of Robespierre it was seriously proposed to pull down the Hôtel de Ville, because it had been his last asylum--"Le Louvre de Robespierre." It was only saved by the common-sense of Leonard Bourdon.

But most of all, in the popular recollection, is the Hôtel de Ville connected with public fêtes--with those on the second marriage of Napoleon I. (1810), on the entry of Louis XVIII. (1814), on the coronation of Charles X. (1825), on the marriage of the Duke of Orleans (1837), on the visits of different foreign potentates to Napoleon III. Here also was the Republic proclaimed, September 4, 1870.

It was in one of the windows of the Hôtel de Ville that Louis Philippe embraced Lafayette (August, 1830) in sight of the people, to evince the union of the July monarchy with the bourgeoisie. On the steps of the building Louis Blanc proclaimed the Republic, February 24,1848. From September 4, 1870, to February 28, 1871, the hôtel was the seat of the "government of the national defense," and from March 19 to May 22, 1871, that of the pretended "Committee of public safety" of the Communists. On May 24 it was burned by its savage defenders, many of whom happily perished in the flames.

The Place de l'Hôtel de Ville is so modernized that it retains nothing of the Place de Grève but its terrible historic associations. Among the many fearful executions here, it is only necessary to recall that of Jean Hardi, torn to pieces by four horses (March 30, 1473) on an accusation of trying to poison Louis XI.; that of the Comte de St. Pol (December 19, 1475), long commemorated by a pillar; those of a long list of Protestants, opened by the auto-de-fé of Jacques de Povanes, student of the University, in 1525; that of Nicholas de Salcède, Sieur d'Auvillers, torn to pieces by four horses in the presence of the king and queens, for conspiracy to murder the Duc d'Anjou, youngest son of Catherine de Medici. More terrible still was the execution of Ravaillac (May 27, 1610) murderer of Henri IV.

"The executioner cut off his hand with an ax, and threw it and the murderous knife into the fire. His breasts, his arms and his legs were torn with pincers, and boiling oil and melted lead poured into the open wounds. He was then dismembered by four strong horses, which pulled for no less than an entire hour. They dismembered only a corpse. He expired," says L'Estoile, "at the second or third pull." When the executioner had to throw the limbs into the fire that the ashes, according to the sentence, might be flung to the winds, the whole crowd rushed on to claim them. "But," adds the same chronicler, "the people rushed on so impetuously that every mother's son had a piece, even the children, who made fires of them at the corners of the streets."

After the capture of the Bastille its brave governor, M. de Launay, was beheaded on the steps of the Hôtel de Ville, and his major, M. de Losme-Salbray, was massacred under the Arcade St. Jean. These were the first victims of the Revolution. Foulon, Intendant du Commerce, suffered here soon afterward, hung from the cords by which a lamp was suspended, whence the expression, which soon resounded in many a popular refrain, of "put the aristocrats to the lantern."

* * * * *

Two parasite buildings, the Conciergerie, and the Prefecture of Police, are now annexed to the Palais de Justice. The Conciergerie takes its name from the house of the concierge in the time of the royal residence here, who had a right to two chickens a day and to the cinders and ashes of the king's chimney.

It has always been a prison, and it was here that the Comte d'Armagnac was murdered, June 12, 1418. Here was made, below the level of the Seine, the prison called La Souricière, from the rats which had the reputation of eating the prisoners alive. The present Conciergerie occupies the lower story of the right wing of the existing Palais de Justice, and extends along the Quai de l'Horloge, as far as the towers of Montgomery and César. It has an entrance on the quay, before which the guillotine-carts received the victims of the Reign of Terror, and another to the right of the great staircase in the Cour d'Honneur.

All other associations of the Conciergerie are lost in those which were attached to it by the great Revolution. The cell in which Marie Antoinette suffered her seventy-five days' agony--from August 2 till October 15, when she was condemned--was turned into a chapel of expiation in 1816. The lamp still exists which lighted the august prisoner and enabled her guards to watch her through the night. The door still exists, tho changed in position, which was cut transversely in half and the upper part fixt that the queen might be forced to bend in going out, because she had said that whatever indignities they might inflict upon her they could never force her to bend the head.

