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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f5d6dc0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #52706 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/52706) diff --git a/old/52706-8.txt b/old/52706-8.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 6f456f2..0000000 --- a/old/52706-8.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3829 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of About Paris, by Richard Harding Davis - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: About Paris - -Author: Richard Harding Davis - -Illustrator: Charles Dana Gibson - -Release Date: August 2, 2016 [EBook #52706] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOUT PARIS *** - - - - -Produced by Clarity, Brian Wilsden and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - - - - - - - - - -[Illustration: "PARIS HAD TAKEN OFF HER MOURNING"] - -ABOUT PARIS -BY -RICHARD HARDING DAVIS - - -ILLUSTRATED -BY -CHARLES DANA GIBSON - -[Illustration] - -NEW YORK -HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS -1895 - -BY RICHARD HARDING DAVIS. - - - - -OUR ENGLISH COUSINS. Illustrated. Post 8vo, -Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25. - -THE RULERS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN. -Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25. - -THE WEST FROM A CAR-WINDOW. Illustrated. -Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25. - -THE EXILES, AND OTHER STORIES. Illustrated. -Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 50. - -VAN BIBBER, AND OTHERS. Illustrated. Post -8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 00; Paper, 60 cents. - -=Published by= HARPER & BROTHERS, =New York=. - - -Copyright, 1895, by Harper & Brothers. - -_All rights reserved._ - - - - -TO - -PAUL BOURGET - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - - I. THE STREETS OF PARIS 1 - - II. THE SHOW-PLACES OF PARIS--NIGHT 47 - - III. PARIS IN MOURNING 98 - - IV. THE GRAND PRIX AND OTHER PRIZES 138 - - V. AMERICANS IN PARIS 177 - - - - -ILLUSTRATIONS - - - PAGE - -"PARIS HAD TAKEN OFF HER MOURNING" _Frontispiece_ - -"THE CONCIERGE OF EACH HOUSE STOOD CONTINUALLY -AT THE FRONT DOOR" 3 - -"SHE LOOKED DOWN UPON OUR STREET" 9 - -"WITH A LONG LOAF OF BREAD" 15 - -"TES DANS LA RUE, VA, T'ES CHEZ TOI" 19 - -"THE PARTY PROMPTLY BROKE UP" 25 - -"AND TRANSFORM LONG-HAIRED STUDENTS INTO MEMBERS -OF THE INSTITUTE" 31 - -INSIDE COLUMBIN'S 37 - -"AND YOU BELIEVE THE GUIDES" 41 - -THE CHÂTEAU ROUGE 59 - -AT BRUANT'S 65 - -AT THE BLACK CAT 71 - -A CAFÉ CHANTANT 77 - -ON MONTMARTRE 83 - -SOME YOUNG PEOPLE OF MONTMARTRE 89 - -AT THE MOULIN ROUGE 93 - -AT THE JARDIN DE PARIS 103 - -PORTRAITS OF CARNOT IN HEAVY BLACK 109 - -"TO BRING A QUEEN BACK TO PARIS" 115 - -"THE GIRL WHO REPRESENTED ALSACE" 131 - -THE RESTAURANT AMONG THE TREES 143 - -INTERESTED IN THE WINNER 149 - -"AROUND SOME STATELY DIGNITARY" 159 - -"THE MAN THAT BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO" 167 - -"LISTENING FOR THE VOICE TO SPEAK HIS NAME ONCE -MORE" 179 - -"STANDING ON THEIR FEET FOR HOURS AT A TIME" 187 - -"THE AMERICAN COLONY IS NOT WICKED" 195 - -WHAT MIGHT SOME TIME HAPPEN IF THESE WERE LOVE-MATCHES 203 - -"'I HAVE ONE PICTURE IN THE SALON'" 215 - - - - -ABOUT PARIS - - - - -I - -THE STREETS OF PARIS - - -The street that I knew best in Paris was an unimportant street, and -one into which important people seldom came, and then only to pass on -through it to the Rue de Rivoli, which ran parallel with it, or to the -Rue Castiglione, which cut it evenly in two. It was to them only the -shortest distance between two points, for the sidewalks of this street -were not sprinkled with damp sawdust and set out with marble-topped -tables under red awnings, nor were there the mirrors and windows of -jewellers and milliners along its course to make one turn and look. -It was interesting only to those people who lived upon it, and to us -perhaps only for that reason. If you judged it by the circumstance -that we all spent our time in hanging out of the windows, and that the -concierge of each house stood continually at the front door, you would -suppose it to be a most interesting thoroughfare, in which things were -always happening. What did happen was not interesting to the outsider, -and you had to live in it some time before you could appreciate the -true value of the street. With one exception. This was the great -distinction of our street, and one of which we were very proud. A poet -had lived in his way, and loved in his way, in one of the houses, and -had died there. You could read the simple, unromantic record of this in -big black letters on a tablet placed evenly between the two windows of -the entresol. It gave a distinguished air to that house, and rendered -it different from all of the others, as a Legion of Honor on the breast -of a French soldier makes him conspicuous amongst his fellows. - -ALFRED DE MUSSET - -né à Paris - -Le 11 Décembre 1810 - -est mort -dans cette maison - -Le 2 Mai 1857 - -[Illustration: "THE CONCIERGE OF EACH HOUSE STOOD -CONTINUALLY AT THE FRONT DOOR"] - -We were all pleased when people stopped and read this inscription. We -took it as a tribute to the importance of our street, and we felt a -proprietary interest in that tablet and in that house, as though this -neighborly association with genius was something to our individual -credit. - -We had other distinguished people in our street, but they were very -much alive, and their tablets were colored ones drawn by Chéret, and -pasted up all over Paris in endless repetition; and though their -celebrity may not live as long as has the poet's, while they are living -they seem to enjoy life as fully as he did, and to get out of the -present all that the present has to give. - -The one in which we all took the most interest lived just across the -street from me, and by looking up a little you could see her looking -out of her window, with her thick, heavy black hair bound in bandeaux -across her forehead, and a great diamond horseshoe pinned at her -throat, and with just a touch of white powder showing on her nose and -cheeks. She looked as though she should have lived by rights in the -Faubourg St.-Germain, and she used to smile down rather kindly upon -the street with a haughty, tolerant look, as if it amused her by its -simplicity and idleness, and by the quietness, which only the cries -of the children or of the hucksters, or the cracking at times of a -coachman's whip, ever broke. She looked very well then, but it was in -the morning that the street saw her at her best. For it was then that -she went out to ride in the Bois in her Whitechapel cart, and as she -never awoke in time, apparently, we had the satisfaction of watching -the pony and the tiger and cart for an hour or two until she came. It -was a brown basket-cart, and the tiger used to walk around it many -times to see that it had not changed in any particular since he had -examined it three minutes before, and the air with which he did this -gave us an excellent idea of the responsibility of his position. So -that people passing stopped and looked too--bakers' boys in white linen -caps and with baskets on their arms, and commissionnaires in cocked -hats and portfolios chained to their persons, and gentlemen freshly -made up for the morning, with waxed mustaches and flat-brimmed high -hats, and little girls with plaits, and little boys with bare legs; and -all of us in-doors, as soon as we heard the pony stamp his sharp hoofs -on the asphalt, would drop books or razors or brooms or mops and wait -patiently at the window until she came. - -When she came she wore a black habit with fresh white gloves, holding -her skirt and crop in one hand, and the crowd would separate on either -side of her. She did not see the crowd. She was used to crowds, and she -would pat the pony's head or rub his ears with the fresh kid gloves, -and tighten the buckle or shift a strap with an air quite as knowing -as the tiger's, but not quite so serious. Then she would wrap the -lap-robe about her, and her maid would take her place at her side with -the spaniel in her arms, and she would give the pony the full length -of the lash, and he would go off like a hound out of the leash. They -always reached the corner before the tiger was able to overtake them, -and I believe it was the hope of seeing him some morning left behind -forever which led to the general interest in their departure. And when -they had gone, the crowd would look at the empty place in the street, -and at each other, and up at us in the windows, and then separate, -and the street would grow quiet again. One could see her again later, -if one wished, in the evening, riding a great horse around the ring, -in another habit, but with the same haughty smile; and as the horse -reared on his hind-legs, and kicked and plunged as though he would -fall back on her, she would smile at him as she did on the children in -our street, with the same unconcerned, amused look that she would have -given to a kitten playing with its tail. - -The houses on our street had tall yellow fronts with gray slate roofs, -and roof-gardens of flowers and palms in pots. Some of the houses had -iron balconies, from which the women leaned and talked across the -street to one another in purring nasal voices, with a great rolling -of the r's and an occasional disdainful movement of the shoulders. -When any other than a French woman shrugs her shoulders she moves the -whole upper part of her body, from the hips up; but the French woman's -shoulders and arms are all that change when she makes that ineffable -gesture that we have settled upon as the characteristic one of her -nation. - -[Illustration: "SHE LOOKED DOWN UPON OUR STREET"] - -In a street of like respectability to ours in London or New York those -who lived on it would know as little of their next-door neighbor as -of a citizen at another end of the town. The house fronts would tell -nothing to the outside world; they would frown upon each other like -family tombs in a cemetery; but in this street of Paris the people -lived in it, or on the balconies, or at the windows. We knew what -they were going to have for dinner, because we could see them -carrying the uncooked portions of it from the restaurant at the corner, -with a long loaf of bread under one arm and a single egg in the other -hand; and when some one gave a fête we knew of it by the rows of -bottles on the ledge of the window and the jellies set out to cool -on the balcony. We were all interested in the efforts of the stout -gentleman in the short blue smoking-jacket who taught his parrot to -call to the coachman of each passing fiacre; he did this every night -after dinner, with his cigarette in his mouth, and with great patience -and good-nature. We took a common pride also in the flower-garden of -the young people on the seventh floor, and in their arrangement of -strings upon which the vines were to grow, and in the lines of roses, -which dropped their petals whenever the wind blew, upon the head of the -concierge, so that she would look up and shake her head at them, and -then go inside and get a broom and sweep the leaves carefully away. -When any one in our street went off in his best clothes in a fiacre we -looked after him with envy, and yet with a certain pride that we lived -with such fortunate people, who were evidently much sought after in -the fashionable world; and when a musician or a blind man broke the -silence of our street with his music or his calls, we vied with one -another in throwing him coppers--not on his account at all, but because -we wished to stand well in the opinion of our neighbors. It was like -camping out on two sides of a valley where every one could look over -into the other's tent. - -There was a young couple near the corner, who, I think, had but lately -married, and every evening she used to watch for him in a fresh gown -for a half-hour or so before he came. During the day she wore a very -plain gown, and her eyes wandered everywhere; but during that half-hour -before he came she never changed her position nor relaxed her vigil. -And it made us all quite uncomfortable, and we could not give our -attention to anything else until he had turned the corner and waved -his hand, and she had answered him with a start and a little shrug of -content. After dinner they appeared together, and he would put his arm -around her waist, with that refreshing disregard for the world that -French lovers have, and they would smile down upon us in a very happy -and superior manner, or up at the sun as it sank a brilliant red at -the end of our street, with the hundreds of chimney-pots looking like -black musical notes against it. There was also a very interesting old -lady in the house that blocked the end of our street, a very fat and -masculine old lady in a loose white wrapper, who spent all of her time -rearranging her plants and flowers, and kept up an amiable rivalry with -the people in the balconies above and below her in the abundance and -verdure of her garden. It was a very pleasant competition for the rest -of us, as it hung that end of the street with a curtain of living green. - -[Illustration: "WITH A LONG LOAF OF BREAD"] - -For a little time there was a young girl who used to sit upon the -balcony whenever the sun was brightest and the air not too chill; but -she took no interest in the street, for she knew nothing of it except -its noises. She lay always in an invalid's chair, looking up at the -sky and the roof-line above, and with her profile against the gray -wall. During the day a nurse in a white cap sat with her; but after -dinner a stout, jaunty man of middle age came back from his club or -his bureau, and took the place beside her until it grew dark, when he -and the nurse would lift her in-doors again, and he would take his -hat and go off to the boulevards, I suppose, to cheer himself a bit. -It did not last long, for one day I came home to find them taking -down a black-and-silver curtain from the front of the house, and the -concierge said that the girl had been buried, and that her father was -now quite alone. For the first week after that he did not go to the -boulevards, but used to sit out on the balcony until late into the -evening, with the night about him, so that we would not have known he -was there save for the light of his cigar burning in the darkness. - -The step from our street to the boulevards is a much longer one in -the imagination than in actual distance. Our street, after all, was -only typical of thousands of other Parisian streets, and when you have -explained it you have described miles after miles of other streets like -it. But there is nothing just like the boulevards. If you should wish -to sit at the exact centre of the world and to watch it revolve around -you, you have only to take your place at that corner table of the Café -de la Paix which juts the farthest out into the Avenue de l'Opéra -and the Boulevard Capucines. This table is the apex of all the other -tables. It turns the tides of pedestrians on the broad sidewalks of -both the great thoroughfares, and it is geographically situated exactly -under the "de la" of the "Café de la Paix," painted in red letters -on the awning over your head. From this admirable position you can -sweep the square in front of the Opera-house, the boulevard itself, -and the three great streets running into it from the river. People -move obligingly around and up and down and across these, and if you -sit there long enough you will see every one worth seeing in the known -world. - -There is a large class of Parisians whose knowledge of that city is -limited to the boulevards. They neither know nor care to know of -any other part; we read about them a great deal, of them and their -witticisms and café politics; and what "the boulevards" think of this -or that is as seriously quoted as what "a gentleman very near the -President," or "a diplomat whose name I am requested not to give, but -who is in a position to know whereof he speaks," cares to say of public -matters at home. For my part, I should think an existence limited to -two sidewalks would be somewhat sad, especially if it were continued -into the middle age, which all boulevardiers seem to have already -attained. It does not strike one as a difficult school to enter, or -as one for which there is any long apprenticeship. You have only to -sit for an hour every evening under the "de la," and you will find -that you know by sight half the faces of the men who pass you, who -come up suddenly out of the night and disappear again, like slides in -a stereopticon, or whom you find next you when you take your place, -and whom you leave behind, still sipping from the half-empty glasses -ordered three hours before you came. - -The man who goes to Paris for a summer must be a very misanthropic -and churlish individual if he tires of the boulevards in that short -period. There is no place so amusing for the stranger between the -hours of six and seven and eleven and one as these same boulevards; -but to the Parisian what a bore it must become! That is, what a bore -it would become to any one save a Parisian! To have the same fat man -with the sombrero and the waxed mustache snap patent match-boxes in -your face day after day and night after night, and to have "Carnot at -Longchamps" taking off his hat and putting it on again held out for -your inspection for weeks, and to seek the same insipid silly faces -of boys with broad velvet collars and stocks, which they believe are -worn by Englishmen, and the same pompous gentlemen who cut their white -goatees as do military men of the Second Empire, and who hope that the -ruddiness of their cheeks, which is due to the wines of Burgundy, will -be attributed to the suns of Tunis and Algiers. And the same women, -the one with the mustache and the younger one with the black curl, and -the hundreds of others, silent and panther-like, and growing obviously -more ugly as the night grows later and the streets more deserted. If -any one aspires to be known among such as these, his aspirations are -easily gratified. He can have his heart's desire; he need only walk the -boulevards for a week, and he will be recognized as a boulevardier. It -is a cheap notoriety, purchased at the expense of the easy exercise of -walking, and the cost of some few glasses of "bock," with a few cents -to the waiter. There is much excuse for the visitor; he is really to be -envied; it is all new and strange and absurd to him; but what an old, -old story it must be to the boulevardier! - -[Illustration: "TES DANS LA RUE, VA, T'ES CHEZ TOI"] - -The visitor, perhaps, has never sat out-of-doors before and taken his -ease on the sidewalk. Yet it seems a perfectly natural thing to do, -until he imagines himself doing the same thing at home. There was a -party of men and women from New York sitting in front of the Café de -la Paix one night after the opera, and enjoying themselves very much, -until one of them suggested their doing the same thing the next month -at home. "We will all take chairs," he said, "and sit at the corner of -Twenty-sixth Street and Broadway at twelve o'clock at night and drink -bock-bier," and the idea was so impossible that the party promptly -broke up and went to their hotels. - -Of course the visitor in Paris misses a great deal that the true -boulevardier enjoys through not knowing or understanding all that he -sees. But, on the other hand, he has an advantage in being able to -imagine that he is surrounded by all the famous journalists and poets -and noted duellists; and every clerk with a portfolio becomes a Deputy, -and every powdered and auburn-haired woman who passes in an open fiacre -is a celebrated actress of the Comédie Française. He can distribute -titles as freely as the Papal court, and transform long-haired students -into members of the Institute, and promote the boys of the Polytechnic -School, in their holiday cocked hats and play-swords, into lieutenants -and captains of the regular army. He believes that the ill-looking -individual in rags who shows such apparent fear of the policeman on -the corner really has forbidden prints and books to sell, and that -the guides who hover about like vultures looking for a fresh victim -have it in their power to show him things to which they only hold the -key--things which any Frenchman could tell him he could see at his own -home if he has the taste for such sights. - -The best of the boulevards is that the people sitting on their -sidewalks, and the heavy green trees, and the bare heads of so many -of the women, make one feel how much out-of-doors he is, as no other -street or city does, and what a folly it is to waste time within walls. -I do not think we appreciate how much we owe to the women in Paris who -go without bonnets. They give the city so homelike and friendly an -air, as though every woman knew every other woman so well that she did -not mind running across the street to gossip with her neighbor without -the formality of a head-covering. And it really seems strange that the -prettiest bonnets should come from the city where the women of the -poorer classes have shown how very pretty a woman of any class can look -without any bonnet at all. - -The enduring nature of the boulevards impresses one who sees them at -different hours as much as does their life and gayety at every hour. -You sometimes think surely to-morrow they will rest, and the cafés -will be closed, and the long passing stream of cabs and omnibuses -will stop, and the asphalt street will be permitted to rest from its -burden. You may think this at night, but when you turn up again at nine -the next morning you will find it all just as you left it at one the -same morning. The same waiters, the same rush of carriages, the same -ponderous omnibuses with fine straining white horses, the flowers in -the booths, and the newspapers neatly piled round the colored kiosks. - -[Illustration: "THE PARTY PROMPTLY BROKE UP"] - -The Champs Élysées is hardly a street, but as a thoroughfare it is -the most remarkable in the world. It is a much better show than are -the boulevards. The place for which you pay to enter is generally -more interesting than the place to which admittance is free, and any -one can walk along the boulevards, but to ride in the Champs Élysées -you must pay something, even if you take your fiacre by the hour. -Some Parisians regret that the Avenue des Champs Élysées should be so -cheapened that it is not reserved for carriages hired by the month, -and not by the course, and that omnibuses and hired cabs are not kept -out of it, as they are kept out of Hyde Park. But should this rule -obtain the Avenue des Champs Élysées would lose the most amusing of -its features. It would shut out the young married couples and their -families and friends in their gala clothes, which look strangely -unfamiliar in the sunlight, and make you think that the wearers have -been up all night; and the hundreds of girls in pairs from the Jardin -de Paris, who have halved the expense of a fiacre, but who cannot yet -afford a brougham; and the English tourists dressed in flannel shirts -and hunting-caps and knickerbockers, exactly as though they were -penetrating the mountains of Afghanistan or the deserts of Syria, and -as unashamed of their provincialism as the young marquis who passes on -his dog-cart is unashamed of having placed the girl with him on his -right hand instead of his left, though by so doing he tells every one -who passes who and what she is. It would shut out the omnibuses, with -the rows of spectators on their tops, who lean on their knees and look -down into the carriages below, and point out the prettiest gowns and -faces; and it would exclude the market-wagons laden with huge piles -of yellow carrots and purple radishes, with a woman driving on the -box-seat, and a dog chained beside her. There is no other place in the -world, unless it be Piccadilly at five o'clock in the afternoon, where -so many breeds of horses trot side by side, where the chains of the -baron banker and the cracking whip of a drunken cabman and the horn -of some American millionaire's four-in-hand all sound at the same -time. To be known is easy in the boulevards, but it is a distinction -in the Avenue des Champs Élysées--a distinction which costs much -money and which lasts an hour. Sometimes it is gained by liveries and -trappings and a large red rosette in the button-hole, or by driving -the same coach at the same hour at the same rate of speed throughout -the season, or by wearing a fez, or by sending two sais ahead of your -cart to make a way for it, or by a beautiful face and a thoroughbred -pug on a cushion at your side, although this last mode is not so easy, -as there are many pretty faces and many softly cushioned victorias -and innumerable pug-dogs, and when the prevailing color for the hair -happens to be red--as it was last summer--the chance of gaining any -individuality becomes exceedingly difficult. When all of these people -meet in the afternoon on their way to and from the Bois, there is no -better entertainment of the sort in the world, and the avenue grows -much too short, and the hours before dinner even shorter. There are -women in light billowy toilets, with elbows squared and whip in hand, -fearlessly driving great English horses from the top of a mail-phaeton, -while a frightened little English groom clutches at the rail and peers -over their shoulder to grasp the reins if need be, or to jump if he -must. And there are narrow-chested corseted and padded young Frenchmen -in white kid gloves, who hold one rein in each hand as little girls -hold a skipping-rope, and who imagine they are so like Englishmen -that no one can distinguish them even by their accent. There are fat -Hebrew bankers and their equally fat sons in open victorias, who, -lacking the spirit of the Frenchmen, who at least attempt to drive -themselves, recline consciously on cushions, like the poodles in the -victorias of the ladies with the red hair. There are also visiting -princes from India or pashas from Egypt; or diplomats of the last -Spanish-American republic, as dark as the negroes of Sixth Avenue, but -with magnificent liveries and clanking chains; the nabobs of Haiti, of -Algiers and Tunis, and with these the beautiful Spanish-looking woman -from South America, the wives of the _rastaqouères_; and mixed with these -is the long string of bookmakers and sporting men coming back from -the races at Longchamps or Auteuil, red-faced and hot and dusty, with -glasses strapped around them, and the badges still flying from their -button-holes. There are three rows of carriages down and three of -carriages up, and if you look from the Arc de Triomphe to the Tuileries -you see a broken mass of glittering carriage-tops and lace parasols, -and what looks like the flashing of thousands of mirrors as the setting -sun strikes on the glass of the lamps and windows and on the lacquered -harness and polished mountings. Whether you view this procession from -the rows of green iron seats on either side or as a part of it, you -must feel lifted up by its movement and color and the infinite variety -of its changes. A man might live in the Champs Élysées for a week or a -month, seeing no more of Paris than he finds under its beautiful trees -or on its broad thoroughfare, and be so well content with that much of -the city as to prefer it to all other cities. - -There was a little fat man in his shirt sleeves one morning in front of -the Theatre of the Republic, which, as everybody knows, stands under -the trees in the Champs Élysées, on the Rue Matignon, hanging a new -curtain, and the fat man, as the proprietor and manager, was naturally -anxious. Two small boys with their bare legs, and leather belts about -their smocks, and a nurse with broad blue ribbons down her back, and -myself looked our admiration from the outside of the roped enclosure. -The orchestra had laid down its fiddle, and was helping the man who -takes the twenty centimes to adjust the square yard of canvas. The -proprietor placed his fat fingers on the small of his back and threw -his head to one side and shut one eye. We waited breathlessly for his -opinion. He took two steps backward from the ten-centime seats, and -studied the effect of the curtain from that distance, with his chin -thrown up and his arms folded severely. We suggested that it was an -improvement on the old curtain, and one that would be sure to catch the -passer's eye. - -[Illustration: "AND TRANSFORM LONG-HAIRED STUDENTS INTO MEMBERS OF THE -INSTITUTE"] - -"Possibly," the proprietor said, indulgently, and then wiped his brow -and shook his head. He told us we had little idea how great were the -trials of an _impresario_ of an open-air theatre in the Champs Élysées. -What with the rent and the cost of the costumes and the employment -of three assistants--one to work the marionettes, and one to take up -the money, and one to play in the orchestra--expenses did run up. Of -course there was madame, his wife, who made costumes herself better -than those that could be bought at the regular costumers', and that was -a saving; and then she also helped in working the figures when there -were more than two on the scene at once, but this was hard upon her, -as she was stout, and the heat at the top of the tin-roofed theatre -up among the dusty flies was trying. And then, I suggested, there was -much competition. The proprietor waved a contemptuous dismissal of the -claims of the four little theatres about him. It was not their rivalry -that he cared for. It is true the seats were filled, but with whom? -Ah, yes, with whom? He placed his finger at the side of his nose, -and winked and nodded his head mysteriously. With the friends of the -proprietor, of course. Poor non-paying acquaintances to make a show, -and attract others less knowing to a very inferior performance. Now -here with him everybody paid, and received the worth of his money many -times. Perhaps I had not seen the performance; in that case I should -surely do so. The clown and the donkey-cart were very amusing, and -the dancing skeleton, which came to pieces before the audience and -frightened the gendarme, was worthy of my approval. So the two small -boys and the nurse and the baby and I dodged under the rope and waited -for the performance. - -The idle man, who knows that "they also serve who only stand and -wait," must find the Champs Élysées the most acceptable of all places -for such easy service. There are at one corner the stamp-collectors -to entertain him, with their scrap-books and market-baskets full of -their precious bits of colored paper, gathered from all over the known -world, comparing and examining their treasures, bargaining with easy -good-nature and with the zeal of enthusiasts. Three times a week he -will find this open market or exchange under the trees, where old -men and little boys and pretty young girls meet together and chatter -over their common hobby, and swap Columbian stamps for those of some -French protectorate, and of many other places of which they know -nothing save that it has a post-office of its own. At another corner -there are smoothly-shaven men and plump, well-fed-looking women -waiting to take service on some gentleman's box-seat or in front of -some lady's cooking-stove--an intelligence office where there is no -middleman to whom they must pay a fee, and where, while they wait for a -possible employer, they hold an impromptu picnic, and pay such gallant -compliments that one can see they have lived much in the fashionable -world. - -Or the idler can drop into a chair in one of the cafés chantants on -an off day, when there is no regular performance, but a rehearsal, -to which the public is neither invited nor forbidden. It is an -entertaining place in which to spend an hour or two, with something to -drink in front of you, and a cigar, and the sun shining through the -trees upon the mirrors and artificial flowers and the gaudy hangings -of the stage. Here you will see Mlle. Nicolle as she is in her moments -of leisure. The night before she wore a greasy gingham gown, with her -hair plastered over her forehead in oily flat curls, as a laundress or -charwoman of Montmartre might wear them. Now she is fashionably dressed -in black, with white lace over it, and with a lace parasol, which she -swings from her finger in time to the music, while the other artists -of the Ambassadeurs' stand farther up the stage waiting their turn, or -politely watch her from the front. The girl who chalked her face as -Pierrot the evening before follows her in a blue boating-dress and a -kick at the end of it, which she means to introduce later in the same -day; and the others comment audibly on it from their seats, calling her -by her first name, and disagreeing with the leader of the orchestra as -to the particular note upon which the kick should come, while he turns -in his seat with his violin on his knee and argues it out with them, -shrugging his shoulders, and making passes in the air with his lighted -cigarette as though it were a baton. - -[Illustration: INSIDE COLUMBIN'S] - -Two gendarmes, with their capes folded and thrown over their shoulders, -come in and stand with the waiters, surveying the rehearsal with -critical disapproval, and the woman who collects the pennies for the -iron seats in the avenue takes a few moments' recess, and brings with -her two nurse-maids, with their neglected charges swinging by the -silken straps around their silken bodies. And so they all stand at one -side and gaze with large eyes at the breathless, laughing young woman -on the stage above them, who runs and kicks and runs back and kicks -again, reflected many times in the background of mirrors around her; -and then the two American song-and-dance men, and the English acrobats, -and the Italian who owns the performing dogs, and the smooth-faced -French comédiennes, and all the idle gentlemen with glasses of bock -before them, sit up as though some one had touched their shoulders with -a whip, and all the actresses smile politely, and look with pressed -lips and half-closed eyes at a very tall woman with red hair, who walks -erectly down the stage with a roll of music in her gloved hands. This -is Yvette Guilbert, the most artistic and the most improper of all the -women of the cafés chantants. She is also the most graceful. You can -see that even now when she is off her guard. She could not make an -ungraceful gesture even after long practice, and when she shudders and -jumps at a false note from the orchestra she is still graceful. - -When the rehearsal is finished you can cross the Place de la Concorde -and hang over the stone parapet, and watch the Deputies coming over -the bridge, or the men washing the dogs in the Seine, and shaving and -trimming their tufts of curly hair, and twisting their mustaches into -military jauntiness; or you can turn your back to this and watch the -thousands of carriages and cabs and omnibuses crossing the great square -before you from the eight streets opening into it, with the water of -the fountains in the middle blown into spray by the wind, and turned -into the colors of the rainbow by the sun. This great, beautiful open -place, even to one accustomed to city streets and their monuments, -seems to change more rapidly and to form with greater life than any -other spot in the world, and its great stupid obelisk in the centre -appears to rise like a monster exclamation-point of wonder at what it -sees about it, and with the surprise over all of finding itself in the -centre of it. - -[Illustration: "AND YOU BELIEVE THE GUIDES"] - -You cannot say you have seen the streets of Paris until you have -walked them at sunrise; every one has seen them at night, but he must -watch them change from night to day before he can claim to have seen -them at their best. I walked under the arches of the Rue de Rivoli one -morning when it was so dark that they looked like the cloisters of -some great monastery, and it was impossible to believe that the empty -length of the Rue Cambon had but an hour before been blocked by the -blazing front of the Olympia, and before that with rows of carriages -in front of the two Columbins. There were a few belated cabs hugging -the sidewalk, with their drivers asleep on the boxes, and a couple -of gendarmes slouching together across the Place de la Concorde made -the only sound of life in the whole city. The Seine lay as motionless -as water in a bath-tub, and the towers of Notre Dame rising out of -the mist at one end, and the round bulk of the Trocadéro bounding it -at the other, seemed to limit the river to what one could see of its -silent surface from the Bridge of the Deputies. The Eiffel Tower, the -great skeleton of the departed exposition, disappeared and reformed -itself again as drifting clouds of mist swept through it and cut its -great ugly length into fragments hung in mid-air. As the light grew in -strength the façades of the government buildings grew in outline, as -though one were focussing them through an opera-glass, and the pillars -of the Madeleine took form and substance; then the whole great square -showed itself, empty and deserted. The darkness had hidden nothing -more terrible than the clean asphalt and the motionless statues of the -cities of France. - -A solitary fiacre passed me slowly with no one on the box, but with -the coachman sitting back in his cab. He was returning to the stables, -evidently, and had on his way given a seat to a girl from the street, -whom he was now entertaining with genial courtesy. He had one leg -thrown over the other, and one arm passed back along the top of the -seat, and with the other he waved to the great buildings as they sprang -up into life as the day grew. The girl beside him was smiling at his -pleasantries, while the rising sun showed how tired and pale she was, -and mocked at the paint around her sleepy eyes. The horse stumbled at -every sixth step, and then woke again, while the whip rocked and rolled -fantastically in its socket like a drunken man. From up the avenue of -the Champs Élysées came the first of the heavy market-wagons, with the -driver asleep on the bench, and his lantern burning dully in the early -light. Back of him lay the deserted stretch of the avenue, strange -and unfamiliar in its emptiness--save for the great arch that rose -against the dawn, and seemed, from its elevation on the very top of the -horizon, to serve as a gateway into the skies beyond. The air in the -Champs Élysées was heavy with a perfume of flowers and of green plants, -and the leaves dripped damp and cool with the dew. Hundreds of birds -sang and chattered as though they knew the solitude was theirs but -for only one more brief hour, and that they then must give way to the -little children, and later to crowds of idle men and women. It seemed -impossible that but a few hours before Duclerc had filled these silent, -cool woods with her voice--Duclerc, with her shoulder-straps slipping -to her elbows and her white powdered arms tossing in the colored lights -of the serpentine dance. The long, gaudy lithographs on the bill-boards -and the arches of colored lamps stood out of the silence and fresh -beauty of the hour like the relics of some feast which should have been -cleared away before the dawn, and the theatres themselves looked like -temples to a heathen idol in some primeval wood. And as I passed out -from under the cool trees to the silent avenues I felt as though I had -caught Paris napping, and when she was off her guard, and good and -fresh and sweet, and had discovered a hidden trait in her many-sided -character, a moment of which she would be ashamed an hour or two later, -as cynics are ashamed of their secret acts of charity. - - - - -II - -THE SHOW-PLACES OF PARIS - -NIGHT - - -Paris is the only city in the world which the visitor from the outside -positively refuses to take seriously. He may have come to Paris with -an earnest purpose to study art, or to investigate the intricacies -of French law, or the historical changes of the city; or, if it be -a woman, she may have come to choose a trousseau; but no matter how -serious his purpose may be, there is always some one part of each day -when the visitor rests from his labors and smiles indulgently and does -as the Parisians do. Whether the city or the visitor is responsible for -this, whether Paris adopts the visitor, or the visitor adapts himself -to his surroundings, it is impossible to say. But there is certainly no -other capital of the world in which the stranger so soon takes on the -local color, in which he becomes so soon acclimated, and which brings -to light in him so many new and unsuspected capacities for enjoyment -and adventure. - -Americans go to London for social triumph or to float railroad shares, -to Rome for art's sake, and to Berlin to study music and to economize; -but they go to Paris to enjoy themselves. And there are no young men of -any nation who enter into the accomplishment of this so heartily and -so completely as does the young American. It is hardly possible for -the English youth to appreciate Paris perfectly, because he has been -brought up to believe that "one Englishman can thrash three Frenchmen," -and because he holds a nation that talks such an absurd language in -some contempt; hence he is frequently while there irritable and rude, -and jostles men at the public dances, and in other ways asserts his -dignity. - -But the American goes to Paris as though returning to his inheritance -and to his own people. He approaches it with the friendly confidence of -a child. Its language holds no terrors for him; and he feels himself -fully equipped if he can ask for his "edition," and say, "Cocher, allez -Henry's tout sweet." There is nothing so joyous and confiding as the -American during his first visit to the French metropolis. He has been -told by older men of the gay, glad days of the Second Empire, and by -his college chum of the summer of the last exposition, and he enters -Paris determined to see all that any one else has ever seen, and to -outdo all that any one else has ever done, and to stir that city to -its suburbs. He saves his time, his money, and his superfluous energy -for this visit, and the most amusing part of it is that he always -leaves Paris fully assured that he has enjoyed himself while there more -thoroughly than any one else has ever done, and that the city will -require two or three months' rest before it can readjust itself after -the shock and wonder due to his meteoric flight through its limits. -London he dismisses in a week as a place in which you can get good -clothes at moderate prices, and which supports some very entertaining -music-halls; but Paris, he tells you, ecstatically, when he meets you -on the boulevards or at the banker's, where he is drawing grandly on -his letter of credit, is "the greatest place on earth," and he adds, as -evidence of the truth of this, that he has not slept in three weeks. He -is unsurpassed in his omnivorous capacity for sight-seeing, and in his -ability to make himself immediately and contentedly at home. There is a -story which illustrates this that is told by a young American banker -who has been living in Paris for the last six years. He met one day -on the boulevards an old college friend of his, and welcomed him with -pleasure. - -"You must let me be your guide," the banker said. "I have been here -so long now that I know just what you ought to see, and I shall enjoy -seeing it with you as much as though it were for the first time. When -did you come?" The new arrival had reached Paris only three days -before, and said that he was ready to see all that it had to show. "You -have nothing to do to-night, then?" asked the banker. "Well, we will -drop in at the gardens and the cafés chantants. There is nothing like -them anywhere." His friend said he had made the tour of the gardens -on the night of his arrival, but that he would be glad to revisit -them. But that being the case, the banker would rather take him to the -cafés--"The Black Cat," and Bruant's, and "The Dead Rat." These his -friend had visited on his second evening. - -"Oh, well, we can cross the river, then, and I will show you some -slumming," said the banker. "You should see the places where the -thieves go--the Château Rouge and Père Lunette." - -"I went there last night," said the new-comer. - -The man who had lived six years in Paris took the stranger by the arm -and asked him if he was sure he was not engaged for that evening. "For -if you are not," he said, "you might take me with you and show me some -of the sights!" - -The American visitor is not only undaunted by the strange language, -but unimpressed by the signs of years of vivid history about him. He -sandwiches a glimpse at the tomb of Napoleon, and a trip on a penny -steamer up the Seine, and back again to the Morgue, with a rush through -the Cathedral of Notre Dame, between the hours of his breakfast and -the race-meeting at Longchamps the same afternoon. Nothing of present -interest escapes him, and nothing bores him. He assimilates and -grasps the method of Parisian existence with a rapidity that leaves -you wondering in the rear, and at the end of a week can tell you that -you should go to one side of the Grand Hôtel for cigars, and to the -other to have your hat blocked. He knows at what hour Yvette Guilbert -comes on at the Ambassadeurs', and on which mornings of the week -the flower-market is held around the Madeleine. While you are still -hunting for apartments he has visited the sewers under the earth, and -the Eiffel Tower over the earth, and eaten his dinner in a tree at -Robinson's, and driven a coach to Versailles over the same road upon -which the mob tramped to bring Marie Antoinette back to Paris, without -being the least impressed by the contrast which this offers to his own -progress. He develops also a daring and reckless spirit of adventure, -which would never have found vent in his native city or town, or in -any other foreign city or town. It is in the air, and he enters into -the childish good-nature of the place and of the people after the same -manner that the head of a family grows young again at his class reunion. - -One Harvard graduate arrived in Paris summer before last during those -riots which originated with the students, and were carried on by the -working-people, and which were cynically spoken of on the boulevards -as the Revolution of Sarah Brown. In any other city he would have -watched these ebullitions from the outskirts of the mob, or remained -a passive spectator of what did not concern him, but being in Paris, -and for the first time, he mounted a barricade, and made a stirring -address to the students behind it in his best Harvard French, and was -promptly cut over the head by a gendarme and conveyed to a hospital, -where he remained during his stay in the gay metropolis. But he still -holds that Paris is the finest place that he has ever seen. There was -another American youth who stood up suddenly in the first row of -seats at the Nouveau Cirque and wagered the men with him that he would -jump into the water with which the circus ring is flooded nightly, and -swim, "accoutred as he was," to the other side. They promptly took him -at his word, and the audience of French bourgeois were charmed by the -spectacle of a young gentleman in evening dress swimming calmly across -the tank, and clambering leisurely out on the other side. He was loudly -applauded for this, and the management sent the "American original" -home in a fiacre. In any other city he would have been hustled by the -ushers and handed over to the police. - -Those show-places of Paris which are seen only at night, and of which -one hears the most frequently, are curiously few in number. It is their -quality and not their quantity which has made them talked about. It is -quite as possible to tell off on the fingers of two hands the names and -the places to which the visitor to Paris will be taken as it is quite -impossible to count the number of times he will revisit them. - -In London there are so many licensed places of amusement that a man -might visit one every night for a year and never enter the same place -twice, and those of unofficial entertainment are so numerous that -men spend years in London and never hear of nooks and corners in it -as odd and strange as Stevenson's Suicide Club or Fagan's School for -Thieves--public-houses where blind beggars regain their sight and the -halt and lame walk and dance, music-halls where the line is strictly -drawn between the gentleman who smokes a clay pipe and the one who -smokes a brier, and arenas like the Lambeth School of Arms, from which -boy pugilists and coal-heavers graduate to the prize-ring, and such -thoroughfares as Ship's Alley, where in the space of fifty yards twenty -murders have occurred in three years. - -In Paris there are virtually no slums at all. The dangerous classes are -there, and there is an army of beggars and wretches as poor and brutal -as are to be found at large in any part of the world, but the Parisian -criminal has no environment, no setting. He plays the part quite as -effectively as does the London or New York criminal, but he has no -appropriate scenery or mechanical effects. - -If he wishes to commit murder, he is forced to make the best of the -well-paved, well-lighted, and cleanly swept avenue. He cannot choose a -labyrinth of alleyways and covered passages, as he could were he in -Whitechapel, or a net-work of tenements and narrow side streets, as he -could were he in the city of New York. - -Young men who have spent a couple of weeks in Paris, and who have been -taken slumming by paid guides, may possibly question the accuracy of -this. They saw some very awful places indeed--one place they remember -in particular, called the Château Rouge, and another called Père -Lunette. The reason they so particularly remember these two places -is that these are the only two places any one ever sees, and they -do not recall the fact that the neighboring houses were of hopeless -respectability, and that they were able to pick up a cab within a -hundred yards of these houses. Young Frenchmen who know all the worlds -of Paris tell you mysteriously of these places, and of how they visited -them disguised in blue smocks and guarded by detectives; detectives -themselves speak to you of them as a fisherman speaks to you of a -favorite rock or a deep hole where you can always count on finding -fish, and every newspaper correspondent who visits Paris for the first -time writes home of them as typical of Parisian low life. They are as -typical of Parisian low life as the animals in the Zoo in Central Park -are typical of the other animals we see drawing stages and horse-cars -and broughams on the city streets, and you require the guardianship of -a detective when you visit them as much as you would need a policeman -in Mulberry Bend or at an organ recital in Carnegie Hall. They are -show-places, or at least they have become so, and though they would no -doubt exist without the aid of the tourist or the man about town of -intrepid spirit, they count upon him, and are prepared for him with set -speeches, and are as ready to show him all that there is to see as are -the guides around the Capitol at Washington. - -I should not wish to be misunderstood as saying that these are the -only abodes of poverty and the only meeting-places for criminals in -Paris, which would of course be absurd, but they are the only places of -such interest that the visitor sees. There are other places, chiefly -wine-shops in cellars in the districts of la Glacière, Montrouge, or -la Villette, but unless an inspector of police leads you to them, and -points out such and such men as thieves, you would not be able to -distinguish any difference between them and the wine-shops and their -_habitués_ north of the bridges and within sound of the boulevards. The -paternal municipality of Paris, and the thought it has spent in laying -out the streets, and the generous manner in which it has lighted -them, are responsible for the lack of slums. Houses of white stucco, -and broad, cleanly swept boulevards with double lines of gas lamps and -shade trees, extend, without consideration for the criminal, to the -fortifications and beyond, and the thief and bully whose interests are -so little regarded is forced in consequence to hide himself underground -in cellars or in the dark shadows of the Bois de Boulogne at night. -This used to appeal to me as one of the most peculiar characteristics -of Paris--that the most desperate poverty and the most heartless -of crimes continued in neighborhoods notorious chiefly for their -wickedness, and yet which were in appearance as well-ordered and -commonplace-looking as the new model tenements in Harlem or the trim -working-men's homes in the factory districts of Philadelphia. - -The Château Rouge was originally the house of some stately family in -the time of Louis XIV. They will tell you there that it was one of -the mistresses of this monarch who occupied it, and will point to the -frescos of one room to show how magnificent her abode then was. This -tradition may or may not be true, but it adds an interest to the house, -and furnishes the dramatic contrast to its present wretchedness. It -is a tall building painted red, and set back from the street in a -court. There are four rooms filled with deal tables on the first floor, -and a long counter with the usual leaden top. "Whoever buys a glass -of wine here may sleep with his or her head on the table, or lie at -length up-stairs