After her condemnation, Marie Antoinette was not brought back to this chamber. It was a far more miserable cell which saw her write her last touching farewell to Madame Elizabeth. But this was the room in which the Girondins spent their last night, when, as Riouffe, himself in the prison at the time, says, "all during this frightful night their songs sounded and if they stopt singing it was but to talk about their country." The adjoining cell, now used as a sacristy, was the prison of Robespierre.

Père la Chaise

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

[Footnote: From "Outre Mer." Published by Houghton, Mifflin Co.]

The cemetery of Père la Chaise is the Westminster Abbey of Paris. Both are the dwellings of the dead; but in one they repose in green alleys and beneath the open sky--in the other their resting-place is in the shadowy aisle, and beneath the dim arches of an ancient abbey. One is a temple of nature; the other a temple of art. In one, the soft melancholy of the scene is rendered still more touching by the warble of birds and the shade of trees, and the grave receives the gentle visit of the sunshine and the shower; in the other, no sound but the passing footfall breaks the silence of the place; the twilight steals in through high and dusky windows; and the damps of the gloomy vault lie heavy on the heart, and leave their stain upon the moldering tracery of the tomb.

Père la Chaise stands just beyond the Barrière d'Aulney, on a hill-side, looking toward the city. Numerous gravel-walks, winding through shady avenues and between marble monuments, lead up from the principal entrance to a chapel on the summit. There is hardly a grave that has not its little inclosure planted with shrubbery; and a thick mass of foliage half conceals each funeral stone. The sighing of the wind, as the branches rise and fall upon it,--the occasional note of a bird among the trees, and the shifting of light and shade upon the tombs beneath, have a soothing effect upon the mind; and I doubt whether any one can enter that inclosure, where repose the dust and ashes of so many great and good men, without feeling the religion of the place steal over him, and seeing something of the dark and gloomy expression pass off from the stern countenance of death.

It was near the close of a bright summer afternoon that I visited this celebrated spot for the first time. The object that arrested my attention, on entering, was a monument in the form of a small Gothic chapel, which stands near the entrance, in the avenue leading to the right hand. On the marble couch within are stretched two figures, carved in stone and drest in the antique garb of the Middle Ages. It is the tomb of Abélard and Héloïse. The history of these unfortunate lovers is too well known to need recapitulation; but perhaps it is not so well known how often their ashes were disturbed in the slumber of the grave. Abélard died in the monastery of Saint Marcel, and was buried in the vaults of the church. His body was afterward removed to the convent of the Paraclet, at the request of Héloïse, and at her death her body was deposited in the same tomb. Three centuries they reposed together; after which they were separated to different sides of the church, to calm the delicate scruples of the lady-abbess of the convent. More than a century afterward, they were again united in the same tomb; and when at length the Paraclet was destroyed, their moldering remains were transported to the church of Nogent-sur-Seine. They were next deposited in an ancient cloister at Paris; and now repose near the gateway of the cemetery of Père la Chaise. What a singular destiny was theirs! that, after a life of such passionate and disastrous love,--such sorrows, and tears, and penitence--their very dust should not be suffered to rest quietly in the grave!--that their death should so much resemble their life in its changes and vicissitudes, its partings and its meetings, its inquietudes and its persecutions!--that mistaken zeal should follow them down to the very tomb--as if earthly passion could glimmer, like a funeral lamp, amid the damps of the charnel-house, and "even in their ashes bum their wonted fires!"....

Leaving this interesting tomb behind me, I took a pathway to the left, which conducted me up the hill-side. I soon found myself in the deep shade of heavy foliage, where the branches of the yew and willow mingled, interwoven with the tendrils and blossoms of the honeysuckle. I now stood in the most populous part of this city of tombs. Every step awakened a new train of thrilling recollections; for at every step my eye caught the name of some one whose glory had exalted the character of his native land, and resounded across the waters of the Atlantic. Philosophers, historians, musicians, warriors, and poets slept side by side around me; some beneath the gorgeous monument, and some beneath the simple headstone. But the political intrigue, the dream of science, the historical research, the ravishing harmony of sound, the tried courage, the inspiration of the lyre--where are they? With the living, and not with the dead! The right hand has lost its cunning in the grave; but the soul, whose high volitions it obeyed, still lives to reproduce itself in ages yet to come.