on the floor of that room where one still sees the -stucco cupids of the fine lady's boudoir. It is now a lodging-house -for beggars and for those who collect the ends of castaway cigars and -cigarettes on the boulevards, and possibly for those who thieve in a -small way. By ten o'clock each night the place is filled with men and -women sleeping heavily at the tables, with their heads on their arms, -or gathered together for miserable company, whispering and gossiping, -each sipping jealously of his glass of red wine." - -[Illustration: THE CHÂTEAU ROUGE] - -There is a little room at the rear, the walls of which are painted -with scenes of celebrated murders, and the portraits of the murderers, -of anarchists, and of their foes the police. A sharp-faced boy points -to these with his cap, and recites his lesson in a high singsong, -and in an _argot_ which makes all he says quite unintelligible. He -is interesting chiefly because the men of whom he speaks are heroes -to him, and he roars forth the name of "Antoine, who murdered the -policeman Jervois," as though he were saying Gambetta, the founder -of the republic, and with the innocent confidence that you will -share with him in his enthusiasm. The pictures are ghastly things, -in which the artist has chiefly done himself honor in the generous -use of scarlet paint for blood, and in the way he has shown how by -rapid gradations the criminal descends from well-dressed innocence to -ragged viciousness, until he reaches the steps of the guillotine at -Roquette. It is a miserable chamber of horrors, in which the heavy-eyed -absinthe-drinkers raise their heads to stare mistily at the visitor, -and to listen for the hundredth time to the boy's glib explanation -of each daub in the gallery around them, from the picture of the -vermilion-cheeked young woman who caused the trouble, to an imaginative -picture of Montfaucon covered with skulls, where, many years in the -past, criminals swung in chains. - -The café of Père Lunette is just around several sharp corners from the -Château Rouge. It was originally presided over by an old gentleman who -wore spectacles, which gave his shop its name. It is a resort of the -lowest class of women and men, and its walls are painted throughout -with faces and scenes a little better in execution than those in the -Château Rouge, and a little worse in subject. It is a very small -place to enjoy so wide-spread a reputation, and its front room is -uninteresting, save for a row of casks resting on their sides, on the -head of each of which is painted the portrait of some noted Parisian, -like Zola, Eiffel, or Boulanger. The young proprietor fell upon us as -his natural prey the night we visited the place, and drove us before -him into a room in the rear of the wineshop. He was followed as a -matter of course by a dozen men in blouses, and as many bareheaded -women, who placed themselves expectantly at the deal tables, and -signified what it was they wished to drink before going through the -form of asking us if we meant to pay for it. They were as ready to do -their part of the entertainment as the actors of the theatre are ready -to go on when the curtain rises, and there was nothing about any of -them to suggest that he or she was there for any other reason than -the hope of a windfall in the person of a stranger who would supply -him or her with money or liquor. A long-haired boy with a three days' -growth of hair upon his chin, of whom the proprietor spoke proudly as a -poet, recited in verse a long descriptive story of what the pictures -on the wall were intended to represent, and another youth, with a -Vandyck beard and slouched hat, and curls hanging to his shoulder, sang -Aristide Bruant's song of "Saint Lazare." All of the women of the place -belonged to the class which spends many months of each year in that -prison. The music of the song is in a minor key, and is strangely sad -and eerie. It is the plaint of a young girl writing to her lover from -within the walls of the prison, begging him to be faithful to her while -she is gone, and Bruant cynically makes her designate three or four -feminine friends as those whose society she particularly desires him -to avoid. The women, all of whom sang with sodden seriousness, may not -have appreciated how well the words of the song applied to themselves, -but you could imagine that they did, and this gave to the moment and -the scene a certain touch of interest. Apart from this the place was -dreary, and the pictures indecent and stupid. - -There is much more of interest in the Café of Aristide Bruant, on the -Boulevard Rochechouart. Bruant is the modern François Villon. He is -the poet of the people, and more especially of the criminal classes. -He sings the virtues or the lack of virtue of the several districts -of Paris, with the life of which he claims an intimate familiarity. He -is the bard of the bully, and of the thief, and of the men who live on -the earnings of women. He is unquestionably one of the most picturesque -figures in Paris, but his picturesqueness is spoiled in some degree by -the evident fact that he is conscious of it. He is a poet, but he is -very much more of a _poseur_. - -[Illustration: AT BRUANT'S] - -Bruant began by singing his own songs in the café chantant in the -Champs Élysées, and celebrating in them the life of Montmartre and -the Place de la République, and of the Bastille. He has done for the -Parisian bully what Albert Chevallier has done for the coster of -Whitechapel, and Edward Harrigan for the East Side of New York, but -with the important difference that the Frenchman claims to be one of -the class of whom he writes, and the audacity with which he robs stray -visitors to his café would seem to justify his claims. There is no -question as to the strength in his poems, nor that he gives you the -spirit of the places which he describes, and that he sees whatever is -dramatic and characteristic in them. But the utter heartlessness with -which he writes of the wickedness of his friends the souteneurs rings -false, and sounds like an affectation. One of the best specimens -of his verse is that in which he tells of the Bois de Boulogne at -night, when the woods, he says, cloak all manner of evil things, and -when, instead of the rustling of the leaves, you hear the groans of -the homeless tossing in their sleep under the sky, and calls for -help suddenly hushed, and the angry cries of thieves who have fallen -out over their spoils and who fight among themselves; or the hurried -footsteps of a belated old gentleman hastening home, and followed -silently in the shadow of the trees by men who fall upon and rob him -after the fashion invented and perfected by le Père François. Others of -his poems are like the most realistic paragraphs of _L'Assommoir_ and -_Nana_ put into verse. - -Bruant himself is a young man, and an extremely handsome one. He wears -his yellow hair separated in the middle and combed smoothly back over -his ears, and dresses at all times in brown velvet, with trousers -tucked in high boots, and a red shirt and broad sombrero. He has had -the compliment paid him of the most sincere imitation, for a young man -made up to look exactly like him now sings his songs in the cafés, even -the characteristically modest one in which Bruant slaps his chest -and exclaims at the end of each verse: "And I? I am Bruant." The real -Bruant sings every night in his own café, but as his under-study at the -Ambassadeurs' is frequently mistaken for him, he may be said to have -accomplished the rather difficult task of being in two places at once. - -Bruant's café is a little shop barred and black without, and guarded -by a commissionnaire dressed to represent a policeman. If you desire -to enter, this man raps on the door, and Bruant, when he is quite -ready, pushes back a little panel, and scrutinizes the visitor through -the grated opening. If he approves of you he unbars the door, with -much jangling of chains and rasping of locks, and you enter a tiny -shop, filled with three long tables, and hung with all that is absurd -and fantastic in decoration, from Chéret's bill-posters to unframed -oil-paintings, and from beer-mugs to plaster death-masks. There is a -different salutation for every one who enters this café, in which all -those already in the place join in chorus. A woman is greeted by a -certain burst of melody, and a man by another, and a soldier with easy -satire, as representing the government, by an imitation of the fanfare -which is blown by the trumpeters whenever the President appears in -public. There did not seem to be any greeting which exactly fitted our -case, so Bruant waved us to a bench, and explained to his guests, with -a shrug: "These are two gentlemen from the boulevards who have come to -see the thieves of Montmartre. If they are quiet and well-behaved we -will not rob them." After this somewhat discouraging reception we, in -our innocence, sat perfectly still, and tried to think we were enjoying -ourselves, while we allowed ourselves to be robbed by waiters and -venders of songs and books without daring to murmur or protest. - -Bruant is assisted in the entertainment of his guests by two or three -young men who sing his songs, the others in the room joining with them. -Every third number is sung by the great man himself, swaggering up and -down the narrow limits of the place, with his hands sunk deep in the -pockets of his coat, and his head rolling on his shoulders. At the end -of each verse he withdraws his hands, and brushes his hair back over -his ears, and shakes it out like a mane. One of his perquisites as -host is the privilege of saluting all of the women as they leave, of -which privilege he avails himself when they are pretty, or resigns it -and bows gravely when they are not. It is amusing to notice how the -different women approach the door when it is time to go, and how the -escort of each smiles proudly when the young man deigns to bend his -head over the lips of the girl and kiss her good-night. - -The café of the Black Cat is much finer and much more pretentious than -Bruant's shop, and is of wider fame. It is, indeed, of an entirely -different class, but it comes in here under the head of the show-places -of Paris at night. It was originally a sort of club where journalists -and artists and poets met round the tables of a restaurant-keeper who -happened to be a patron of art as well, and fitted out his café with -the canvases of his customers, and adopted their suggestions in the -arrangement of its decoration. The outside world of Paris heard of -these gatherings at the Black Cat, as the café and club were called, -and of the wit and spirit of its _habitués_, and sought admittance to -its meetings, which was at first granted as a great privilege. But at -the present day the café has been turned over into other hands, and -is a show-place pure and simple, and a most interesting one. The café -proper is fitted throughout with heavy black oak, or something in -imitation of it. There are heavy broad tables and high wainscoting and -an immense fireplace and massive rafters. - -[Illustration: AT THE BLACK CAT] - -To set off the sombreness of this, the walls are covered with panels in -the richest of colors, by Steinlen, the most imaginative and original -of the Parisian illustrators, in all of which the black cat appears as -a subject, but in a different rôle and with separate treatment. Upon -one panel hundreds of black cats race over the ocean, in another they -are waltzing with naiads in the woods, and in another they are whirling -through space over red-tiled roofs, followed by beautiful young women, -gendarmes, and boulevardiers in hot pursuit. And in every other part of -the café the black cat appears as frequently as did the head of Charles -I. in the writings of Mr. Dick. It stalks stuffed in its natural skin, -or carved in wood, with round glass eyes and long red tongue, or it -perches upon the chimney-piece with back arched and tail erect, peering -down from among the pewter pots and salvers. The gas-jets shoot from -the mouths of wrought-iron cats, and the dismembered heads of others -grin out into the night from the stained-glass windows. The room shows -the struggle for what is odd and bizarre, but the drawings in black and -white and the watercolors and oil-paintings on the walls are signed by -some of the cleverest artists in Paris. The inscriptions and rules and -regulations are as odd as the decorations. As, for example, the one -placed halfway up the narrow flight of stairs which leads to the tiny -theatre, and which commemorates the fact that the café was on such a -night visited by President Carnot, who--so the inscription adds, lest -the visitor should suppose the Black Cat was at all impressed by the -honor--"is the successor of Charlemagne and Napoleon I." Another fancy -of the Black Cat was at one time to dress all the waiters in the green -coat and gold olive leaves of the members of the Institute, to show how -little the poets and artists of the café thought of the other artists -and poets who belonged to that ancient institution across the bridges. -But this has now been given up, either because the uniforms proved too -expensive, or because some one of the Black Cat's _habitués_ had left -his friends "for a ribbon to wear in his coat," and so spoiled the -satire. - -Three times a week there is a performance in the theatre up-stairs, -at which poets of the neighborhood recite their own verses, and some -clever individual tells a story, with a stereopticon and a caste of -pasteboard actors for accessories. These latter little plays are very -clever and well arranged, and as nearly proper as a Frenchman with -such a temptation to be otherwise could be expected to make them. It is -a most informal gathering, more like a performance in a private house -than a theatre, and the most curious thing about it is the character -of the audience, which, instead of being bohemian and artistic, is -composed chiefly of worthy bourgeoisie, and young men and young women -properly chaperoned by the parents of each. They sit on very stiff -wooden chairs, while a young man stands on the floor in front of them -with his arms comfortably folded and recites a poem or a monologue, or -plays a composition of his own. And then the lights are all put out, -and a tiny curtain is rung up, showing a square hole in the proscenium, -covered with a curtain of white linen. On this are thrown the shadows -of the pasteboard figures, who do the most remarkable things with a -naturalness which might well shame some living actors. - -It would be impossible to write of the entertainment Paris affords -at night without cataloguing the open-air concerts and the public -gardens and dance-halls. The best of the cafés chantants in Paris is -the Ambassadeurs'. There are many others, but the Ambassadeurs' is the -best known, is nearest to the boulevards, and has the best restaurant. -It is like all the rest in its general arrangement, or all the others -copy it, so that what is true of the Ambassadeurs' may be considered as -descriptive of them all. - -The Ambassadeurs' is a roof-garden on the ground, except that there -are comfortable benches instead of tables with chairs about them, and -that there is gravel underfoot in place of wooden flooring. Lining the -block of benches on either side are rows of boxes, and at the extreme -rear is the restaurant, with a wide balcony, where people sit and -dine, and listen to the music of the songs without running any risk -of hearing the words. The stage is shut in with mirrors and set with -artificial flowers, which make a bad background for the artists, and -which at matinées, in the broad sunlight, look very ghastly indeed. But -at night, when all the gas-jets are lit and the place is crowded, it is -very gay, joyous, and pretty. - -[Illustration: A CAFÉ CHANTANT] - -The Parisian may economize in household matters, in the question of -another egg for his breakfast, and in the turning of an uneaten entrée -into a soup, but in public he is most generous; and he is in nothing -so generous as in his reckless use of gas. He raises ten lamp-posts -to every one that is put up in London or New York, and he does not -plant them only to light some thing or some person, but because -they are pleasing to look at in themselves. It is difficult to feel -gloomy in a city which is so genuinely illuminated that one can sit in -the third-story window of a hotel and read a newspaper by the glare of -the gas-lamps in the street below. This is a very wise generosity, for -it helps to attract people to Paris, who spend money there, so that -in the end the lighting of the city may be said to pay for itself. If -we had as good government in New York as there is in Paris, Madison -Square would not depend for its brilliancy at night on the illuminated -advertising of two business firms. - -Individuals follow the municipality of Paris in this extravagance, -and the Ambassadeurs' is in consequence as brilliant as many rows of -gas-jets can make it, and these globes of white light among the green -branches of the trees are one of the prettiest effects on the Champs -Élysées at night. They do not turn night into day, but they make the -darkness itself more attractive by contrast. The performers at the -Ambassadeurs' are the best in their line of work, and the audiences are -composed of what in London would be called the middle class, mixed with -cocottes and boulevardiers. You will also often see American men and -women who are well known at home dining there on the balcony, but they -do not bring young girls with them. - -It is interesting to note what pleases French people of the class -who gather at these open-air concerts. What is artistic they seem -to appreciate much more fully than would an American or an English -audience--at least, they are more demonstrative in their applause; but -the contradictory feature of their appreciation lies in their delight -and boisterous enthusiasm, not only over what is very good, but also -over what is most childish horse-play. They enjoy with equal zest the -quiet, inimitable character studies of Nicolle and the efforts of two -trained dogs to play upon a fiddle, while a hideous, gaunt creature, -six foot tall, in a woman's ballet costume, throws them off their -chairs in convulsions of delight. They are like children with a mature -sense of the artistic, and still with an infantile delight in what is -merely noisy and absurd. - -It is also interesting to note how much these audiences will permit -from the stage in the direction of suggestiveness, and what would be -called elsewhere "outraged propriety." This is furnished them to the -highest degree by Yvette Guilbert. It seems that as this artist became -less of a novelty, she recognized that it would be necessary for her -to increase the audacity of her songs if she meant to hold her original -place in the interest of her audiences, and she has now reached a point -in daring which seems hardly possible for her or any one else to pass. -No one can help delighting in her and in her line of work, in her -subtlety, her grace, and the absolute knowledge she possesses of what -she wants to do and how to do it. But her songs are beyond anything -that one finds in the most impossible of French novels or among the -legends of the Viennese illustrated papers. These latter may treat -of certain subjects in a too realistic or in a scoffing but amusing -manner, but Guilbert talks of things which are limited generally to -the clinique of a hospital and the _blague_ of medical students; -things which are neither funny, witty, nor quaint, but simply nasty -and offensive. The French audiences of the open-air concerts, however, -enjoy these, and encore her six times nightly. At Pastor's Theatre last -year a French girl sang a song which probably not one out of three -hundred in the audience understood, but which she delivered with such -appropriateness of gesture as to make her meaning plain. When she left -the stage there was absolute silence in the house, and in the wings the -horrified manager seized her by the arms, and in spite of her protests -refused to allow her to reappear. So her performance in this country -was limited to that one song. It was a very long trip to take for such -a disappointment, and the management were, of course, to blame for not -knowing what they wanted and what their audiences did not want, but the -incident is interesting as showing how widely an American and a French -audience differs in matters of this sort. - -There was another Frenchwoman who appeared in New York last winter, -named Duclerc. She is a very beautiful woman, and very popular in -Paris, and I used to think her amusing at the Ambassadeurs', where -she appealed to a sympathetic audience; but in a New York theatre she -gave you a sense of personal responsibility that sent cold shivers -down your back, and you lacked the courage to applaud, when even the -gallery looked on with sullen disapproval. And when the Irish comedian -who followed her said that he did not understand her song, but that -she was quite right to sing it under an umbrella, there was a roar of -relief from the audience which showed it wanted some one to express its -sentiments, which it had been too polite to do except in silence. This -tolerance impressed me very much, especially because I had seen the -same woman suffer at the hands of her own people, whom she had chanced -to offend. The incident is interesting, perhaps, as showing that the -French have at times not only the child's quick delight, but also the -cruelty of a child, than which there is nothing more unreasoning and -nothing more savage. - -[Illustration: ON MONTMARTRE] - -One night at the Ambassadeurs', when Duclerc had finished the first -verse of her song, a man rose suddenly in the front row of seats and -insulted her. Had he used the same words in any American or English -theatre, he would have been hit over the head by the member of the -orchestra nearest him, and then thrown out of the theatre into the -street. It appeared from this man's remarks that the actress had -formerly cared for him, but that she had ceased to do so, and that he -had come there that night to show her how well he could stand such -treatment. He did this by bringing another woman with him, and by -placing a dozen bullies from Montmartre among the audience to hiss -the actress when she appeared. This they did with a rare good-will, -while the rejected suitor in the front row continued to insult her, -assisted at the same time by his feminine companion. No one in the -audience seemed to heed this, or to look upon it as unfair to himself -or to the actress, who was becoming visibly hysterical. There was a -piece of wood lying on the stage that had been used in a previous act, -and Duclerc, in a frenzy at a word which the man finally called to -her, suddenly stooped, and, picking this up, hurled it at him. In an -instant the entire audience was on its feet. This last was an insult to -itself. As long as it was Duclerc who was being attacked, it did not -feel nor show any responsibility, but when she dared to hurl sticks -of wood at the face of a Parisian audience, it rose in its might and -shouted its indignation. Under the cover of this confusion the hired -bullies stooped, and, scooping up handfuls of the gravel with which -the place is strewn, hurled them at Duclerc, until the stones rattled -around her on the stage like a fall of hail. She showed herself a very -plucky woman, and continued her song, even though you could see her -face growing white beneath the rouge, and her legs twisting and sinking -under her when she tried to dance. It was an awful scene, breaking so -suddenly into the easy programme of the evening, and one of the most -cowardly and unmanly exhibitions that I have ever witnessed. There did -not seem to be a man in the place who was not standing up and yelling -"À bas Duclerc!" and the groans and hisses and abuse were like the -worst efforts of a mob. Of course the stones did not hurt the woman, -but the insult of being stoned did. They put an end to her misery at -last by ringing down the curtain, and they said at the stage door -afterwards that she had been taken home in a fit. - -When I saw her a few months later at Pastor's, I was thankful that, as -a people, our self-respect is not so easily hurt as to make us revenge -a slight upon it by throwing stones at a woman. Of course a Frenchman -might say that it is not fair to judge the Parisians by the audience -of a music-hall, but there were several ladies of title and gentlemen -of both worlds in the audience, who a few months later assailed Jane -Harding when she appeared as Phryne in the Opéra Comique with exactly -the same violence and for as little cause. These outbursts are only -temporary aberrations, however; as one of the attendants of the -Ambassadeurs' said, "To-morrow they will applaud her the more to make -up for it," which they probably did. It is in the same spirit that they -change the names of streets, and pull down columns only to rebuild them -again, until it would seem a wise plan for them, as one Englishman -suggested, to put the Column of Vendôme on a hinge, so that it could be -raised and lowered with less trouble. - -Of the public gardens and dance-halls there are a great number, and the -men who have visited Paris do not have to be told much concerning them, -and the women obtain a sufficiently correct idea of what they are like -from the photographs along the Rue de Rivoli to prevent their wishing -to learn more. What these gardens were in the days of the Second -Empire, when the Jardin Mabille and the Bal Bullier were celebrated -through books and illustrations, and by word of mouth by every English -and American traveller who had visited them, it is now difficult to -say. It may be that they were the scenes of mad abandon and fascinating -frenzy, of which the last generation wrote with mock horror and with -suggestive smiles, and of which its members now speak with a sigh of -regret. But we are always ready to doubt whether that which has passed -away, and which in consequence we cannot see, was as remarkable as it -is made to appear. We depreciate it in order to console ourselves. -And if the Mabille and the Bullier were no more wickedly attractive -in those days than is the Moulin Rouge which has taken their place -under the Republic, we cannot but feel that the men of the last -generation visited Paris when they were very young. Perhaps it is true -that Paris was more careless and happy then. It can easily be argued -so, for there was more money spent under the Empire, and more money -given away in fêtes and in spectacles and in public pleasures, and the -Parisian in those days had no responsibility. Now that he has a voice -and a vote, and is the equal of his President, he devotes himself to -those things which did not concern him at all in the earlier times. -Then the Emperor and his ministers felt the responsibility, and asked -of him only that he should enjoy himself. - -[Illustration: SOME YOUNG PEOPLE OF MONTMARTRE] - -But whatever may have been true of the spirit of Paris then, the man -who visits it to-day expecting to see Leech's illustrations and Mark -Twain's description of the Mabille reproduced in the Jardin de Paris -and the Moulin Rouge will be disappointed. He will, on the contrary, -find a great deal of light and some very good music, and a mixed -crowd composed chiefly of young women and Frenchmen well advanced in -years and English and American tourists. The young women have all the -charm that only a Frenchwoman possesses, and parade quietly below -the boxes, and before the rows of seats that stretch around the hall -or the garden, as it happens to be, and are much better behaved and -infinitely more self-respecting and attractive in appearance than the -women of their class in London or New York. But there are no students -nor grisettes to kick off high hats and to dance in an ecstasy of -abandon. There are in their places from four to a dozen ugly women -and shamefaced-looking men, who are hired to dance, and who go sadly -through the figures of the quadrille, while one of the women after -another shows how high she can kick, and from what a height she can -fall on the asphalt, and do what in the language of acrobats is called -a "split;" there is no other name for it. It is not an edifying nor -thrilling spectacle. - -[Illustration: AT THE MOULIN ROUGE] - -The most notorious of these dance-halls is the Moulin Rouge. You must -have noticed when journeying through France the great windmills that -stand against the sky-line on so many hilltops. They are a picturesque -and typical feature of the landscape, and seem to signify the honest -industry and primitiveness of the French people of the provinces. And -as the great arms turn in the wind you can imagine you can hear the -sound of the mill-wheel clacking while the wheels inside grind -out the flour that is to give life and health. And so when you see -the great Red Mill turn high up where four streets meet on the side -of Montmartre, and know its purpose, you are impressed with the grim -contrast of its past uses and its present notoriety. An imaginative -person could not fail to be impressed by the sight of the Moulin Rouge -at night. It glows like a furnace, and the glare from its lamps reddens -the sky and lights up the surrounding streets and cafés and the faces -of the people passing like a conflagration. The mill is red, the -thatched roof is red, the arms are picked out in electric lights in red -globes, and arches of red lamp-shades rise on every side against the -blackness of the night. Young men and women are fed into the blazing -doors of the mill nightly, and the great arms, as they turn unceasingly -and noisily in a fiery circle through the air, seem to tell of the -wheels within that are grinding out the life and the health and souls -of these young people of Montmartre. - -If you have visited many of the places touched upon in this article -in the same night, you will find yourself caught in the act by the -early sunlight, and as it will then be too late to go to bed, you can -do nothing better than turn your steps towards the Madeleine. There -you may find the market-people taking the flowers out of the black -canvas wagons and putting up the temporary booths, while the sidewalk -is hidden with a mass of roses in their white paper cornucopiæ and the -dark, damp green of palms and ferns. - -It will be well worth your while to go on through the silent streets -from this market of flowers to the market of food in the Halles -Centrales, where there are strawberry patches stretching for a block, -and bounded by acres of radishes or acres of mushrooms, and by queer -fruits from as far south as Algiers and Tunis, just arrived from -Marseilles on the train, and green pease and carrots from no greater a -distance than just beyond the fortifications. It is the only spot in -the city where many people are awake. Everybody is awake here, bustling -and laughing and scolding--porters with brass badges on their sleeves -carrying great piles of vegetables, and plump market-women in white -sleeves and caps, and drivers in blue blouses smacking their lips over -their hot coffee after their long ride through the night. It is like a -great exposition building of food exhibits, with the difference that -all of these exhibits are to be scattered and are to disappear on the -breakfast-tables of Paris that same morning. Loud-voiced gentlemen are -auctioneering off whole crops of potatoes, a sidewalk at a time, or a -small riverful of fish with a single clap of the hands; live lobsters -and great turtles crawl and squirm on marble slabs, and vistas of red -meat stretch on iron hooks from one street corner to the next. - -You are, and feel that you are, a drone in this busy place, and salute -with a sense of guilty companionship the groups of men and girls in -dinner dress who have been up all night, and who come singing and -chaffing in their open carriages in search of coffee and a box of -strawberries, or a bunch of cold, crisp radishes with the dew still on -them, which they buy from a virtuous matron of grim and disapproving -countenance at a price which throws a lurid light on the profits of -Bignon's and Laurent's. - -And then you become conscious of your evening dress and generally -dissolute and out-of-place air, and hurry home through the bright -sunlight to put out your sputtering candle and to creep shamefacedly to -bed. - - - - -III - -PARIS IN MOURNING - - -[Illustration] - -The news of the assassination of President Carnot at Lyons reached -Paris and the Café de la Paix at ten o'clock on Sunday night. What -is told at the Café de la Paix is not long in traversing the length -of the boulevards, and in crossing the Place de la Concorde to the -cafés chantants and the public gardens in the Champs Élysées, so that -by eleven o'clock on the night of the 24th of June "all Paris" was -acquainted with the fact that the President of the Republic had been -cruelly murdered. - -There are many people in America who remember the night when President -Garfield died, and how, when his death was announced from the stage of -the different theatres, the audience in each theatre rose silently as -one man and walked quietly out. To them the President's death was not -unexpected; it did not stun them, it came with no sudden shock, but it -was not necessary to announce to them that the performance for that -evening was at an end. They did not leave because the manager had rung -down the curtain, but because at such a time they felt more at ease -with themselves outside of a place of amusement than in one. - -This was not the feeling of the Parisians when President Carnot died. -On that night no lights were put out in the cafés; no leader's bâton -rapped for a sudden silence in the Jardin de Paris, and the Parisians -continued to drink their bock and to dance, or to watch others dance, -even though they knew that at that same moment Madame Carnot in a -special train was hurrying through the night to reach the death-bed of -her husband. It is never possible to tell which way the French people -will jump, or how they will act at a crisis. They have no precedents -of conduct; they are as likely to do the characteristic thing, which -in itself is different from what people of any other nation would -do under like circumstances, as the uncharacteristic thing, which is -even more unexpected. They complicate history by behaving with perfect -tranquillity when other people would become excited, and by losing -their heads when there is no occasion for it. As the Yale captain said -of the Princeton team, "They keep you guessing." - -So when I was convinced by the morning papers, after the first shock -of unbelief, that the President of France was dead, I walked out into -the streets to see what sign there would be of it in Paris. I argued -that in a city given to demonstrations the feelings of the people would -take some actual and visible form; that there would be meetings in -the street, rioting perhaps in the Italian quarter, and extraordinary -expressions of grief in the shape of crêpe and mourning. But the people -were as undisturbed and tranquil as the sun; the same men were sitting -at the same round tables; the same women were shopping in the Rue de -la Paix, and but for an increased energy on the part of the newsboys -there was no sign that a good man had died, that one who had harmed no -one had himself been cruelly harmed, and that the highest office of the -state was vacant. - -When I complained of this to Parisians, or to those who were Parisians -by choice and not by birth, they explained it by saying that the -people were stunned. "They are too shocked to act. It is a horror -without a precedent," they said; but it struck me that they were an -inordinately long time in recovering from the blow. At one o'clock on -Monday morning a workman crawled out upon the roof of the Invalides, -and, gathering the tricolored flag in his arms, tied a wisp of crêpe -about it. The flags in the Chamber of Deputies and in the War Office -were draped in the same manner, and with these three exceptions I saw -no other visible sign of mourning in all Paris. On Monday night those -theatres subsidized by the government, and some others, but not all, -were closed for that evening. At three o'clock on Tuesday, two days -after the death of the President, I counted but three flags draped with -crêpe on the boulevards; but on the day following all the shops on -the Rue de la Paix and the hotels on the Rue de Rivoli put out flags -covered with mourning, and so advertised themselves and their grief. It -is interesting to remember that the most generous display of crêpe in -Paris was made by an English firm of ladies' tailors. During this time -the correspondents were cabling of the grief and rage of the Parisians -to sympathetic peoples all over the world; and we, in our turn, were -reading in Paris the telegrams of condolence and the resolutions of -sympathy from as different sources as the Parliament of Cape Town and -the Congress of the United States. What effect the reading of these -sincere and honest words had upon the people of Paris I do not know, -but I could not at the time conceive of their reading them without -blushing. I looked up from the paper which gave Lord Rosebery's speech, -and the brotherly words which came from little colonies in the Pacific, -from barbarous monarchs, and from widows to Madame Carnot, and from -corporations, Emperors, and Presidents to the city of Paris, and saw -nothing in the countenances of the Parisians at the table next to mine -but smiles of gratification at the importance that they had so suddenly -attained in the eyes of the whole world. - -[Illustration: AT THE JARDIN DE PARIS] - -It was also interesting to note by the Paris papers how the French -valued the expressions of sympathy which poured in upon them. The fact -that both Houses in the United States had adjourned to do honor to -the memory of M. Carnot was not in their minds of as much importance -as was the telegram from the Czar of Russia, which was given the -most important place in every paper. It was followed almost invariably -by the message from the German Emperor, whose telegram, it is also -interesting to remember, was the second one to reach Paris after the -death of the President was announced. When one reads a congratulatory -telegram from the German Emperor on the result of the Cambridge-Oxford -boat-race, and another of condolence to the King of Greece in reference -to an earthquake, and then this one to the French people, it really -seems as though the young ruler did not mean that any event of -importance should take place anywhere without his having something to -say concerning it. But this last telegram was well timed, and the line -which said that M. Carnot had died like a soldier at his post was well -chosen to please the French love of things military, and please them -it did, as the Emperor knew that it would. But the condolence from the -sister republic across the sea was printed at the end of the column, -after those from Bulgaria and Switzerland. In the eyes of the Parisian -news editor, the sympathy of the people of a great nation was not so -important to his readers as the few words from an Emperor to whom they -looked for help in time of war. - -This was not probably true of the whole of France, but it was true of -the Parisians. Two years from now Carnot's assassination will have -become history, and will impress them much more than it did at the -time of his death. The next Salon will be filled with the apotheosis -of Carnot, with his portrait and with pictures of his murder, and of -France in mourning laying a wreath upon his tomb. His son will find -quick promotion in the army, and may possibly aspire to Presidential -honors, or threaten the safety of the republic with a military -dictatorship. It sounds absurd now, but it is quite possible in a -country where General Dodds at once became a dangerous Presidential -possibility because he had conquered the Dahomans in the swamps of -Africa. - -Where the French will place Carnot in their history, and how they -will reverence his memory, the next few years will show; but it is -a fact that at the time of his death they treated him with scant -consideration, and were much more impressed with the effect which their -loss made upon others than with what it meant to them. It is not a -pleasant thing to write about, nor is it the point of view that was -taken at the time, but in writing of facts it is more interesting to -report things as they happened than as they should have happened. - -It is also true that those Parisians who could decently make a little -money out of the nation's loss went about doing so with an avidity that -showed a thrifty mind. Almost every one who had windows or balconies -facing the line of the funeral procession offered them for rent, and -advertised them vigorously by placards and through the papers; venders -of knots of crêpe and emblems of mourning filled the streets with their -cries. Portraits of Carnot in heavy black were hawked about by the same -men who weeks before had sold ridiculous figures of him taking off -his hat and bowing to an imaginary audience; the great shops removed -their summer costumes from the windows and put stacks of flags bound -with crêpe in their place; the flower-shops lined the sidewalks with -specimens of their work in mourning-wreaths; and the papers, after -their first expression of grief, proceeded to actively discuss Carnot's -successor, quoting the popularity of different candidates by giving the -betting odds for and against them, as they had done the week before, -when the horses were entered for the Grand Prix. This was three days -after Carnot's death, and while he was still lying unburied at the -Élysée. - -The French constitution provides that in such an event as that of -1893 the National Assembly shall be convened immediately to select a -new President. According to this the President of the Senate, in his -capacity as President of the National Assembly, decided that the two -Chambers should convene for that purpose at Versailles on Wednesday, -June 27th, at one o'clock. This certainly seemed to promise a scene of -unusual activity, and perhaps historical importance. I knew what the -election of a President meant to us at home, and I argued that if the -less excitable Americans could work themselves up into such a state of -frenzy that they blocked the traffic of every great city, and reddened -the sky with bonfires from Boston to San Francisco, the Frenchman's -ecstasy of excitement would be a spectacle of momentous interest. -This seemed to be all the more probable because to the American an -election means a new Executive but for the next four years, while to -the Frenchman the new state of affairs that threatened him would extend -for seven. Young Howlett had a vacant place on the top of his public -coach, and was just turning the corner as I came out of the hotel; so -I went out with him, and looked anxiously down on each side to see -the hurrying crowds pushing forward to the palace in the suburbs; -and when I found that all roads did not lead to Versailles that day, I -decided that it must be because we were on the wrong one, which would -eventually lead us somewhere else. - -[Illustration: PORTRAITS OF CARNOT IN HEAVY BLACK] - -It did not seem possible that the Parisians would feel so little -interest as to who their new President might be that they would -remain quietly in Paris while he was being elected on its outskirts. -I expected to see them trooping out along the seven-mile road to -Versailles in as great numbers as when they went there once before to -bring a Queen back to Paris. But when we drove into Versailles the -coach rattled through empty streets. There were no processions of -cheering men in white hats tramping to the music of "Marching through -Georgia." No red, white, and blue umbrellas, no sky-rocket yells, no -dangling badges with gold fringe, nothing that makes a Presidential -convention in Chicago the sight of a lifetime. No one was shouting the -name of his political club or his political favorite; no one had his -handkerchief tucked inside his collar and a palm leaf in his hand; -there were no brass-bands, no banners, and not even beer. Nor was -there any of the excitement which surrounds the election of even a -Parliamentary candidate in England. I saw no long line of sandwich-men -tramping in each gutter, no violent Radicals hustling equally elated -Conservatives, and crying, "Good old Smith!" or "Good old Brown!" no -women with primrose badges stuck to their persons making speeches or -soliciting votes from the back of dog-carts. And nobody was engaged -in throwing kippered herring or blacking the eyes of anybody else. -Versailles was as unmoved as the statues in her public squares. Her -broad, hospitable streets lay cool and quiet in the reflection of her -yellow house-fronts, and under the heavy shadows of the double rows of -elms the round, flat cobble-stones, unsoiled by hurrying footsteps, -were as clean and regular as a pan of biscuit ready for the oven. - -There were about six hundred Deputies in the town, who had not been -there the day before, and who would leave it before the sun set that -evening, but they bore themselves so modestly that their presence -could not disturb the sleepy, sunny beauty of the grand old gardens -and of the silent thoroughfares, and when we rattled up to the Hôtel -des Réservoirs at one o'clock we made more of a disturbance with the -coach-horn than had the arrival of both Chambers of Deputies. These -gentlemen were at _déjeuner_ when we arrived, and eating and drinking -as leisurely and good-naturedly as though they had nothing in hand of -more importance than a few calls to make or a game of cards at the -club. Indeed, it looked much more as though Versailles had been invaded -by a huge wedding-party than by a convention of Presidential electors. -Some of the Deputies had brought their wives with them, and few as they -were, they leavened and enlivened the group of black coats as the same -number of women of no other nation could have done, and the men came -from different tables to speak to them, to drink their health, and to -pay them pretty compliments; and the good fellows of the two Chambers -hustled about like so many maîtres d'hôtel seeing that such a one had -a place at the crowded tables, that the salad of this one was being -properly dressed, and that another had a match for his cigarette. - -Besides the Deputies, there were a half-dozen young and old -Parisians--those who make it a point to see everything and to be seen -everywhere. They would have attended quite as willingly a fête of -flowers, or a prize-fight between two English jockeys at Longchamps, -and at either place they would have been as completely at home. -They were typical Parisians of the highest world, to whom even the -selection of a President for all France was not without its interest. -With them were the diplomats, who were pretending to take the change -of executive seriously, as representatives of the powers, but who were -really whispering that it would probably bring back the leadership of -the fashionable world to the Élysée, where it should be, and that it -meant the reappearance of many royalist families in society, and the -inauguration of magnificent functions, and the reopening of ballrooms -long unused. - -It was throughout a pretty, lazy, well-bred scene. Outside the entrance -to the hotel, coachmen with the cockades of the different embassies in -their hats were standing at ease in their shirtsleeves, and with their -pipes between their teeth; and the gentlemen, having finished their -breakfast, strolled out into the court-yard and watched the hostlers -rubbing down the coach-horses, or walked up the hill to the palace, -where the boy sentries were hugging their guns, and waving back the -few surprised tourists who had come to look at the pictures in the -historical gallery, and who did not know that the palace on that day -was being used for the prologue of a new historical play. - -[Illustration: "TO BRING A QUEEN BACK TO PARIS"] - -At the gates leading to the great Court of Honor there were possibly -two hundred people in all. They came from the neighboring streets, and -not from Paris. None of these people spoke in tones louder than those -of ordinary converse, and they speculated with indolent interest as to -the outcome of the afternoon's voting. A young man in a brown straw -hat found an objection to Casimir-Perier as a candidate because he was -so rich, but he withdrew his objection when an older man in a blouse -pointed out that Casimir-Perier would make an excellent appearance on -horseback. - -"The President of France," he said, "must be a man who can look well on -a horse;" and the crowd of old women in white caps, and boy soldiers -with their hands on their baggy red breeches, from the barracks across -the square, nodded their heads approvingly. It was a most interesting -sight when compared with the anxious, howling mob that surrounds the -building in which a Presidential convention is being held at home. - -It is also interesting to remember that a special telephone wire was -placed in the Chamber at Versailles in order that the news of the -election might be communicated to the newspaper offices in Paris, -and that this piece of enterprise was considered so remarkable that -it was commented upon by the entire newspaper press of that city. -In Chicago, at the time of the last Presidential convention, when a -nomination merely and not an election was taking place, the interest -of the people justified the Western Union Telegraph Company in sending -out fifteen million words from the building during the three days of -the convention. Wires ran from it directly to the offices of all the -principal newspapers from San Francisco to Boston, and in Chicago -itself there were two hundred extra operators, and relays of horsemen -galloping continually with "copy" from the convention to the main -offices of the different telegraph companies. - -This merely shows a difference of temperament: the American likes -to know what has happened while it is hot, and to know all that has -happened. The European and the Parisian, on this occasion at least, was -content to wait at a café in ease and comfort until he was told the -result. He did not feel that he could change that result in any way by -going out to Versailles in the hot sun and cheering his candidate from -the outside of an iron fence. - -At the gate of the Place d'Armes there was a crowd of fifty people, -watched by a few hundred more from under the shade of the trees and -the awnings of the restaurants around the square. The dust rose in -little eddies, and swept across the square in yellow clouds, and the -people turned their backs to it and shrugged their shoulders and waited -patiently. Inside of the Court of Honor a single line of lancers stood -at their horses' heads, their brass helmets flashing like the signals -of a dozen heliographs. Officers with cigarettes and heavily braided -sleeves strolled up and down, and took themselves much more seriously -than they did the matter in hand. A dozen white-waistcoated and -high-hatted Deputies standing outside of the Chamber suggested nothing -more momentous or national than a meeting of a Presbyterian General -Assembly. Bicyclers of both sexes swung themselves from their machines -and peered curiously through the iron fence, and, seeing nothing more -interesting than the fluttering pennants of the lancers, mounted their -wheels again and disappeared in the clouds of dust. - -In the meanwhile Casimir-Perier has been elected on the first ballot, -which was taken without incident, save when one Deputy refused to -announce his vote as the roll was called until he was addressed as -"citizen," and not as "monsieur." This silly person was finally -humored, and the result was declared, and Casimir-Perier left the -hall to put on a dress-suit in order that he might receive the -congratulations of his friends. As the first act of the new President, -this must not be considered as significant of the particular man who -did it, but as illustrating the point of view of his countrymen, who -do not see that if the highest office in the country cannot lend -sufficient dignity to the man who holds it, a dress-suit or his -appearance on horseback is hardly able to do so. The congratulations -last a long time, and are given so heartily and with such eloquence -that the new President weeps while he grasps the hand of his late -confrères, and says to each, "You must help me; I need you all." -Neither is the fact that the President wept on this occasion -significant of anything but that he was laboring under much excitement, -and that the temperament of the French is one easily moved. People who -cannot see why a strong man should weep merely because he has become -a President must remember that Casimir-Perier wears the cross of the -Legion of Honor for bravery in action on the field of battle. - -The congratulations come to an end at last, and the new President -leaves the palace, and takes his place in the open carriage that has -been waiting his pleasure these last two hours. There is a great crowd -around the gate now, all Versailles having turned out to cheer him, -and he can hear them crying "Vive le Président!" from far across the -length of the Court of Honor. - -M. Dupuy, his late rival at the polls, seats himself beside him on his -left, and two officers in uniform face him from the front. Before his -carriage are two open lines of cavalry, proudly conscious in their -steel breastplates and with their carbines on the hip that they are -to convoy the new President to Paris; and behind him, in close order, -are the lancers, with their flashing brass helmets, and their pennants -fluttering in the wind. The horses start forward with a sharp clatter -of hoofs on the broad stones of the square, the Deputies raise their -high hats, and with a jangling of steel chains and swords, and with -the pennants snapping in the breeze like tiny whips, the new President -starts on his triumphal ride into Paris. The colossal statues of -France's great men, from Charlemagne to Richelieu, look down upon him -curiously as he whirls between them to the iron gateway and disappears -in the alley of mounted men and cheering civilians. He is out of it -in a moment, and has galloped on in a whirling cloud of yellow dust -towards the city lying seven miles away, where, six months later, by -his unexpected resignation, he is to create a consternation as intense -as that which preceded his election. - -It would be interesting to know of what Casimir-Perier thought as he -rode through the empty streets in the cool of the summer evening, -startling the villagers at their dinners, and bringing them on a run -to the doors by the ringing jangle of his mounted men and the echoing -hoofs. Perhaps he thought of the anarchists who might attempt his life, -or of those who succeeded with the man whose place he had taken, or, -what is more likely, he gave himself up to the moment, and said to -himself, as each new face was framed by a window or peered through a -doorway: "Yes, it is the new President of France, Casimir-Perier; not -only of France, but of all her colonies. By to-night they will know in -Siam, in Tunis, in Algiers, and in the swamps of Dahomey that there is -a new step on the floor, and governors of provinces, and native rulers -of barbarous states, and _sous-préfets_, and pretenders to the throne -of France, will consider anxiously what the change means to them, and -will be measuring their fortunes with mine." - -The carriage and its escort enter the cool shadows of the Bois de -Boulogne at Passy, and pass Longchamps, where the French President -annually reviews the army of France, and where now the victorias and -broughams and fiacres draw to one side; and he notes the look of amused -interest on the faces of their occupants as his outriders draw rapidly -nearer, and the smiles of intelligence as they comprehend that it is -the new President, and he catches a glimpse out of the corner of his -eye of nodding faces, and hats half raised in salute as he gallops -past. It must have been a pleasant drive. Very few men have taken it. -Very few men have swept round the circle of the Arc de Triomphe and -seen the mass of glittering carriages stretching far down the avenue -part and make way for them on either side. - -Casimir-Perier's brief term included many imbitterments, but it is a -question if they will ever destroy the sweetness of that moment when -power first touched him as he was borne back to Paris the President of -France; and in his retirement he will recall that ride in the summer -twilight, which the refractory Deputies who caused his downfall have -never taken, and hear again the people cheering at Versailles, and the -galloping horses, and see the crowd that waited for him in the Place de -la Concorde and ran beside his carriage across the bridge. - - * * * * * - -Although the funeral procession was not to leave the Élysée until ten -o'clock on Sunday morning, the thrifty citizens of Paris began to -prepare for it as early as eleven o'clock on Saturday night. The Champs -Élysées at that hour was lined with tables, boxes, and ladders, and -any other portable object that could afford from its top a view of the -pageant and standing-room, for which one might reasonably ask a franc. -This barricade stretched in an unbroken front, which extended far back -under the trees from the Avenue Marigny to the Place de la Concorde, -where it spread out over the raised sidewalks and around the fountains -and islands of safety, until the square was transformed into what -looked like a great market-place. It was one of the most curious sights -that Parisians have ever seen in time of peace. Over four thousand -people were encamped around these temporary stands, some drinking and -eating, others sleeping, and others busily and noisily engaged in -erecting still more stands, while the falling of the boards that were -to form them rattled as they fell from the carts to the asphalt like -the reports of musketry. Each stand was lit by a lantern and a smoking -lamp; and the men and women, as they moved about in the half-darkness, -or slept curled up beneath the carts and tables, suggested the bivouac -of an army, or that part of a besieged city where the people had -gathered with their household goods for safety. - -The procession the next morning moved down the Champs Élysées and -across the Place de la Concorde and along the Rue de Rivoli to Notre -Dame, from whence, after the ceremony there, it proceeded on to the -Panthéon. All of this line of march was guarded on either side by -double lines of infantry, and one can obtain an idea of how great was -the crowd behind them by the fact that on the morning of the procession -five hundred people were taken in ambulances to the different hospitals -of Paris. This included those who had fainted in the crush, or who -had been overcome by the heat, or who had fallen from one of the many -tottering scaffoldings. Each of the great vases along the iron fence -of the Tuileries held one or two men, one of whom sat opposite us -across the Rue de Rivoli, who had been there six hours, like Stylites -on his pillar, except that the Parisian had an opera-glass, a morning -paper, and a bottle of red wine to keep him company. The trees in the -Tuileries were blackened with men, and the sky-line of every house-top -moved with them. The crowd was greatest perhaps in the Place de la -Concorde, where it spread a black carpet over the great square, which -parted and fell away before the repeated charges of the cavalry like a -piece of cloth before a pair of shears. It was a most orderly crowd, -and an extremely good-humored one, and it manifested no strong feeling -at any time, except over two features of the procession, which had -nothing to do with the death of Carnot. Except when there was music, -which was much too seldom, the crowd chattered and laughed as it might -have done at a purely military function, and only the stern hisses of a -few kept the majority from applauding any one who passed for whom they -held an especial interest. - -The procession left the Élysée at ten o'clock, to the accompaniment of -minute-guns from the battery on the pier near the Chamber of Deputies. -It was led by a very fine body of cuirassiers, who presented a better -appearance than any of the soldiers in the procession. It was not the -great military display that had been expected; there was no artillery -in line, and the navy was not represented, save by a few guards around -the wreath from the officers of that particular service. The regiments -of infantry, who were followed by the cavalry, lacked form, and marched -as though they had not convinced themselves that what they were doing -was worth doing well. The infantry was followed by the mourning-wreaths -sent by the Senate and by the different monarchs of Europe. These -wreaths form an important and characteristic part of the funeral of -a great man in France, and as the French have studied this form of -expressing their grief for some time, they produce the most magnificent -and beautiful tributes, of greater proportions and in better taste than -any that can be seen in any other country in the world. The larger of -these wreaths were hung from great scaffoldings, supported on floats, -each drawn by four or six horses. Some of these were so large that a -man standing upright within them could not touch the opposite inner -edges with his finger-tips. They were composed entirely of orchids or -violets, with bands of purple silk stretching from side to side, and -bearing the names of the senders in gold letters. The wreath sent -by the Emperor of Russia was given a place by itself, and mounted -magnificently on a car draped with black, and surrounded by a special -guard of military and servants of the household. The wreaths of the -royalties were followed by more soldiers, and then came the black and -silver catafalque that bore the body of the late President. The wheels -of this car were muffled with cloth, and the horses that drew it were -completely hidden under trappings of black and silver; the reins were -broad white ribbons, and there was a mute at each horse's head. As the -car passed, there was the first absolute silence of the morning, and -many people crossed themselves, and all of the men stood bareheaded. - -Separated from the catafalque by but a few rods, and walking quite -alone, was the new President, Casimir-Perier. There were soldiers -and attendants between him and the line of soldiers which guarded -the sidewalks, but he was alone in that there was no one near him. -According to the protocol he should not have been there at all, as -the etiquette of this function ruled that the new President should -not intrude his person upon the occasion when the position held by -his predecessor is being officially recognized for the last time. -Casimir-Perier, however, chose to disregard the etiquette of this -protocol, arguing that the occasion was exceptional, and that no one -had a better right to mourn for the late President than the man who -had succeeded to the dangers and responsibilities of that office. He -was also undoubtedly moved by the fact that it was generally believed -that his life would be attempted if he did walk conspicuously in the -procession. Had Carnot died a natural death, Casimir-Perier's presence -at the funeral would have been in debatable taste, but Carnot's -assassination, and the threats which hung thick in the air, made the -President take the risk he did, in spite of the fact that Carnot had -been murdered in a public place, and not on account of it. - -It was distinctly a courageous thing for him to do, and it was done -against the wishes of his best friends and the entreaties of his -family, who spent the entire night before the procession in a chapel -praying for his safety. He walked erect, with his eyes turned down, and -with his hat at his side. He was in evening dress, with the crimson -sash of the Legion of Honor across his breast, and he presented a fine -and soldierly bearing, and made an impression, both by his appearance -and by his action, that could not have been gained so soon in any other -manner. - -The embassies and legations followed Casimir-Perier in an irregular -mass of glittering groups. All of these men were on foot. There was no -exception permitted to this rule; and it was interesting to see Lord -Dufferin in the uniform of a viceroy of India, which he wore instead -of his diplomatic uniform, marching in the dust in the same line with -the firemen and letter-carriers. The ambassadors and their attachés -were undoubtedly the most brilliant and picturesque features of the -occasion, and the United States ambassador and his secretaries were, -on account of the contrast their black-and-white evening dress made -to the colors and ribbons of the others, on this occasion, the most -conspicuous and appropriately dressed men present. - -[Illustration: -"THE GIRL WHO REPRESENTED ALSACE"] - -But what best pleased the French people were two girls dressed in the -native costumes of Alsace and Lorraine. They headed the deputation -from those provinces. The girl who represented Alsace was particularly -beautiful, with long black hair parted in the middle, and hanging down -her back in long plaits. She wore the characteristic head-dress of -the Alsacian women, and a short red skirt, black velvet bodice, and -black stockings. She carried the French flag in front of her draped in -crêpe, and as she stepped briskly forward the wind blew the black -bow on her hair and the folds of the flag about her face, and gave -her a living and spirited air that in no way suited the occasion, but -which delighted the populace. They applauded her and her companion -from one end of the march to the other, and the spectacle must have -rendered the German ambassador somewhat uncomfortable, and made him -wish for a billet among a people who could learn to forget. The only -other feature of the procession which called forth applause, which no -one tried to suppress, was the presence in it of an old general who -was mistaken by the spectators for Marshal Canrobert. This last of the -marshals of France was too ill to march in the funeral cortége; but -the old soldier, who looked not unlike him, and whose limping gait and -bent back and crutch-stick led him to be mistaken for the marshal, -served the purpose quite as well. One wondered if it did not embarrass -the veteran to find himself so suddenly elevated into the rôle of -popular idol of the hour; but perhaps he persuaded himself that it was -his white hair and crutch and many war-medals which called forth the -ovation, and that he deserved it on his own account--as who can say he -did not? - -The unpleasant incident of the day was one which was unfortunately -acted in full view of the balconies of the hotels Meurice and -Continental. These were occupied by most of the foreigners visiting -Paris, and were virtually the grandstands of the spectacle. - -In the Rue Castiglione, which separated the two hotels, and in full -sight of these critical onlookers, a horse was taken with the blind -staggers, and upset a stand, throwing those who sat upon it out into -the street. In an instant the crash of the falling timbers and the -cries of the half-dozen men and women who had been precipitated into -the street struck panic into the crowd of sight-seers on the pavement -and among the firemen who were at that moment marching past. The terror -of another dynamite outrage was in the minds of all, and without -waiting to learn what had happened, or to even look, the thousands of -people broke into a confused mass of screaming, terrified creatures, -running madly in every direction, and changing the quiet solemnity -of the moment into a scene of horror and panic. The firemen dropped -the wreath they were carrying and fled with the crowd; and then the -French soldiers who were lining the pavements, to the astonishment -and disgust of the Americans and English on the balconies, who were -looking down like spectators at a play, tucked their guns under their -arms and joined in the mad rush for safety. It was a sight that made -even the women on the balconies keep silence in shame for them. It was -pathetic, ridiculous, and inexcusable, and the boy officers on duty -would have gained the sympathy of the unwilling spectators had they -cut their men down with their swords, and shown the others that he who -runs away from a falling grandstand is not needed to live to fight -a German army later. It is true that the men who ran away were only -boys fresh from the provinces, with dull minds filled with the fear of -what an anarchist might do; but it showed a lack of discipline that -should have made the directors of the Salon turn the military pictures -in that gallery to the wall, until the picture exhibited in the Rue -Castiglione was effaced from the minds of the visiting strangers. -Imagine a squad of New York policemen running away from a horse with -the blind staggers, and not, on the contrary, seizing the chance to -club every one within reach back to the sidewalk! Remember the London -bobby who carried a dynamite bomb in his hand from the hall of the -Houses of Parliament, and the Chicago police who walked into a real -anarchist mob over the bodies of their comrades, and who answered the -terrifying bombs with the popping of their revolvers! It is surprising -that Napoleon, looking down upon the scene in the Rue Castiglione from -the top of his column, did not turn on his pedestal. - -After such an exhibition as this it was only natural that the people -should turn from the soldiers to find the greater interest in the -miles of wreaths that came from every corner of France. These were the -expressions of the truer sympathy with the dead President, and there -seemed to be more sentiment and real regret in the little black bead -wreaths from the villages in the south and west of France than there -were in all the great wreaths of orchids and violets purchased on the -boulevards. - -The procession had been two hours in passing a given point. It had -moved at ten o'clock, and it was four in the afternoon before it -dispersed at the Panthéon, and Deputies in evening dress and attachés -in uniform and judges in scarlet robes could be seen hurrying over -Paris in fiacres, faint and hot and cross, for the first taste of food -and drink that had touched their lips since early morning. A few hours -later there was not a soldier out of his barracks, the scaffoldings had -been taken to pieces, the spectators had been distributed in trains to -the environs, the bands played again in the gardens, and the theatres -opened their doors. Paris had taken off her mourning, and fallen back -into her interrupted routine of pleasure, and had left nothing in the -streets to show that Carnot's body had passed over them save thousands -of scraps of greasy newspapers in which the sympathetic spectators of -the solemn function had wrapped their breakfasts. - - - - -IV - -THE GRAND PRIX AND OTHER PRIZES - - -I think the most satisfying thing about the race for the Grand Prix at -Longchamps is the knowledge that every one in Paris is justifying your -interest in the event by being just as much excited about it as you -are. You have the satisfaction of feeling that you are with the crowd, -or that the crowd is with you, as you choose to put it, and that you -move in sympathy with hundreds of thousands of people, who, though they -may not be at the race-track in person, wish they were, which is the -next best thing, and which helps you in the form of moral support, at -least. You feel that every one who passes by knows and approves of your -idea of a holiday, and will quite understand when you ride out on the -Champs Élysées at eleven o'clock in the morning with four other men -packed in one fiacre, or when, for no apparent reason, you hurl your -hat into the air. - -There are two ways of reaching Longchamps, the right way and the -wrong way. The wrong way is to go with the crowd the entire distance -through the Bois, and so find yourself stopped half a mile from the -race-track in a barricade of carriages and hired fiacres, with the -wheels scraping, and the noses of the horses rubbing the backs of the -carriages in front. This is entertaining for a quarter of an hour, as -you will find that every American or English man and woman you have -ever met is sitting within talking distance of you, and as you weave -your way in and out like a shuttle in a great loom you have a chance to -bow to a great many friends, and to gaze for several minutes at a time -at all of the celebrities of Paris. But after an hour has passed, and -you have discovered that your driver is not as clever as the others in -stealing ground and pushing himself before his betters, you begin to -grow hot, dusty, and cross, and when you do arrive at the track you are -not in a proper frame of mind to lose money cheerfully and politely, -like the true sportsman that you ought to be. - -The right way to go is through the Bois by the Lakes, stopping within -sound of the waterfall at the Café de la Cascade. The advantage of this -is that you escape the crowd, and that you have the pleasing certainty -in your mind throughout the rest of the afternoon of knowing that you -will be able to find your carriage again when the races are over. If -you leave your fiacre at the main entrance, you will have to pick it -out from three or four thousand others, all of which look exactly -alike; and even if you do tie a red handkerchief around the driver's -whip, you will find that six hundred other people have thought of doing -the same thing, and you will be an hour in finding the right one, and -you will be jostled at the same time by the boys in blouses who are -hunting up lost carriages, and finding the owners to fit them. - -You can avoid all this if you go to the Cascade and take your -coachman's little ticket, and send him back to wait for you in the -stables of the café, not forgetting to give him something in advance -for his breakfast. It is then only a three minutes' walk from the -restaurant among the trees to the back door of the race-track, and in -five minutes after you have left your carriage you will have passed the -sentry at the ticket-box, received your ticket from the young woman -inside of it, given it to the official with a high hat and a big badge, -and will be within the enclosure, with your temper unruffled and your -boots immaculate. And then, when the races are over, you have only to -return to the restaurant and hand your coachman's ticket to the tall -chasseur, and let him do the rest, while you wait at a little round -table and order cooling drinks. - -All great race meetings look very much alike. There are always the -long grandstand with human beings showing from the lowest steps to -the sky-line; the green track, and the miles of carriages and coaches -encamped on the other side; the crowd of well-dressed people in -the enclosure, and the thin-legged horses cloaked mysteriously in -blankets and stalking around the paddock; the massive crush around -the betting-booths, that sweeps slowly in eddies and currents like a -great body of water; and the rush which answers the starting-bell. -The two most distinctive features of the Grand Prix are the numbers -of beautifully dressed women who mix quietly with the men around the -booths at which the mutuals are sold, and the fact that every one -speaks English, either because that is his native tongue, or because, -if he be a Frenchman, he finds so many English terms in his racing -vocabulary that it is easier for him to talk entirely in that tongue -than to change from French to English three or four times in each -sentence. - -But the most curious, and in a way the most interesting feature of the -Grand Prix day, is the queer accompaniment to which the races are run. -It never ceases or slackens, or lowers its sharp monotone. It comes -from the machines which stamp the tickets bought in the mutual pools. -If you can imagine a hundred ticket-collectors on an elevated railroad -station all chopping tickets at the same time, and continuing at this -uninterruptedly for five hours, you can obtain an idea of the sound -of this accompaniment. It is not a question of cancelling a five-cent -railroad ticket with these little instruments. It is the same to them -whether they clip for the girl who wagers a louis on the favorite for -a place, and who stands to win two francs, or for the English plunger -who has shoved twenty thousand francs under the wire, and who has -only the little yellow and red ticket which one of the machines has -so nonchalantly punched to show for his money. People may neglect the -horses for luncheon, or press over the rail to see them rush past, or -gather to watch the President of the Republic enter to a solemn fanfare -of trumpets between lines of soldiers, but there are always a few left -to feed these little machines, and their clicking goes on through -the whole of the hot, dusty day, like the clipping of the shears of -Atropos. - -[Illustration: THE RESTAURANT AMONG THE TREES] - -The Grand Prix is the only race at which you are generally sure to win -money. You can do this by simply betting against the English horse. The -English horse is generally the favorite, and of late years the French -horse-owners have been so loath to see the blue ribbon of the French -turf go to perfidious Albion that their patriotism sometimes overpowers -their love of fair play. If the English horse is not only the favorite, -but also happens to belong to the stable of Baron Hirsch, you have a -combination that apparently can never win on French soil, and you can -make your bets accordingly. When Matchbox walked on to the track last -year, he was escorted by eight gendarmes, seven detectives in plain -clothes, his two trainers, and the jockey, and it was not until he was -well out in the middle of the track that this body-guard deserted him. -Possibly if they had been allowed to follow him round the course on -bicycles he might have won, and no combination of French jockeys could -have ridden him into the rail, or held Cannon back by a pressure of one -knee in front of another, or driven him to making such excursions into -unknown territory to avoid these very things that the horse had little -strength left for the finish. - -But perhaps the French horse was the better one, after all, and it was -certainly worth the loss of a few francs to see the Frenchmen rejoice -over their victory. To their minds, such a defeat of the English on -the field of Longchamps went far to wipe away the memory of that other -victory on the field near Brussels. - -Grand Prix night is a fête-night in Paris--that is, in the Paris of the -Boulevards and the Champs Élysées--and if you wish to dine well before -ten o'clock, you should engage your table for that night several days -in advance. - -You have seen people during Horse Show week in New York waiting in -the hall at Delmonico's for a table for a half-hour at a time, but on -Grand Prix night you will see hundreds of hungry men standing outside -of the open-air restaurants in the Champs Élysées, or wandering -disconsolately under the trees from the crowded tables of l'Horloge -across the Avenue to those of the Ambassadeurs', and from them to the -Alcazar d'Été, and so on to Laurent's and the Café d'Orient. Every one -apparently is dining out-of-doors on that night, and the white tables, -with their little lamps, and with bottles of red wine flickering in -their light, stretch under the trees from the Place de la Concorde up -to the Avenue Matignon. There are splashing fountains between them and -bands of music, and the voices of the singers in the cafés chantants -sound shrilly above the chorus of rattling china and of hundreds of -people talking and laughing, and the never-ceasing undertone of the -cabs rolling by on the great Avenue, with their lamps approaching and -disappearing in the night like thousands of giant fire-flies. You are -sure to dine well in such surroundings, and especially so after the -great race--for the reason that if your friends have won, they command -a good dinner to celebrate the fact; or should they have lost, they -design a better one in order to help them forget their ill-fortune. - -The spirit of adventure and excitement that has been growing and -feeding upon itself throughout the day of the Grand Prix reaches its -climax after the dinner hour, and finds an outlet among the trees and -Chinese lanterns of the Jardin de Paris. There you will see all Paris. -It is the crest of the highest wave of pleasure that rears itself and -breaks there. - -You will see on that night, and only on that night, all of the most -celebrated women of Paris racing with linked arms about the asphalt -pavement which circles around the band-stand. It is for them their -one night of freedom in public, when they are permitted to conduct -themselves as do their less prosperous sisters, when, instead of -reclining in a victoria in the Bois, with eyes demurely fixed ahead of -them, they can throw off restraint and mix with all the men of Paris, -and show their diamonds, and romp and dance and chaff and laugh as -they did when they were not so famous. The French swells who are their -escorts have cut down Chinese lanterns with their sticks, and stuck the -candles inside of them on the top of their high hats with the burning -tallow, and made living torches of themselves. So on they go, racing -by--first a youth in evening dress, dripping with candle-grease, and -then a beautiful girl in a dinner gown, with her silk and velvet opera -cloak slipping from her shoulders--all singing to the music of the -band, sweeping the people before them, or closing in a circle around -some stately dignitary, and waltzing furiously past him to prevent his -escape. Sometimes one party will storm the band-stand and seize the -musicians' instruments, while another invades the stage of the little -theatre, or overpowers the women in charge of the shooting-gallery, or -institutes a hurdle-race over the iron tables and the wicker chairs. - -[Illustration: INTERESTED IN THE WINNER] - -Or you will see ambassadors and men of title from the Jockey Club -jostling cockney bookmakers and English lords to look at a little girl -in a linen blouse and a flat straw hat, who is dancing in the same -circle of shining shirt-fronts _vis-à-vis_ to the most-talked-of young -person in Paris, who wears diamonds in ropes, and who rode herself into -notoriety by winning a steeplechase against a field of French officers. -The first is a hired dancer, who will kick off some gentleman's hat -when she wants it, and pass it round for money, and the other is the -companion of princes, and has probably never been permitted to enter -the Jardin de Paris before; but they are both of the same class, and -when the music stops for a moment they approach each other smiling, -each on her guard against possible condescension or familiarity; and -the hired dancer, who is as famous in her way as the young girl with -the ropes of diamonds is in hers, compliments madame on her dancing, -and madame calls the other "mademoiselle," and says, "How very warm -it is!" and the circle of men around them, who are leaning on each -other's shoulders and standing on benches and tables to look, smile -delightedly at the spectacle. They consider it very _chic_, this -combination. It is like a meeting between Madame Bernhardt and Yvette -Guilbert. - -But the climax of the night was reached last year when the band of a -hundred pieces struck buoyantly into that most reckless and impudent of -marches and comic songs, "The Man that Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo." -The cymbals clashed, and the big drums emphasized the high notes, and -the brass blared out boastfully with a confidence and swagger that -showed how sure the musicians were of pleasing that particular audience -with that particular tune. And they were not disappointed. The three -thousand men and women hailed the first bars of the song with a yell of -recognition, and then dancing and strutting to the rhythm of the tune, -and singing and shouting it in French and English, they raised their -voices in such a chorus that they could be heard defiantly proclaiming -who they were and what they had done as far as the boulevards. And -when they reached the high note in the chorus, the musicians, carried -away by the fever of the crowd, jumped upon the chairs, and held their -instruments as high above their heads as they could without losing -control of that note, and every one stood on tiptoe, and many on one -foot, all holding on to that highest note as long as their breath -lasted. It was a triumphant, reckless yell of defiance and delight; -it was the war-cry of that class of Parisians of which one always -reads and which one sees so seldom, which comes to the surface only -at unusual intervals, and which, when it does appear, lives up to its -reputation, and does not disappoint you. - - * * * * * - -It happened a short time ago, when I was in Paris, that the ranks of -those members of the Institute of France who are known as the Forty -Immortals were incomplete, one of the Forty having but lately died. I -do not now recall the name of this Immortal, which is not, I trust, -an evidence of ignorance on my part so much as it is an illustration -of the circumstance that when men choose to make sure of immortality -while they are alive, in preference to waiting for it after death, they -are apt to be considered, when they cease to live, as having had their -share, and the world closes its account with them, and opens up one -with some less impatient individual. It is only a matter of choice, -and suggests that one cannot have one's cake and eat it too. And so, -while we can but envy François Coppée in his green coat and his laurel -wreath of the Immortals of France, we may remember the other sort of -immortality that came to François Villon and François Millet, who were -not members of the Institute, and whose coats were very ragged indeed. -I do, however, remember the name of the gentleman who was elected to -fill the vacancy in the ranks of the Forty, and in telling how he and -other living men take on the robe of immortality I hope to report the -proceedings of one of the most interesting functions of the French -capital. He was the Vicomte de Bornier, and his name was especially -impressed upon me by a paragraph which appeared in the _Figaro_ on the -day following his admittance to the Academy. - -"M. Manel," the paragraph read, "the well-known journalist, has -renounced his candidacy for the vacant chair among the Forty Immortals. -M. Manel will be well remembered by Parisians as the author who has -written so much and so charmingly under the _nom de plume_ of 'Le -Vicomte de Bornier.'" Whether this was or was not fair to the gentleman -I had seen so highly honored I do not know, but it was calculated to -make him a literary light of interest. - -You are told in Paris that the title of Academician is the only one -remaining under the republic which counts for anything; and, on the -other hand, you hear the Academy called a pleasant club for old -gentlemen, to which new members are elected not for any great work -which they are doing in the world, but because their point of view -is congenial to those who are already members. All that can be said -against the Academy by a Frenchman has been printed by Alphonse Daudet -in _The Immortals_. In that novel he charges that the Academy numbs -the style of whosoever wears its green livery; he says that he who -enters its door leaves originality behind, that he grows conservative -and self-conscious, and that whatever freshness of thought or literary -method may have been his before his admittance to its venerable portals -is chilled by the severe classicism of his thirty-nine brethren. - -This may or may not be true of some of the members, but it certainly -cannot be true of all, as many of them were never distinguished -as authors, but were elected, as were De Lesseps and Pasteur, for -discoveries and research in science, medicine, or engineering. - -Nor is it true of M. Paul Bourget, who is the last distinguished -Frenchman to be received into the ranks of the Immortals. The same -observations which he made to me while in this country, and when he -was not an Academician, upon Americans and American institutions, he -has repeated, since his accession to the rank of an Immortal, in _Outre -Mer_. And the freedom with which he has spoken shows that the shadow of -the palm-trees has not clouded his cosmopolitan point of view, nor the -classicism of the Academy dulled his wonderful powers of analysis. In -his election, representing as he does the most brilliant of the younger -and progressive school of French writers, the Academy has not so much -honored the man as the man has honored the Academy. - -M. Daudet's opinion, however, is interesting as being that of one of -the most distinguished of French writers, and it is a satire which -costs something, for it shuts off M. Daudet forever from hope of -election to the body at which he scoffs, and at the same time robs -him of the possibility of ever enjoying the added money value which -attaches to each book that bears the leaves of the Academy on its -title-page. Since the days of Richelieu, Frenchmen have mocked at -this institution, and Frenchmen have given up years of their lives in -working, scheming, and praying to be admitted to its councils, and died -disappointed, and bitterly cursing it in their hearts. We have on -the one hand the familiar story of Alexis Piron, who had engraved on -his tombstone, - - "_Ci-gît Piron, qui ne fut rien, - Pas même Académicien._" - -And on the other there is the present picture of M. Zola knocking -year after year at its portals, asking men in many ways his inferior -to permit him a right to sit beside them. If you look over its lists -from 1635 to the present day you will find as many great names among -its members as those which are missing from its rolls; so that proves -nothing. - -[Illustration: "AROUND SOME STATELY DIGNITARY"] - -No ridicule can disestablish the importance of the work done by the -Academy in keeping the French language pure, or the value of its -Dictionary, or the incentive which it gives to good work by examining -and reporting from time to time on literary, scientific, and historical -works. - -A short time ago the anarchists of Paris determined to actively -ridicule the Académie Française by putting forth a foolish person, -Citizen Achille Le Roy, as a candidate for its honors. As a -preliminary to election to the Academy a candidate must call upon all -of its members. It is a formality which may be considered somewhat -humiliating, as it suggests begging from door to door, hat in hand; but -Citizen Le Roy made his round of visits in triumphal state, dressed -in the cast-off uniform of a Bolivian general, and accompanied by a -band of music and a wagonette full of journalists. Wherever he was -not received he deposited an imitation bomb at the door of the member -who had refused to see him, either as a warning or as a joke, and -much to the alarm of the servants who opened the door. He concluded -his journey, which extended over several days, by being photographed -outside of the door of the Institute, which was, of course, the only -side of the door which he will ever see. - -The Institute of France stands beyond the bridges, facing the Seine. -It is a most impressive and ancient pile, built around a great court, -and guarded by statues in bronze and stone of the men who have been -admitted to its gates. The ceremony of receiving a new member takes -place in one end of this quadrangle of stone, in a little round hall, -not so large as the auditorium of a New York theatre, and built like -a dissecting-room, with three rows of low-hanging stone balconies -circling the entire circumference of its walls. One part of the -lowest balcony is divided into two large boxes, with a high desk -between them, and a flight of steps leading down from it into the pit, -which is packed close with benches. In one of these boxes sit some -members of the Institute, and in the other the members of the Académie -Française, which is only one, though the best known, of the five -branches into which the Institute is divided. Behind the high desk sits -the President, or, as he is called, the Secrétaire Perpétuel, of the -Academy, with a member on either side. It is the duty of one of these -to read the address of welcome to the incoming mortal. - -It is a very pretty sight and a most important function in the social -world, and as there are no reserved places, the invited ones come as -early as eight o'clock in the morning to secure a good place, although -the brief exercises do not begin until two o'clock in the afternoon. -At that hour the street outside is lined with long rows of carriages, -guarded by the smartest of English coachmen, and emblazoned with the -oldest of French coats-of-arms. In the court-yard there is a fluttering -group of pretty women in wonderful toilets, surrounding a few -distinguished-looking men with ribbons in their coats, and encircled -by a ring of journalists making notes of the costumes and taking down -the names of the social celebrities. A double row of soldiers--for the -Institute is part of the state--lines the main hall leading to the -chamber, and salutes all who pass, whether men or women. - -I was so unfortunate as to arrive very late, but as I came in with -the American ambassador I secured a very good place, although -a most awkwardly conspicuous one. Three old gentlemen in silk -knickerbockers and gold chains bowed the ambassador down the hall -between the soldiers, and out on to the steps which lead from the -desk between the boxes in which sat the Immortals. There they placed -two little camp-stools about eight inches high, on which they begged -us to be seated. There was not another square foot of space in the -entire chamber which was not occupied, so we dropped down upon the -camp-stools. We were as conspicuous as you would be if you seated -yourself on top of the prompter's box on the stage of the Grand -Opera-house, and I felt exactly, after the audience had examined us at -their leisure, as though the Secretary was about to suddenly rap on -his desk and auction me off for whatever he could get. Still, we sat -among the Immortals, if only for an hour, and that was something. The -venerable Secretary peered over his desk, and the other Immortals gazed -with polite curiosity, for the ambassador had only just arrived in -Paris, and was not yet known. - -The gentleman on the right of the Secretary was François Coppée, a -very handsome man, with a strong, kind face, smoothly shaven, and -suggesting a priest or a tragic actor. He wore the uniform of the -Academy, which Napoleon spent much time in devising. It consists of -a coat of dark green, bordered with palm leaves in a lighter green -silk; there are, too, a high standing collar and a white waistcoat and -a pearl-handled sword. The poet also wore a great many decorations, -and smiled kindly upon Mr. Eustis and myself, with apparently great -amusement. On the other side of the President, back of Mr. Eustis, was -Comte d'Haussonville; he is a tall man with a Vandyck beard, and it was -he who was to read the address of welcome to the Vicomte de Bornier. - -Below in the pit, and all around in the balconies, were women -beautifully dressed, among whom there were as few young girls as -there were men. These were the most interesting women in Parisian -society--the ladies of the Faubourg St.-Germain, who at that time -would have appeared at scarcely any other function, and the ladies who -support the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, and the pretty young daughters of -champagne and chocolate-making papas who had married ancient titles, -and who try to emulate in their interests, if not in their toilets, -their more noble sisters-in-law, and all the prettiest women of the -high world, as well as the sisters of pretenders to the throne and -the wife of President Carnot. The absence of men was very noticeable; -the Immortals seemed to have it all to themselves, and it looked as -though they had purposely refrained from asking any men, or that the -men who had not been given the robe of immortality were jealous, and -so stayed away of their own accord. Those who were there either looked -bored, or else posed for the benefit of the ladies, with one hand in -the opening of their waistcoats, nodding their heads approvingly at -what the speaker said. In the pit I recognized M. Blowitz, the famous -correspondent of the _Times_, entirely surrounded by women. He wore a -gray suit and a flowing white tie, and he did not seem to be having a -very good time. There were also among the Immortals Jules Simon, and -Alexandre Dumas fils, dark-skinned, with little, black, observant -eyes, and white, curled hair, and crisp mustache. He seemed to be more -interested in watching the women than in listening to the speeches, -and moved restlessly and inattentively. When the exercises were over, -and the Academicians came out of their box and were presented to Mr. -Eustis, Dumas was gravely courteous, and spoke a few words of welcome -to the ambassador in a formal, distant way, and then hurried off by -himself without waiting to chat with the women, as the others did. He -was the most interesting of them all to me, and the least interested in -what was going on. There were many others there, and it was amusing to -try and fasten to them the names of Pasteur and Henri Meilhac, Ludovic -Halévy, and the Duc d'Aumale, the uncle of the Comte de Paris, who -was then alive, and Benjamin Constant, who had the week before been -admitted to the Institute. Some of them, heavy-eyed men, with great -firm jaws and heavy foreheads, wearing their braided coats uneasily, -as though they would have been more comfortable in a surgeon's apron -or a painter's blouse, kept you wondering what they had done; and -others, dapper and smiling and obsequious, made you ask what they could -possibly do. - -The Vicomte Bornier opened the proceedings by reading his address -to the beautiful ladies, with his cocked hat under his arm and his -mother-of-pearl sword at his side, and I am afraid it did not appeal to -me as a very serious business. It was too suggestive of an afternoon -tea. There was too much patting of kid-gloved hands, and too many women -altogether. It was a little like Bunthorne and the twenty maidens. If -the little theatre had been crowded with men eager to hear what this -new light in literature had to say, it might have been impressive, -but the sight of forty distinguished men sitting apart and calling -themselves fine names, and surrounded by women who believed they were -what they called themselves, had its humorous side. I could not make -out what the speech was about, because the French was too good; but it -was eminently characteristic and interesting to find that both Bornier -and D'Haussonville made their most successful points when they paid -compliments to the ladies present, or to womenkind in general, or when -they called for revenge on Germany. I thought it curious that even in -a eulogy on a dead man, and in an address of welcome to a live one, -each Frenchman could manage to introduce at least three references of -Alsace-Lorraine, and to bow and make pretty speeches to the ladies in -the audience. - -[Illustration: "THE MAN THAT BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO"] - -There is a peculiarity about this second address which is worth noting. -It concerns itself with the virtues of the incoming member, and as he -is generally puffed up with honor, the address is always put into the -hands of one whose duty it is to severely criticise and undervalue him -and his words. It is a curious idea to belittle the man whom you have -just honored, but it is the custom, and as both speeches are submitted -to a committee before they are read, there is no very hard feeling. -It is only in the address read after a member's death that he is -eulogized, and then it does not do him very much good. On the occasion -of Pierre Loti's admission to the Academy he, instead of eulogizing -the man whose place he had taken, lauded his own methods and style of -composition so greatly that when the second member arose he prefaced -his remarks by suggesting that "M. Loti has said so much for himself -that he has left me nothing to add." - - * * * * * - -It is very much of a step from the Académie Française to the Fête of -Flowers in the Bois de Boulogne, but the latter comes under the head -of one of the shows of Paris, and is to me one of the prettiest and -the most remarkable. I do not believe that it could be successfully -carried out in any other city in the world. There would certainly be -horse-play and roughness to spoil it, and it is only the Frenchman's -idea of gallantry and the good-nature of both the French man and -woman which render it possible. It would be an easy matter to hold -a fête of flowers at Los Angeles or at Nice, or in any small city -or watering-place where all the participants would know one another -and the masses would be content to act as spectators; but to venture -on such a spectacle, and to throw it open to any one who pays a few -francs, in as great a city as Paris, requires, first of all, the -highest executive ability before the artistic and pictorial side of the -affair is considered at all, and the most hearty co-operation of the -state or local government with the citizens who have it in hand. - -On the day of the fête the Allée du Jardin d'Acclimatation in the -Bois is reserved absolutely for the combatants in this annual battle -of flowers, which begins at four o'clock in the afternoon and lasts -uninterruptedly until dinner-time. Each of the cross-roads leading up -to the Allée is barricaded, and carriages are allowed to enter or to -depart only at either end. This leaves an open stretch of road several -miles in extent, and wide enough for four rows of carriages to pass one -another at the same moment. Thick woods line the Allée on either side, -and the branches of the trees almost touch above it. Beneath them, -and close to the roadway, sit thousands of men, women, and children -in close rows, and back of them hundreds more move up and down the -pathways. The carriages proceed in four unbroken lines, two going up -and two going down; and as they pass, the occupants pelt each other and -the spectators along the road-side with handfuls of flowers. For three -miles this battle rages between the six rows of people, and the air is -filled with the flying missiles and shrieks of laughter and the most -graceful of compliments and good-natured _blague_. At every fifty yards -stands a high arch, twined with festoons trailing from one arch to the -next, and temporary flagpoles flying long banners of the tricolor, -and holding shields which bear the monogram of the republic. The long -festoons of flowers and the flags swinging and flying against the dark -green of the trees form the Allée into one long tunnel of color and -light; and at every thirty paces there is the gleaming cuirass of a -trooper, with the sun shining on his helmet and breastplate, and on -other steel breastplates, which extend, like the mirrors in "Richard -III.," as far as the eye can reach, flashing and burning in the sun. -Between these beacons of steel, and under the flags and flowers and -green branches, move nearly eight miles of carriages, with varnished -sides and polished leather flickering in the light, each smothered with -broad colored ribbons and flowers, and gay with lace parasols. - -It is a most cosmopolitan crowd, and it is interesting to see how -seriously some of the occupants of the carriages take the matter in -hand, and how others turn it into an ovation for themselves, and still -others treat it as an excuse to give some one else pleasure. You will -see two Parisian dandies in a fiacre, with their ammunition piled as -high as their knees, saluting and chaffing and calling by name each -pretty woman who passes, and following them in the line you will see a -respectable family carriage containing papa, mamma, and the babies, and -with the coachman on the box hidden by great breastworks of bouquets. -To the proud parents on the back seat the affair is one which is to be -met with dignified approval, and they bow politely to whoever hurls a -rose or a bunch of wild flowers at one of their children. They, in -their turn, will be followed by a magnificent victoria, glittering -with varnish and emblazoned by strange coats-of-arms, and holding two -coal-black negroes, with faces as shiny as their high silk hats. They -have with them on the front seat a hired guide from one of the hotels, -who is showing Paris to them, and who is probably telling them that -every woman who laughs and hits them with a flower is a duchess at -least, at which their broad faces beam with good-natured embarrassment -and their teeth show, and they scramble up and empty a handful of rare -roses over the lady's departing shoulders. There are frequent halts -in the procession, which moves at a walk, and carriages are often -left standing side by side facing opposite ways for the space of a -minute, in which time there is ample opportunity to exhaust most of the -ammunition at hand, or to express thanks for the flowers received. The -good order of the day is very marked, and the good manners as well. The -flowers are not accepted as missiles, but as tributes, and the women -smile and nod demurely, and the men bow, and put aside a pretty nosegay -for the next meeting; and when they draw near the same carriage again, -they will smile their recognition, and wait until the wheels are just -drawing away from one another, and then heap their offerings at the -ladies' feet. - -There are a great number of Americans who are only in Paris for the -month, and whom you have seen on the steamer, or passing up the Rue de -la Paix, or at the banker's on mail day, and they seize this chance to -recognize their countrymen, and grow tremendously excited in hitting -each other in the eyes and on the nose, and then pass each other the -next day in the Champs Élysées without the movement of an eyelash. -The hour excuses all. It has the freedom of carnival-time without its -license, and it is pretty to see certain women posing as great ladies, -in hired fiacres, and being treated with as much _empressement_ and -courtesy by every man as though he believed the fiacre was not hired, -and the pearl necklace was real and not from the Palais Royal, and -that he had not seen the woman the night before circling around the -endless treadmill of the Jardin de Paris. Sometimes there will be -a coach all red and green and brass, and sometimes a little wicker -basket on low wheels, with a donkey in the shafts, and filled with -children in the care of a groom, who holds them