Among these graves of genius I observed here and there a splendid monument, which had been raised by the pride of family over the dust of men who could lay no claim either to the gratitude or remembrances of posterity. Their presence seemed like an intrusion into the sanctuary of genius. What had wealth to do there? Why should it crowd the dust of the great? That was no thoroughfare of business--no mart of gain! There were no costly banquets there; no silken garments, nor gaudy liveries, nor obsequious attendants!....

I continued my walk through the numerous winding paths, as chance or curiosity directed me. Now I was lost in a little green hollow, overhung with thick-leaved shrubbery, and then came out upon an elevation, from which, through an opening in the trees, the eye caught glimpses of the city, and the little esplanade, at the foot of the hill, where the poor lie buried. There poverty hires its grave, and takes but a short lease of the narrow house. At the end of a few months, or at most of a few years, the tenant is dislodged to give place to another, and he in turn to a third. "Who," says Sir Thomas Browne, "knows the fate of his bones, or how often he is to be buried? Who hath the oracle of his ashes, or whither they are to be scattered?"

Yet, even in that neglected corner, the hand of affection had been busy in decorating the hired house. Most of the graves were surrounded with a slight wooden paling, to secure them from the passing footstep; there was hardly one so deserted as not to be marked with its little wooden cross, and decorated with a garland of flowers; and here and there I could perceive a solitary mourner, clothed in black, stooping to plant a shrub on the grave, or sitting in motionless sorrow beside it....

After rambling leisurely about for some time, reading the iscriptions on the various monuments which attracted my curiosity, and giving way to the different reflections they suggested, I sat down to rest myself on a sunken tombstone. A winding gravel-walk, overshaded by an avenue of trees, and lined on both sides with richly sculptured monuments, had gradually conducted me to the summit of the hill, upon whose slope the cemetery stands. Beneath me in the distance, and dim-discovered through the misty and smoky atmosphere of evening, rose the countless roofs and spires of the city. Beyond, throwing his level rays athwart the dusky landscape, sank the broad red sun. The distant murmur of the city rose upon my ear; and the toll of the evening bell came up, mingled with the rattle of the paved street and the confused sounds of labor. What an hour for meditation! What a contrast between the metropolis of the living and the metropolis of the dead!....

Before I left the graveyard the shades of evening had fallen, and the objects around me grown dim and indistinct. As I passed the gateway, I turned to take a parting look. I could distinguish only the chapel on the summit of the hill, and here and there a lofty obelisk of snow-white marble, rising from the black and heavy mass of foliage around, and pointing upward to the gleam of the departed sun, that still lingered in the sky, and mingled with the soft starlight of a summer evening.

The Musée de Cluny

By Grant Allen

[Footnote: From "Paris."]

The primitive nucleus of the suburb on the South Side consists of the Roman fortress palace, the "tête du pont" of the Left Bank, now known as the Thermes, owing to the fact that its principal existing remains include only the ruins of the bath or therma. This colossal building, probably erected by Constantius Chlorus, the father of Constantine, covered an enormous area south of the river. After the Frankish conquest, it still remained the residence of the Merwing and Karling kings on the rare occasions when they visited Paris; and it does not seem to have fallen into utter decay till a comparatively late date in the Middle Ages.

With the Norman irruptions, however, and the rise of the real French monarchs under Eudes and the Capets, the new sovereigns found it safest to transfer their seat to the Palace on the Island (now the Palais de Justice), and the Roman fortress was gradually dismantled. In 1340 the gigantic ruins came into the hands of the powerful Benedictine Abbey of Cluny, near Mâcon, in Burgundy; and about 1480, the abbots began to erect on the spot a town mansion for themselves, which still bears the name of the Hôtel de Cluny. The letter K, the mark of Charles VIII. (1483-1498), occurs on many parts of the existing building, and fixes its epoch. The house was mostly built by Jaques d'Amboise, abbot, in 1490. The style is late Gothic, with Renaissance features.