by their skirts to -keep them from hurling themselves out after the flowers, and who looks -immensely pleased whenever any one pelts them back and points them out -as pretty children. But the greater number of the children stand along -the road-side with their sisters and mothers. They are of the good -bourgeois class and of the decently poor, who beg prettily for a flower -instead of giving one, and who dash out under the wheels for those -that fall by the wayside, and return with them to the safety of their -mother's knee in a state of excited triumph. - -When you see how much one of the broken flowers means to them, you -wonder what they think of the cars that pass toppling over with -flowers, with the harness and the spokes of the wheels picked out in -carnations, and banked with shields of nodding roses at the sides and -backs. - -These are the carriages entered for prizes, and some of them are very -wonderful and very beautiful. One holds a group of Rastaqouères, who -have spent a clerk's yearly income in decorating their victoria, that -they may send word back to South America that they have won a prize -from a board of Parisian judges. - -And another is a big billowy phaeton blooming within and without with -white roses and carnations, and holding a beautiful lady with auburn -hair and powdered face, and with the lace of her Empire bonnet just -falling to the line of her black eyebrows. She is all in white too, -with white gloves, and a parasol of nothing but white lace, and she -reclines rather than sits in this triumphal car of pure white flowers, -like a Cleopatra in her barge, or Venus lying on the white crest of the -waves. All the men recognize her, and throw their choicest offerings -into her lap; but whenever I saw her she seemed more interested in -the crowds along the road-side, who announced her approach with an -excited murmur of admiration, and the little children in blouses threw -their nosegays at her, and then stood back, abashed at her loveliness, -with their hands behind them. She was quite used to being pelted with -flowers at one of the theatres, but she seemed to enjoy this tribute -very much, and she tossed roses back at the children, and watched them -as they carried her flowers to the nurse or the elder sister who was -taking care of them, and who looked after the woman with frightened, -admiring eyes. - - - - -V - -AMERICANS IN PARIS - - -Americans who go to Paris might be divided, for the purposes of this -article at least, into two classes--those who use Paris for their -own improvement or pleasure, and those who find her too strong for -them, and who go down before her and worship her, and whom she either -fashions after her own liking, or rides under foot and neglects until -they lose heart and disappear forever. - -Balzac, in the last paragraph of one of his novels, leaves his hero -standing on the top of a hill above Paris, shaking his fist at the city -below him, and cursing her for a wanton. - -One might argue that this was a somewhat childish and theatrical point -of view for the young man to have taken. He probably found in Paris -exactly what he brought there, and it seems hardly fair, because the -city was stronger than he, that he should blame her and call her a -hard name. Paris is something much better than that, only the young -man was probably not looking for anything better. He had taken her -frivolous side too seriously, and had not sought for her better side at -all. Some one should have told him that Paris makes a most agreeable -mistress, but a very hard master. - -There are a few Americans who do not know this until it is too late, -until they lose their heads with all the turmoil and beauty and -unending pleasures of the place, and grow to believe that the voice -of Paris is the voice of the whole world. Perhaps they have heard the -voice speak once; it has praised a picture which they have painted, or -a book of verses that they have written, or a garden fête that they -have given, at which there were present as many as three ambassadors. -And they sit breathless ever after, waiting for the voice to speak to -them again, and while they are waiting Paris is exclaiming over some -new picture, or another fête, at which there were four ambassadors; and -the poor little artist or the poor little social struggler wonders why -he is forgotten, and keeps on struggling and fluttering and biting his -nails and eating his heart out in private, listening for the voice to -speak his name once more. - -[Illustration: "LISTENING FOR THE VOICE TO SPEAK HIS NAME ONCE MORE"] - -He will not believe that his time has come and gone, and that Paris has -no memory, and no desire but to see and to hear some new thing. She -has taken his money and eaten his dinners and hung his pictures once -or twice in a good place; but, now that his money is gone, Paris has -other dinners to eat, and other statues to admire, and no leisure time -to spend at his dull receptions, which have taken the place of his rare -dinners, or to climb to his garret when there is a more amusing and -more modern painter on the first floor. - -Paris is full of these poor hangers-on, who have allowed her to use -them and pat them on the back, and who cannot see that her approbation -is not the only reward worth the striving for, but who go on year -after year tagging in her train, beseeching her to take some notice -of them. They are like the little boys who run beside the coaches and -turn somersaults to draw a copper from the passengers on top, and who -are finally left far behind, unobserved and forgotten beside the dusty -road. The wise man and the sensible man takes the button or the medal -or the place on a jury that Paris gives him, and is glad to get it, and -proud of the recognition and of the source from which it comes, and -then continues on his way unobserved, working for the work's sake. He -knows that Paris has taught him much, but that she has given him all -she can, and that he must now work out his own salvation for himself. - -Or, if he be merely an idler visiting Paris for the summer, he takes -Paris as an idler should, and she receives him with open arms. He -does not go there to spend four hours a day, or even four hours a -week, in the serious occupation of leaving visiting-cards. He does -not invite the same people with whom he dined two weeks before in New -York to dine and breakfast with him again in Paris, nor does he spend -every afternoon in a frock-coat watching polo, or in flannels playing -lawn-tennis on the Île de Puteaux. He has tennis and polo at home. Nor -did he go all the way to Paris to dance in little hot apartments, or to -spend the greater part of each day at the race-tracks of Longchamps or -Auteuil. The Americans who do these things in Paris are a strange and -incomprehensible class. Fortunately they do not form a large class, but -they do form a conspicuous one, and while it really does not concern -any one but themselves as to how they spend their time, it is a little -aggravating to have them spoiling the local color of a city for which -they have no real appreciation, and from which they get no more benefit -than they would have received had they remained at home in Newport. - -They treat Paris as they would treat Narragansett Pier, only they act -with a little less restraint, and are very much more in evidence. They -are in their own environment and in the picture at the Pier or at -the Horse Show, and if you do not like it you are at perfect liberty -to keep out of it, and you will not be missed; but you do object to -have your view of the Arc de Triomphe cut in two by a coach-load of -them, or to have them swoop down upon D'Armenonville or Maxim's on the -boulevards, calling each other by their first names, and running from -table to table, and ordering the Hungarians to play "Daisy Bell," until -you begin to think you are in the hall of the Hotel Waldorf, and go out -into the night to hear French spoken, if only by a cabman. - -I was on the back seat of a coach one morning in the Bois de Boulogne, -watching Howlett give a man a lesson in driving four horses at once. - -It was very early, and the dew was still on the trees, and the great, -broad avenues were empty and sweet-smelling and green, and I exclaimed -on the beauty of Paris. "Beautiful?" echoed Howlett. "I should say it -was, sir. Now in London, sir, all the roads lie so straight there's -no practice driving there. But in Paris it's all turns and short -corners. It's the most beautiful city in the world." I thought it was -interesting to find a man so wrapped up in his chosen work that he -could see nothing in the French capital but the angles which made the -driving of four horses a matter of some skill. But what interest can -you take in those Americans who have been taught something else besides -driving, and who yet see only those things in Paris that are of quite -as little worth as the sharp turns of the street corners? - -You wonder if it never occurs to them to walk along the banks of the -Seine and look over the side at the people unloading canal-boats, or -clipping poodles, or watering cavalry horses, or patiently fishing; -if they never pull over the books in the stalls that line the quays, -or just loiter in abject laziness, with their arms on the parapet of -a bridge, with the sun on their backs, and the steamboats darting to -and fro beneath them, and with the towers of Notre Dame before and the -grim prison of the Conciergerie on one side. Surely this is a better -employment than taking tea to the music of a Hungarian band while your -young friends from Beverly Farms and Rockaway knock a polo-ball around -a ten-acre lot. I met two American women hurrying along the Rue de -Rivoli one morning last summer who told me that they had just arrived -in Paris that moment, and were about to leave two hours later for Havre -to take the steamer home. - -"So," explained the elder, "as we have so much time, we are just -running down to the Louvre to take a farewell look at 'Mona Lisa' and -the 'Winged Victory;' we won't see them again for a year, perhaps." -Their conduct struck me as interesting when compared with that of about -four hundred other American girls, who never see anything of Paris -during their four weeks' stay there each summer, because so much of -their time is taken up at the dress-makers'. It is pathetic to see -them come back to the hotel at five, tired out and cross, with having -had to stand on their feet four hours at a time while some mysterious -ceremony was going forward. It is hard on them when the sun is shining -out-of-doors and there are beautiful drives and great art galleries and -quaint old chapels and curious museums and ancient gardens lying free -and open all around them, that they should be compelled to spend four -weeks in this fashion. - -There was a young woman of this class of American visitors to Paris who -had just arrived there on her way from Rome, and who was telling us how -much she had delighted in the galleries there. She was complaining that -she had no more pictures to enjoy. Some one asked her what objection -she had to the Louvre or the Luxembourg. - -"Oh, none at all," she said; "but I saw those pictures last year." - -These are the Americans who go to Paris for the spring and summer only, -who live in hotels, and see little of the city beyond the Rue de la -Paix and the Avenue of the Champs Élysées and their bankers'. They get -a great deal of pleasure out of their visit, however, and they learn -how important a thing it is to speak French correctly. If they derive -no other benefit from their visit they are sufficiently justified, and -when we contrast them with other Americans who have made Paris their -chosen home, they almost shine as public benefactors in comparison. - -For they, at least, bring something back to their own country: -themselves, and pretty frocks and bonnets, and a certain wider -knowledge of the world. That is not much, but it is more than the -American Colony does. - -[Illustration: "STANDING ON THEIR FEET FOR HOURS AT A TIME"] - -There is something fine in the idea of a colony, of a body of men and -women who strike out for themselves in a new country, who cut out their -homes in primeval forests, and who make their peace with the native -barbarians. The Pilgrim Fathers and the early settlers in Australia -and South Africa and amidst the snows of Canada were colonists of -whom any mother-nation might be proud; but the emigrants who shrink -at the crudeness of our present American civilization, who shirk the -responsibilities of our government, who must have a leisure class with -which to play, and who are shocked by the familiarity of our press, -are colonists who leave their country for their country's good. The -American Colony in Paris is in a strange position. Its members are -neither the one thing nor the other. They cannot stand in the shadow of -the Arc de Triomphe and feel that any part of its glory falls on them, -nor can they pretend an interest in the defeat of Tammany Hall, nor -claim any portion in the magnificent triumph of the Chicago Fair. Their -attitude must always be one of explanation; they are continually on the -defensive; they apologize to the American visitor and to the native -Frenchman; they have declined their birthright and are voluntary exiles -from their home. The only way by which they can justify their action -is either to belittle what they have given up, or to emphasize the -benefits which they have received in exchange, and these benefits are -hardly perceptible. They remain what they are, and no matter how long -it may have been since they ceased to be Americans, they do not become -Frenchmen. They are a race all to themselves; they are the American -Colony. - -On regular occasions this Colony asserts itself, but only on those -occasions when there is a chance of its advertising itself at the -expense of the country it has renounced. When this chance comes the -Colonists suddenly remember their former home; they rush into print, -or they make speeches in public places, or buy wreaths for some dead -celebrity. Or when it so happens that no one of prominence has died for -some time, and there seems to be no other way of getting themselves -noticed, the American Colony rises in its strength and remembers -Lafayette, and decorates his grave. Once every month or so they march -out into the country and lay a wreath on his tomb, and so for the -moment gain a certain vogue with the Parisians, which is all that -they ask. They do not perform this ceremony because Lafayette fought -in America, but because he was a Frenchman fighting in America, and -they are playing now to the French galleries and not to the American -bleaching-boards. There are a few descendants of Lafayette who are -deserving of our sincere sympathy. For these gentlemen are brought into -the suburbs many times a year in the rain and storm to watch different -American Colonists place a wreath on the tomb of their distinguished -ancestor, and make speeches about a man who left his country only to -fight for the independence of another country, and not to live in -it after it was free. Some day the descendants of Lafayette and the -secretaries of the American embassy will rise up and rebel, and refuse -to lend themselves longer to the uses of these gentlemen. - -They will suggest that there are other graves in Paris. There is, for -instance, the grave of Paul Jones, who possibly did as much for America -on the sea as Lafayette did on shore. If he had only been a Frenchman, -with a few descendants of title still living who would consent to act -as chief mourners on occasion, his spirit might hope to be occasionally -remembered with a wreath or two; but as it is, he is not to be -considered with the French marquis, who must, we can well imagine, -turn uneasily beneath the wreaths these self-advertising patriots lay -upon his grave. - -The American Colony is not wicked, but it would like to be thought -so, which is much worse. Among some of the men it is a pose to be -considered the friend of this or that particular married woman, and -each of them, instead of paying the woman the slight tribute of -treating her in public as though they were the merest acquaintances, -which is the least the man can do, rather forces himself upon her -horizon, and is always in evidence, not obnoxiously, but unobtrusively, -like a pet cat or a butler, but still with sufficient pertinacity to -let you know that he is there. - -As a matter of fact the women have not the courage to carry out to the -end these affairs of which they hint, as have the French men and women -around them whose example they are trying to emulate. And, moreover, -the twenty-five years of virtue which they have spent in America, as -Balzac has pointed out, is not to be overcome in a day or in many -days, and so they only pretend to have overcome it, and tell _risqués_ -stories and talk scandalously of each other and even of young girls. -But it all begins and ends in talk, and the _risqués_ stories, if they -knew it, sound rather silly from their lips, especially to men who put -them away when they were boys at boarding-school, and when they were so -young that they thought it was grand to be vulgar and manly to be nasty. - -It is a question whether or not one should be pleased that the would-be -wicked American woman in Paris cannot adopt the point of view of the -Parisian women as easily as she adopts their bonnets. She tries to do -so, it is true; she tries to look on life from the same side, but she -does not succeed very well, and you may be sure she is afraid and a -fraud at heart, and in private a most excellent wife and mother. If it -be reprehensible to be a hypocrite and to pretend to be better than one -is, it should also be wrong to pretend to be worse than one dares to -be, and so lend countenance to others. It is like a man who shouts with -the mob, but whose sympathies are against it. The mob only hears him -shout and takes courage at his doing so, and continues in consequence -to destroy things. And these foolish, pretty women lend countenance -by their talk and by their stories to many things of which they know -nothing from experience, and so do themselves injustice and others -much harm. Sometimes it happens that an outsider brings them up with a -sharp turn, and shows them how far they have strayed from the standard -which they recognized at home. I remember, as an instance of this, how -an American art student told me with much satisfaction last summer of -how he had made himself intensely disagreeable at a dinner given by -one of these expatriated Americans. "I didn't mind their taking away -the character of every married woman they knew," he said; "they were -their own friends, not mine; but I did object when they began on the -young girls, for that is something we haven't learned at home yet. And -finally they got to Miss ----, and one of the women said, 'Oh, she has -so compromised herself now that no one will marry her.'" - -At which, it seems, my young man banged the table with his fist, and -said: "I'll marry her, if she'll have me, and I know twenty more men -at home who would be glad of the chance. We've all asked her once, and -we're willing to ask her again." - -[Illustration: "THE AMERICAN COLONY IS NOT WICKED"] - -There was an uncomfortable pause, and the young woman who had spoken -protested she had not meant it so seriously. She had only meant the -girl was a trifle _passée_ and travel-worn. But when the women had left -the table, one of the men laughed, and said: - -"You are quite like a breeze from the piny woods at home. I suppose we -do talk rather thoughtlessly over here, but then none of us take what -we say of each other as absolute truth." - -The other men all agreed to this, and protested that no one took them -or what they said seriously. They were quite right, and, as a matter -of fact, it would be unjust to them to do so, except to pity them. The -Man without a Country was no more unfortunate than they. It is true -they have Henry's bar, where they can get real American cocktails, and -the Travellers', where they can play real American poker; but that is -as near as they ever get to anything that savors of our country, and -they do not get as near as that towards anything that savors of the -Frenchman's country. They have their own social successes, and their -own salons and dinner-parties, but the Faubourg St.-Germain is as -strange a territory to many of them as though it were situated in the -heart of the Congo Basin. - -Of course there are many fine, charming, whole-souled, and clean-minded -American women in Paris. They are the wives of bankers or merchants or -the representatives of the firms which have their branches in Paris and -London as well as New York. And there are hundreds more of Americans -who are in Paris because of its art, the cheapness of its living, and -its beauty. I am not speaking of them, and should they read this they -will understand. - -The American in Paris of whom one longest hesitates to speak is -the girl or woman who has married a title. She has been so much -misrepresented in the press, and so misunderstood, and she suffers in -some cases so acutely without letting it be known how much she suffers, -that the kindest word that could be said of her is not half so kind as -silence. No one can tell her more distinctly than she herself knows -what her lot is, or how few of her illusions have been realized. It is -not a case where one can point out grandiloquently that uneasy lies -the head that wears a coronet; it is not magnificent sorrow; it is -just pathetic, sordid, and occasionally ridiculous. To treat it too -seriously would be as absurd as to weep over a man who had allowed -himself to be fooled by a thimblerigger; only in this case it is a -woman who has been imposed upon, and who asks for your sympathy. - -There is a very excellent comic song which points out how certain -things are only English when you see them on Broadway; and a title, or -the satisfaction of being a countess or princess, when viewed from a -Broadway or Fifth Avenue point of view, is a very pretty and desirable -object. But as the title has to be worn in Paris and not in New York, -its importance lies in the way in which it is considered there, not -here. As far as appears on the surface, the American woman of title -in Paris fails to win what she sought, from either her own people or -those among whom she has married. To her friends from New York or San -Francisco she is still Sallie This or Eleanor That. Her friends are not -deceived or impressed or overcome--at least, not in Paris. When they -return to New York they speak casually of how they have been spending -the summer with the Princess So-and-So, and they do not add that she -used to be Sallie Sprigs of San Francisco. But in Paris, when they -are with her, they call her Sallie, just as of yore, and they let her -understand that they do not consider her in any way changed since she -has become ennobled, or that the glamour of her rank in any way dazzles -them. And she in her turn is so anxious that they shall have nothing to -say of her to her disadvantage when they return that she shows them -little of her altered state, and is careful not to refer to any of the -interesting names on her new visiting-list. - -Her husband's relations in France are more disappointing: they -certainly cannot be expected to see her in any different light from -that of an outsider and a nobody; they will not even admit that she -is pretty; and they say among themselves that, so long as Cousin -Charles had to marry a great fortune, it is a pity he did not marry a -French woman, and that they always had preferred the daughter of the -chocolate-maker, or the champagne-grower, or the Hebrew banker--all of -whom were offered to him. The American princess cannot expect people -who have had title and ancestors so long as to have forgotten them -to look upon Sallie Sprigs of California as anything better than an -Indian squaw. And the result is, that all which the American woman -makes by her marriage is the privilege of putting her coronet on her -handkerchief and the humble deference of the women at Paquin's or -Virot's, who say "Madame the Baroness" and "Madame the Princess" at -every second word. It really seems a very heavy price to pay for very -little. - -We are attributing very trivial and vulgar motives to the woman, and -it may be, after all, that she married for love in spite of the title, -and not on account of it. But if these are love-matches, it would -surely sometimes happen that the American men, in their turn, would -fall in love with foreign women of title, and that we would hear of -impecunious princesses and countesses hunting through the States for -rich brokers and wheat-dealers. Of course the obvious answer to this -is that the American women are so much more attractive than the men -that they appeal to people of all nations and of every rank, and that -American men are content to take them without the title. - -The rich fathers of the young girls who are sacrificed should go into -the business with a more accurate knowledge of what they are buying. -Even the shrewdest of them--men who could not be misled into buying a -worthless railroad or an empty mine--are frequently imposed upon in -these speculations. The reason is that while they have made a study of -the relative values and the soundness of railroads and mines, they have -not taken the pains to study this question of titles, and as long as a -man is a count or a prince, they inquire no further, and one of them -buys him for his daughter on his face value. There should be a sort -of Bradstreet for these rich parents, which they could consult before -investing so much money plus a young girl's happiness. There are, as a -matter of fact, only a very few titles worth buying, and in selecting -the choice should always lie between one of England and one of Germany. -An English earl is the best the American heiress can reasonably hope -for, and after him a husband with a German title is very desirable. -These might be rated as "sure" and "safe" investments. - -But these French titles created by Napoleon, or the Italians, with -titles created by the Papal Court, and the small fry of other -countries, are really not worth while. Theirs are not titles; as some -one has said, they are epitaphs; and the best thing to do with the -young American girl who thinks she would like to be a princess is -to take her abroad early in her life, and let her meet a few other -American girls who have become princesses. After that, if she still -wants to buy a prince and pay his debts and supply him with the credit -to run into more debt, she has only herself to blame, and goes into it -with her pretty eyes wide open. It will be then only too evident that -she is fitted for nothing higher. - -[Illustration: "WHAT MIGHT SOME TIME HAPPEN IF THESE WERE LOVE-MATCHES"] - -On no one class of visitor does Paris lay her spell more heavily than -on the American art student. For, no matter where he has studied at -home, or under what master, he finds when he reaches Paris so much -that is new and beautiful and full of inspiration that he becomes as -intolerant as are all recent converts, and so happy in his chosen -profession that he looks upon everything else than art with impatience -and contempt. As art is something about which there are many opinions, -he too often passes rapidly on to the stage when he can see nothing to -admire in any work save that which the master that he worships declares -to be true, and he scorns every other form of expression and every -other school and every other artist. - -You almost envy the young man his certainty of mind and the -unquestionableness of his opinion. He will take you through the Salon -at a quick step, demolishing whole walls of pictures as he goes with -a sweeping gesture of the hand, and will finally bring you breathless -before a little picture, or a group of them, which, so he informs you, -are the only ones in the exhibition worthy of consideration. And on -the day following a young disciple of another school will escort you -through the same rooms, and regard with pitying contempt the pictures -which your friend of the day before has left standing, and will pick -out somewhere near the roof a strange monstrosity, beneath which he -will stand with bowed head, and upon which he will comment in a whisper. - -It is an amusing pose, and most bewildering to a philistine like -myself when he finds all the artists whom he had venerated denounced -as photographers and decorators, or story-tellers and illustrators. I -used to be quite ashamed of the ignorance which had left me so long -unenlightened as to what was true and beautiful. - -These boys have, perhaps, an aunt in Kansas City, or a mother in Lynn, -Massachusetts, who is saving and pinching to send them fifteen or -twenty dollars a week so that they can learn to be great painters, -and they have not been in Paris a week before they have changed their -entire view of art, and adopted a new method and a new master and a -new religion. It is nowise derogatory to a boy to be supported by a -fond aunt in Kansas City, who sends him fifteen dollars a week and the -news of the social life of that place, but it is amusing to think how -she and his cousins in the West would be awed if they heard him damn a -picture by waving his thumb in the air at it, and saying, "It has a -little too much of that," with a downward sweep of the thumb, "and not -enough of this," with an upward sweep. For one hardly expects a youth -who is still at Julien's, and who has not yet paid the first quarter's -rent for his studio, to proclaim all the first painters of France as -only fit to color photographs. It is as if some one were to say, "You -can take away all of the books of the Boston Library and nothing will -be lost, but spare three volumes of sonnets written by the only great -writer of the present time, who is a friend of mine, and of whom no one -knows but myself." - -Of course one must admire loyalty of that sort, for when it is loyalty -to an idea it cannot help but be fine and sometimes noble, though it is -a trifle amusing as well. It is just this tenacity of belief in one's -own work, and just this intolerance of the work of others, that make -Paris inspiring. A man cannot help but be in earnest, if he amounts -to anything at all, when on every side he hears his work attacked or -vaunted to the skies. As long as the question asked is "Is it art?" and -not "Will it sell?" and "Is it popular?" the influence must be for good. - -These students, in their loyalty to the particular school they admire, -of course proclaim their belief in every public and private place, and -are ever on their guard, but it is in their studios that they have set -up their gods and established their doctrines most firmly. - -One of these young men, whom I had known at college, took me to his -studio last summer, and asked me to tell him how I liked it. It was -a most embarrassing question to me, for to my untrained eye the -rooms seemed to be stricken with poverty, and so bare as to appear -untenanted. I said, at last, that he had a very fine view from his -windows. - -"Yes, but you say nothing of the room itself," he protested; "and I -have spent so much time and thought on it. I have been a year and a -half in arranging this room." - -"But there is nothing in it," I objected; "you couldn't have taken a -year and a half to arrange these things. There is not enough of them. -It shouldn't have taken more than half an hour." - -He smiled with a sweet, superior smile, and shook his head at me. "I am -afraid," he said, "that you are one of those people who like studios -filled with tapestries and armor and palms and huge, hideous chests -of carved wood. You are probably the sort of person who would hang a -tennis-racket on his wall and consider it decorative. _We_ believe in -lines and subdued colors and broad, bare surfaces. There is nothing in -this room that has not a meaning of its own. You are quite right; there -is very little in it; but what is here could not be altered or changed -without spoiling the harmony of the whole, and nothing in it could be -replaced or improved upon." - -I regarded the studio with renewed interest at this, and took a mental -inventory of its contents for my own improvement. I was guiltily -conscious that once at college I had placed two lacrosse-sticks over -my doorway, and what made it worse was that I did not play lacrosse, -and that they had been borrowed from the man up-stairs for decorative -purposes solely. I hoped my artist friend would not question me too -closely. His room had a bare floor and gray walls and a green door. -There was a long, low bookcase, and a straight-legged table, on which -stood, ranged against the wall, a blue and white jar, a gold Buddha, -and a jade bottle. On one wall hung a gray silk poke-bonnet, of the -fashion of the year 1830, and on another an empty gold frame. With the -exception of three chairs there was nothing else in the room. I moved -slightly, and with the nervous fear that if I disturbed or disarranged -anything the bare gray walls might fall in on me. And then I asked him -why he did not put a picture in his frame. - -"Ah, exactly!" he exclaimed, triumphantly; "that shows exactly what -you are; you are an American philistine. You cannot see that a picture -is a beautiful thing in itself, and that a dead-gold frame with its -four straight lines is beautiful also; but together they might not be -beautiful. That gray wall needs a spot on it, and so I hung that gold -frame there, not because it was a frame, but because it was beautiful; -for the same reason I hung that eighteen-thirty bonnet on the other -wall. The two grays harmonize. People do not generally hang bonnets on -walls, but that is because they regard them as things of use, and not -as things of beauty." - -I pointed with my stick at the three lonely ornaments on the solitary -table. "Then if you were to put the blue and white jar on the right of -the Buddha, instead of on the left," I asked, "the whole room would -feel the shock?" - -"Of course," answered my friend. "Can't even you see that?" - -I tried to see it, but I could not. I had only just arrived in Paris. - -There was another artist with a studio across the bridges, and his love -of art cost him much money and some severe trials. His suite of rooms -was all in blue, gray, white, and black. He said that if you looked at -things in the world properly, you would see that they were all gray, -blue, or black. He had painted a gray lady in a gray dress, with a blue -parrot on her shoulder. She had brown lips and grayish teeth. He was -very much disappointed in me when I told him that lips always looked -to me either pink or red. He explained by saying that my eyes were not -trained properly. I resented this, and told him that my eyes were as -good as his own, and that a recruiting officer had once tested them -with colored yarns and letters of the alphabet held up in inaccessible -corners, and had given me a higher mark for eyesight than for anything -else. He said it was not a question of colored yarns; and that while -I might satisfy a recruiting sergeant that I could distinguish an -ammunition train from a travelling circus, it did not render me a -critic on art matters. He pointed out that the eyes of the women in the -Caucasus who make rugs are trained to distinguish a hundred and eighty -different shades of colors that other eyes cannot see; and in time, he -added, I would see that everything in real life looked flat and gray. -I took a red carnation out of my coat, and put it over the gray lady's -lips, and asked him whether he would call it gray or red, and he said -that was no argument. - -He suffered a great deal in his efforts to live up to his ideas, but -assured me that he was much happier than I in my ignorance of what -was beautiful. He explained, for instance, that he would like to put -up some of the photographs of his family that he had brought with him -around his room, but that he could not do it, because photographs were -so undecorative. So he kept them in his trunk. He also kept a green -cage full of doves because they were gray and white and decorative, -and in spite of the fact that they were a nuisance, and always flying -away, and being caught again by small boys, who brought them back, and -wanted a franc for so doing. He suffered, too, in his inability to -find the shade of blue for his chair covers that would harmonize with -the rest of his room. He covered the furniture five times, and never -successfully, and hence the cushions of his lounge and stiff chairs -were still as white as when they had last gone to the upholsterer's. - -These young men are friends of mine, and I am sure they will not -object to my describing their ateliers, of which they were very proud. -They believed in their own schools, and in their own ways of looking -at art, and no one could laugh or argue them out of it; consequently -they deserved credit for the faith that was in them. They are chiefly -interesting here as showing how a young man will develop in the -artistic atmosphere of Paris. It is only when he ceases to develop, -and sinks into the easy lethargy of a life of pleasure there, that he -becomes uninteresting. - -There was still another young man whom I knew there who can serve here -now as an example of the American who stops in Paris too long. - -I first met this artist at a garden-party, and he asked me if I did not -think it dull, and took me for a walk up to Montmartre, talking all the -way of what a great and beautiful mother Paris was to those who worked -there. His home was in Maine, and he let me know, without reflecting on -his native town, that he had been choked and cramped there, and that -his life had been the life of a Siberian exile. Here he found people -who could understand; here, the very statues and buildings gave him -advice and encouragement; here were people who took him and his work -seriously, and who helped him on to fresh endeavors, and who made work -a delight. - -"I have one picture in the Salon," he said, flushing with proper pride -and pleasure, "and one has just gone to the World's Fair, and another -has received an honorable mention at Munich. That's pretty good for -my first year, is it not? And I'm only twenty-five years old now," he -added, with his eyes smiling into the future at the great things he -was to do. Nobody could resist the contagion of his enthusiasm and -earnestness of purpose. - -He was painting the portrait of some rich man's daughter at the time, -and her family took a patronizing interest in him, and said it was a -pity that he did not go out more into society and get commissions. -They asked me to tell him to be more careful about his dress, and to -suggest to him not to wear a high hat with a sack-coat. I told them to -leave him alone, and not to worry about his clothes, or to suggest his -running after people who had pretty daughters and money enough to have -them painted. These people would run after him soon enough, if he went -on as he had begun. - -[Illustration: "'I HAVE ONE PICTURE IN THE SALON'"] - -When I saw him on the boulevards the next summer he had to -reintroduce himself; he was very smartly dressed, in a cheap way, and -he was sipping silly little sweet juices in front of a café. He was -flushed and nervous and tired looking, and rattled off a list of the -fashionable people who were then in Paris as correctly as a _Galignani_ -reporter could have done it. - -"How's art?" I asked. - -"Oh, very well," he replied. "I had a picture in the Salon last year, -and another was commended at Munich, and I had another one at the Fair. -That's pretty good for my first two years abroad, isn't it?" - -The next year I saw him several times with various young women in the -court-yard of the Grand Hôtel, than which there is probably no place in -all Paris less Parisian. They seemed to be models in street dress, and -were as easy to distinguish as a naval officer in citizen's clothes. He -stopped me once again before I left Paris, and invited me to his studio -to breakfast. I asked him what he had to show me there. - -"I have three pictures," he said, "that I did the first six months I -was here; they--" - -"Yes, I know," I interrupted. "One was at last year's Salon, and one at -the World's Fair, and the other took a prize at Munich. Is that all?" - -He flushed a little, and laughed, and said, "Yes, that is all." - -"Do you get much inspiration here?" I asked, pointing to the colored -fountain and the piles of luggage and the ugly glass roof. - -"I don't understand you," he said. - -He put the card he had held out to me back in his case, and bowed -grandly, and walked back to the girl he had left at one of the tables, -and on my way out from the offices I saw him frowning into a glass -before him. The girl was pulling him by the sleeve, but he apparently -was not listening. - -The American artist who has taken Paris properly has only kind -words to speak of her. He is grateful for what she gave him, but -he is not unmindful of his mother-country at home. He may complain -when he returns of the mud in our streets, and the height of our -seventeen-story buildings, and the ugliness of our elevated roads--and -who does not? But if his own art is lasting and there is in his heart -much constancy, his work will grow and continue in spite of these -things, and will not droop from the lack of atmosphere about him. New -York and every great city owns a number of these men who have studied -in the French capital, and who speak of it as fondly as a man speaks -of his college and of the years he spent there. They help to leaven the -lump and to instruct others who have not had the chance that was given -them to see and to learn of all these beautiful things. These are the -men who made the Columbian Fair what it was, who taught their teacher -and the whole world a lesson in what was possible in architecture and -in statuary, in decoration and design. That was a much better and a -much finer thing for them to have done than to have dragged on in Paris -waiting for a ribbon or a medal. They are the best examples we have -of the Americans who made use of Paris, instead of permitting Paris -to make use of them. And because they did the one thing and avoided -the other, they are now helping and enlightening their own people and -a whole nation, and not selfishly waiting in a foreign capital for a -place on a jury for themselves. - - -THE END - - - - -Transcriber's Note: -1. Obvious punctuation and typographical errors repaired. -2. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - - - -Title: About Paris - -Author: Richard Harding Davis - -Illustrator: Charles Dana Gibson - -Release Date: August 2, 2016 [EBook #52706] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOUT PARIS *** - - - - -Produced by Clarity, Brian Wilsden and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="cover"></a> -<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt="" width="548" height="800" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[Pg ii]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="PARIS_HAD_TAKEN_OFF_HER_MOURNING"></a> -<img src="images/illus_001.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="359" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"PARIS HAD TAKEN OFF HER MOURNING" <span class="small"><a href="#Page_137">(Page 137)</a></span></div> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[Pg iii]</a></span></p> -<h1><span class="gesperrt">ABOUT PARIS</span></h1> -<p class="center"><span class="small">BY</span><br /> -<span class="xlarge">RICHARD HARDING DAVIS</span></p> - -<div class="topspace3"></div> - -<p class="center">Illustrated<br /> -<span class="small">BY</span><br /> -CHARLES DANA GIBSON</p> - -<div class="topspace3"></div> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illus_002.jpg" alt="" width="100" height="122" /> -</div> - -<div class="topspace3"></div> - -<p class="center">NEW YORK<br /> -HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS<br /> -1895</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[Pg iv]</a></span></p> - -<div class="adborder24"> -<p class="center"><span class="xlarge">By RICHARD HARDING DAVIS.</span></p> - - -<hr class="sect" /> - - -<p class="left"><span class="large">OUR ENGLISH COUSINS. Illustrated. Post 8vo,</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.</span></p> - -<p class="left"><span class="large">THE RULERS OF THE MEDITERRANEAN.</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Illustrated. Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.</span></p> - -<p class="left"><span class="large">THE WEST FROM A CAR-WINDOW. Illustrated.</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 25.</span></p> - -<p class="left"><span class="large">THE EXILES, AND OTHER STORIES. Illustrated.</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">Post 8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 50.</span></p> - -<p class="left"><span class="large">VAN BIBBER, AND OTHERS. Illustrated. Post</span><br /> -<span style="margin-left: 1em;">8vo, Cloth, Ornamental, $1 00; Paper, 60 cents.</span></p> - - -<hr class="sect" /> - - -<p class="left"><span class="smcap">Published by</span> -<span class="xlarge"> HARPER & BROTHERS, </span> -<span class="smcap">New York.</span></p> -</div> - -<div class="topspace3"></div> - -<p class="center">Copyright, 1895, by <span class="smcap">Harper & Brothers.</span></p> - -<hr class="r5" /> - -<p class="center"><i>All rights reserved.</i></p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v-vi]</a></span></p> - -<div class="topspace3"></div> -<p class="center">TO<br /> -<span class="xlarge">PAUL BOURGET</span></p> -<div class="topspace3"></div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[Pg vii]</a></span></p> - - -<h2 class="chapter" >CONTENTS</h2> - -<table summary="contents"> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"> </td> -<td class="tdl"> </td> -<td class="tdr">PAGE</td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdr">I.</td> -<td class="tdl">THE STREETS OF PARIS</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdr">II.</td> -<td class="tdl">THE SHOW-PLACES OF PARIS—NIGHT</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_47">47</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdr">III.</td> -<td class="tdl">PARIS IN MOURNING</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdr">IV.</td> -<td class="tdl">THE GRAND PRIX AND OTHER PRIZES</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_138">138</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdr">V.</td> -<td class="tdl"> AMERICANS IN PARIS</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#Page_177">177</a></td> -</tr> -</table> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[Pg ix-x]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter">ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> - -<table summary="illustrations" class="center"> -<tr> -<td class="tdr"></td> -<td class="tdr">PAGE</td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"PARIS HAD TAKEN OFF HER MOURNING"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#PARIS_HAD_TAKEN_OFF_HER_MOURNING"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"THE CONCIERGE OF EACH HOUSE STOOD CONTINUALLY -AT THE FRONT DOOR"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_CONCIERGE_OF_EACH_HOUSE_STOOD_CONTINUALLY_AT_THE_FRONT_DOOR">3</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"SHE LOOKED DOWN UPON OUR STREET"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#SHE_LOOKED_DOWN_UPON_OUR_STREET">9</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"WITH A LONG LOAF OF BREAD"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#WITH_A_LONG_LOAF_OF_BREAD">15</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"TES DANS LA RUE, VA, T'ES CHEZ TOI"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#TES_DANS_LA_RUE_VA_TES_CHEZ_TOI">19</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"THE PARTY PROMPTLY BROKE UP"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_PARTY_PROMPTLY_BROKE_UP">25</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"AND TRANSFORM LONG-HAIRED STUDENTS INTO MEMBERS OF THE INSTITUTE"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AND_TRANSFORM_LONGHAIRED_STUDENTS_INTO_MEMBERS_OF_THE_INSTITUTE">31</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">INSIDE COLUMBIN'S</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#INSIDE_COLUMBINS">37</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"AND YOU BELIEVE THE GUIDES"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AND_YOU_BELIEVE_THE_GUIDES">41</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">THE CHÂTEAU ROUGE</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_CHATEAU_ROUGE">59</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">AT BRUANT'S</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AT_BRUANTS">65</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">AT THE BLACK CAT</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AT_THE_BLACK_CAT">71</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">A CAFÉ CHANTANT</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#A_CAFE_CHANTANT">77</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">ON MONTMARTRE</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#ON_MONTMARTRE">83</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">SOME YOUNG PEOPLE OF MONTMARTRE</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#SOME_YOUNG_PEOPLE_OF_MONTMARTRE">89</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">AT THE MOULIN ROUGE</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AT_THE_MOULIN_ROUGE">93</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">AT THE JARDIN DE PARIS</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AT_THE_JARDIN_DE_PARIS">103</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">PORTRAITS OF CARNOT IN HEAVY BLACK</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#PORTRAITS_OF_CARNOT_IN_HEAVY_BLACK">109</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"TO BRING A QUEEN BACK TO PARIS"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#TO_BRING_A_QUEEN_BACK_TO_PARIS">115</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"THE GIRL WHO REPRESENTED ALSACE"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_GIRL_WHO_REPRESENTED_ALSACE">131</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">THE RESTAURANT AMONG THE TREES</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_RESTAURANT_AMONG_THE_TREES">143</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">INTERESTED IN THE WINNER</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#INTERESTED_IN_THE_WINNER">149</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"AROUND SOME STATELY DIGNITARY"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#AROUND_SOME_STATELY_DIGNITARY">159</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"THE MAN THAT BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_MAN_THAT_BROKE_THE_BANK_AT_MONTE_CARLO">167</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"LISTENING FOR THE VOICE TO SPEAK HIS NAME ONCE MORE"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#LISTENING_FOR_THE_VOICE_TO_SPEAK_HIS_NAME_ONCE_MORE">179</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"STANDING ON THEIR FEET FOR HOURS AT A TIME"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#STANDING_ON_THEIR_FEET_FOR_HOURS_AT_A_TIME">187</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"THE AMERICAN COLONY IS NOT WICKED"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#THE_AMERICAN_COLONY_IS_NOT_WICKED">195</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">WHAT MIGHT SOME TIME HAPPEN IF THESE WERE LOVE-MATCHES</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#WHAT_MIGHT_SOME_TIME_HAPPEN_IF_THESE_WERE_LOVEMATCHES">203</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="tdl">"'I HAVE ONE PICTURE IN THE SALON'"</td> -<td class="tdr"><a href="#I_HAVE_ONE_PICTURE_IN_THE_SALON">215</a></td> -</tr> - -</table> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter"><span class="gesperrt">ABOUT PARIS</span></h2> -<hr class="r15" /> -<p class="center"><span class="xlarge"><b>I<br /> -THE STREETS OF PARIS</b></span></p> - -<div><img class="drop-cap" src="images/illus_012.jpg" alt="" width="100" height="102" /> -</div> -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap">The</span> street that I knew best in Paris was an unimportant street, and -one into which important people seldom came, and then only to pass on -through it to the Rue de Rivoli, which ran parallel with it, or to the -Rue Castiglione, which cut it evenly in two. It was to them only the -shortest distance between two points, for the sidewalks of this street -were not sprinkled with damp sawdust and set out with marble-topped -tables under red awnings, nor were there the mirrors and windows of -jewellers and milliners along its course to make one turn and look. -It was interesting only to those people who lived upon it, and to us -perhaps only for that reason. - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> - -If you judged it by the circumstance that we all spent our time in -hanging out of the windows, and that the concierge of each house stood -continually at the front door, you would suppose it to be a most -interesting thoroughfare, in which things were always happening. What -did happen was not interesting to the outsider, and you had to live in -it some time before you could appreciate the true value of the street. -With one exception. This was the great distinction of our street, and -one of which we were very proud. A poet had lived in his way, and -loved in his way, in one of the houses, and had died there. You could -read the simple, unromantic record of this in big black letters on a -tablet placed evenly between the two windows of the entresol. It gave -a distinguished air to that house, and rendered it different from all -of the others, as a Legion of Honor on the breast of a French soldier -makes him conspicuous amongst his fellows.