The abbots, however, seldom visited Paris, and they frequently placed their town house accordingly at the disposition of the kings of France. Mary of England, sister of Henry VIII., and widow of Louis XII., occupied it thus in 1515, soon after its completion. It was usual for the queens of France to wear white as mourning; hence her apartment is still known as the "Chambre de la reine blanche."

At the Revolution, when the property of the monasteries was confiscated, the Hôtel de Cluny was sold, and passed at last, in 1833, into the hands of M. du Sommerard, a zealous antiquary, who began the priceless collection of works of art which it contains. He died in 1842, and the Government then bought the house and museum, and united it with the Roman ruin at its back under the title of Musée des Thermes et de l'Hôtel de Cluny. Since that time many further objects have been added to the collection.

At Cluny the actual building forms one of the most interesting parts of the sight, and is in itself a museum. It is a charming specimen of a late medieval French mansion; and the works of art it contains are of the highest artistic value.... At least two whole days should be devoted to Cluny--one to the lower and one to the upper floor. Much more, if possible.

The Place de la Bastille

By Augustus J. C. Hare

[Footnote: From "Walks in Paris." By arrangement with the publisher, David McKay. Copyright, 1880.]

The south end of the Rue des Tournelles falls into the Place de la Bastille, containing Le Colonne de Juillet, surmounted by a statue of Liberty, and erected 1831-1840. This marks the site of the famous castle-prison of the Bastille, which for four centuries and a half terrified Paris, and which has left a name to the quarter it frowned upon. Hugues Ambriot, Mayor of Paris, built it under Charles V. to defend the suburb which contained the royal palace of St. Paul. Unpopular from the excess of his devotion to his royal master, Aubriot was the first prisoner in his own prison.

Perhaps the most celebrated of the long list of after captives were the Connétable de St. Pol and Jacques d'Armagnac, Due de Nemours, taken thence for execution to the Place de Grève under Louis XI., Charles de Gontaut, Due de Biron, executed within the walls of the fortress under Henri IV., and the "Man with the Iron Mask," brought hither mysteriously, September 18, 1698, and who died in the Bastille, November 19, 1703.

A thousand engravings show us the Bastille as it was--as a "fort-bastide"--built on the line of the city walls just to the south of the Porte St. Antoine, surrounded by its own moat. It consisted of eight round towers, each bearing a characteristic name, connected by massive walls, ten feet thick, pierced with narrow slits by which the cells were lighted. In the early times it had entrances on three sides, but after 1580 only one, with a drawbridge over the moat on the side toward the river, which led to outer courts and a second drawbridge, and wound by a defended passage to an outer entrance opposite the Rue des Tournelles.

Close beside the Bastille, to the north, rose the Porte St. Antoine, approached over the city fosse by its own bridge, at the outer end of which was a triumphal arch built on the return of Henri II. from Poland in 1573. Both gate and arch were restored for the triumphal entry of Louis XIV. in 1667; but the gate (before which Etienne Marcel was killed, July, 1358), was pulled down in 1674.

The Bastille was taken by the people, July 14, 1789, and the National Assembly decreed its demolition.... The massive circular pedestal upon which the Colonne de Juillet now rests was intended by Napoleon I. to support a gigantic fountain in the form of an elephant, instead of the column which, after the destruction of the Bastille, the "tiers état" of Paris had asked to erect "à Louis XVI., restaurateur de la liberté publique." It is characteristic of the Parisians that on the very same spot the throne of Louis Philippe was publicly burned, February 24, 1848. The model for the intended elephant existed here till the middle of the reign of Louis Philippe, and is depicted by Victor Hugo as the lodging of "Le petit Gavroche."

The Panthéon and St. Etienne-Du-Mont

By Grant Allen

[Footnote: From "Paris."]

The medieval church of Ste. Geneviève, having fallen into decay in the middle of the eighteenth century, Louis XV. determined to replace it by a sumptuous domed edifice in the style of the period. This building, designed by Soufflot, was not completed till the Revolution, when it was immediately secularized as the Panthéon, under circumstances to be mentioned later. The remains of Ste. Geneviève, which had lain temporarily meanwhile in a sumptuous chapel of St. Étienne-du-Mont (the subsidiary church of the monastery) were taken out by the Revolutionists; the medieval shrine, or reliquary (which replaced St. Éloy's), was ruthlessly broken up; and the body of the patroness and preserver of Paris was publicly burned in the Place de Grève.