</p> - -<div class="adborder10"> -<p class="center">ALFRED DE MUSSET<br /> -né à Paris<br /> -Le 11 Décembre 1810<br /> -est mort<br /> -dans cette maison<br /> -Le 2 Mai 1857</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3-4]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_CONCIERGE_OF_EACH_HOUSE_STOOD_CONTINUALLY_AT_THE_FRONT_DOOR"></a> -<img src="images/illus_014.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="406" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"THE CONCIERGE OF EACH HOUSE STOOD CONTINUALLY AT THE -FRONT DOOR"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p> - -<p>We were all pleased when people stopped and read this inscription. We -took it as a tribute to the importance of our street, and we felt a -proprietary interest in that tablet and in that house, as though this -neighborly association with genius was something to our individual -credit.</p> - -<p>We had other distinguished people in our street, but they were very -much alive, and their tablets were colored ones drawn by Chéret, and -pasted up all over Paris in endless repetition; and though their -celebrity may not live as long as has the poet's, while they are living -they seem to enjoy life as fully as he did, and to get out of the -present all that the present has to give.</p> - -<p>The one in which we all took the most interest lived just across the -street from me, and by looking up a little you could see her looking -out of her window, with her thick, heavy black hair bound in bandeaux -across her forehead, and a great diamond horseshoe pinned at her -throat, and with just a touch of white powder showing on her nose and -cheeks. She looked as though she should have lived by rights in the -Faubourg St.-Germain, and she used to smile down rather kindly upon -the street with a haughty, tolerant look, as if it amused her by its -simplicity and idleness, and by the quietness, which only the - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> - -cries of the children or of the hucksters, or the cracking at times of a -coachman's whip, ever broke. She looked very well then, but it was in -the morning that the street saw her at her best. For it was then that -she went out to ride in the Bois in her Whitechapel cart, and as she -never awoke in time, apparently, we had the satisfaction of watching -the pony and the tiger and cart for an hour or two until she came. It -was a brown basket-cart, and the tiger used to walk around it many -times to see that it had not changed in any particular since he had -examined it three minutes before, and the air with which he did this -gave us an excellent idea of the responsibility of his position. So -that people passing stopped and looked too—bakers' boys in white -linen caps and with baskets on their arms, and commissionnaires in -cocked hats and portfolios chained to their persons, and gentlemen -freshly made up for the morning, with waxed mustaches and flat-brimmed -high hats, and little girls with plaits, and little boys with bare -legs; and all of us in-doors, as soon as we heard the pony stamp his -sharp hoofs on the asphalt, would drop books or razors or brooms or -mops and wait patiently at the window until she came.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span></p> - -<p>When she came she wore a black habit with fresh white gloves, holding -her skirt and crop in one hand, and the crowd would separate on either -side of her. She did not see the crowd. She was used to crowds, and she -would pat the pony's head or rub his ears with the fresh kid gloves, -and tighten the buckle or shift a strap with an air quite as knowing -as the tiger's, but not quite so serious. Then she would wrap the -lap-robe about her, and her maid would take her place at her side with -the spaniel in her arms, and she would give the pony the full length -of the lash, and he would go off like a hound out of the leash. They -always reached the corner before the tiger was able to overtake them, -and I believe it was the hope of seeing him some morning left behind -forever which led to the general interest in their departure. And when -they had gone, the crowd would look at the empty place in the street, -and at each other, and up at us in the windows, and then separate, -and the street would grow quiet again. One could see her again later, -if one wished, in the evening, riding a great horse around the ring, -in another habit, but with the same haughty smile; and as the horse -reared on his hind-legs, and kicked and plunged as though he would -fall back on her, she would smile at him as she did on the children in -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> -our street, with the same unconcerned, amused look that she would have -given to a kitten playing with its tail.</p> - -<p>The houses on our street had tall yellow fronts with gray slate roofs, -and roof-gardens of flowers and palms in pots. Some of the houses had -iron balconies, from which the women leaned and talked across the -street to one another in purring nasal voices, with a great rolling -of the r's and an occasional disdainful movement of the shoulders. -When any other than a French woman shrugs her shoulders she moves the -whole upper part of her body, from the hips up; but the French woman's -shoulders and arms are all that change when she makes that ineffable -gesture that we have settled upon as the characteristic one of her -nation.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9-10]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="SHE_LOOKED_DOWN_UPON_OUR_STREET"></a> -<img src="images/illus_020.jpg" alt="" width="339" height="550" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"SHE LOOKED DOWN UPON OUR STREET"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span></p> - -<p>In a street of like respectability to ours in London or New York those -who lived on it would know as little of their next-door neighbor as -of a citizen at another end of the town. The house fronts would tell -nothing to the outside world; they would frown upon each other like -family tombs in a cemetery; but in this street of Paris the people -lived in it, or on the balconies, or at the windows. We knew what they -were going to have for dinner, because we could see them carrying -the uncooked portions of it from the restaurant at the corner, with a -long loaf of bread under one arm and a single egg in the other hand; -and when some one gave a fête we knew of it by the rows of bottles on -the ledge of the window and the jellies set out to cool on the balcony. -We were all interested in the efforts of the stout gentleman in the -short blue smoking-jacket who taught his parrot to call to the coachman -of each passing fiacre; he did this every night after dinner, with -his cigarette in his mouth, and with great patience and good-nature. -We took a common pride also in the flower-garden of the young people -on the seventh floor, and in their arrangement of strings upon which -the vines were to grow, and in the lines of roses, which dropped -their petals whenever the wind blew, upon the head of the concierge, -so that she would look up and shake her head at them, and then go -inside and get a broom and sweep the leaves carefully away. When any -one in our street went off in his best clothes in a fiacre we looked -after him with envy, and yet with a certain pride that we lived with -such fortunate people, who were evidently much sought after in the -fashionable world; and when a musician or - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12-14]</a></span> - -a blind man broke the silence of our street with his music or his -calls, we vied with one another in throwing him coppers—not on -his account at all, but because we wished to stand well in the opinion -of our neighbors. It was like camping out on two sides of a valley -where every one could look over into the other's tent.</p> - -<p>There was a young couple near the corner, who, I think, had but lately -married, and every evening she used to watch for him in a fresh gown -for a half-hour or so before he came. During the day she wore a very -plain gown, and her eyes wandered everywhere; but during that half-hour -before he came she never changed her position nor relaxed her vigil. -And it made us all quite uncomfortable, and we could not give our -attention to anything else until he had turned the corner and waved -his hand, and she had answered him with a start and a little shrug of -content. After dinner they appeared together, and he would put his arm -around her waist, with that refreshing disregard for the world that -French lovers have, and they would smile down upon us in a very happy -and superior manner, or up at the sun as it sank a brilliant red at the -end of our street, with the hundreds of chimney-pots looking like black -musical notes against it. - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> - -There was also a very interesting old lady in the house that blocked -the end of our street, a very fat and masculine old lady in a loose -white wrapper, who spent all of her time rearranging her plants -and flowers, and kept up an amiable rivalry with the people in the -balconies above and below her in the abundance and verdure of her -garden. It was a very pleasant competition for the rest of us, as it -hung that end of the street with a curtain of living green.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="WITH_A_LONG_LOAF_OF_BREAD"></a> -<img src="images/illus_024.jpg" alt="" width="277" height="550" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"WITH A LONG LOAF OF BREAD"</div> -</div> - -<p>For a little time there was a young girl who used to sit upon the -balcony whenever the sun was brightest and the air not too chill; but -she took no interest in the street, for she knew nothing of it except -its noises. She lay always in an invalid's chair, looking up at the -sky and the roof-line above, and with her profile against the gray -wall. During the day a nurse in a white cap sat with her; but after -dinner a stout, jaunty man of middle age came back from his club or -his bureau, and took the place beside her until it grew dark, when he -and the nurse would lift her in-doors again, and he would take his -hat and go off to the boulevards, I suppose, to cheer himself a bit. -It did not last long, for one day I came home to find them taking -down a black-and-silver curtain from the front of the house, and the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> -concierge said that the girl had been buried, and that her father was -now quite alone. For the first week after that he did not go to the -boulevards, but used to sit out on the balcony until late into the -evening, with the night about him, so that we would not have known he -was there save for the light of his cigar burning in the darkness.</p> - -<p>The step from our street to the boulevards is a much longer one in -the imagination than in actual distance. Our street, after all, was -only typical of thousands of other Parisian streets, and when you have -explained it you have described miles after miles of other streets like -it. But there is nothing just like the boulevards. If you should wish -to sit at the exact centre of the world and to watch it revolve around -you, you have only to take your place at that corner table of the Café -de la Paix which juts the farthest out into the Avenue de l'Opéra -and the Boulevard Capucines. This table is the apex of all the other -tables. It turns the tides of pedestrians on the broad sidewalks of -both the great thoroughfares, and it is geographically situated exactly -under the "de la" of the "Café de la Paix," painted in red letters -on the awning over your head. From this admirable position you can -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> -sweep the square in front of the Opera-house, the boulevard itself, -and the three great streets running into it from the river. People -move obligingly around and up and down and across these, and if you -sit there long enough you will see every one worth seeing in the known -world.</p> - -<p>There is a large class of Parisians whose knowledge of that city is -limited to the boulevards. They neither know nor care to know of -any other part; we read about them a great deal, of them and their -witticisms and café politics; and what "the boulevards" think of this -or that is as seriously quoted as what "a gentleman very near the -President," or "a diplomat whose name I am requested not to give, but -who is in a position to know whereof he speaks," cares to say of public -matters at home. For my part, I should think an existence limited to -two sidewalks would be somewhat sad, especially if it were continued -into the middle age, which all boulevardiers seem to have already -attained. It does not strike one as a difficult school to enter, or -as one for which there is any long apprenticeship. You have only to -sit for an hour every evening under the "de la," and you will find -that you know by sight half the faces of the men who pass you, who -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> -come up suddenly out of the night and disappear again, like slides in -a stereopticon, or whom you find next you when you take your place, -and whom you leave behind, still sipping from the half-empty glasses -ordered three hours before you came.</p> - -<p>The man who goes to Paris for a summer must be a very misanthropic -and churlish individual if he tires of the boulevards in that short -period. There is no place so amusing for the stranger between the hours -of six and seven and eleven and one as these same boulevards; but to -the Parisian what a bore it must become! That is, what a bore it would -become to any one save a Parisian! To have the same fat man with the -sombrero and the waxed mustache snap patent match-boxes in your face -day after day and night after night, and to have "Carnot at Longchamps" -taking off his hat and putting it on again held out for your inspection -for weeks, and to seek the same insipid silly faces of boys with broad -velvet collars and stocks, which they believe are worn by Englishmen, -and the same pompous gentlemen who cut their white goatees as do -military men of the Second Empire, and who hope that the ruddiness of -their cheeks, which is due to the wines of Burgundy, will be -attributed to the suns of Tunis and Algiers. And the same women, the -one with the mustache and the younger one with the black curl, and the -hundreds of others, silent and panther-like, and growing obviously -more ugly as the night grows later and the streets more deserted. If -any one aspires to be known among such as these, his aspirations are -easily gratified. He can have his heart's desire; he need only walk the -boulevards for a week, and he will be recognized as a boulevardier. It -is a cheap notoriety, purchased at the expense of the easy exercise of -walking, and the cost of some few glasses of "bock," with a few cents -to the waiter. There is much excuse for the visitor; he is really to be -envied; it is all new and strange and absurd to him; but what an old, -old story it must be to the boulevardier!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19-20]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="TES_DANS_LA_RUE_VA_TES_CHEZ_TOI"></a> -<img src="images/illus_030.jpg" alt="" width="264" height="550" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"TES DANS LA RUE, VA, T'ES CHEZ TOI"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> - -<p>The visitor, perhaps, has never sat out-of-doors before and taken his -ease on the sidewalk. Yet it seems a perfectly natural thing to do, -until he imagines himself doing the same thing at home. There was a -party of men and women from New York sitting in front of the Café de -la Paix one night after the opera, and enjoying themselves very much, -until one of them suggested their doing the same thing the next month -at home.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> -"We will all take chairs," he said, "and sit at the corner of -Twenty-sixth Street and Broadway at twelve o'clock at night and drink -bock-bier," and the idea was so impossible that the party promptly -broke up and went to their hotels.</p> - -<p>Of course the visitor in Paris misses a great deal that the true -boulevardier enjoys through not knowing or understanding all that he -sees. But, on the other hand, he has an advantage in being able to -imagine that he is surrounded by all the famous journalists and poets -and noted duellists; and every clerk with a portfolio becomes a Deputy, -and every powdered and auburn-haired woman who passes in an open fiacre -is a celebrated actress of the Comédie Française. He can distribute -titles as freely as the Papal court, and transform long-haired students -into members of the Institute, and promote the boys of the Polytechnic -School, in their holiday cocked hats and play-swords, into lieutenants -and captains of the regular army. He believes that the ill-looking -individual in rags who shows such apparent fear of the policeman on -the corner really has forbidden prints and books to sell, and that -the guides who hover about like vultures looking for a fresh victim -have it in their power to show him things to which they only hold the -key—things which any Frenchman could tell him he could see at his own -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> -home if he has the taste for such sights.</p> - -<p>The best of the boulevards is that the people sitting on their -sidewalks, and the heavy green trees, and the bare heads of so many -of the women, make one feel how much out-of-doors he is, as no other -street or city does, and what a folly it is to waste time within walls. -I do not think we appreciate how much we owe to the women in Paris who -go without bonnets. They give the city so homelike and friendly an -air, as though every woman knew every other woman so well that she did -not mind running across the street to gossip with her neighbor without -the formality of a head-covering. And it really seems strange that the -prettiest bonnets should come from the city where the women of the -poorer classes have shown how very pretty a woman of any class can look -without any bonnet at all.</p> - -<p>The enduring nature of the boulevards impresses one who sees them at -different hours as much as does their life and gayety at every hour. -You sometimes think surely to-morrow they will rest, and the cafés -will be closed, and the long passing stream of cabs and omnibuses -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> -will stop, and the asphalt street will be permitted to rest from its -burden. You may think this at night, but when you turn up again at -nine the next morning you will find it all just as you left it at one -the same morning. The same waiters, the same rush of carriages, the -same ponderous omnibuses with fine straining white horses, the flowers -in the booths, and the newspapers neatly piled round the colored -kiosks.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25-26]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_PARTY_PROMPTLY_BROKE_UP"></a> -<img src="images/illus_036.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="374" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"THE PARTY PROMPTLY BROKE UP"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Champs Élysées is hardly a street, but as a thoroughfare it is the -most remarkable in the world. It is a much better show than are the -boulevards. The place for which you pay to enter is generally more -interesting than the place to which admittance is free, and any one can -walk along the boulevards, but to ride in the Champs Élysées you must -pay something, even if you take your fiacre by the hour. Some Parisians -regret that the Avenue des Champs Élysées should be so cheapened that -it is not reserved for carriages hired by the month, and not by the -course, and that omnibuses and hired cabs are not kept out of it, as -they are kept out of Hyde Park. But should this rule obtain the Avenue -des Champs Élysées would lose the most amusing of its features. It -would shut out the young married couples and their families and friends -in their gala clothes, which look strangely unfamiliar in the sunlight, -and make you think that the wearers have been up all night; and the -hundreds of girls in pairs from the Jardin de Paris, who have halved -the expense of a fiacre, but who cannot yet afford a brougham; and -the English tourists dressed in flannel shirts and hunting-caps and -knickerbockers, exactly as though they were penetrating the mountains -of Afghanistan or the deserts of Syria, and as unashamed of their -provincialism as the young marquis who passes on his dog-cart is -unashamed of having placed the girl with him on his right hand instead -of his left, though by so doing he tells every one who passes who -and what she is. It would shut out the omnibuses, with the rows of -spectators on their tops, who lean on their knees and look down into -the carriages below, and point out the prettiest gowns and faces; and -it would exclude the market-wagons laden with huge piles of yellow -carrots and purple radishes, with a woman driving on the box-seat, -and a dog chained beside her. There is no other place in the world, -unless it be Piccadilly at five o'clock in the afternoon, where so -many breeds of horses trot side by side, where the chains of the baron -banker and the cracking whip of a drunken cabman and the horn of some - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> - -American millionaire's four-in-hand all sound at the same time. To be -known is easy in the boulevards, but it is a distinction in the Avenue -des Champs Élysées—a distinction which costs much money and which -lasts an hour. Sometimes it is gained by liveries and trappings and -a large red rosette in the button-hole, or by driving the same coach -at the same hour at the same rate of speed throughout the season, or -by wearing a fez, or by sending two sais ahead of your cart to make a -way for it, or by a beautiful face and a thoroughbred pug on a cushion -at your side, although this last mode is not so easy, as there are -many pretty faces and many softly cushioned victorias and innumerable -pug-dogs, and when the prevailing color for the hair happens to be -red—as it was last summer—the chance of gaining any individuality -becomes exceedingly difficult. When all of these people meet in the -afternoon on their way to and from the Bois, there is no better -entertainment of the sort in the world, and the avenue grows much too -short, and the hours before dinner even shorter. There are women in -light billowy toilets, with elbows squared and whip in hand, fearlessly -driving great English horses from the top of a mail-phaeton, while a - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> - -frightened little English groom clutches at the rail and peers over -their shoulder to grasp the reins if need be, or to jump if he must. -And there are narrow-chested corseted and padded young Frenchmen in -white kid gloves, who hold one rein in each hand as little girls hold a -skipping-rope, and who imagine they are so like Englishmen that no one -can distinguish them even by their accent. There are fat Hebrew bankers -and their equally fat sons in open victorias, who, lacking the spirit -of the Frenchmen, who at least attempt to drive themselves, recline -consciously on cushions, like the poodles in the victorias of the -ladies with the red hair. There are also visiting princes from India or -pashas from Egypt; or diplomats of the last Spanish-American republic, -as dark as the negroes of Sixth Avenue, but with magnificent liveries -and clanking chains; the nabobs of Haiti, of Algiers and Tunis, and -with these the beautiful Spanish-looking woman from South America, the -wives of the <i>rastaqouères</i>; and mixed with these is the long string of -bookmakers and sporting men coming back from the races at Longchamps -or Auteuil, red-faced and hot and dusty, with glasses strapped around -them, and the badges still flying from their button-holes. There are -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> -three rows of carriages down and three of carriages up, and if you -look from the Arc de Triomphe to the Tuileries you see a broken mass -of glittering carriage-tops and lace parasols, and what looks like -the flashing of thousands of mirrors as the setting sun strikes on -the glass of the lamps and windows and on the lacquered harness and -polished mountings. Whether you view this procession from the rows -of green iron seats on either side or as a part of it, you must feel -lifted up by its movement and color and the infinite variety of its -changes. A man might live in the Champs Élysées for a week or a month, -seeing no more of Paris than he finds under its beautiful trees or on -its broad thoroughfare, and be so well content with that much of the -city as to prefer it to all other cities.</p> - -<p>There was a little fat man in his shirt sleeves one morning in front -of the Theatre of the Republic, which, as everybody knows, stands under -the trees in the Champs Élysées, on the Rue Matignon, hanging a new -curtain, and the fat man, as the proprietor and manager, was naturally -anxious. Two small boys with their bare legs, and leather belts about -their smocks, and a nurse with broad blue ribbons down her back, and -myself looked our admiration from the outside of the roped enclosure. -The orchestra had laid down its fiddle, and was helping the man -who takes the twenty centimes to adjust the square yard of canvas. The -proprietor placed his fat fingers on the small of his back and threw -his head to one side and shut one eye. We waited breathlessly for his -opinion. He took two steps backward from the ten-centime seats, and -studied the effect of the curtain from that distance, with his chin -thrown up and his arms folded severely. We suggested that it was an -improvement on the old curtain, and one that would be sure to catch the -passer's eye.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31-32]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AND_TRANSFORM_LONGHAIRED_STUDENTS_INTO_MEMBERS_OF_THE_INSTITUTE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_042.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="328" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"AND TRANSFORM LONG-HAIRED STUDENTS INTO MEMBERS OF THE -INSTITUTE"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> - -<p>"Possibly," the proprietor said, indulgently, and then wiped his brow -and shook his head. He told us we had little idea how great were the -trials of an <i>impresario</i> of an open-air theatre in the Champs Élysées. -What with the rent and the cost of the costumes and the employment -of three assistants—one to work the marionettes, and one to take up -the money, and one to play in the orchestra—expenses did run up. Of -course there was madame, his wife, who made costumes herself better -than those that could be bought at the regular costumers', and that was -a saving; and then she also helped in working the figures when there -were more than two on the scene at once, but this was hard upon her, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> -as she was stout, and the heat at the top of the tin-roofed theatre -up among the dusty flies was trying. And then, I suggested, there was -much competition. The proprietor waved a contemptuous dismissal of the -claims of the four little theatres about him. It was not their rivalry -that he cared for. It is true the seats were filled, but with whom? -Ah, yes, with whom? He placed his finger at the side of his nose, -and winked and nodded his head mysteriously. With the friends of the -proprietor, of course. Poor non-paying acquaintances to make a show, -and attract others less knowing to a very inferior performance. Now -here with him everybody paid, and received the worth of his money many -times. Perhaps I had not seen the performance; in that case I should -surely do so. The clown and the donkey-cart were very amusing, and -the dancing skeleton, which came to pieces before the audience and -frightened the gendarme, was worthy of my approval. So the two small -boys and the nurse and the baby and I dodged under the rope and waited -for the performance.</p> - -<p>The idle man, who knows that "they also serve who only stand and -wait," must find the Champs Élysées the most acceptable of all places - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> - -for such easy service. There are at one corner the stamp-collectors -to entertain him, with their scrap-books and market-baskets full of -their precious bits of colored paper, gathered from all over the known -world, comparing and examining their treasures, bargaining with easy -good-nature and with the zeal of enthusiasts. Three times a week he -will find this open market or exchange under the trees, where old -men and little boys and pretty young girls meet together and chatter -over their common hobby, and swap Columbian stamps for those of some -French protectorate, and of many other places of which they know -nothing save that it has a post-office of its own. At another corner -there are smoothly-shaven men and plump, well-fed-looking women -waiting to take service on some gentleman's box-seat or in front of -some lady's cooking-stove—an intelligence office where there is no -middleman to whom they must pay a fee, and where, while they wait for a -possible employer, they hold an impromptu picnic, and pay such gallant -compliments that one can see they have lived much in the fashionable -world.</p> - -<p>Or the idler can drop into a chair in one of the cafés chantants on -an off day, when there is no regular performance, but a rehearsal, - -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> - -to which the public is neither invited nor forbidden. It is an -entertaining place in which to spend an hour or two, with something to -drink in front of you, and a cigar, and the sun shining through the -trees upon the mirrors and artificial flowers and the gaudy hangings -of the stage. Here you will see Mlle. Nicolle as she is in her moments -of leisure. The night before she wore a greasy gingham gown, with her -hair plastered over her forehead in oily flat curls, as a laundress or -charwoman of Montmartre might wear them. Now she is fashionably dressed -in black, with white lace over it, and with a lace parasol, which she -swings from her finger in time to the music, while the other artists -of the Ambassadeurs' stand farther up the stage waiting their turn, or -politely watch her from the front. The girl who chalked her face as -Pierrot the evening before follows her in a blue boating-dress and a -kick at the end of it, which she means to introduce later in the same -day; and the others comment audibly on it from their seats, calling her -by her first name, and disagreeing with the leader of the orchestra as -to the particular note upon which the kick should come, while he turns -in his seat with his violin on his knee and argues it out with them, -shrugging his shoulders, and making passes in the air with his lighted -cigarette as though it were a baton.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37-38]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="INSIDE_COLUMBINS"></a> -<img src="images/illus_048.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="360" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">INSIDE COLUMBIN'S</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> - -<p>Two gendarmes, with their capes folded and thrown over -their shoulders, come in and stand with the waiters, surveying the -rehearsal with critical disapproval, and the woman who collects the -pennies for the iron seats in the avenue takes a few moments' recess, -and brings with her two nurse-maids, with their neglected charges -swinging by the silken straps around their silken bodies. And so they -all stand at one side and gaze with large eyes at the breathless, -laughing young woman on the stage above them, who runs and kicks and -runs back and kicks again, reflected many times in the background of -mirrors around her; and then the two American song-and-dance men, and -the English acrobats, and the Italian who owns the performing dogs, -and the smooth-faced French comédiennes, and all the idle gentlemen -with glasses of bock before them, sit up as though some one had touched -their shoulders with a whip, and all the actresses smile politely, and -look with pressed lips and half-closed eyes at a very tall woman with -red hair, who walks erectly down the stage with a roll of music in her -gloved hands. This is Yvette Guilbert, the most artistic and the most -improper of all the women of the cafés chantants. She is also the most -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> -graceful. You can see that even now when she is off her guard. She -could not make an ungraceful gesture even after long practice, and when -she shudders and jumps at a false note from the orchestra she is still -graceful.</p> - -<p>When the rehearsal is finished you can cross the Place de la Concorde -and hang over the stone parapet, and watch the Deputies coming over -the bridge, or the men washing the dogs in the Seine, and shaving and -trimming their tufts of curly hair, and twisting their mustaches into -military jauntiness; or you can turn your back to this and watch the -thousands of carriages and cabs and omnibuses crossing the great square -before you from the eight streets opening into it, with the water of -the fountains in the middle blown into spray by the wind, and turned -into the colors of the rainbow by the sun. This great, beautiful open -place, even to one accustomed to city streets and their monuments, -seems to change more rapidly and to form with greater life than any -other spot in the world, and its great stupid obelisk in the centre -appears to rise like a monster exclamation-point of wonder at what it -sees about it, and with the surprise over all of finding itself in the -centre of it.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41-42]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AND_YOU_BELIEVE_THE_GUIDES"></a> -<img src="images/illus_052.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="359" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"AND YOU BELIEVE THE GUIDES"</div> -</div> -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> - -<p>You cannot say you have seen the streets of Paris until you have -walked them at sunrise; every one has seen them at night, but he must -watch them change from night to day before he can claim to have seen -them at their best. I walked under the arches of the Rue de Rivoli one -morning when it was so dark that they looked like the cloisters of -some great monastery, and it was impossible to believe that the empty -length of the Rue Cambon had but an hour before been blocked by the -blazing front of the Olympia, and before that with rows of carriages -in front of the two Columbins. There were a few belated cabs hugging -the sidewalk, with their drivers asleep on the boxes, and a couple of -gendarmes slouching together across the Place de la Concorde made the -only sound of life in the whole city. The Seine lay as motionless as -water in a bath-tub, and the towers of Notre Dame rising out of the -mist at one end, and the round bulk of the Trocadéro bounding it at the -other, seemed to limit the river to what one could see of its silent -surface from the Bridge of the Deputies. The Eiffel Tower, the great -skeleton of the departed exposition, disappeared and reformed itself -again as drifting clouds of mist swept through it and cut its great -ugly length into fragments hung in mid-air. As the light grew -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> - in strength the façades of the government buildings grew in -outline, as though one were focussing them through an opera-glass, and -the pillars of the Madeleine took form and substance; then the whole -great square showed itself, empty and deserted. The darkness had hidden -nothing more terrible than the clean asphalt and the motionless statues -of the cities of France.</p> - -<p>A solitary fiacre passed me slowly with no one on the box, but with -the coachman sitting back in his cab. He was returning to the stables, -evidently, and had on his way given a seat to a girl from the street, -whom he was now entertaining with genial courtesy. He had one leg -thrown over the other, and one arm passed back along the top of the -seat, and with the other he waved to the great buildings as they sprang -up into life as the day grew. The girl beside him was smiling at his -pleasantries, while the rising sun showed how tired and pale she was, -and mocked at the paint around her sleepy eyes. The horse stumbled at -every sixth step, and then woke again, while the whip rocked and rolled -fantastically in its socket like a drunken man. From up the avenue of -the Champs Élysées came the first of the heavy market-wagons, with the -driver asleep on the bench, and his lantern burning dully in the early -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> -light. Back of him lay the deserted stretch of the avenue, strange -and unfamiliar in its emptiness—save for the great arch that rose -against the dawn, and seemed, from its elevation on the very top of the -horizon, to serve as a gateway into the skies beyond. The air in the -Champs Élysées was heavy with a perfume of flowers and of green plants, -and the leaves dripped damp and cool with the dew. Hundreds of birds -sang and chattered as though they knew the solitude was theirs but -for only one more brief hour, and that they then must give way to the -little children, and later to crowds of idle men and women. It seemed -impossible that but a few hours before Duclerc had filled these silent, -cool woods with her voice—Duclerc, with her shoulder-straps slipping -to her elbows and her white powdered arms tossing in the colored lights -of the serpentine dance. The long, gaudy lithographs on the bill-boards -and the arches of colored lamps stood out of the silence and fresh -beauty of the hour like the relics of some feast which should have been -cleared away before the dawn, and the theatres themselves looked like -temples to a heathen idol in some primeval wood. And as I passed out -from under the cool trees to the silent avenues I felt as though I had -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> -caught Paris napping, and when she was off her guard, and good and -fresh and sweet, and had discovered a hidden trait in her many-sided -character, a moment of which she would be ashamed an hour or two later, -as cynics are ashamed of their secret acts of charity.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter"><a name="II" id="II"></a>II<br /> -<span class="small">THE SHOW-PLACES OF PARIS NIGHT</span></h2> - -<div> -<img class="drop-cap" src="images/illus_058.jpg" alt="" width="100" height="102" /> -</div> -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap">PARIS</span> is the only city in the world which the visitor from the outside -positively refuses to take seriously. He may have come to Paris with -an earnest purpose to study art, or to investigate the intricacies -of French law, or the historical changes of the city; or, if it be -a woman, she may have come to choose a trousseau; but no matter how -serious his purpose may be, there is always some one part of each day -when the visitor rests from his labors and smiles indulgently and does -as the Parisians do. Whether the city or the visitor is responsible for -this, whether Paris adopts the visitor, or the visitor adapts himself -to his surroundings, it is impossible to say. But there is certainly no -other capital of the world in which the stranger so soon takes on the -local color, in which he becomes so soon acclimated, and which brings -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> -to light in him so many new and unsuspected capacities for enjoyment -and adventure.</p> - -<p>Americans go to London for social triumph or to float railroad shares, -to Rome for art's sake, and to Berlin to study music and to economize; -but they go to Paris to enjoy themselves. And there are no young men of -any nation who enter into the accomplishment of this so heartily and -so completely as does the young American. It is hardly possible for -the English youth to appreciate Paris perfectly, because he has been -brought up to believe that "one Englishman can thrash three Frenchmen," -and because he holds a nation that talks such an absurd language in -some contempt; hence he is frequently while there irritable and rude, -and jostles men at the public dances, and in other ways asserts his -dignity.</p> - -<p>But the American goes to Paris as though returning to his inheritance -and to his own people. He approaches it with the friendly confidence of -a child. Its language holds no terrors for him; and he feels himself -fully equipped if he can ask for his "edition," and say, "Cocher, allez -Henry's tout sweet." There is nothing so joyous and confiding as the -American during his first visit to the French metropolis. He has been -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> -told by older men of the gay, glad days of the Second Empire, and by -his college chum of the summer of the last exposition, and he enters -Paris determined to see all that any one else has ever seen, and to -outdo all that any one else has ever done, and to stir that city to -its suburbs. He saves his time, his money, and his superfluous energy -for this visit, and the most amusing part of it is that he always -leaves Paris fully assured that he has enjoyed himself while there more -thoroughly than any one else has ever done, and that the city will -require two or three months' rest before it can readjust itself after -the shock and wonder due to his meteoric flight through its limits. -London he dismisses in a week as a place in which you can get good -clothes at moderate prices, and which supports some very entertaining -music-halls; but Paris, he tells you, ecstatically, when he meets you -on the boulevards or at the banker's, where he is drawing grandly on -his letter of credit, is "the greatest place on earth," and he adds, as -evidence of the truth of this, that he has not slept in three weeks. He -is unsurpassed in his omnivorous capacity for sight-seeing, and in his -ability to make himself immediately and contentedly at home. There is a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> -story which illustrates this that is told by a young American banker -who has been living in Paris for the last six years. He met one day -on the boulevards an old college friend of his, and welcomed him with -pleasure.</p> - -<p>"You must let me be your guide," the banker said. "I have been here -so long now that I know just what you ought to see, and I shall enjoy -seeing it with you as much as though it were for the first time. When -did you come?" The new arrival had reached Paris only three days -before, and said that he was ready to see all that it had to show. "You -have nothing to do to-night, then?" asked the banker. "Well, we will -drop in at the gardens and the cafés chantants. There is nothing like -them anywhere." His friend said he had made the tour of the gardens -on the night of his arrival, but that he would be glad to revisit -them. But that being the case, the banker would rather take him to the -cafés—"The Black Cat," and Bruant's, and "The Dead Rat." These his -friend had visited on his second evening.</p> - -<p>"Oh, well, we can cross the river, then, and I will show you some -slumming," said the banker. "You should see the places where the -thieves go—the Château Rouge and Père Lunette."</p> - -<p>"I went there last night," said the new-comer.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> - -<p>The man who had lived six years in Paris took the stranger by the arm -and asked him if he was sure he was not engaged for that evening. "For -if you are not," he said, "you might take me with you and show me some -of the sights!"</p> - -<p>The American visitor is not only undaunted by the strange language, -but unimpressed by the signs of years of vivid history about him. He -sandwiches a glimpse at the tomb of Napoleon, and a trip on a penny -steamer up the Seine, and back again to the Morgue, with a rush through -the Cathedral of Notre Dame, between the hours of his breakfast and -the race-meeting at Longchamps the same afternoon. Nothing of present -interest escapes him, and nothing bores him. He assimilates and -grasps the method of Parisian existence with a rapidity that leaves -you wondering in the rear, and at the end of a week can tell you that -you should go to one side of the Grand Hôtel for cigars, and to the -other to have your hat blocked. He knows at what hour Yvette Guilbert -comes on at the Ambassadeurs', and on which mornings of the week -the flower-market is held around the Madeleine. While you are still -hunting for apartments he has visited the sewers under the earth, and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> -the Eiffel Tower over the earth, and eaten his dinner in a tree at -Robinson's, and driven a coach to Versailles over the same road upon -which the mob tramped to bring Marie Antoinette back to Paris, without -being the least impressed by the contrast which this offers to his own -progress. He develops also a daring and reckless spirit of adventure, -which would never have found vent in his native city or town, or in -any other foreign city or town. It is in the air, and he enters into -the childish good-nature of the place and of the people after the same -manner that the head of a family grows young again at his class reunion.</p> - -<p>One Harvard graduate arrived in Paris summer before last during those -riots which originated with the students, and were carried on by the -working-people, and which were cynically spoken of on the boulevards -as the Revolution of Sarah Brown. In any other city he would have -watched these ebullitions from the outskirts of the mob, or remained -a passive spectator of what did not concern him, but being in Paris, -and for the first time, he mounted a barricade, and made a stirring -address to the students behind it in his best Harvard French, and was -promptly cut over the head by a gendarme and conveyed to a hospital, -where he remained during his stay in the gay metropolis. But he still -holds that Paris is the finest place that he has ever seen. There was -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> -another American youth who stood up suddenly in the first row of -seats at the Nouveau Cirque and wagered the men with him that he would -jump into the water with which the circus ring is flooded nightly, and -swim, "accoutred as he was," to the other side. They promptly took him -at his word, and the audience of French bourgeois were charmed by the -spectacle of a young gentleman in evening dress swimming calmly across -the tank, and clambering leisurely out on the other side. He was loudly -applauded for this, and the management sent the "American original" -home in a fiacre. In any other city he would have been hustled by the -ushers and handed over to the police.</p> - -<p>Those show-places of Paris which are seen only at night, and of which -one hears the most frequently, are curiously few in number. It is their -quality and not their quantity which has made them talked about. It is -quite as possible to tell off on the fingers of two hands the names and -the places to which the visitor to Paris will be taken as it is quite -impossible to count the number of times he will revisit them.</p> - -<p>In London there are so many licensed places of amusement that a man -might visit one every night for a year and never enter the same place -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> -twice, and those of unofficial entertainment are so numerous that -men spend years in London and never hear of nooks and corners in it -as odd and strange as Stevenson's Suicide Club or Fagan's School for -Thieves—public-houses where blind beggars regain their sight and the -halt and lame walk and dance, music-halls where the line is strictly -drawn between the gentleman who smokes a clay pipe and the one who -smokes a brier, and arenas like the Lambeth School of Arms, from which -boy pugilists and coal-heavers graduate to the prize-ring, and such -thoroughfares as Ship's Alley, where in the space of fifty yards twenty -murders have occurred in three years.</p> - -<p>In Paris there are virtually no slums at all. The dangerous classes are -there, and there is an army of beggars and wretches as poor and brutal -as are to be found at large in any part of the world, but the Parisian -criminal has no environment, no setting. He plays the part quite as -effectively as does the London or New York criminal, but he has no -appropriate scenery or mechanical effects.</p> - -<p>If he wishes to commit murder, he is forced to make the best of the -well-paved, well-lighted, and cleanly swept avenue. He cannot choose a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> -labyrinth of alleyways and covered passages, as he could were he in -Whitechapel, or a net-work of tenements and narrow side streets, as he -could were he in the city of New York.</p> - -<p>Young men who have spent a couple of weeks in Paris, and who have been -taken slumming by paid guides, may possibly question the accuracy of -this. They saw some very awful places indeed—one place they remember -in particular, called the Château Rouge, and another called Père -Lunette. The reason they so particularly remember these two places -is that these are the only two places any one ever sees, and they -do not recall the fact that the neighboring houses were of hopeless -respectability, and that they were able to pick up a cab within a -hundred yards of these houses. Young Frenchmen who know all the worlds -of Paris tell you mysteriously of these places, and of how they visited -them disguised in blue smocks and guarded by detectives; detectives -themselves speak to you of them as a fisherman speaks to you of a -favorite rock or a deep hole where you can always count on finding -fish, and every newspaper correspondent who visits Paris for the first -time writes home of them as typical of Parisian low life. They are as -typical of Parisian low life as the animals in the Zoo in Central Park -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> -are typical of the other animals we see drawing stages and horse-cars -and broughams on the city streets, and you require the guardianship of -a detective when you visit them as much as you would need a policeman -in Mulberry Bend or at an organ recital in Carnegie Hall. They are -show-places, or at least they have become so, and though they would no -doubt exist without the aid of the tourist or the man about town of -intrepid spirit, they count upon him, and are prepared for him with set -speeches, and are as ready to show him all that there is to see as are -the guides around the Capitol at Washington.</p> - -<p>I should not wish to be misunderstood as saying that these are the -only abodes of poverty and the only meeting-places for criminals in -Paris, which would of course be absurd, but they are the only places of -such interest that the visitor sees. There are other places, chiefly -wine-shops in cellars in the districts of la Glacière, Montrouge, or -la Villette, but unless an inspector of police leads you to them, and -points out such and such men as thieves, you would not be able to -distinguish any difference between them and the wine-shops and their -<i>habitués</i> north of the bridges and within sound of the boulevards. The -paternal municipality of Paris, and the thought it has spent in laying -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> -out the streets, and the generous manner in which it has lighted -them, are responsible for the lack of slums. Houses of white stucco, -and broad, cleanly swept boulevards with double lines of gas lamps and -shade trees, extend, without consideration for the criminal, to the -fortifications and beyond, and the thief and bully whose interests are -so little regarded is forced in consequence to hide himself underground -in cellars or in the dark shadows of the Bois de Boulogne at night. -This used to appeal to me as one of the most peculiar characteristics -of Paris—that the most desperate poverty and the most heartless -of crimes continued in neighborhoods notorious chiefly for their -wickedness, and yet which were in appearance as well-ordered and -commonplace-looking as the new model tenements in Harlem or the trim -working-men's homes in the factory districts of Philadelphia.