This, however, strange to say, was not quite the end of Ste. Geneviève. A few of her relics were said to have been preserved: some bones, together with a lock of the holy shepherdess's hair, were afterward recovered, and replaced in the sarcophagus they had once occupied. Such at least is the official story; and these relics, now once more enclosed in a costly shrine, still attract thousands of votaries to the chapel of the saint in St. Étienne-du-Mont.

The Panthéon, standing in front of the original church, is now a secular burial-place for the great men of France. The remains of Ste. Geneviève still repose at St. Étienne. Thus it is impossible to dissociate the two buildings, which should be visited together; and thus too it happens that the patroness of Paris has now no church in her own city. Local saints are always the most important; this hill and Montmartre are still the holiest places in Paris.

Proceed, as far as the garden of the Thermes, as on the excursion to Cluny. Then continue straight up the Boulevard St. Michel. The large edifice visible on the right of the Rue des Écoles to your left, is the new building of the Sorbonne, or University. Further up, at the Place du Sorbonne, the domed church of the same name stands before you. It is the University church, and is noticeable as the earliest true dome erected in Paris. The next corner shows one, right, the Luxembourg garden, and left, the Rue Soufflot, leading up to the Panthéon.

The colossal domed temple which replaces the ancient church of Ste. Geneviève was begun by Soufflot, under Louis XV., in imitation of St. Peter's, at Rome. Like all architects of his time, Soufflot sought merely to produce an effect of pagan or "classical" grandeur, peculiarly out of place in the shrine of the shepherdess of Nanterre. Secularized almost immediately on its completion, during the Revolution, the building was destined as the national monument to the great men of France, and the inscription, "Aux Grands Hommes la Patrie Reconnaissante," which it still bears, was then first placed under the sculptures of the pediment.

Restored to worship by the Restoration, it was again secularized under the Third Republic in order to admit the burial of Victor Hugo. The building itself, a vast bare barn of the pseudo-classical type, very cold and formal, is worthy of notice merely on account of its immense size and its historic position; but it may be visited to this day with pleasure, not only for some noble modern paintings, but also for the sake of the reminiscences of Ste. Geneviève which it still contains. The tympanum has a group by David d'Angers, representing France distributing wreaths to soldiers, politicians, men of letters, men of science, and artists.

The interior is in the shape of a Greek cross (with equal arms). Follow round the walls, beginning from the right. In the right aisle are paintings (modern) looking like frescoes, and representing the preaching of St. Denis, by Galand; and the history of Ste. Geneviève--her childhood, recognition by St. Germain l'Auxerrois, miracles, etc., delicate and elusive works, by Puvis de Chavannes. The paintings of the South Transept represent episodes in the early history of France. Chronologically speaking, they begin from the east central corner. Choir, Death of Ste. Geneviève, and Miracles before her Shrine, by Laurens. Apse of the tribune, fine modern (archaic) mosaic, by Hébert, representing Christ with the Guardian Angel of France, the Madonna, Jean d'Arc, and Ste. Geneviève. Stand under the dome to observe the proportions of the huge, bare, unimpressive building. Left, or Northern Transept, east side, the history of Jeanne d'Arc; she hears the voices; leads the assault at Orleans; assists at the coronation of Charles VII. at Rheims; and is burned at Rouen. West side, St. Louis as a child instructed by Blanche of Castille; administering justice in the Palace; and a captive among the Saracens. North aisle, history of Ste. Geneviève and St. Denis. The building is thus at once the apotheosis of patriotism, and the lasting memorial of the part borne by Christianity in French, and especially Parisian, history.

As you descend the steps of the Panthéon, the building that faces you to the left is the Mairie of the 5th Arrondissement; that to the right, the École de Droit. Turn to the right along the north side of the Panthéon. The long, low building which faces you is the Bibliotheque Ste. Geneviève. Nothing now remains of the Abbey of Ste. Geneviève except the tall early Gothic tower seen to the right near the end of the Panthéon, and rising above the modern buildings of the Lycée Henri IV. The singularly picturesque and strangely-mingled church across the little square is St. Étienne-du-Mont, which we now proceed to visit.