</p> - -<p>The Château Rouge was originally the house of some stately family in -the time of Louis XIV. They will tell you there that it was one of -the mistresses of this monarch who occupied it, and will point to the -frescos of one room to show how magnificent her abode then was. This -tradition may or may not be true, but it adds an interest to the house, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> -and furnishes the dramatic contrast to its present wretchedness. It -is a tall building painted red, and set back from the street in a -court. There are four rooms filled with deal tables on the first floor, -and a long counter with the usual leaden top. "Whoever buys a glass -of wine here may sleep with his or her head on the table, or lie at -length up-stairs on the floor of that room where one still sees the -stucco cupids of the fine lady's boudoir. It is now a lodging-house -for beggars and for those who collect the ends of castaway cigars and -cigarettes on the boulevards, and possibly for those who thieve in a -small way. By ten o'clock each night the place is filled with men and -women sleeping heavily at the tables, with their heads on their arms, -or gathered together for miserable company, whispering and gossiping, -each sipping jealously of his glass of red wine."</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59-60]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_CHATEAU_ROUGE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_070.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">THE CHÂTEAU ROUGE</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> - -<p>There is a little room at the rear, the walls of which are painted -with scenes of celebrated murders, and the portraits of the murderers, -of anarchists, and of their foes the police. A sharp-faced boy points -to these with his cap, and recites his lesson in a high singsong, -and in an <i>argot</i> which makes all he says quite unintelligible. He -is interesting chiefly because the men of whom he speaks are heroes -to him, and he roars forth the name of "Antoine, who murdered the -policeman Jervois," as though he were saying Gambetta, the founder -of the republic, and with the innocent confidence that you will -share with him in his enthusiasm. The pictures are ghastly things, -in which the artist has chiefly done himself honor in the generous -use of scarlet paint for blood, and in the way he has shown how by -rapid gradations the criminal descends from well-dressed innocence to -ragged viciousness, until he reaches the steps of the guillotine at -Roquette. It is a miserable chamber of horrors, in which the heavy-eyed -absinthe-drinkers raise their heads to stare mistily at the visitor, -and to listen for the hundredth time to the boy's glib explanation -of each daub in the gallery around them, from the picture of the -vermilion-cheeked young woman who caused the trouble, to an imaginative -picture of Montfaucon covered with skulls, where, many years in the -past, criminals swung in chains.</p> - -<p>The café of Père Lunette is just around several sharp corners from the -Château Rouge. It was originally presided over by an old gentleman who -wore spectacles, which gave his shop its name. It is a resort of the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> -lowest class of women and men, and its walls are painted throughout -with faces and scenes a little better in execution than those in the -Château Rouge, and a little worse in subject. It is a very small -place to enjoy so wide-spread a reputation, and its front room is -uninteresting, save for a row of casks resting on their sides, on the -head of each of which is painted the portrait of some noted Parisian, -like Zola, Eiffel, or Boulanger. The young proprietor fell upon us as -his natural prey the night we visited the place, and drove us before -him into a room in the rear of the wineshop. He was followed as a -matter of course by a dozen men in blouses, and as many bareheaded -women, who placed themselves expectantly at the deal tables, and -signified what it was they wished to drink before going through the -form of asking us if we meant to pay for it. They were as ready to do -their part of the entertainment as the actors of the theatre are ready -to go on when the curtain rises, and there was nothing about any of -them to suggest that he or she was there for any other reason than -the hope of a windfall in the person of a stranger who would supply -him or her with money or liquor. A long-haired boy with a three days' -growth of hair upon his chin, of whom the proprietor spoke proudly as a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> -poet, recited in verse a long descriptive story of what the pictures -on the wall were intended to represent, and another youth, with a -Vandyck beard and slouched hat, and curls hanging to his shoulder, sang -Aristide Bruant's song of "Saint Lazare." All of the women of the place -belonged to the class which spends many months of each year in that -prison. The music of the song is in a minor key, and is strangely sad -and eerie. It is the plaint of a young girl writing to her lover from -within the walls of the prison, begging him to be faithful to her while -she is gone, and Bruant cynically makes her designate three or four -feminine friends as those whose society she particularly desires him -to avoid. The women, all of whom sang with sodden seriousness, may not -have appreciated how well the words of the song applied to themselves, -but you could imagine that they did, and this gave to the moment and -the scene a certain touch of interest. Apart from this the place was -dreary, and the pictures indecent and stupid.</p> - -<p>There is much more of interest in the Café of Aristide Bruant, on the -Boulevard Rochechouart. Bruant is the modern François Villon. He is -the poet of the people, and more especially of the criminal classes. -He sings the virtues or the lack of virtue of the several districts -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> -of Paris, with the life of which he claims an intimate familiarity. He -is the bard of the bully, and of the thief, and of the men who live on -the earnings of women. He is unquestionably one of the most picturesque -figures in Paris, but his picturesqueness is spoiled in some degree by -the evident fact that he is conscious of it. He is a poet, but he is -very much more of a <i>poseur</i>.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65-66]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AT_BRUANTS"></a> -<img src="images/illus_076.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">AT BRUANT'S</div> -</div> - -<p>Bruant began by singing his own songs in the café chantant in the -Champs Élysées, and celebrating in them the life of Montmartre and -the Place de la République, and of the Bastille. He has done for the -Parisian bully what Albert Chevallier has done for the coster of -Whitechapel, and Edward Harrigan for the East Side of New York, but -with the important difference that the Frenchman claims to be one of -the class of whom he writes, and the audacity with which he robs stray -visitors to his café would seem to justify his claims. There is no -question as to the strength in his poems, nor that he gives you the -spirit of the places which he describes, and that he sees whatever is -dramatic and characteristic in them. But the utter heartlessness with -which he writes of the wickedness of his friends the souteneurs rings -false, and sounds like an affectation. One of the best specimens -of his verse is that in which he tells of the Bois de Boulogne at -night, when the woods, he says, cloak all manner of evil things, and -when, instead of the rustling of the leaves, you hear the groans of -the homeless tossing in their sleep under the sky, and calls for -help suddenly hushed, and the angry cries of thieves who have fallen -out over their spoils and who fight among themselves; or the hurried -footsteps of a belated old gentleman hastening home, and followed -silently in the shadow of the trees by men who fall upon and rob him -after the fashion invented and perfected by le Père François. Others of -his poems are like the most realistic paragraphs of <i>L'Assommoir</i> and -<i>Nana</i> put into verse.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> - -<p>Bruant himself is a young man, and an extremely handsome one. He wears -his yellow hair separated in the middle and combed smoothly back over -his ears, and dresses at all times in brown velvet, with trousers -tucked in high boots, and a red shirt and broad sombrero. He has had -the compliment paid him of the most sincere imitation, for a young man -made up to look exactly like him now sings his songs in the cafés, even -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> -the characteristically modest one in which Bruant slaps his chest -and exclaims at the end of each verse: "And I? I am Bruant." The real -Bruant sings every night in his own café, but as his under-study at the -Ambassadeurs' is frequently mistaken for him, he may be said to have -accomplished the rather difficult task of being in two places at once.</p> - -<p>Bruant's café is a little shop barred and black without, and guarded -by a commissionnaire dressed to represent a policeman. If you desire -to enter, this man raps on the door, and Bruant, when he is quite -ready, pushes back a little panel, and scrutinizes the visitor through -the grated opening. If he approves of you he unbars the door, with -much jangling of chains and rasping of locks, and you enter a tiny -shop, filled with three long tables, and hung with all that is absurd -and fantastic in decoration, from Chéret's bill-posters to unframed -oil-paintings, and from beer-mugs to plaster death-masks. There is a -different salutation for every one who enters this café, in which all -those already in the place join in chorus. A woman is greeted by a -certain burst of melody, and a man by another, and a soldier with easy -satire, as representing the government, by an imitation of the fanfare -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> -which is blown by the trumpeters whenever the President appears in -public. There did not seem to be any greeting which exactly fitted our -case, so Bruant waved us to a bench, and explained to his guests, with -a shrug: "These are two gentlemen from the boulevards who have come to -see the thieves of Montmartre. If they are quiet and well-behaved we -will not rob them." After this somewhat discouraging reception we, in -our innocence, sat perfectly still, and tried to think we were enjoying -ourselves, while we allowed ourselves to be robbed by waiters and -venders of songs and books without daring to murmur or protest.</p> - -<p>Bruant is assisted in the entertainment of his guests by two or three -young men who sing his songs, the others in the room joining with them. -Every third number is sung by the great man himself, swaggering up and -down the narrow limits of the place, with his hands sunk deep in the -pockets of his coat, and his head rolling on his shoulders. At the end -of each verse he withdraws his hands, and brushes his hair back over -his ears, and shakes it out like a mane. One of his perquisites as -host is the privilege of saluting all of the women as they leave, of -which privilege he avails himself when they are pretty, or resigns it -and bows gravely when they are not. It is amusing to notice how the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> -different women approach the door when it is time to go, and how the -escort of each smiles proudly when the young man deigns to bend his -head over the lips of the girl and kiss her good-night.</p> - -<p>The café of the Black Cat is much finer and much more pretentious than -Bruant's shop, and is of wider fame. It is, indeed, of an entirely -different class, but it comes in here under the head of the show-places -of Paris at night. It was originally a sort of club where journalists -and artists and poets met round the tables of a restaurant-keeper who -happened to be a patron of art as well, and fitted out his café with -the canvases of his customers, and adopted their suggestions in the -arrangement of its decoration. The outside world of Paris heard of -these gatherings at the Black Cat, as the café and club were called, -and of the wit and spirit of its <i>habitués</i>, and sought admittance to -its meetings, which was at first granted as a great privilege. But at -the present day the café has been turned over into other hands, and -is a show-place pure and simple, and a most interesting one. The café -proper is fitted throughout with heavy black oak, or something in -imitation of it. There are heavy broad tables and high wainscoting and -an immense fireplace and massive rafters.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71-72]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AT_THE_BLACK_CAT"></a> -<img src="images/illus_082.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">AT THE BLACK CAT</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p> - -<p>To set off the sombreness of this, the walls are covered with -panels in the richest of colors, by Steinlen, the most imaginative -and original of the Parisian illustrators, in all of which the black -cat appears as a subject, but in a different rôle and with separate -treatment. Upon one panel hundreds of black cats race over the ocean, -in another they are waltzing with naiads in the woods, and in another -they are whirling through space over red-tiled roofs, followed by -beautiful young women, gendarmes, and boulevardiers in hot pursuit. And -in every other part of the café the black cat appears as frequently -as did the head of Charles I. in the writings of Mr. Dick. It stalks -stuffed in its natural skin, or carved in wood, with round glass eyes -and long red tongue, or it perches upon the chimney-piece with back -arched and tail erect, peering down from among the pewter pots and -salvers. The gas-jets shoot from the mouths of wrought-iron cats, -and the dismembered heads of others grin out into the night from the -stained-glass windows. The room shows the struggle for what is odd -and bizarre, but the drawings in black and white and the watercolors -and oil-paintings on the walls are signed by some of the cleverest -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> -artists in Paris. The inscriptions and rules and regulations are -as odd as the decorations. As, for example, the one placed halfway -up the narrow flight of stairs which leads to the tiny theatre, and -which commemorates the fact that the café was on such a night visited -by President Carnot, who—so the inscription adds, lest the -visitor should suppose the Black Cat was at all impressed by the -honor—"is the successor of Charlemagne and Napoleon I." Another -fancy of the Black Cat was at one time to dress all the waiters in the -green coat and gold olive leaves of the members of the Institute, to -show how little the poets and artists of the café thought of the other -artists and poets who belonged to that ancient institution across the -bridges. But this has now been given up, either because the uniforms -proved too expensive, or because some one of the Black Cat's <i>habitués</i> -had left his friends "for a ribbon to wear in his coat," and so spoiled -the satire.</p> - -<p>Three times a week there is a performance in the theatre up-stairs, -at which poets of the neighborhood recite their own verses, and some -clever individual tells a story, with a stereopticon and a caste of -pasteboard actors for accessories. These latter little plays are very -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> -clever and well arranged, and as nearly proper as a Frenchman with -such a temptation to be otherwise could be expected to make them. It is -a most informal gathering, more like a performance in a private house -than a theatre, and the most curious thing about it is the character -of the audience, which, instead of being bohemian and artistic, is -composed chiefly of worthy bourgeoisie, and young men and young women -properly chaperoned by the parents of each. They sit on very stiff -wooden chairs, while a young man stands on the floor in front of them -with his arms comfortably folded and recites a poem or a monologue, or -plays a composition of his own. And then the lights are all put out, -and a tiny curtain is rung up, showing a square hole in the proscenium, -covered with a curtain of white linen. On this are thrown the shadows -of the pasteboard figures, who do the most remarkable things with a -naturalness which might well shame some living actors.</p> - -<p>It would be impossible to write of the entertainment Paris affords -at night without cataloguing the open-air concerts and the public -gardens and dance-halls. The best of the cafés chantants in Paris is -the Ambassadeurs'. There are many others, but the Ambassadeurs' is the -best known, is nearest to the boulevards, and has the best restaurant. -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> -It is like all the rest in its general arrangement, or all the others -copy it, so that what is true of the Ambassadeurs' may be considered as -descriptive of them all.</p> - -<p>The Ambassadeurs' is a roof-garden on the ground, except that there -are comfortable benches instead of tables with chairs about them, and -that there is gravel underfoot in place of wooden flooring. Lining the -block of benches on either side are rows of boxes, and at the extreme -rear is the restaurant, with a wide balcony, where people sit and -dine, and listen to the music of the songs without running any risk -of hearing the words. The stage is shut in with mirrors and set with -artificial flowers, which make a bad background for the artists, and -which at matinées, in the broad sunlight, look very ghastly indeed. But -at night, when all the gas-jets are lit and the place is crowded, it is -very gay, joyous, and pretty.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77-78]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="A_CAFE_CHANTANT"></a> -<img src="images/illus_088.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">A CAFÉ CHANTANT</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Parisian may economize in household matters, in the question of -another egg for his breakfast, and in the turning of an uneaten entrée -into a soup, but in public he is most generous; and he is in nothing -so generous as in his reckless use of gas. He raises ten lamp-posts -to every one that is put up in London or New York, and he does not -plant them only to light some thing or some person, but because they -are pleasing to look at in themselves. It is difficult to feel gloomy -in a city which is so genuinely illuminated that one can sit in the -third-story window of a hotel and read a newspaper by the glare of the -gas-lamps in the street below. This is a very wise generosity, for it -helps to attract people to Paris, who spend money there, so that in -the end the lighting of the city may be said to pay for itself. If -we had as good government in New York as there is in Paris, Madison -Square would not depend for its brilliancy at night on the illuminated -advertising of two business firms.</p> - -<p>Individuals follow the municipality of Paris in this extravagance, -and the Ambassadeurs' is in consequence as brilliant as many rows of -gas-jets can make it, and these globes of white light among the green -branches of the trees are one of the prettiest effects on the Champs -Élysées at night. They do not turn night into day, but they make the -darkness itself more attractive by contrast. The performers at the -Ambassadeurs' are the best in their line of work, and the audiences are -composed of what in London would be called the middle class, mixed with -cocottes and boulevardiers. You will also often see American men and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> -women who are well known at home dining there on the balcony, but they -do not bring young girls with them.</p> - -<p>It is interesting to note what pleases French people of the class -who gather at these open-air concerts. What is artistic they seem -to appreciate much more fully than would an American or an English -audience—at least, they are more demonstrative in their applause; but -the contradictory feature of their appreciation lies in their delight -and boisterous enthusiasm, not only over what is very good, but also -over what is most childish horse-play. They enjoy with equal zest the -quiet, inimitable character studies of Nicolle and the efforts of two -trained dogs to play upon a fiddle, while a hideous, gaunt creature, -six foot tall, in a woman's ballet costume, throws them off their -chairs in convulsions of delight. They are like children with a mature -sense of the artistic, and still with an infantile delight in what is -merely noisy and absurd.</p> - -<p>It is also interesting to note how much these audiences will permit -from the stage in the direction of suggestiveness, and what would be -called elsewhere "outraged propriety." This is furnished them to the -highest degree by Yvette Guilbert. It seems that as this artist became -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> -less of a novelty, she recognized that it would be necessary for her -to increase the audacity of her songs if she meant to hold her original -place in the interest of her audiences, and she has now reached a point -in daring which seems hardly possible for her or any one else to pass. -No one can help delighting in her and in her line of work, in her -subtlety, her grace, and the absolute knowledge she possesses of what -she wants to do and how to do it. But her songs are beyond anything -that one finds in the most impossible of French novels or among the -legends of the Viennese illustrated papers. These latter may treat -of certain subjects in a too realistic or in a scoffing but amusing -manner, but Guilbert talks of things which are limited generally to -the clinique of a hospital and the <i>blague</i> of medical students; -things which are neither funny, witty, nor quaint, but simply nasty -and offensive. The French audiences of the open-air concerts, however, -enjoy these, and encore her six times nightly. At Pastor's Theatre last -year a French girl sang a song which probably not one out of three -hundred in the audience understood, but which she delivered with such -appropriateness of gesture as to make her meaning plain. When she left -the stage there was absolute silence in the house, and in the wings the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> -horrified manager seized her by the arms, and in spite of her protests -refused to allow her to reappear. So her performance in this country -was limited to that one song. It was a very long trip to take for such -a disappointment, and the management were, of course, to blame for not -knowing what they wanted and what their audiences did not want, but the -incident is interesting as showing how widely an American and a French -audience differs in matters of this sort.</p> - -<p>There was another Frenchwoman who appeared in New York last winter, -named Duclerc. She is a very beautiful woman, and very popular in -Paris, and I used to think her amusing at the Ambassadeurs', where -she appealed to a sympathetic audience; but in a New York theatre she -gave you a sense of personal responsibility that sent cold shivers -down your back, and you lacked the courage to applaud, when even the -gallery looked on with sullen disapproval. And when the Irish comedian -who followed her said that he did not understand her song, but that -she was quite right to sing it under an umbrella, there was a roar of -relief from the audience which showed it wanted some one to express its -sentiments, which it had been too polite to do except in silence. This -tolerance impressed me very much, especially because I had seen the -same woman suffer at the hands of her own people, whom she had chanced -to offend. The incident is interesting, perhaps, as showing that the -French have at times not only the child's quick delight, but also the -cruelty of a child, than which there is nothing more unreasoning and -nothing more savage.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83-84]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="ON_MONTMARTRE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_094.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">ON MONTMARTRE</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p> - -<p>One night at the Ambassadeurs', when Duclerc had finished the first -verse of her song, a man rose suddenly in the front row of seats and -insulted her. Had he used the same words in any American or English -theatre, he would have been hit over the head by the member of the -orchestra nearest him, and then thrown out of the theatre into the -street. It appeared from this man's remarks that the actress had -formerly cared for him, but that she had ceased to do so, and that he -had come there that night to show her how well he could stand such -treatment. He did this by bringing another woman with him, and by -placing a dozen bullies from Montmartre among the audience to hiss -the actress when she appeared. This they did with a rare good-will, -while the rejected suitor in the front row continued to insult her, -assisted at the same time by his feminine companion. No one in the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> -audience seemed to heed this, or to look upon it as unfair to himself -or to the actress, who was becoming visibly hysterical. There was a -piece of wood lying on the stage that had been used in a previous act, -and Duclerc, in a frenzy at a word which the man finally called to -her, suddenly stooped, and, picking this up, hurled it at him. In an -instant the entire audience was on its feet. This last was an insult to -itself. As long as it was Duclerc who was being attacked, it did not -feel nor show any responsibility, but when she dared to hurl sticks -of wood at the face of a Parisian audience, it rose in its might and -shouted its indignation. Under the cover of this confusion the hired -bullies stooped, and, scooping up handfuls of the gravel with which -the place is strewn, hurled them at Duclerc, until the stones rattled -around her on the stage like a fall of hail. She showed herself a very -plucky woman, and continued her song, even though you could see her -face growing white beneath the rouge, and her legs twisting and sinking -under her when she tried to dance. It was an awful scene, breaking so -suddenly into the easy programme of the evening, and one of the most -cowardly and unmanly exhibitions that I have ever witnessed. There did -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> -not seem to be a man in the place who was not standing up and yelling -"À bas Duclerc!" and the groans and hisses and abuse were like the -worst efforts of a mob. Of course the stones did not hurt the woman, -but the insult of being stoned did. They put an end to her misery at -last by ringing down the curtain, and they said at the stage door -afterwards that she had been taken home in a fit.</p> - -<p>When I saw her a few months later at Pastor's, I was thankful that, as -a people, our self-respect is not so easily hurt as to make us revenge -a slight upon it by throwing stones at a woman. Of course a Frenchman -might say that it is not fair to judge the Parisians by the audience -of a music-hall, but there were several ladies of title and gentlemen -of both worlds in the audience, who a few months later assailed Jane -Harding when she appeared as Phryne in the Opéra Comique with exactly -the same violence and for as little cause. These outbursts are only -temporary aberrations, however; as one of the attendants of the -Ambassadeurs' said, "To-morrow they will applaud her the more to make -up for it," which they probably did. It is in the same spirit that they -change the names of streets, and pull down columns only to rebuild them -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> -again, until it would seem a wise plan for them, as one Englishman -suggested, to put the Column of Vendôme on a hinge, so that it could be -raised and lowered with less trouble.</p> - -<p>Of the public gardens and dance-halls there are a great number, and -the men who have visited Paris do not have to be told much concerning -them, and the women obtain a sufficiently correct idea of what they -are like from the photographs along the Rue de Rivoli to prevent -their wishing to learn more. What these gardens were in the days of -the Second Empire, when the Jardin Mabille and the Bal Bullier were -celebrated through books and illustrations, and by word of mouth by -every English and American traveller who had visited them, it is now -difficult to say. It may be that they were the scenes of mad abandon -and fascinating frenzy, of which the last generation wrote with mock -horror and with suggestive smiles, and of which its members now speak -with a sigh of regret. But we are always ready to doubt whether that -which has passed away, and which in consequence we cannot see, was -as remarkable as it is made to appear. We depreciate it in order to -console ourselves. And if the Mabille and the Bullier were no more -wickedly attractive in those days than is the Moulin Rouge which has -taken their place under the Republic, we cannot but feel that the men -of the last generation visited Paris when they were very young. Perhaps -it is true that Paris was more careless and happy then. It can easily -be argued so, for there was more money spent under the Empire, and more -money given away in fêtes and in spectacles and in public pleasures, -and the Parisian in those days had no responsibility. Now that he has a -voice and a vote, and is the equal of his President, he devotes himself -to those things which did not concern him at all in the earlier times. -Then the Emperor and his ministers felt the responsibility, and asked -of him only that he should enjoy himself.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89-90]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="SOME_YOUNG_PEOPLE_OF_MONTMARTRE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_100.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">SOME YOUNG PEOPLE OF MONTMARTRE</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span></p> - -<p>But whatever may have been true of the spirit of Paris then, the man -who visits it to-day expecting to see Leech's illustrations and Mark -Twain's description of the Mabille reproduced in the Jardin de Paris -and the Moulin Rouge will be disappointed. He will, on the contrary, -find a great deal of light and some very good music, and a mixed -crowd composed chiefly of young women and Frenchmen well advanced in -years and English and American tourists. The young women have all the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> -charm that only a Frenchwoman possesses, and parade quietly below -the boxes, and before the rows of seats that stretch around the hall -or the garden, as it happens to be, and are much better behaved and -infinitely more self-respecting and attractive in appearance than the -women of their class in London or New York. But there are no students -nor grisettes to kick off high hats and to dance in an ecstasy of -abandon. There are in their places from four to a dozen ugly women -and shamefaced-looking men, who are hired to dance, and who go sadly -through the figures of the quadrille, while one of the women after -another shows how high she can kick, and from what a height she can -fall on the asphalt, and do what in the language of acrobats is called -a "split;" there is no other name for it. It is not an edifying nor -thrilling spectacle.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93-94]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AT_THE_MOULIN_ROUGE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_104.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">AT THE MOULIN ROUGE</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p> - -<p>The most notorious of these dance-halls is the Moulin Rouge. You -must have noticed when journeying through France the great windmills -that stand against the sky-line on so many hilltops. They are a -picturesque and typical feature of the landscape, and seem to signify -the honest industry and primitiveness of the French people of the -provinces. And as the great arms turn in the wind you can imagine you -can hear the sound of the mill-wheel clacking while the wheels inside -grind out the flour that is to give life and health. And so when you -see the great Red Mill turn high up where four streets meet on the side -of Montmartre, and know its purpose, you are impressed with the grim -contrast of its past uses and its present notoriety. An imaginative -person could not fail to be impressed by the sight of the Moulin Rouge -at night. It glows like a furnace, and the glare from its lamps reddens -the sky and lights up the surrounding streets and cafés and the faces -of the people passing like a conflagration. The mill is red, the -thatched roof is red, the arms are picked out in electric lights in red -globes, and arches of red lamp-shades rise on every side against the -blackness of the night. Young men and women are fed into the blazing -doors of the mill nightly, and the great arms, as they turn unceasingly -and noisily in a fiery circle through the air, seem to tell of the -wheels within that are grinding out the life and the health and souls -of these young people of Montmartre.</p> - -<p>If you have visited many of the places touched upon in this article -in the same night, you will find yourself caught in the act by the -early sunlight, and as it will then be too late to go to bed, you can -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> -do nothing better than turn your steps towards the Madeleine. There -you may find the market-people taking the flowers out of the black -canvas wagons and putting up the temporary booths, while the sidewalk -is hidden with a mass of roses in their white paper cornucopiæ and the -dark, damp green of palms and ferns.</p> - -<p>It will be well worth your while to go on through the silent streets -from this market of flowers to the market of food in the Halles -Centrales, where there are strawberry patches stretching for a block, -and bounded by acres of radishes or acres of mushrooms, and by queer -fruits from as far south as Algiers and Tunis, just arrived from -Marseilles on the train, and green pease and carrots from no greater a -distance than just beyond the fortifications. It is the only spot in -the city where many people are awake. Everybody is awake here, bustling -and laughing and scolding—porters with brass badges on their sleeves -carrying great piles of vegetables, and plump market-women in white -sleeves and caps, and drivers in blue blouses smacking their lips over -their hot coffee after their long ride through the night. It is like a -great exposition building of food exhibits, with the difference that -all of these exhibits are to be scattered and are to disappear on the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> -breakfast-tables of Paris that same morning. Loud-voiced gentlemen are -auctioneering off whole crops of potatoes, a sidewalk at a time, or a -small riverful of fish with a single clap of the hands; live lobsters -and great turtles crawl and squirm on marble slabs, and vistas of red -meat stretch on iron hooks from one street corner to the next.</p> - -<p>You are, and feel that you are, a drone in this busy place, and salute -with a sense of guilty companionship the groups of men and girls in -dinner dress who have been up all night, and who come singing and -chaffing in their open carriages in search of coffee and a box of -strawberries, or a bunch of cold, crisp radishes with the dew still on -them, which they buy from a virtuous matron of grim and disapproving -countenance at a price which throws a lurid light on the profits of -Bignon's and Laurent's.</p> - -<p>And then you become conscious of your evening dress and generally -dissolute and out-of-place air, and hurry home through the bright -sunlight to put out your sputtering candle and to creep shamefacedly to -bed.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter"><a name="III" id="III"></a>III<br /> -<span class="small">PARIS IN MOURNING</span></h2> - -<div class="figleft"> -<img src="images/illus_109.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -</div> - -<div> -<img class="drop-cap" src="images/illus_109a.jpg" alt="" /> -</div> -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap">THE</span> news of the assassination of President Carnot at Lyons reached -Paris and the Café de la Paix at ten o'clock on Sunday night. What -is told at the Café de la Paix is not long in traversing the length -of the boulevards, and in crossing the Place de la Concorde to the -cafés chantants and the public gardens in the Champs Élysées, so that -by eleven o'clock on the night of the 24th of June "all Paris" was -acquainted with the fact that the President of the Republic had been -cruelly murdered.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> - -<p>There are many people in America who remember the night when President -Garfield died, and how, when his death was announced from the stage of -the different theatres, the audience in each theatre rose silently as -one man and walked quietly out. To them the President's death was not -unexpected; it did not stun them, it came with no sudden shock, but it -was not necessary to announce to them that the performance for that -evening was at an end. They did not leave because the manager had rung -down the curtain, but because at such a time they felt more at ease -with themselves outside of a place of amusement than in one.</p> - -<p>This was not the feeling of the Parisians when President Carnot died. -On that night no lights were put out in the cafés; no leader's bâton -rapped for a sudden silence in the Jardin de Paris, and the Parisians -continued to drink their bock and to dance, or to watch others dance, -even though they knew that at that same moment Madame Carnot in a -special train was hurrying through the night to reach the death-bed of -her husband. It is never possible to tell which way the French people -will jump, or how they will act at a crisis. They have no precedents -of conduct; they are as likely to do the characteristic thing, which -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> -in itself is different from what people of any other nation would -do under like circumstances, as the uncharacteristic thing, which is -even more unexpected. They complicate history by behaving with perfect -tranquillity when other people would become excited, and by losing -their heads when there is no occasion for it. As the Yale captain said -of the Princeton team, "They keep you guessing."</p> - -<p>So when I was convinced by the morning papers, after the first shock -of unbelief, that the President of France was dead, I walked out into -the streets to see what sign there would be of it in Paris. I argued -that in a city given to demonstrations the feelings of the people would -take some actual and visible form; that there would be meetings in -the street, rioting perhaps in the Italian quarter, and extraordinary -expressions of grief in the shape of crêpe and mourning. But the people -were as undisturbed and tranquil as the sun; the same men were sitting -at the same round tables; the same women were shopping in the Rue de -la Paix, and but for an increased energy on the part of the newsboys -there was no sign that a good man had died, that one who had harmed no -one had himself been cruelly harmed, and that the highest office of the -state was vacant.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p> - -<p>When I complained of this to Parisians, or to those who were Parisians -by choice and not by birth, they explained it by saying that the -people were stunned. "They are too shocked to act. It is a horror -without a precedent," they said; but it struck me that they were an -inordinately long time in recovering from the blow. At one o'clock on -Monday morning a workman crawled out upon the roof of the Invalides, -and, gathering the tricolored flag in his arms, tied a wisp of crêpe -about it. The flags in the Chamber of Deputies and in the War Office -were draped in the same manner, and with these three exceptions I saw -no other visible sign of mourning in all Paris. On Monday night those -theatres subsidized by the government, and some others, but not all, -were closed for that evening. At three o'clock on Tuesday, two days -after the death of the President, I counted but three flags draped with -crêpe on the boulevards; but on the day following all the shops on -the Rue de la Paix and the hotels on the Rue de Rivoli put out flags -covered with mourning, and so advertised themselves and their grief. It -is interesting to remember that the most generous display of crêpe in -Paris was made by an English firm of ladies' tailors. During this time -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> -the correspondents were cabling of the grief and rage of the Parisians -to sympathetic peoples all over the world; and we, in our turn, were -reading in Paris the telegrams of condolence and the resolutions of -sympathy from as different sources as the Parliament of Cape Town and -the Congress of the United States. What effect the reading of these -sincere and honest words had upon the people of Paris I do not know, -but I could not at the time conceive of their reading them without -blushing. I looked up from the paper which gave Lord Rosebery's speech, -and the brotherly words which came from little colonies in the Pacific, -from barbarous monarchs, and from widows to Madame Carnot, and from -corporations, Emperors, and Presidents to the city of Paris, and saw -nothing in the countenances of the Parisians at the table next to mine -but smiles of gratification at the importance that they had so suddenly -attained in the eyes of the whole world.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103-104]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AT_THE_JARDIN_DE_PARIS"></a> -<img src="images/illus_114.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">AT THE JARDIN DE PARIS</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> - -<p>It was also interesting to note by the Paris papers how the French -valued the expressions of sympathy which poured in upon them. The fact -that both Houses in the United States had adjourned to do honor to -the memory of M. Carnot was not in their minds of as much importance -as was the telegram from the Czar of Russia, which was given the most -important place in every paper. It was followed almost invariably -by the message from the German Emperor, whose telegram, it is also -interesting to remember, was the second one to reach Paris after the -death of the President was announced. When one reads a congratulatory -telegram from the German Emperor on the result of the Cambridge-Oxford -boat-race, and another of condolence to the King of Greece in reference -to an earthquake, and then this one to the French people, it really -seems as though the young ruler did not mean that any event of -importance should take place anywhere without his having something to -say concerning it. But this last telegram was well timed, and the line -which said that M. Carnot had died like a soldier at his post was well -chosen to please the French love of things military, and please them -it did, as the Emperor knew that it would. But the condolence from the -sister republic across the sea was printed at the end of the column, -after those from Bulgaria and Switzerland. In the eyes of the Parisian -news editor, the sympathy of the people of a great nation was not so -important to his readers as the few words from an Emperor to whom they -looked for help in time of war.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> - -<p>This was not probably true of the whole of France, but it was true of -the Parisians. Two years from now Carnot's assassination will have -become history, and will impress them much more than it did at the -time of his death. The next Salon will be filled with the apotheosis -of Carnot, with his portrait and with pictures of his murder, and of -France in mourning laying a wreath upon his tomb. His son will find -quick promotion in the army, and may possibly aspire to Presidential -honors, or threaten the safety of the republic with a military -dictatorship. It sounds absurd now, but it is quite possible in a -country where General Dodds at once became a dangerous Presidential -possibility because he had conquered the Dahomans in the swamps of -Africa.</p> - -<p>Where the French will place Carnot in their history, and how they -will reverence his memory, the next few years will show; but it is -a fact that at the time of his death they treated him with scant -consideration, and were much more impressed with the effect which their -loss made upon others than with what it meant to them. It is not a -pleasant thing to write about, nor is it the point of view that was -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> -taken at the time, but in writing of facts it is more interesting to -report things as they happened than as they should have happened.</p> - -<p>It is also true that those Parisians who could decently make a little -money out of the nation's loss went about doing so with an avidity that -showed a thrifty mind. Almost every one who had windows or balconies -facing the line of the funeral procession offered them for rent, and -advertised them vigorously by placards and through the papers; venders -of knots of crêpe and emblems of mourning filled the streets with their -cries. Portraits of Carnot in heavy black were hawked about by the same -men who weeks before had sold ridiculous figures of him taking off -his hat and bowing to an imaginary audience; the great shops removed -their summer costumes from the windows and put stacks of flags bound -with crêpe in their place; the flower-shops lined the sidewalks with -specimens of their work in mourning-wreaths; and the papers, after -their first expression of grief, proceeded to actively discuss Carnot's -successor, quoting the popularity of different candidates by giving the -betting odds for and against them, as they had done the week before, -when the horses were entered for the Grand Prix. This was three days -after Carnot's death, and while he was still lying unburied at the -Élysée.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p> - -<p>The French constitution provides that in such an event as that of -1893 the National Assembly shall be convened immediately to select a -new President. According to this the President of the Senate, in his -capacity as President of the National Assembly, decided that the two -Chambers should convene for that purpose at Versailles on Wednesday, -June 27th, at one o'clock. This certainly seemed to promise a scene of -unusual activity, and perhaps historical importance. I knew what the -election of a President meant to us at home, and I argued that if the -less excitable Americans could work themselves up into such a state of -frenzy that they blocked the traffic of every great city, and reddened -the sky with bonfires from Boston to San Francisco, the Frenchman's -ecstasy of excitement would be a spectacle of momentous interest. -This seemed to be all the more probable because to the American an -election means a new Executive but for the next four years, while to -the Frenchman the new state of affairs that threatened him would extend -for seven. Young Howlett had a vacant place on the top of his public -coach, and was just turning the corner as I came out of the hotel; so -I went out with him, and looked anxiously down on each side to see -the hurrying crowds pushing forward to the palace in the suburbs; and -when I found that all roads did not lead to Versailles that day, I -decided that it must be because we were on the wrong one, which would -eventually lead us somewhere else.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109-110]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="PORTRAITS_OF_CARNOT_IN_HEAVY_BLACK"></a> -<img src="images/illus_120.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">PORTRAITS OF CARNOT IN HEAVY BLACK</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p> - -<p>It did not seem possible that the Parisians would feel so little -interest as to who their new President might be that they would -remain quietly in Paris while he was being elected on its outskirts. -I expected to see them trooping out along the seven-mile road to -Versailles in as great numbers as when they went there once before to -bring a Queen back to Paris. But when we drove into Versailles the -coach rattled through empty streets. There were no processions of -cheering men in white hats tramping to the music of "Marching through -Georgia." No red, white, and blue umbrellas, no sky-rocket yells, no -dangling badges with gold fringe, nothing that makes a Presidential -convention in Chicago the sight of a lifetime. No one was shouting the -name of his political club or his political favorite; no one had his -handkerchief tucked inside his collar and a palm leaf in his hand; -there were no brass-bands, no banners, and not even beer. Nor was -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> -there any of the excitement which surrounds the election of even a -Parliamentary candidate in England. I saw no long line of sandwich-men -tramping in each gutter, no violent Radicals hustling equally elated -Conservatives, and crying, "Good old Smith!" or "Good old Brown!" no -women with primrose badges stuck to their persons making speeches or -soliciting votes from the back of dog-carts. And nobody was engaged -in throwing kippered herring or blacking the eyes of anybody else. -Versailles was as unmoved as the statues in her public squares. Her -broad, hospitable streets lay cool and quiet in the reflection of her -yellow house-fronts, and under the heavy shadows of the double rows of -elms the round, flat cobble-stones, unsoiled by hurrying footsteps, -were as clean and regular as a pan of biscuit ready for the oven.</p> - -<p>There were about six hundred Deputies in the town, who had not been -there the day before, and who would leave it before the sun set that -evening, but they bore themselves so modestly that their presence -could not disturb the sleepy, sunny beauty of the grand old gardens -and of the silent thoroughfares, and when we rattled up to the Hôtel -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> -des Réservoirs at one o'clock we made more of a disturbance with the -coach-horn than had the arrival of both Chambers of Deputies. These -gentlemen were at <i>déjeuner</i> when we arrived, and eating and drinking -as leisurely and good-naturedly as though they had nothing in hand of -more importance than a few calls to make or a game of cards at the -club. Indeed, it looked much more as though Versailles had been invaded -by a huge wedding-party than by a convention of Presidential electors. -Some of the Deputies had brought their wives with them, and few as they -were, they leavened and enlivened the group of black coats as the same -number of women of no other nation could have done, and the men came -from different tables to speak to them, to drink their health, and to -pay them pretty compliments; and the good fellows of the two Chambers -hustled about like so many maîtres d'hôtel seeing that such a one had -a place at the crowded tables, that the salad of this one was being -properly dressed, and that another had a match for his cigarette.</p> - -<p>Besides the Deputies, there were a half-dozen young and old -Parisians—those who make it a point to see everything and to be seen -everywhere. They would have attended quite as willingly a fête of -flowers, or a prize-fight between two English jockeys at Longchamps, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> -and at either place they would have been as completely at home. -They were typical Parisians of the highest world, to whom even the -selection of a President for all France was not without its interest. -With them were the diplomats, who were pretending to take the change -of executive seriously, as representatives of the powers, but who were -really whispering that it would probably bring back the leadership of -the fashionable world to the Élysée, where it should be, and that it -meant the reappearance of many royalist families in society, and the -inauguration of magnificent functions, and the reopening of ballrooms -long unused.</p> - -<p>It was throughout a pretty, lazy, well-bred scene. Outside the entrance -to the hotel, coachmen with the cockades of the different embassies in -their hats were standing at ease in their shirtsleeves, and with their -pipes between their teeth; and the gentlemen, having finished their -breakfast, strolled out into the court-yard and watched the hostlers -rubbing down the coach-horses, or walked up the hill to the palace, -where the boy sentries were hugging their guns, and waving back the -few surprised tourists who had come to look at the pictures in the -historical gallery, and who did not know that the palace on that day -was being used for the prologue of a new historical play.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115-116]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="TO_BRING_A_QUEEN_BACK_TO_PARIS"></a> -<img src="images/illus_126.