Stand in the left-hand corner of the Place to examine the facade. The church was begun (1517) as late Gothic; but before it was finished, the Renaissance style had come into fashion, and the architects accordingly jumbled the two in the most charming manner. The incongruity here only adds to the beauty. The quaintly original Renaissance portal bears a dedication to St. Stephen the Protomartyr, beneath which is a relief of his martyrdom, with a Latin inscription, "Stone destroyed the temple of the Lord," i.e., Stephen, "Stone rebuilds it." Right and left of the portal are statues of Sts. Stephen and Geneviève, whose monograms also appear on the doors. In the pediment is the usual representation of the Resurrection and Last Judgment. Above it, the rose window, on either side of which, in accordance with Italian rather than with French custom (showing Italian Renaissance influence) are the Angel of the Annunciation and the Madonna receiving his message. In the third story, a gable-end. Singular tower to the left, with an additional round turret, a relic of the earlier Gothic building. The whole façade (17th century) represents rather late Renaissance than transitional architecture.

The interior is the most singular, and in some ways the most picturesque, in Paris--a Gothic church, tricked out in Renaissance finery. The nave is flanked by aisles, which are divided from it by round pillars, capped by a singular balustrade or gallery with low, flat arches, simulating a triforium. The upper arches are round, and the decorations Renaissance; but the vaulting, both of nave and aisles, with its pendant keystones, recalls the Gothic style, as do also most of the windows. Stand near the entrance, in the center of the nave, and look up the church.

The most striking feature is the beautiful Renaissance jubé or rood-loft (the only one now left in Paris) which divides the Choir from the body of the building. This rood-loft still bears a crucifix, for the reception of which it was originally intended. On the arch below are two charmingly sculptured Renaissance angels. The rood-loft is flanked by two spiral staircases, which are wholly unique architectural features. Notice also the exquisite pendentive of the roof at the point of intersection of the nave and short false transepts.

Now walk up the right aisle. The first chapel is the Baptistery, containing the font and a modern statue of the boy Baptist. Third chapel, St. Antony of Padua. The fourth chapel contains a curious Holy Sepulcher, with quaint life-size terra-cotta figures of the 16th century. Fifth chapel, a gilt châsse. Notice the transepts, reduced to short arms, scarcely, if at all, projecting beyond the chapels. From this point examine the exquisite Renaissance tracery of the rood-screen and staircases. Then pass under the fine Renaissance door, with lovely decorative work, into the ambulatory. The Choir is in large part Gothic, with late flamboyant tracery. The apparent triforium is continued round the ambulatory.

The splendid gilded shrine in the second choir-chapel contains the remains of Ste. Geneviève, or what is left of them. Candles burn perpetually around it. Hundreds of votaries here pay their devotions daily to the Patroness of Paris. The shrine, containing what is alleged to be the original sarcophagus of the Saint (more probably of the 13th century) stands under a richly-gilt Gothic tabernacle, adorned with figures legibly named on their pedestals. The stained-glass window behind it has a representation of a processional function with the body of the Saint, showing this church, together with a view of the original church of Ste. Geneviève, the remaining tower, and adjacent houses, historically most interesting. The window beyond the shrine also contains the history of Ste. Geneviève--her childhood, first communion, miracles, distribution of bread during the siege of Paris, conversion of Clovis, death, etc.

Indeed the long sojourn of the body of Ste. Geneviève in this church has almost overshadowed its dedication to St. Stephen, several memorials of whom may, however, be recognized by the attentive visitor--among them, a picture of his martyrdom (by Abel de Pujol) near the entrance to the choir. The Protomartyr also stands, with his deacon's robe and palm, in a niche near the door of the sacristy, where left and right are frescoes of his Disputation with the Doctors, and his Martyrdom. The chapel immediately behind the high altar is, as usual, the Lady Chapel. The next contains a good modern window of the Marriage of the Virgin.