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"TO BRING A QUEEN BACK TO PARIS"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> - -<p>At the gates leading to the great Court of Honor there were possibly -two hundred people in all. They came from the neighboring streets, and -not from Paris. None of these people spoke in tones louder than those -of ordinary converse, and they speculated with indolent interest as to -the outcome of the afternoon's voting. A young man in a brown straw -hat found an objection to Casimir-Perier as a candidate because he was -so rich, but he withdrew his objection when an older man in a blouse -pointed out that Casimir-Perier would make an excellent appearance on -horseback.</p> - -<p>"The President of France," he said, "must be a man who can look well on -a horse;" and the crowd of old women in white caps, and boy soldiers -with their hands on their baggy red breeches, from the barracks across -the square, nodded their heads approvingly. It was a most interesting -sight when compared with the anxious, howling mob that surrounds the -building in which a Presidential convention is being held at home.</p> - -<p>It is also interesting to remember that a special telephone wire was -placed in the Chamber at Versailles in order that the news of the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> -election might be communicated to the newspaper offices in Paris, -and that this piece of enterprise was considered so remarkable that -it was commented upon by the entire newspaper press of that city. -In Chicago, at the time of the last Presidential convention, when a -nomination merely and not an election was taking place, the interest -of the people justified the Western Union Telegraph Company in sending -out fifteen million words from the building during the three days of -the convention. Wires ran from it directly to the offices of all the -principal newspapers from San Francisco to Boston, and in Chicago -itself there were two hundred extra operators, and relays of horsemen -galloping continually with "copy" from the convention to the main -offices of the different telegraph companies.</p> - -<p>This merely shows a difference of temperament: the American likes -to know what has happened while it is hot, and to know all that has -happened. The European and the Parisian, on this occasion at least, was -content to wait at a café in ease and comfort until he was told the -result. He did not feel that he could change that result in any way by -going out to Versailles in the hot sun and cheering his candidate from -the outside of an iron fence.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> - -<p>At the gate of the Place d'Armes there was a crowd of fifty people, -watched by a few hundred more from under the shade of the trees and -the awnings of the restaurants around the square. The dust rose in -little eddies, and swept across the square in yellow clouds, and the -people turned their backs to it and shrugged their shoulders and waited -patiently. Inside of the Court of Honor a single line of lancers stood -at their horses' heads, their brass helmets flashing like the signals -of a dozen heliographs. Officers with cigarettes and heavily braided -sleeves strolled up and down, and took themselves much more seriously -than they did the matter in hand. A dozen white-waistcoated and -high-hatted Deputies standing outside of the Chamber suggested nothing -more momentous or national than a meeting of a Presbyterian General -Assembly. Bicyclers of both sexes swung themselves from their machines -and peered curiously through the iron fence, and, seeing nothing more -interesting than the fluttering pennants of the lancers, mounted their -wheels again and disappeared in the clouds of dust.</p> - -<p>In the meanwhile Casimir-Perier has been elected on the first ballot, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> -which was taken without incident, save when one Deputy refused to -announce his vote as the roll was called until he was addressed as -"citizen," and not as "monsieur." This silly person was finally -humored, and the result was declared, and Casimir-Perier left the -hall to put on a dress-suit in order that he might receive the -congratulations of his friends. As the first act of the new President, -this must not be considered as significant of the particular man who -did it, but as illustrating the point of view of his countrymen, who -do not see that if the highest office in the country cannot lend -sufficient dignity to the man who holds it, a dress-suit or his -appearance on horseback is hardly able to do so. The congratulations -last a long time, and are given so heartily and with such eloquence -that the new President weeps while he grasps the hand of his late -confrères, and says to each, "You must help me; I need you all." -Neither is the fact that the President wept on this occasion -significant of anything but that he was laboring under much excitement, -and that the temperament of the French is one easily moved. People who -cannot see why a strong man should weep merely because he has become -a President must remember that Casimir-Perier wears the cross of the -Legion of Honor for bravery in action on the field of battle.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> - -<p>The congratulations come to an end at last, and the new President -leaves the palace, and takes his place in the open carriage that has -been waiting his pleasure these last two hours. There is a great crowd -around the gate now, all Versailles having turned out to cheer him, -and he can hear them crying "Vive le Président!" from far across the -length of the Court of Honor.</p> - -<p>M. Dupuy, his late rival at the polls, seats himself beside him on his -left, and two officers in uniform face him from the front. Before his -carriage are two open lines of cavalry, proudly conscious in their -steel breastplates and with their carbines on the hip that they are -to convoy the new President to Paris; and behind him, in close order, -are the lancers, with their flashing brass helmets, and their pennants -fluttering in the wind. The horses start forward with a sharp clatter -of hoofs on the broad stones of the square, the Deputies raise their -high hats, and with a jangling of steel chains and swords, and with -the pennants snapping in the breeze like tiny whips, the new President -starts on his triumphal ride into Paris. The colossal statues of -France's great men, from Charlemagne to Richelieu, look down upon him -curiously as he whirls between them to the iron gateway and disappears -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> -in the alley of mounted men and cheering civilians. He is out of it -in a moment, and has galloped on in a whirling cloud of yellow dust -towards the city lying seven miles away, where, six months later, by -his unexpected resignation, he is to create a consternation as intense -as that which preceded his election.</p> - -<p>It would be interesting to know of what Casimir-Perier thought as he -rode through the empty streets in the cool of the summer evening, -startling the villagers at their dinners, and bringing them on a run -to the doors by the ringing jangle of his mounted men and the echoing -hoofs. Perhaps he thought of the anarchists who might attempt his life, -or of those who succeeded with the man whose place he had taken, or, -what is more likely, he gave himself up to the moment, and said to -himself, as each new face was framed by a window or peered through a -doorway: "Yes, it is the new President of France, Casimir-Perier; not -only of France, but of all her colonies. By to-night they will know in -Siam, in Tunis, in Algiers, and in the swamps of Dahomey that there is -a new step on the floor, and governors of provinces, and native rulers -of barbarous states, and <i>sous-préfets</i>, and pretenders to the throne -of France, will consider anxiously what the change means to them, and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> -will be measuring their fortunes with mine."</p> - -<p>The carriage and its escort enter the cool shadows of the Bois de -Boulogne at Passy, and pass Longchamps, where the French President -annually reviews the army of France, and where now the victorias and -broughams and fiacres draw to one side; and he notes the look of amused -interest on the faces of their occupants as his outriders draw rapidly -nearer, and the smiles of intelligence as they comprehend that it is -the new President, and he catches a glimpse out of the corner of his -eye of nodding faces, and hats half raised in salute as he gallops -past. It must have been a pleasant drive. Very few men have taken it. -Very few men have swept round the circle of the Arc de Triomphe and -seen the mass of glittering carriages stretching far down the avenue -part and make way for them on either side.</p> - -<p>Casimir-Perier's brief term included many imbitterments, but it is a -question if they will ever destroy the sweetness of that moment when -power first touched him as he was borne back to Paris the President of -France; and in his retirement he will recall that ride in the summer -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> -twilight, which the refractory Deputies who caused his downfall have -never taken, and hear again the people cheering at Versailles, and the -galloping horses, and see the crowd that waited for him in the Place de -la Concorde and ran beside his carriage across the bridge.</p> - - -<hr class="sect" /> - - -<p>Although the funeral procession was not to leave the Élysée until ten -o'clock on Sunday morning, the thrifty citizens of Paris began to -prepare for it as early as eleven o'clock on Saturday night. The Champs -Élysées at that hour was lined with tables, boxes, and ladders, and -any other portable object that could afford from its top a view of the -pageant and standing-room, for which one might reasonably ask a franc. -This barricade stretched in an unbroken front, which extended far back -under the trees from the Avenue Marigny to the Place de la Concorde, -where it spread out over the raised sidewalks and around the fountains -and islands of safety, until the square was transformed into what -looked like a great market-place. It was one of the most curious sights -that Parisians have ever seen in time of peace. Over four thousand -people were encamped around these temporary stands, some drinking and -eating, others sleeping, and others busily and noisily engaged in -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> -erecting still more stands, while the falling of the boards that were -to form them rattled as they fell from the carts to the asphalt like -the reports of musketry. Each stand was lit by a lantern and a smoking -lamp; and the men and women, as they moved about in the half-darkness, -or slept curled up beneath the carts and tables, suggested the bivouac -of an army, or that part of a besieged city where the people had -gathered with their household goods for safety.</p> - -<p>The procession the next morning moved down the Champs Élysées and -across the Place de la Concorde and along the Rue de Rivoli to Notre -Dame, from whence, after the ceremony there, it proceeded on to the -Panthéon. All of this line of march was guarded on either side by -double lines of infantry, and one can obtain an idea of how great was -the crowd behind them by the fact that on the morning of the procession -five hundred people were taken in ambulances to the different hospitals -of Paris. This included those who had fainted in the crush, or who -had been overcome by the heat, or who had fallen from one of the many -tottering scaffoldings. Each of the great vases along the iron fence -of the Tuileries held one or two men, one of whom sat opposite us -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> -across the Rue de Rivoli, who had been there six hours, like Stylites -on his pillar, except that the Parisian had an opera-glass, a morning -paper, and a bottle of red wine to keep him company. The trees in the -Tuileries were blackened with men, and the sky-line of every house-top -moved with them. The crowd was greatest perhaps in the Place de la -Concorde, where it spread a black carpet over the great square, which -parted and fell away before the repeated charges of the cavalry like a -piece of cloth before a pair of shears. It was a most orderly crowd, -and an extremely good-humored one, and it manifested no strong feeling -at any time, except over two features of the procession, which had -nothing to do with the death of Carnot. Except when there was music, -which was much too seldom, the crowd chattered and laughed as it might -have done at a purely military function, and only the stern hisses of a -few kept the majority from applauding any one who passed for whom they -held an especial interest.</p> - -<p>The procession left the Élysée at ten o'clock, to the accompaniment of -minute-guns from the battery on the pier near the Chamber of Deputies. -It was led by a very fine body of cuirassiers, who presented a better -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> -appearance than any of the soldiers in the procession. It was not the -great military display that had been expected; there was no artillery -in line, and the navy was not represented, save by a few guards around -the wreath from the officers of that particular service. The regiments -of infantry, who were followed by the cavalry, lacked form, and marched -as though they had not convinced themselves that what they were doing -was worth doing well. The infantry was followed by the mourning-wreaths -sent by the Senate and by the different monarchs of Europe. These -wreaths form an important and characteristic part of the funeral of -a great man in France, and as the French have studied this form of -expressing their grief for some time, they produce the most magnificent -and beautiful tributes, of greater proportions and in better taste than -any that can be seen in any other country in the world. The larger of -these wreaths were hung from great scaffoldings, supported on floats, -each drawn by four or six horses. Some of these were so large that a -man standing upright within them could not touch the opposite inner -edges with his finger-tips. They were composed entirely of orchids or -violets, with bands of purple silk stretching from side to side, and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> -bearing the names of the senders in gold letters. The wreath sent -by the Emperor of Russia was given a place by itself, and mounted -magnificently on a car draped with black, and surrounded by a special -guard of military and servants of the household. The wreaths of the -royalties were followed by more soldiers, and then came the black and -silver catafalque that bore the body of the late President. The wheels -of this car were muffled with cloth, and the horses that drew it were -completely hidden under trappings of black and silver; the reins were -broad white ribbons, and there was a mute at each horse's head. As the -car passed, there was the first absolute silence of the morning, and -many people crossed themselves, and all of the men stood bareheaded.</p> - -<p>Separated from the catafalque by but a few rods, and walking quite -alone, was the new President, Casimir-Perier. There were soldiers -and attendants between him and the line of soldiers which guarded -the sidewalks, but he was alone in that there was no one near him. -According to the protocol he should not have been there at all, as -the etiquette of this function ruled that the new President should -not intrude his person upon the occasion when the position held by -his predecessor is being officially recognized for the last time. -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> -Casimir-Perier, however, chose to disregard the etiquette of this -protocol, arguing that the occasion was exceptional, and that no one -had a better right to mourn for the late President than the man who -had succeeded to the dangers and responsibilities of that office. He -was also undoubtedly moved by the fact that it was generally believed -that his life would be attempted if he did walk conspicuously in the -procession. Had Carnot died a natural death, Casimir-Perier's presence -at the funeral would have been in debatable taste, but Carnot's -assassination, and the threats which hung thick in the air, made the -President take the risk he did, in spite of the fact that Carnot had -been murdered in a public place, and not on account of it.</p> - -<p>It was distinctly a courageous thing for him to do, and it was done -against the wishes of his best friends and the entreaties of his -family, who spent the entire night before the procession in a chapel -praying for his safety. He walked erect, with his eyes turned down, and -with his hat at his side. He was in evening dress, with the crimson -sash of the Legion of Honor across his breast, and he presented a fine -and soldierly bearing, and made an impression, both by his appearance -and by his action, that could not have been gained so soon in any other -manner.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p> - -<p>The embassies and legations followed Casimir-Perier in an irregular -mass of glittering groups. All of these men were on foot. There was no -exception permitted to this rule; and it was interesting to see Lord -Dufferin in the uniform of a viceroy of India, which he wore instead -of his diplomatic uniform, marching in the dust in the same line with -the firemen and letter-carriers. The ambassadors and their attachés -were undoubtedly the most brilliant and picturesque features of the -occasion, and the United States ambassador and his secretaries were, -on account of the contrast their black-and-white evening dress made -to the colors and ribbons of the others, on this occasion, the most -conspicuous and appropriately dressed men present.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131-32]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_GIRL_WHO_REPRESENTED_ALSACE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_142.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"THE GIRL WHO REPRESENTED ALSACE"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> - -<p>But what best pleased the French people were two girls dressed in -the native costumes of Alsace and Lorraine. They headed the deputation -from those provinces. The girl who represented Alsace was particularly -beautiful, with long black hair parted in the middle, and hanging down -her back in long plaits. She wore the characteristic head-dress of -the Alsacian women, and a short red skirt, black velvet bodice, and -black stockings. She carried the French flag in front of her draped -in crêpe, and as she stepped briskly forward the wind blew the black -bow on her hair and the folds of the flag about her face, and gave -her a living and spirited air that in no way suited the occasion, but -which delighted the populace. They applauded her and her companion -from one end of the march to the other, and the spectacle must have -rendered the German ambassador somewhat uncomfortable, and made him -wish for a billet among a people who could learn to forget. The only -other feature of the procession which called forth applause, which no -one tried to suppress, was the presence in it of an old general who -was mistaken by the spectators for Marshal Canrobert. This last of the -marshals of France was too ill to march in the funeral cortége; but -the old soldier, who looked not unlike him, and whose limping gait and -bent back and crutch-stick led him to be mistaken for the marshal, -served the purpose quite as well. One wondered if it did not embarrass -the veteran to find himself so suddenly elevated into the rôle of -popular idol of the hour; but perhaps he persuaded himself that it was -his white hair and crutch and many war-medals which called forth the -ovation, and that he deserved it on his own account—as who can -say he did not?</p> - -<p>The unpleasant incident of the day was one which was unfortunately -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> -acted in full view of the balconies of the hotels Meurice and -Continental. These were occupied by most of the foreigners visiting -Paris, and were virtually the grandstands of the spectacle.</p> - -<p>In the Rue Castiglione, which separated the two hotels, and in full -sight of these critical onlookers, a horse was taken with the blind -staggers, and upset a stand, throwing those who sat upon it out into -the street. In an instant the crash of the falling timbers and the -cries of the half-dozen men and women who had been precipitated into -the street struck panic into the crowd of sight-seers on the pavement -and among the firemen who were at that moment marching past. The terror -of another dynamite outrage was in the minds of all, and without -waiting to learn what had happened, or to even look, the thousands of -people broke into a confused mass of screaming, terrified creatures, -running madly in every direction, and changing the quiet solemnity -of the moment into a scene of horror and panic. The firemen dropped -the wreath they were carrying and fled with the crowd; and then the -French soldiers who were lining the pavements, to the astonishment -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> -and disgust of the Americans and English on the balconies, who were -looking down like spectators at a play, tucked their guns under their -arms and joined in the mad rush for safety. It was a sight that made -even the women on the balconies keep silence in shame for them. It was -pathetic, ridiculous, and inexcusable, and the boy officers on duty -would have gained the sympathy of the unwilling spectators had they -cut their men down with their swords, and shown the others that he who -runs away from a falling grandstand is not needed to live to fight -a German army later. It is true that the men who ran away were only -boys fresh from the provinces, with dull minds filled with the fear of -what an anarchist might do; but it showed a lack of discipline that -should have made the directors of the Salon turn the military pictures -in that gallery to the wall, until the picture exhibited in the Rue -Castiglione was effaced from the minds of the visiting strangers. -Imagine a squad of New York policemen running away from a horse with -the blind staggers, and not, on the contrary, seizing the chance to -club every one within reach back to the sidewalk! Remember the London -bobby who carried a dynamite bomb in his hand from the hall of the -Houses of Parliament, and the Chicago police who walked into a real -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> -anarchist mob over the bodies of their comrades, and who answered the -terrifying bombs with the popping of their revolvers! It is surprising -that Napoleon, looking down upon the scene in the Rue Castiglione from -the top of his column, did not turn on his pedestal.</p> - -<p>After such an exhibition as this it was only natural that the people -should turn from the soldiers to find the greater interest in the -miles of wreaths that came from every corner of France. These were the -expressions of the truer sympathy with the dead President, and there -seemed to be more sentiment and real regret in the little black bead -wreaths from the villages in the south and west of France than there -were in all the great wreaths of orchids and violets purchased on the -boulevards.</p> - -<p>The procession had been two hours in passing a given point. It had -moved at ten o'clock, and it was four in the afternoon before it -dispersed at the Panthéon, and Deputies in evening dress and attachés -in uniform and judges in scarlet robes could be seen hurrying over -Paris in fiacres, faint and hot and cross, for the first taste of food -and drink that had touched their lips since early morning. A few hours -later there was not a soldier out of his barracks, the scaffoldings had -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> -been taken to pieces, the spectators had been distributed in trains to -the environs, the bands played again in the gardens, and the theatres -opened their doors. Paris had taken off her mourning, and fallen back -into her interrupted routine of pleasure, and had left nothing in the -streets to show that Carnot's body had passed over them save thousands -of scraps of greasy newspapers in which the sympathetic spectators of -the solemn function had wrapped their breakfasts.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter"><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV<br /> -<span class="small">THE GRAND PRIX AND OTHER PRIZES</span></h2> - -<div><img class="drop-cap" src="images/illus_149.jpg" alt="" /> -</div> -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap">I THINK</span> the most satisfying thing about the race for the Grand Prix at -Longchamps is the knowledge that every one in Paris is justifying your -interest in the event by being just as much excited about it as you -are. You have the satisfaction of feeling that you are with the crowd, -or that the crowd is with you, as you choose to put it, and that you -move in sympathy with hundreds of thousands of people, who, though they -may not be at the race-track in person, wish they were, which is the -next best thing, and which helps you in the form of moral support, at -least. You feel that every one who passes by knows and approves of your -idea of a holiday, and will quite understand when you ride out on the -Champs Élysées at eleven o'clock in the morning with four other men -packed in one fiacre, or when, for no apparent reason, you hurl your -hat into the air.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span></p> - -<p>There are two ways of reaching Longchamps, the right way and the -wrong way. The wrong way is to go with the crowd the entire distance -through the Bois, and so find yourself stopped half a mile from the -race-track in a barricade of carriages and hired fiacres, with the -wheels scraping, and the noses of the horses rubbing the backs of the -carriages in front. This is entertaining for a quarter of an hour, as -you will find that every American or English man and woman you have -ever met is sitting within talking distance of you, and as you weave -your way in and out like a shuttle in a great loom you have a chance to -bow to a great many friends, and to gaze for several minutes at a time -at all of the celebrities of Paris. But after an hour has passed, and -you have discovered that your driver is not as clever as the others in -stealing ground and pushing himself before his betters, you begin to -grow hot, dusty, and cross, and when you do arrive at the track you are -not in a proper frame of mind to lose money cheerfully and politely, -like the true sportsman that you ought to be.</p> - -<p>The right way to go is through the Bois by the Lakes, stopping within -sound of the waterfall at the Café de la Cascade. The advantage of this -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> -is that you escape the crowd, and that you have the pleasing certainty -in your mind throughout the rest of the afternoon of knowing that you -will be able to find your carriage again when the races are over. If -you leave your fiacre at the main entrance, you will have to pick it -out from three or four thousand others, all of which look exactly -alike; and even if you do tie a red handkerchief around the driver's -whip, you will find that six hundred other people have thought of doing -the same thing, and you will be an hour in finding the right one, and -you will be jostled at the same time by the boys in blouses who are -hunting up lost carriages, and finding the owners to fit them.</p> - -<p>You can avoid all this if you go to the Cascade and take your -coachman's little ticket, and send him back to wait for you in the -stables of the café, not forgetting to give him something in advance -for his breakfast. It is then only a three minutes' walk from the -restaurant among the trees to the back door of the race-track, and in -five minutes after you have left your carriage you will have passed the -sentry at the ticket-box, received your ticket from the young woman -inside of it, given it to the official with a high hat and a big badge, -and will be within the enclosure, with your temper unruffled and your -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> -boots immaculate. And then, when the races are over, you have only to -return to the restaurant and hand your coachman's ticket to the tall -chasseur, and let him do the rest, while you wait at a little round -table and order cooling drinks.</p> - -<p>All great race meetings look very much alike. There are always the -long grandstand with human beings showing from the lowest steps to -the sky-line; the green track, and the miles of carriages and coaches -encamped on the other side; the crowd of well-dressed people in -the enclosure, and the thin-legged horses cloaked mysteriously in -blankets and stalking around the paddock; the massive crush around -the betting-booths, that sweeps slowly in eddies and currents like a -great body of water; and the rush which answers the starting-bell. -The two most distinctive features of the Grand Prix are the numbers -of beautifully dressed women who mix quietly with the men around the -booths at which the mutuals are sold, and the fact that every one -speaks English, either because that is his native tongue, or because, -if he be a Frenchman, he finds so many English terms in his racing -vocabulary that it is easier for him to talk entirely in that tongue -than to change from French to English three or four times in each -sentence.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> - -<p>But the most curious, and in a way the most interesting feature of the -Grand Prix day, is the queer accompaniment to which the races are run. -It never ceases or slackens, or lowers its sharp monotone. It comes -from the machines which stamp the tickets bought in the mutual pools. -If you can imagine a hundred ticket-collectors on an elevated railroad -station all chopping tickets at the same time, and continuing at this -uninterruptedly for five hours, you can obtain an idea of the sound -of this accompaniment. It is not a question of cancelling a five-cent -railroad ticket with these little instruments. It is the same to them -whether they clip for the girl who wagers a louis on the favorite for -a place, and who stands to win two francs, or for the English plunger -who has shoved twenty thousand francs under the wire, and who has -only the little yellow and red ticket which one of the machines has -so nonchalantly punched to show for his money. People may neglect the -horses for luncheon, or press over the rail to see them rush past, or -gather to watch the President of the Republic enter to a solemn fanfare -of trumpets between lines of soldiers, but there are always a few left -to feed these little machines, and their clicking goes on through the -whole of the hot, dusty day, like the clipping of the shears of Atropos.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143-44]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_RESTAURANT_AMONG_THE_TREES"></a> -<img src="images/illus_154.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">THE RESTAURANT AMONG THE TREES</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg145]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Grand Prix is the only race at which you are generally sure to win -money. You can do this by simply betting against the English horse. The -English horse is generally the favorite, and of late years the French -horse-owners have been so loath to see the blue ribbon of the French -turf go to perfidious Albion that their patriotism sometimes overpowers -their love of fair play. If the English horse is not only the favorite, -but also happens to belong to the stable of Baron Hirsch, you have a -combination that apparently can never win on French soil, and you can -make your bets accordingly. When Matchbox walked on to the track last -year, he was escorted by eight gendarmes, seven detectives in plain -clothes, his two trainers, and the jockey, and it was not until he was -well out in the middle of the track that this body-guard deserted him. -Possibly if they had been allowed to follow him round the course on -bicycles he might have won, and no combination of French jockeys could -have ridden him into the rail, or held Cannon back by a pressure of one -knee in front of another, or driven him to making such excursions into -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> -unknown territory to avoid these very things that the horse had little -strength left for the finish.</p> - -<p>But perhaps the French horse was the better one, after all, and it was -certainly worth the loss of a few francs to see the Frenchmen rejoice -over their victory. To their minds, such a defeat of the English on -the field of Longchamps went far to wipe away the memory of that other -victory on the field near Brussels.</p> - -<p>Grand Prix night is a fête-night in Paris—that is, in the Paris of the -Boulevards and the Champs Élysées—and if you wish to dine well before -ten o'clock, you should engage your table for that night several days -in advance.</p> - -<p>You have seen people during Horse Show week in New York waiting in -the hall at Delmonico's for a table for a half-hour at a time, but on -Grand Prix night you will see hundreds of hungry men standing outside -of the open-air restaurants in the Champs Élysées, or wandering -disconsolately under the trees from the crowded tables of l'Horloge -across the Avenue to those of the Ambassadeurs', and from them to the -Alcazar d'Été, and so on to Laurent's and the Café d'Orient. Every one -apparently is dining out-of-doors on that night, and the white tables, -with their little lamps, and with bottles of red wine flickering in -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> -their light, stretch under the trees from the Place de la Concorde up -to the Avenue Matignon. There are splashing fountains between them and -bands of music, and the voices of the singers in the cafés chantants -sound shrilly above the chorus of rattling china and of hundreds of -people talking and laughing, and the never-ceasing undertone of the -cabs rolling by on the great Avenue, with their lamps approaching and -disappearing in the night like thousands of giant fire-flies. You are -sure to dine well in such surroundings, and especially so after the -great race—for the reason that if your friends have won, they command -a good dinner to celebrate the fact; or should they have lost, they -design a better one in order to help them forget their ill-fortune.</p> - -<p>The spirit of adventure and excitement that has been growing and -feeding upon itself throughout the day of the Grand Prix reaches its -climax after the dinner hour, and finds an outlet among the trees and -Chinese lanterns of the Jardin de Paris. There you will see all Paris. -It is the crest of the highest wave of pleasure that rears itself and -breaks there.</p> - -<p>You will see on that night, and only on that night, all of the most -celebrated women of Paris racing with linked arms about the asphalt -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> -pavement which circles around the band-stand. It is for them their -one night of freedom in public, when they are permitted to conduct -themselves as do their less prosperous sisters, when, instead of -reclining in a victoria in the Bois, with eyes demurely fixed ahead of -them, they can throw off restraint and mix with all the men of Paris, -and show their diamonds, and romp and dance and chaff and laugh as -they did when they were not so famous. The French swells who are their -escorts have cut down Chinese lanterns with their sticks, and stuck the -candles inside of them on the top of their high hats with the burning -tallow, and made living torches of themselves. So on they go, racing -by—first a youth in evening dress, dripping with candle-grease, and -then a beautiful girl in a dinner gown, with her silk and velvet opera -cloak slipping from her shoulders—all singing to the music of the -band, sweeping the people before them, or closing in a circle around -some stately dignitary, and waltzing furiously past him to prevent his -escape. Sometimes one party will storm the band-stand and seize the -musicians' instruments, while another invades the stage of the little -theatre, or overpowers the women in charge of the shooting-gallery, or -institutes a hurdle-race over the iron tables and the wicker chairs.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149-50]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="INTERESTED_IN_THE_WINNER"></a> -<img src="images/illus_160.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">INTERESTED IN THE WINNER</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span></p> - -<p>Or you will see ambassadors and men of title from the Jockey Club -jostling cockney bookmakers and English lords to look at a little girl -in a linen blouse and a flat straw hat, who is dancing in the same -circle of shining shirt-fronts <i>vis-à-vis</i> to the most-talked-of young -person in Paris, who wears diamonds in ropes, and who rode herself into -notoriety by winning a steeplechase against a field of French officers. -The first is a hired dancer, who will kick off some gentleman's hat -when she wants it, and pass it round for money, and the other is the -companion of princes, and has probably never been permitted to enter -the Jardin de Paris before; but they are both of the same class, and -when the music stops for a moment they approach each other smiling, -each on her guard against possible condescension or familiarity; and -the hired dancer, who is as famous in her way as the young girl with -the ropes of diamonds is in hers, compliments madame on her dancing, -and madame calls the other "mademoiselle," and says, "How very warm -it is!" and the circle of men around them, who are leaning on each -other's shoulders and standing on benches and tables to look, smile -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> -delightedly at the spectacle. They consider it very <i>chic</i>, this -combination. It is like a meeting between Madame Bernhardt and Yvette -Guilbert.</p> - -<p>But the climax of the night was reached last year when the band of a -hundred pieces struck buoyantly into that most reckless and impudent of -marches and comic songs, "The Man that Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo." -The cymbals clashed, and the big drums emphasized the high notes, and -the brass blared out boastfully with a confidence and swagger that -showed how sure the musicians were of pleasing that particular audience -with that particular tune. And they were not disappointed. The three -thousand men and women hailed the first bars of the song with a yell of -recognition, and then dancing and strutting to the rhythm of the tune, -and singing and shouting it in French and English, they raised their -voices in such a chorus that they could be heard defiantly proclaiming -who they were and what they had done as far as the boulevards. And -when they reached the high note in the chorus, the musicians, carried -away by the fever of the crowd, jumped upon the chairs, and held their -instruments as high above their heads as they could without losing -control of that note, and every one stood on tiptoe, and many on one -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span> -foot, all holding on to that highest note as long as their breath -lasted. It was a triumphant, reckless yell of defiance and delight; -it was the war-cry of that class of Parisians of which one always -reads and which one sees so seldom, which comes to the surface only -at unusual intervals, and which, when it does appear, lives up to its -reputation, and does not disappoint you.</p> - - -<hr class="sect" /> - - -<p>It happened a short time ago, when I was in Paris, that the ranks of -those members of the Institute of France who are known as the Forty -Immortals were incomplete, one of the Forty having but lately died. I -do not now recall the name of this Immortal, which is not, I trust, -an evidence of ignorance on my part so much as it is an illustration -of the circumstance that when men choose to make sure of immortality -while they are alive, in preference to waiting for it after death, they -are apt to be considered, when they cease to live, as having had their -share, and the world closes its account with them, and opens up one -with some less impatient individual. It is only a matter of choice, -and suggests that one cannot have one's cake and eat it too. And so, -while we can but envy François Coppée in his green coat and his laurel -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> -wreath of the Immortals of France, we may remember the other sort of -immortality that came to François Villon and François Millet, who were -not members of the Institute, and whose coats were very ragged indeed. -I do, however, remember the name of the gentleman who was elected to -fill the vacancy in the ranks of the Forty, and in telling how he and -other living men take on the robe of immortality I hope to report the -proceedings of one of the most interesting functions of the French -capital. He was the Vicomte de Bornier, and his name was especially -impressed upon me by a paragraph which appeared in the <i>Figaro</i> on the -day following his admittance to the Academy.</p> - -<p>"M. Manel," the paragraph read, "the well-known journalist, has -renounced his candidacy for the vacant chair among the Forty Immortals. -M. Manel will be well remembered by Parisians as the author who has -written so much and so charmingly under the <i>nom de plume</i> of 'Le -Vicomte de Bornier.'" Whether this was or was not fair to the gentleman -I had seen so highly honored I do not know, but it was calculated to -make him a literary light of interest.</p> - -<p>You are told in Paris that the title of Academician is the only one -remaining under the republic which counts for anything; and, on the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> -other hand, you hear the Academy called a pleasant club for old -gentlemen, to which new members are elected not for any great work -which they are doing in the world, but because their point of view -is congenial to those who are already members. All that can be said -against the Academy by a Frenchman has been printed by Alphonse Daudet -in <i>The Immortals</i>. In that novel he charges that the Academy numbs -the style of whosoever wears its green livery; he says that he who -enters its door leaves originality behind, that he grows conservative -and self-conscious, and that whatever freshness of thought or literary -method may have been his before his admittance to its venerable portals -is chilled by the severe classicism of his thirty-nine brethren.</p> - -<p>This may or may not be true of some of the members, but it certainly -cannot be true of all, as many of them were never distinguished -as authors, but were elected, as were De Lesseps and Pasteur, for -discoveries and research in science, medicine, or engineering.</p> - -<p>Nor is it true of M. Paul Bourget, who is the last distinguished -Frenchman to be received into the ranks of the Immortals. The same -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> -observations which he made to me while in this country, and when he -was not an Academician, upon Americans and American institutions, he -has repeated, since his accession to the rank of an Immortal, in <i>Outre -Mer</i>. And the freedom with which he has spoken shows that the shadow of -the palm-trees has not clouded his cosmopolitan point of view, nor the -classicism of the Academy dulled his wonderful powers of analysis. In -his election, representing as he does the most brilliant of the younger -and progressive school of French writers, the Academy has not so much -honored the man as the man has honored the Academy.</p> - -<p>M. Daudet's opinion, however, is interesting as being that of -one of the most distinguished of French writers, and it is a satire -which costs something, for it shuts off M. Daudet forever from hope -of election to the body at which he scoffs, and at the same time robs -him of the possibility of ever enjoying the added money value which -attaches to each book that bears the leaves of the Academy on its -title-page. Since the days of Richelieu, Frenchmen have mocked at -this institution, and Frenchmen have given up years of their lives in -working, scheming, and praying to be admitted to its councils, and died -disappointed, and bitterly cursing it in their hearts. We have on the -one hand the familiar story of Alexis Piron, who had engraved on his -tombstone,</p> - -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="poem"> - <div class="stanza"> - <span class="i0">"<i>Ci-gît Piron, qui ne fut rien,</i></span> - <span class="i1"><i>Pas même Académicien.</i>"</span> -</div></div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> - -<p>And on the other there is the present picture of M. Zola knocking -year after year at its portals, asking men in many ways his inferior -to permit him a right to sit beside them. If you look over its lists -from 1635 to the present day you will find as many great names among -its members as those which are missing from its rolls; so that proves -nothing.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157-58]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="AROUND_SOME_STATELY_DIGNITARY"></a> -<img src="images/illus_168.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"AROUND SOME STATELY DIGNITARY"</div> -</div> - -<p>No ridicule can disestablish the importance of the work done by the -Academy in keeping the French language pure, or the value of its -Dictionary, or the incentive which it gives to good work by examining -and reporting from time to time on literary, scientific, and historical -works.</p> - -<p>A short time ago the anarchists of Paris determined to actively -ridicule the Académie Française by putting forth a foolish person, -Citizen Achille Le Roy, as a candidate for its honors. As a -preliminary to election to the Academy a candidate must call upon all -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> -of its members. It is a formality which may be considered somewhat -humiliating, as it suggests begging from door to door, hat in hand; but -Citizen Le Roy made his round of visits in triumphal state, dressed -in the cast-off uniform of a Bolivian general, and accompanied by a -band of music and a wagonette full of journalists. Wherever he was -not received he deposited an imitation bomb at the door of the member -who had refused to see him, either as a warning or as a joke, and -much to the alarm of the servants who opened the door. He concluded -his journey, which extended over several days, by being photographed -outside of the door of the Institute, which was, of course, the only -side of the door which he will ever see.</p> - -<p>The Institute of France stands beyond the bridges, facing the Seine. -It is a most impressive and ancient pile, built around a great court, -and guarded by statues in bronze and stone of the men who have been -admitted to its gates. The ceremony of receiving a new member takes -place in one end of this quadrangle of stone, in a little round hall, -not so large as the auditorium of a New York theatre, and built like -a dissecting-room, with three rows of low-hanging stone balconies -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> -circling the entire circumference of its walls. One part of the -lowest balcony is divided into two large boxes, with a high desk -between them, and a flight of steps leading down from it into the pit, -which is packed close with benches. In one of these boxes sit some -members of the Institute, and in the other the members of the Académie -Française, which is only one, though the best known, of the five -branches into which the Institute is divided. Behind the high desk sits -the President, or, as he is called, the Secrétaire Perpétuel, of the -Academy, with a member on either side. It is the duty of one of these -to read the address of welcome to the incoming mortal.</p> - -<p>It is a very pretty sight and a most important function in the social -world, and as there are no reserved places, the invited ones come as -early as eight o'clock in the morning to secure a good place, although -the brief exercises do not begin until two o'clock in the afternoon. -At that hour the street outside is lined with long rows of carriages, -guarded by the smartest of English coachmen, and emblazoned with the -oldest of French coats-of-arms. In the court-yard there is a fluttering -group of pretty women in wonderful toilets, surrounding a few -distinguished-looking men with ribbons in their coats, and encircled -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> -by a ring of journalists making notes of the costumes and taking down -the names of the social celebrities. A double row of soldiers—for the -Institute is part of the state—lines the main hall leading to the -chamber, and salutes all who pass, whether men or women.</p> - -<p>I was so unfortunate as to arrive very late, but as I came in with -the American ambassador I secured a very good place, although -a most awkwardly conspicuous one. Three old gentlemen in silk -knickerbockers and gold chains bowed the ambassador down the hall -between the soldiers, and out on to the steps which lead from the -desk between the boxes in which sat the Immortals. There they placed -two little camp-stools about eight inches high, on which they begged -us to be seated. There was not another square foot of space in the -entire chamber which was not occupied, so we dropped down upon the -camp-stools. We were as conspicuous as you would be if you seated -yourself on top of the prompter's box on the stage of the Grand -Opera-house, and I felt exactly, after the audience had examined us at -their leisure, as though the Secretary was about to suddenly rap on -his desk and auction me off for whatever he could get. Still, we sat -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> -among the Immortals, if only for an hour, and that was something. The -venerable Secretary peered over his desk, and the other Immortals gazed -with polite curiosity, for the ambassador had only just arrived in -Paris, and was not yet known.</p> - -<p>The gentleman on the right of the Secretary was François Coppée, a -very handsome man, with a strong, kind face, smoothly shaven, and -suggesting a priest or a tragic actor. He wore the uniform of the -Academy, which Napoleon spent much time in devising. It consists of -a coat of dark green, bordered with palm leaves in a lighter green -silk; there are, too, a high standing collar and a white waistcoat and -a pearl-handled sword. The poet also wore a great many decorations, -and smiled kindly upon Mr. Eustis and myself, with apparently great -amusement. On the other side of the President, back of Mr. Eustis, was -Comte d'Haussonville; he is a tall man with a Vandyck beard, and it was -he who was to read the address of welcome to the Vicomte de Bornier.</p> - -<p>Below in the pit, and all around in the balconies, were women -beautifully dressed, among whom there were as few young girls as -there were men. These were the most interesting women in Parisian -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> -society—the ladies of the Faubourg St.-Germain, who at that time -would have appeared at scarcely any other function, and the ladies who -support the <i>Revue des Deux Mondes</i>, and the pretty young daughters of -champagne and chocolate-making papas who had married ancient titles, -and who try to emulate in their interests, if not in their toilets, -their more noble sisters-in-law, and all the prettiest women of the -high world, as well as the sisters of pretenders to the throne and -the wife of President Carnot. The absence of men was very noticeable; -the Immortals seemed to have it all to themselves, and it looked as -though they had purposely refrained from asking any men, or that the -men who had not been given the robe of immortality were jealous, and -so stayed away of their own accord. Those who were there either looked -bored, or else posed for the benefit of the ladies, with one hand in -the opening of their waistcoats, nodding their heads approvingly at -what the speaker said. In the pit I recognized M. Blowitz, the famous -correspondent of the <i>Times</i>, entirely surrounded by women. He wore a -gray suit and a flowing white tie, and he did not seem to be having a -very good time. There were also among the Immortals Jules Simon, and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> -Alexandre Dumas fils, dark-skinned, with little, black, observant -eyes, and white, curled hair, and crisp mustache. He seemed to be more -interested in watching the women than in listening to the speeches, -and moved restlessly and inattentively. When the exercises were over, -and the Academicians came out of their box and were presented to Mr. -Eustis, Dumas was gravely courteous, and spoke a few words of welcome -to the ambassador in a formal, distant way, and then hurried off by -himself without waiting to chat with the women, as the others did. He -was the most interesting of them all to me, and the least interested in -what was going on. There were many others there, and it was amusing to -try and fasten to them the names of Pasteur and Henri Meilhac, Ludovic -Halévy, and the Duc d'Aumale, the uncle of the Comte de Paris, who -was then alive, and Benjamin Constant, who had the week before been -admitted to the Institute. Some of them, heavy-eyed men, with great -firm jaws and heavy foreheads, wearing their braided coats uneasily, -as though they would have been more comfortable in a surgeon's apron -or a painter's blouse, kept you wondering what they had done; and -others, dapper and smiling and obsequious, made you ask what they could -possibly do.