Examine in detail all the windows; one of the mystic wine-press is very interesting. Votive offerings of the city of Paris to Ste. Geneviève also exist in the ambulatory. Curious frescoes of the martyrdom of the 10,000 Christians on Mount Ararat on the north side. The best view of the choir is obtained from the north side of the ambulatory, opposite the shrine of Ste. Geneviève. In the north aisle notice St. Louis with the Crown of Thorns. Stand again in the center of the nave, near the entrance, and observe the curious inclination of the choir and high altar to one side--here particularly noticeable, and said in every case to represent the droop of the Redeemer's head on the cross.

As you emerge from the door, observe the cold and bare side of the Panthéon, contrasted with the internal richness of St. Êtienne. Curious view of the late Gothic portion of the church from the little Place on the north side. Return by the Rue Cujas and Rue St. Jacques, passing the Lycée Ste. Barbe, Lycée Louis-le-Grand, University, and other scholastic buildings, which give a good idea of the character of the quarter.

St. Roch

By Augustus J. C. Hare

[Footnote: From "Walks in Paris." By arrangement with the publisher, David McKay. Copyright, 1880.]

Englishmen are often specially imprest with Paris as a city of contrasts, because one side of the principal line of hotels frequented by our countrymen looks down upon the broad, luxurious Rue de Rivoli, all modern gaiety and radiance, while the other side of their courtyards open upon the busy working Rue St. Honoré, lined by the tall, many-windowed houses which have witnessed so many revolutions. They have all the picturesqueness of innumerable balconies, high, slated roofs, with dormer windows, window-boxes full of carnations and bright with crimson flowers through the summer, and they overlook an ever-changing crowd, in great part composed of men in blouses and women in white aprons and caps.

Ever since the fourteenth century the Rue St. Honoré has been one of the busiest streets in Paris. It was the gate leading into this street which was attacked by Jeanne d'Arc in 1429. It was the fact that the Cardinal de Bourbon and the Due de Guise had been seen walking together at the Porte St. Honoré that was said to have turned half the moustache of Henri of Navarre suddenly white, from a presentiment of the crime which has become known as the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. Here, in 1648, the barricade was raised which gave the signal for all the troubles of the Fronde. It was at No 3--then called L'Auberge des Trois Pigeons--that Ravaillac was lodging when he was waiting to murder Henry IV.; here the first gun was fired in the Revolution of July, 1830, which overturned Charles X.; and here, in the Revolution of 1848, a bloody combat took place between the insurgents and the military. Throughout this street, as Marie Antoinette was first entering Paris, the poissardes brought her bouquets, singing:

"La rose est la reine des fleurs.
Antoinette est la reine des coeurs."

("The rose is the queen of flowers, Antoinette is the queen of hearts") and here, as she was being taken to the scaffold, they crowded round her execution-cart and shouted:

"Madame Veto avait promis
De faire égorger tout Paris,
Mais son coup a manqué
Grâce à nos canonniers;
Dansons la carmagnole
Au bruit du son
Du canon!"

("Madame Veto had promised to have the throat cut of all Paris, but her attempt failed, thanks to our gunners. Let us dance the carmagnole to the music of the cannon's roar!")

* * * * *

Turning east toward Old Paris, we pass, on the right of the Rue St. Honoré, the Church of St. Roch, of which Louis XIV. laid the foundation-stone in 1633, replacing a chapel built on the site of the Hôtel Gaillon. The church was only finished, from designs of Robert de Cotte, in 1740. The flight of steps which leads to the entrance has many associations.

"Before St. Roch," says De Goncourt, "the tumbrel in which was Marie Antoinette, stopt in the midst of howling and hooting. A thousand insults were hurled from the steps of the church as it were with one voice, saluting with filth their queen about to die. She, however, serene and majestic, pardoned the insults by disregarding them." It was from these steps, in front of which an open space then extended to the Tuileries gardens, that Bonaparte ordered the first cannon to be fired upon the royalists who rose against the National Convention, and thus prevented a counter-revolution. Traces of this cannonade of 13 Vendémiaire are still to be seen at the angle of the church and the Rue Neuve St. Roch.