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Vicomte Bornier opened the proceedings by reading his address -to the beautiful ladies, with his cocked hat under his arm and his -mother-of-pearl sword at his side, and I am afraid it did not appeal to -me as a very serious business. It was too suggestive of an afternoon -tea. There was too much patting of kid-gloved hands, and too many women -altogether. It was a little like Bunthorne and the twenty maidens. If -the little theatre had been crowded with men eager to hear what this -new light in literature had to say, it might have been impressive, -but the sight of forty distinguished men sitting apart and calling -themselves fine names, and surrounded by women who believed they were -what they called themselves, had its humorous side. I could not make -out what the speech was about, because the French was too good; but it -was eminently characteristic and interesting to find that both Bornier -and D'Haussonville made their most successful points when they paid -compliments to the ladies present, or to womenkind in general, or when -they called for revenge on Germany. I thought it curious that even in -a eulogy on a dead man, and in an address of welcome to a live one, -each Frenchman could manage to introduce at least three references of -Alsace-Lorraine, and to bow and make pretty speeches to the ladies in the audience.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167-68]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_MAN_THAT_BROKE_THE_BANK_AT_MONTE_CARLO"></a> -<img src="images/illus_178.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"THE MAN THAT BROKE THE BANK AT MONTE CARLO"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span></p> - -<p>There is a peculiarity about this second address which is worth noting. -It concerns itself with the virtues of the incoming member, and as he -is generally puffed up with honor, the address is always put into the -hands of one whose duty it is to severely criticise and undervalue him -and his words. It is a curious idea to belittle the man whom you have -just honored, but it is the custom, and as both speeches are submitted -to a committee before they are read, there is no very hard feeling. -It is only in the address read after a member's death that he is -eulogized, and then it does not do him very much good. On the occasion -of Pierre Loti's admission to the Academy he, instead of eulogizing -the man whose place he had taken, lauded his own methods and style of -composition so greatly that when the second member arose he prefaced -his remarks by suggesting that "M. Loti has said so much for himself -that he has left me nothing to add."</p> - - -<hr class="sect" /> - - -<p>It is very much of a step from the Académie Française to the Fête of -Flowers in the Bois de Boulogne, but the latter comes under the head -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> -of one of the shows of Paris, and is to me one of the prettiest and -the most remarkable. I do not believe that it could be successfully -carried out in any other city in the world. There would certainly be -horse-play and roughness to spoil it, and it is only the Frenchman's -idea of gallantry and the good-nature of both the French man and -woman which render it possible. It would be an easy matter to hold -a fête of flowers at Los Angeles or at Nice, or in any small city -or watering-place where all the participants would know one another -and the masses would be content to act as spectators; but to venture -on such a spectacle, and to throw it open to any one who pays a few -francs, in as great a city as Paris, requires, first of all, the -highest executive ability before the artistic and pictorial side of the -affair is considered at all, and the most hearty co-operation of the -state or local government with the citizens who have it in hand.</p> - -<p>On the day of the fête the Allée du Jardin d'Acclimatation in the -Bois is reserved absolutely for the combatants in this annual battle -of flowers, which begins at four o'clock in the afternoon and lasts -uninterruptedly until dinner-time. Each of the cross-roads leading up -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> -to the Allée is barricaded, and carriages are allowed to enter or to -depart only at either end. This leaves an open stretch of road several -miles in extent, and wide enough for four rows of carriages to pass one -another at the same moment. Thick woods line the Allée on either side, -and the branches of the trees almost touch above it. Beneath them, -and close to the roadway, sit thousands of men, women, and children -in close rows, and back of them hundreds more move up and down the -pathways. The carriages proceed in four unbroken lines, two going up -and two going down; and as they pass, the occupants pelt each other and -the spectators along the road-side with handfuls of flowers. For three -miles this battle rages between the six rows of people, and the air is -filled with the flying missiles and shrieks of laughter and the most -graceful of compliments and good-natured <i>blague</i>. At every fifty yards -stands a high arch, twined with festoons trailing from one arch to the -next, and temporary flagpoles flying long banners of the tricolor, -and holding shields which bear the monogram of the republic. The long -festoons of flowers and the flags swinging and flying against the dark -green of the trees form the Allée into one long tunnel of color and -light; and at every thirty paces there is the gleaming cuirass of a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> -trooper, with the sun shining on his helmet and breastplate, and on -other steel breastplates, which extend, like the mirrors in "Richard -III.," as far as the eye can reach, flashing and burning in the sun. -Between these beacons of steel, and under the flags and flowers and -green branches, move nearly eight miles of carriages, with varnished -sides and polished leather flickering in the light, each smothered with -broad colored ribbons and flowers, and gay with lace parasols.</p> - -<p>It is a most cosmopolitan crowd, and it is interesting to see how -seriously some of the occupants of the carriages take the matter in -hand, and how others turn it into an ovation for themselves, and still -others treat it as an excuse to give some one else pleasure. You will -see two Parisian dandies in a fiacre, with their ammunition piled as -high as their knees, saluting and chaffing and calling by name each -pretty woman who passes, and following them in the line you will see a -respectable family carriage containing papa, mamma, and the babies, and -with the coachman on the box hidden by great breastworks of bouquets. -To the proud parents on the back seat the affair is one which is to be -met with dignified approval, and they bow politely to whoever hurls a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> -rose or a bunch of wild flowers at one of their children. They, in -their turn, will be followed by a magnificent victoria, glittering -with varnish and emblazoned by strange coats-of-arms, and holding two -coal-black negroes, with faces as shiny as their high silk hats. They -have with them on the front seat a hired guide from one of the hotels, -who is showing Paris to them, and who is probably telling them that -every woman who laughs and hits them with a flower is a duchess at -least, at which their broad faces beam with good-natured embarrassment -and their teeth show, and they scramble up and empty a handful of rare -roses over the lady's departing shoulders. There are frequent halts -in the procession, which moves at a walk, and carriages are often -left standing side by side facing opposite ways for the space of a -minute, in which time there is ample opportunity to exhaust most of the -ammunition at hand, or to express thanks for the flowers received. The -good order of the day is very marked, and the good manners as well. The -flowers are not accepted as missiles, but as tributes, and the women -smile and nod demurely, and the men bow, and put aside a pretty nosegay -for the next meeting; and when they draw near the same carriage again, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> -they will smile their recognition, and wait until the wheels are just -drawing away from one another, and then heap their offerings at the -ladies' feet.</p> - -<p>There are a great number of Americans who are only in Paris for the -month, and whom you have seen on the steamer, or passing up the Rue de -la Paix, or at the banker's on mail day, and they seize this chance to -recognize their countrymen, and grow tremendously excited in hitting -each other in the eyes and on the nose, and then pass each other the -next day in the Champs Élysées without the movement of an eyelash. -The hour excuses all. It has the freedom of carnival-time without its -license, and it is pretty to see certain women posing as great ladies, -in hired fiacres, and being treated with as much <i>empressement</i> and -courtesy by every man as though he believed the fiacre was not hired, -and the pearl necklace was real and not from the Palais Royal, and -that he had not seen the woman the night before circling around the -endless treadmill of the Jardin de Paris. Sometimes there will be -a coach all red and green and brass, and sometimes a little wicker -basket on low wheels, with a donkey in the shafts, and filled with -children in the care of a groom, who holds them by their skirts to -keep them from hurling themselves out after the flowers, and who looks -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> -immensely pleased whenever any one pelts them back and points them out -as pretty children. But the greater number of the children stand along -the road-side with their sisters and mothers. They are of the good -bourgeois class and of the decently poor, who beg prettily for a flower -instead of giving one, and who dash out under the wheels for those -that fall by the wayside, and return with them to the safety of their -mother's knee in a state of excited triumph.</p> - -<p>When you see how much one of the broken flowers means to them, you -wonder what they think of the cars that pass toppling over with -flowers, with the harness and the spokes of the wheels picked out in -carnations, and banked with shields of nodding roses at the sides and -backs.</p> - -<p>These are the carriages entered for prizes, and some of them are very -wonderful and very beautiful. One holds a group of Rastaqouères, who -have spent a clerk's yearly income in decorating their victoria, that -they may send word back to South America that they have won a prize -from a board of Parisian judges.</p> - -<p>And another is a big billowy phaeton blooming within and without with -white roses and carnations, and holding a beautiful lady with auburn -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> -hair and powdered face, and with the lace of her Empire bonnet just -falling to the line of her black eyebrows. She is all in white too, -with white gloves, and a parasol of nothing but white lace, and she -reclines rather than sits in this triumphal car of pure white flowers, -like a Cleopatra in her barge, or Venus lying on the white crest of the -waves. All the men recognize her, and throw their choicest offerings -into her lap; but whenever I saw her she seemed more interested in -the crowds along the road-side, who announced her approach with an -excited murmur of admiration, and the little children in blouses threw -their nosegays at her, and then stood back, abashed at her loveliness, -with their hands behind them. She was quite used to being pelted with -flowers at one of the theatres, but she seemed to enjoy this tribute -very much, and she tossed roses back at the children, and watched them -as they carried her flowers to the nurse or the elder sister who was -taking care of them, and who looked after the woman with frightened, -admiring eyes.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p> - -<h2 class="chapter"><a name="V" id="V"></a>V<br /> -<span class="small">AMERICANS IN PARIS</span></h2> - -<div><img class="drop-cap" src="images/illus_188.jpg" alt="" /> -</div> -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap">AMERICANS</span> who go to Paris might be divided, for the purposes of this -article at least, into two classes—those who use Paris for their -own improvement or pleasure, and those who find her too strong for -them, and who go down before her and worship her, and whom she either -fashions after her own liking, or rides under foot and neglects until -they lose heart and disappear forever.</p> - -<p>Balzac, in the last paragraph of one of his novels, leaves his hero -standing on the top of a hill above Paris, shaking his fist at the city -below him, and cursing her for a wanton.</p> - -<p>One might argue that this was a somewhat childish and theatrical point -of view for the young man to have taken. He probably found in Paris -exactly what he brought there, and it seems hardly fair, because the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> -city was stronger than he, that he should blame her and call her a -hard name. Paris is something much better than that, only the young -man was probably not looking for anything better. He had taken her -frivolous side too seriously, and had not sought for her better side at -all. Some one should have told him that Paris makes a most agreeable -mistress, but a very hard master.</p> - -<p>There are a few Americans who do not know this until it is too late, -until they lose their heads with all the turmoil and beauty and -unending pleasures of the place, and grow to believe that the voice -of Paris is the voice of the whole world. Perhaps they have heard the -voice speak once; it has praised a picture which they have painted, or -a book of verses that they have written, or a garden fête that they -have given, at which there were present as many as three ambassadors. -And they sit breathless ever after, waiting for the voice to speak to -them again, and while they are waiting Paris is exclaiming over some -new picture, or another fête, at which there were four ambassadors; and -the poor little artist or the poor little social struggler wonders why -he is forgotten, and keeps on struggling and fluttering and biting his -nails and eating his heart out in private, listening for the voice to -speak his name once more.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179-80]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="LISTENING_FOR_THE_VOICE_TO_SPEAK_HIS_NAME_ONCE_MORE"></a> -<img src="images/illus_190.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"LISTENING FOR THE VOICE TO SPEAK HIS NAME ONCE MORE"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span></p> - -<p>He will not believe that his time has come and gone, and that Paris has -no memory, and no desire but to see and to hear some new thing. She -has taken his money and eaten his dinners and hung his pictures once -or twice in a good place; but, now that his money is gone, Paris has -other dinners to eat, and other statues to admire, and no leisure time -to spend at his dull receptions, which have taken the place of his rare -dinners, or to climb to his garret when there is a more amusing and -more modern painter on the first floor.</p> - -<p>Paris is full of these poor hangers-on, who have allowed her to use -them and pat them on the back, and who cannot see that her approbation -is not the only reward worth the striving for, but who go on year -after year tagging in her train, beseeching her to take some notice -of them. They are like the little boys who run beside the coaches and -turn somersaults to draw a copper from the passengers on top, and who -are finally left far behind, unobserved and forgotten beside the dusty -road. The wise man and the sensible man takes the button or the medal -or the place on a jury that Paris gives him, and is glad to get it, and -proud of the recognition and of the source from which it comes, and -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> -then continues on his way unobserved, working for the work's sake. He -knows that Paris has taught him much, but that she has given him all -she can, and that he must now work out his own salvation for himself.</p> - -<p>Or, if he be merely an idler visiting Paris for the summer, he takes -Paris as an idler should, and she receives him with open arms. He -does not go there to spend four hours a day, or even four hours a -week, in the serious occupation of leaving visiting-cards. He does -not invite the same people with whom he dined two weeks before in New -York to dine and breakfast with him again in Paris, nor does he spend -every afternoon in a frock-coat watching polo, or in flannels playing -lawn-tennis on the Île de Puteaux. He has tennis and polo at home. Nor -did he go all the way to Paris to dance in little hot apartments, or to -spend the greater part of each day at the race-tracks of Longchamps or -Auteuil. The Americans who do these things in Paris are a strange and -incomprehensible class. Fortunately they do not form a large class, but -they do form a conspicuous one, and while it really does not concern -any one but themselves as to how they spend their time, it is a little -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> -aggravating to have them spoiling the local color of a city for which -they have no real appreciation, and from which they get no more benefit -than they would have received had they remained at home in Newport.</p> - -<p>They treat Paris as they would treat Narragansett Pier, only they act -with a little less restraint, and are very much more in evidence. They -are in their own environment and in the picture at the Pier or at -the Horse Show, and if you do not like it you are at perfect liberty -to keep out of it, and you will not be missed; but you do object to -have your view of the Arc de Triomphe cut in two by a coach-load of -them, or to have them swoop down upon D'Armenonville or Maxim's on the -boulevards, calling each other by their first names, and running from -table to table, and ordering the Hungarians to play "Daisy Bell," until -you begin to think you are in the hall of the Hotel Waldorf, and go out -into the night to hear French spoken, if only by a cabman.</p> - -<p>I was on the back seat of a coach one morning in the Bois de Boulogne, -watching Howlett give a man a lesson in driving four horses at once.</p> - -<p>It was very early, and the dew was still on the trees, and the great, -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> -broad avenues were empty and sweet-smelling and green, and I exclaimed -on the beauty of Paris. "Beautiful?" echoed Howlett. "I should say it -was, sir. Now in London, sir, all the roads lie so straight there's -no practice driving there. But in Paris it's all turns and short -corners. It's the most beautiful city in the world." I thought it was -interesting to find a man so wrapped up in his chosen work that he -could see nothing in the French capital but the angles which made the -driving of four horses a matter of some skill. But what interest can -you take in those Americans who have been taught something else besides -driving, and who yet see only those things in Paris that are of quite -as little worth as the sharp turns of the street corners?</p> - -<p>You wonder if it never occurs to them to walk along the banks of the -Seine and look over the side at the people unloading canal-boats, or -clipping poodles, or watering cavalry horses, or patiently fishing; -if they never pull over the books in the stalls that line the quays, -or just loiter in abject laziness, with their arms on the parapet of -a bridge, with the sun on their backs, and the steamboats darting to -and fro beneath them, and with the towers of Notre Dame before and the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> -grim prison of the Conciergerie on one side. Surely this is a better -employment than taking tea to the music of a Hungarian band while your -young friends from Beverly Farms and Rockaway knock a polo-ball around -a ten-acre lot. I met two American women hurrying along the Rue de -Rivoli one morning last summer who told me that they had just arrived -in Paris that moment, and were about to leave two hours later for Havre -to take the steamer home.</p> - -<p>"So," explained the elder, "as we have so much time, we are just -running down to the Louvre to take a farewell look at 'Mona Lisa' and -the 'Winged Victory;' we won't see them again for a year, perhaps." -Their conduct struck me as interesting when compared with that of about -four hundred other American girls, who never see anything of Paris -during their four weeks' stay there each summer, because so much of -their time is taken up at the dress-makers'. It is pathetic to see -them come back to the hotel at five, tired out and cross, with having -had to stand on their feet four hours at a time while some mysterious -ceremony was going forward. It is hard on them when the sun is shining -out-of-doors and there are beautiful drives and great art galleries and -quaint old chapels and curious museums and ancient gardens lying free -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> -and open all around them, that they should be compelled to spend four -weeks in this fashion.</p> - -<p>There was a young woman of this class of American visitors to Paris who -had just arrived there on her way from Rome, and who was telling us how -much she had delighted in the galleries there. She was complaining that -she had no more pictures to enjoy. Some one asked her what objection -she had to the Louvre or the Luxembourg.</p> - -<p>"Oh, none at all," she said; "but I saw those pictures last year."</p> - -<p>These are the Americans who go to Paris for the spring and summer only, -who live in hotels, and see little of the city beyond the Rue de la -Paix and the Avenue of the Champs Élysées and their bankers'. They get -a great deal of pleasure out of their visit, however, and they learn -how important a thing it is to speak French correctly. If they derive -no other benefit from their visit they are sufficiently justified, and -when we contrast them with other Americans who have made Paris their -chosen home, they almost shine as public benefactors in comparison.</p> - -<p>For they, at least, bring something back to their own country: -themselves, and pretty frocks and bonnets, and a certain wider -knowledge of the world. That is not much, but it is more than the American Colony -does.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187-88]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="STANDING_ON_THEIR_FEET_FOR_HOURS_AT_A_TIME"></a> -<img src="images/illus_198.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"STANDING ON THEIR FEET FOR HOURS AT A TIME"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span></p> - -<p>There is something fine in the idea of a colony, of a body of men and -women who strike out for themselves in a new country, who cut out their -homes in primeval forests, and who make their peace with the native -barbarians. The Pilgrim Fathers and the early settlers in Australia -and South Africa and amidst the snows of Canada were colonists of -whom any mother-nation might be proud; but the emigrants who shrink -at the crudeness of our present American civilization, who shirk the -responsibilities of our government, who must have a leisure class with -which to play, and who are shocked by the familiarity of our press, -are colonists who leave their country for their country's good. The -American Colony in Paris is in a strange position. Its members are -neither the one thing nor the other. They cannot stand in the shadow of -the Arc de Triomphe and feel that any part of its glory falls on them, -nor can they pretend an interest in the defeat of Tammany Hall, nor -claim any portion in the magnificent triumph of the Chicago Fair. Their -attitude must always be one of explanation; they are continually on the -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> -defensive; they apologize to the American visitor and to the native -Frenchman; they have declined their birthright and are voluntary exiles -from their home. The only way by which they can justify their action -is either to belittle what they have given up, or to emphasize the -benefits which they have received in exchange, and these benefits are -hardly perceptible. They remain what they are, and no matter how long -it may have been since they ceased to be Americans, they do not become -Frenchmen. They are a race all to themselves; they are the American -Colony.</p> - -<p>On regular occasions this Colony asserts itself, but only on those -occasions when there is a chance of its advertising itself at the -expense of the country it has renounced. When this chance comes the -Colonists suddenly remember their former home; they rush into print, -or they make speeches in public places, or buy wreaths for some dead -celebrity. Or when it so happens that no one of prominence has died for -some time, and there seems to be no other way of getting themselves -noticed, the American Colony rises in its strength and remembers -Lafayette, and decorates his grave. Once every month or so they march -out into the country and lay a wreath on his tomb, and so for the -moment gain a certain vogue with the Parisians, which is all that -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> -they ask. They do not perform this ceremony because Lafayette fought -in America, but because he was a Frenchman fighting in America, and -they are playing now to the French galleries and not to the American -bleaching-boards. There are a few descendants of Lafayette who are -deserving of our sincere sympathy. For these gentlemen are brought into -the suburbs many times a year in the rain and storm to watch different -American Colonists place a wreath on the tomb of their distinguished -ancestor, and make speeches about a man who left his country only to -fight for the independence of another country, and not to live in -it after it was free. Some day the descendants of Lafayette and the -secretaries of the American embassy will rise up and rebel, and refuse -to lend themselves longer to the uses of these gentlemen.</p> - -<p>They will suggest that there are other graves in Paris. There is, for -instance, the grave of Paul Jones, who possibly did as much for America -on the sea as Lafayette did on shore. If he had only been a Frenchman, -with a few descendants of title still living who would consent to act -as chief mourners on occasion, his spirit might hope to be occasionally -remembered with a wreath or two; but as it is, he is not to be -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> -considered with the French marquis, who must, we can well imagine, -turn uneasily beneath the wreaths these self-advertising patriots lay -upon his grave.</p> - -<p>The American Colony is not wicked, but it would like to be thought -so, which is much worse. Among some of the men it is a pose to be -considered the friend of this or that particular married woman, and -each of them, instead of paying the woman the slight tribute of -treating her in public as though they were the merest acquaintances, -which is the least the man can do, rather forces himself upon her -horizon, and is always in evidence, not obnoxiously, but unobtrusively, -like a pet cat or a butler, but still with sufficient pertinacity to -let you know that he is there.</p> - -<p>As a matter of fact the women have not the courage to carry out to the -end these affairs of which they hint, as have the French men and women -around them whose example they are trying to emulate. And, moreover, -the twenty-five years of virtue which they have spent in America, as -Balzac has pointed out, is not to be overcome in a day or in many -days, and so they only pretend to have overcome it, and tell <i>risqués</i> -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> -stories and talk scandalously of each other and even of young girls. -But it all begins and ends in talk, and the <i>risqués</i> stories, if they -knew it, sound rather silly from their lips, especially to men who put -them away when they were boys at boarding-school, and when they were so -young that they thought it was grand to be vulgar and manly to be nasty.</p> - -<p>It is a question whether or not one should be pleased that the would-be -wicked American woman in Paris cannot adopt the point of view of the -Parisian women as easily as she adopts their bonnets. She tries to do -so, it is true; she tries to look on life from the same side, but she -does not succeed very well, and you may be sure she is afraid and a -fraud at heart, and in private a most excellent wife and mother. If it -be reprehensible to be a hypocrite and to pretend to be better than one -is, it should also be wrong to pretend to be worse than one dares to -be, and so lend countenance to others. It is like a man who shouts with -the mob, but whose sympathies are against it. The mob only hears him -shout and takes courage at his doing so, and continues in consequence -to destroy things. And these foolish, pretty women lend countenance -by their talk and by their stories to many things of which they know -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> -nothing from experience, and so do themselves injustice and others -much harm. Sometimes it happens that an outsider brings them up with a -sharp turn, and shows them how far they have strayed from the standard -which they recognized at home. I remember, as an instance of this, how -an American art student told me with much satisfaction last summer of -how he had made himself intensely disagreeable at a dinner given by -one of these expatriated Americans. "I didn't mind their taking away -the character of every married woman they knew," he said; "they were -their own friends, not mine; but I did object when they began on the -young girls, for that is something we haven't learned at home yet. And -finally they got to Miss ——, and one of the women said, 'Oh, she has -so compromised herself now that no one will marry her.'"</p> - -<p>At which, it seems, my young man banged the table with his fist, and -said: "I'll marry her, if she'll have me, and I know twenty more men -at home who would be glad of the chance. We've all asked her once, and -we're willing to ask her again."</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195-96]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="THE_AMERICAN_COLONY_IS_NOT_WICKED"></a> -<img src="images/illus_206.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"THE AMERICAN COLONY IS NOT WICKED"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span></p> - -<p>There was an uncomfortable pause, and the young woman who had spoken -protested she had not meant it so seriously. She had only meant the -girl was a trifle <i>passée</i> and travel-worn. But when the women had left -the table, one of the men laughed, and said:</p> - -<p>"You are quite like a breeze from the piny woods at home. I suppose we -do talk rather thoughtlessly over here, but then none of us take what -we say of each other as absolute truth."</p> - -<p>The other men all agreed to this, and protested that no one took them -or what they said seriously. They were quite right, and, as a matter -of fact, it would be unjust to them to do so, except to pity them. The -Man without a Country was no more unfortunate than they. It is true -they have Henry's bar, where they can get real American cocktails, and -the Travellers', where they can play real American poker; but that is -as near as they ever get to anything that savors of our country, and -they do not get as near as that towards anything that savors of the -Frenchman's country. They have their own social successes, and their -own salons and dinner-parties, but the Faubourg St.-Germain is as -strange a territory to many of them as though it were situated in the -heart of the Congo Basin.</p> - -<p>Of course there are many fine, charming, whole-souled, and clean-minded -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> -American women in Paris. They are the wives of bankers or merchants or -the representatives of the firms which have their branches in Paris and -London as well as New York. And there are hundreds more of Americans -who are in Paris because of its art, the cheapness of its living, and -its beauty. I am not speaking of them, and should they read this they -will understand.</p> - -<p>The American in Paris of whom one longest hesitates to speak is -the girl or woman who has married a title. She has been so much -misrepresented in the press, and so misunderstood, and she suffers in -some cases so acutely without letting it be known how much she suffers, -that the kindest word that could be said of her is not half so kind as -silence. No one can tell her more distinctly than she herself knows -what her lot is, or how few of her illusions have been realized. It is -not a case where one can point out grandiloquently that uneasy lies -the head that wears a coronet; it is not magnificent sorrow; it is -just pathetic, sordid, and occasionally ridiculous. To treat it too -seriously would be as absurd as to weep over a man who had allowed -himself to be fooled by a thimblerigger; only in this case it is a -woman who has been imposed upon, and who asks for your sympathy.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span></p> - -<p>There is a very excellent comic song which points out how certain -things are only English when you see them on Broadway; and a title, or -the satisfaction of being a countess or princess, when viewed from a -Broadway or Fifth Avenue point of view, is a very pretty and desirable -object. But as the title has to be worn in Paris and not in New York, -its importance lies in the way in which it is considered there, not -here. As far as appears on the surface, the American woman of title -in Paris fails to win what she sought, from either her own people or -those among whom she has married. To her friends from New York or San -Francisco she is still Sallie This or Eleanor That. Her friends are not -deceived or impressed or overcome—at least, not in Paris. When they -return to New York they speak casually of how they have been spending -the summer with the Princess So-and-So, and they do not add that she -used to be Sallie Sprigs of San Francisco. But in Paris, when they -are with her, they call her Sallie, just as of yore, and they let her -understand that they do not consider her in any way changed since she -has become ennobled, or that the glamour of her rank in any way dazzles -them. And she in her turn is so anxious that they shall have nothing to -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> -say of her to her disadvantage when they return that she shows them -little of her altered state, and is careful not to refer to any of the -interesting names on her new visiting-list.</p> - -<p>Her husband's relations in France are more disappointing: they -certainly cannot be expected to see her in any different light from -that of an outsider and a nobody; they will not even admit that she -is pretty; and they say among themselves that, so long as Cousin -Charles had to marry a great fortune, it is a pity he did not marry a -French woman, and that they always had preferred the daughter of the -chocolate-maker, or the champagne-grower, or the Hebrew banker—all of -whom were offered to him. The American princess cannot expect people -who have had title and ancestors so long as to have forgotten them -to look upon Sallie Sprigs of California as anything better than an -Indian squaw. And the result is, that all which the American woman -makes by her marriage is the privilege of putting her coronet on her -handkerchief and the humble deference of the women at Paquin's or -Virot's, who say "Madame the Baroness" and "Madame the Princess" at -every second word. It really seems a very heavy price to pay for very -little.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p> -<p>We are attributing very trivial and vulgar motives to the woman, and -it may be, after all, that she married for love in spite of the title, -and not on account of it. But if these are love-matches, it would -surely sometimes happen that the American men, in their turn, would -fall in love with foreign women of title, and that we would hear of -impecunious princesses and countesses hunting through the States for -rich brokers and wheat-dealers. Of course the obvious answer to this -is that the American women are so much more attractive than the men -that they appeal to people of all nations and of every rank, and that -American men are content to take them without the title.</p> - -<p>The rich fathers of the young girls who are sacrificed should go into -the business with a more accurate knowledge of what they are buying. -Even the shrewdest of them—men who could not be misled into buying a -worthless railroad or an empty mine—are frequently imposed upon in -these speculations. The reason is that while they have made a study of -the relative values and the soundness of railroads and mines, they have -not taken the pains to study this question of titles, and as long as a -man is a count or a prince, they inquire no further, and one of them -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> -buys him for his daughter on his face value. There should be a sort -of Bradstreet for these rich parents, which they could consult before -investing so much money plus a young girl's happiness. There are, as a -matter of fact, only a very few titles worth buying, and in selecting -the choice should always lie between one of England and one of Germany. -An English earl is the best the American heiress can reasonably hope -for, and after him a husband with a German title is very desirable. -These might be rated as "sure" and "safe" investments.</p> - -<p>But these French titles created by Napoleon, or the Italians, with -titles created by the Papal Court, and the small fry of other -countries, are really not worth while. Theirs are not titles; as some -one has said, they are epitaphs; and the best thing to do with the -young American girl who thinks she would like to be a princess is -to take her abroad early in her life, and let her meet a few other -American girls who have become princesses. After that, if she still -wants to buy a prince and pay his debts and supply him with the credit -to run into more debt, she has only herself to blame, and goes into it -with her pretty eyes wide open. It will be then only too evident that -she is fitted for nothing higher.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203-04]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="WHAT_MIGHT_SOME_TIME_HAPPEN_IF_THESE_WERE_LOVEMATCHES"></a> -<img src="images/illus_214.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"WHAT MIGHT SOME TIME HAPPEN IF THESE WERE -LOVE-MATCHES"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span></p> - -<p>On no one class of visitor does Paris lay her spell more heavily than -on the American art student. For, no matter where he has studied at -home, or under what master, he finds when he reaches Paris so much -that is new and beautiful and full of inspiration that he becomes as -intolerant as are all recent converts, and so happy in his chosen -profession that he looks upon everything else than art with impatience -and contempt. As art is something about which there are many opinions, -he too often passes rapidly on to the stage when he can see nothing to -admire in any work save that which the master that he worships declares -to be true, and he scorns every other form of expression and every -other school and every other artist.</p> - -<p>You almost envy the young man his certainty of mind and the -unquestionableness of his opinion. He will take you through the Salon -at a quick step, demolishing whole walls of pictures as he goes with -a sweeping gesture of the hand, and will finally bring you breathless -before a little picture, or a group of them, which, so he informs you, -are the only ones in the exhibition worthy of consideration. And on -the day following a young disciple of another school will escort you -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> -through the same rooms, and regard with pitying contempt the pictures -which your friend of the day before has left standing, and will pick -out somewhere near the roof a strange monstrosity, beneath which he -will stand with bowed head, and upon which he will comment in a whisper.</p> - -<p>It is an amusing pose, and most bewildering to a philistine like -myself when he finds all the artists whom he had venerated denounced -as photographers and decorators, or story-tellers and illustrators. I -used to be quite ashamed of the ignorance which had left me so long -unenlightened as to what was true and beautiful.</p> - -<p>These boys have, perhaps, an aunt in Kansas City, or a mother in Lynn, -Massachusetts, who is saving and pinching to send them fifteen or -twenty dollars a week so that they can learn to be great painters, -and they have not been in Paris a week before they have changed their -entire view of art, and adopted a new method and a new master and a -new religion. It is nowise derogatory to a boy to be supported by a -fond aunt in Kansas City, who sends him fifteen dollars a week and the -news of the social life of that place, but it is amusing to think how -she and his cousins in the West would be awed if they heard him damn a -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> -picture by waving his thumb in the air at it, and saying, "It has a -little too much of that," with a downward sweep of the thumb, "and not -enough of this," with an upward sweep. For one hardly expects a youth -who is still at Julien's, and who has not yet paid the first quarter's -rent for his studio, to proclaim all the first painters of France as -only fit to color photographs. It is as if some one were to say, "You -can take away all of the books of the Boston Library and nothing will -be lost, but spare three volumes of sonnets written by the only great -writer of the present time, who is a friend of mine, and of whom no one -knows but myself."</p> - -<p>Of course one must admire loyalty of that sort, for when it is loyalty -to an idea it cannot help but be fine and sometimes noble, though it is -a trifle amusing as well. It is just this tenacity of belief in one's -own work, and just this intolerance of the work of others, that make -Paris inspiring. A man cannot help but be in earnest, if he amounts -to anything at all, when on every side he hears his work attacked or -vaunted to the skies. As long as the question asked is "Is it art?" and -not "Will it sell?" and "Is it popular?" the influence must be for good.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span></p> - -<p>These students, in their loyalty to the particular school they admire, -of course proclaim their belief in every public and private place, and -are ever on their guard, but it is in their studios that they have set -up their gods and established their doctrines most firmly.</p> - -<p>One of these young men, whom I had known at college, took me to his -studio last summer, and asked me to tell him how I liked it. It was -a most embarrassing question to me, for to my untrained eye the -rooms seemed to be stricken with poverty, and so bare as to appear -untenanted. I said, at last, that he had a very fine view from his -windows.</p> - -<p>"Yes, but you say nothing of the room itself," he protested; "and I -have spent so much time and thought on it. I have been a year and a -half in arranging this room."</p> - -<p>"But there is nothing in it," I objected; "you couldn't have taken a -year and a half to arrange these things. There is not enough of them. -It shouldn't have taken more than half an hour."</p> - -<p>He smiled with a sweet, superior smile, and shook his head at me. "I am -afraid," he said, "that you are one of those people who like studios -filled with tapestries and armor and palms and huge, hideous chests -of carved wood. You are probably the sort of person who would hang -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> a -tennis-racket on his wall and consider it decorative. <i>We</i> believe in -lines and subdued colors and broad, bare surfaces. There is nothing in -this room that has not a meaning of its own. You are quite right; there -is very little in it; but what is here could not be altered or changed -without spoiling the harmony of the whole, and nothing in it could be -replaced or improved upon."</p> - -<p>I regarded the studio with renewed interest at this, and took a mental -inventory of its contents for my own improvement. I was guiltily -conscious that once at college I had placed two lacrosse-sticks over -my doorway, and what made it worse was that I did not play lacrosse, -and that they had been borrowed from the man up-stairs for decorative -purposes solely. I hoped my artist friend would not question me too -closely. His room had a bare floor and gray walls and a green door. -There was a long, low bookcase, and a straight-legged table, on which -stood, ranged against the wall, a blue and white jar, a gold Buddha, -and a jade bottle. On one wall hung a gray silk poke-bonnet, of the -fashion of the year 1830, and on another an empty gold frame. With the -exception of three chairs there was nothing else in the room. I moved -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> -slightly, and with the nervous fear that if I disturbed or disarranged -anything the bare gray walls might fall in on me. And then I asked him -why he did not put a picture in his frame.</p> - -<p>"Ah, exactly!" he exclaimed, triumphantly; "that shows exactly what -you are; you are an American philistine. You cannot see that a picture -is a beautiful thing in itself, and that a dead-gold frame with its -four straight lines is beautiful also; but together they might not be -beautiful. That gray wall needs a spot on it, and so I hung that gold -frame there, not because it was a frame, but because it was beautiful; -for the same reason I hung that eighteen-thirty bonnet on the other -wall. The two grays harmonize. People do not generally hang bonnets on -walls, but that is because they regard them as things of use, and not -as things of beauty."</p> - -<p>I pointed with my stick at the three lonely ornaments on the solitary -table. "Then if you were to put the blue and white jar on the right of -the Buddha, instead of on the left," I asked, "the whole room would -feel the shock?"</p> - -<p>"Of course," answered my friend. "Can't even you see that?"</p> - -<p>I tried to see it, but I could not. I had only just arrived in Paris.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span></p> - -<p>There was another artist with a studio across the bridges, and his love -of art cost him much money and some severe trials. His suite of rooms -was all in blue, gray, white, and black. He said that if you looked at -things in the world properly, you would see that they were all gray, -blue, or black. He had painted a gray lady in a gray dress, with a blue -parrot on her shoulder. She had brown lips and grayish teeth. He was -very much disappointed in me when I told him that lips always looked -to me either pink or red. He explained by saying that my eyes were not -trained properly. I resented this, and told him that my eyes were as -good as his own, and that a recruiting officer had once tested them -with colored yarns and letters of the alphabet held up in inaccessible -corners, and had given me a higher mark for eyesight than for anything -else. He said it was not a question of colored yarns; and that while -I might satisfy a recruiting sergeant that I could distinguish an -ammunition train from a travelling circus, it did not render me a -critic on art matters. He pointed out that the eyes of the women in the -Caucasus who make rugs are trained to distinguish a hundred and eighty -different shades of colors that other eyes cannot see; and in time, he -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> -added, I would see that everything in real life looked flat and gray. -I took a red carnation out of my coat, and put it over the gray lady's -lips, and asked him whether he would call it gray or red, and he said -that was no argument.</p> - -<p>He suffered a great deal in his efforts to live up to his ideas, but -assured me that he was much happier than I in my ignorance of what -was beautiful. He explained, for instance, that he would like to put -up some of the photographs of his family that he had brought with him -around his room, but that he could not do it, because photographs were -so undecorative. So he kept them in his trunk. He also kept a green -cage full of doves because they were gray and white and decorative, -and in spite of the fact that they were a nuisance, and always flying -away, and being caught again by small boys, who brought them back, and -wanted a franc for so doing. He suffered, too, in his inability to -find the shade of blue for his chair covers that would harmonize with -the rest of his room. He covered the furniture five times, and never -successfully, and hence the cushions of his lounge and stiff chairs -were still as white as when they had last gone to the upholsterer's.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span></p> - -<p>These young men are friends of mine, and I am sure they will not -object to my describing their ateliers, of which they were very proud. -They believed in their own schools, and in their own ways of looking -at art, and no one could laugh or argue them out of it; consequently -they deserved credit for the faith that was in them. They are chiefly -interesting here as showing how a young man will develop in the -artistic atmosphere of Paris. It is only when he ceases to develop, -and sinks into the easy lethargy of a life of pleasure there, that he -becomes uninteresting.</p> - -<p>There was still another young man whom I knew there who can serve here -now as an example of the American who stops in Paris too long.</p> - -<p>I first met this artist at a garden-party, and he asked me if I did not -think it dull, and took me for a walk up to Montmartre, talking all the -way of what a great and beautiful mother Paris was to those who worked -there. His home was in Maine, and he let me know, without reflecting on -his native town, that he had been choked and cramped there, and that -his life had been the life of a Siberian exile. Here he found people -who could understand; here, the very statues and buildings gave him -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> -advice and encouragement; here were people who took him and his work -seriously, and who helped him on to fresh endeavors, and who made work -a delight.</p> - -<p>"I have one picture in the Salon," he said, flushing with proper pride -and pleasure, "and one has just gone to the World's Fair, and another -has received an honorable mention at Munich. That's pretty good for -my first year, is it not? And I'm only twenty-five years old now," he -added, with his eyes smiling into the future at the great things he -was to do. Nobody could resist the contagion of his enthusiasm and -earnestness of purpose.</p> - -<p>He was painting the portrait of some rich man's daughter at the time, -and her family took a patronizing interest in him, and said it was a -pity that he did not go out more into society and get commissions. -They asked me to tell him to be more careful about his dress, and to -suggest to him not to wear a high hat with a sack-coat. I told them to -leave him alone, and not to worry about his clothes, or to suggest his -running after people who had pretty daughters and money enough to have -them painted. These people would run after him soon enough, if he went -on as he had begun.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215-16]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"><a id="I_HAVE_ONE_PICTURE_IN_THE_SALON"></a> -<img src="images/illus_226.jpg" alt="" /> -<div class="topspace1"></div> -<div class="caption">"'I HAVE ONE PICTURE IN THE SALON'"</div> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p> - -<p>When I saw him on the boulevards the next summer he had to reintroduce -himself; he was very smartly dressed, in a cheap way, and he was -sipping silly little sweet juices in front of a café. He was flushed -and nervous and tired looking, and rattled off a list of the -fashionable people who were then in Paris as correctly as a <i>Galignani</i> -reporter could have done it.</p> - -<p>"How's art?" I asked.</p> - -<p>"Oh, very well," he replied. "I had a picture in the Salon last year, -and another was commended at Munich, and I had another one at the Fair. -That's pretty good for my first two years abroad, isn't it?"</p> - -<p>The next year I saw him several times with various young women in the -court-yard of the Grand Hôtel, than which there is probably no place in -all Paris less Parisian. They seemed to be models in street dress, and -were as easy to distinguish as a naval officer in citizen's clothes. He -stopped me once again before I left Paris, and invited me to his studio -to breakfast. I asked him what he had to show me there.</p> - -<p>"I have three pictures," he said, "that I did the first six months I -was here; they—"</p> - -<p>"Yes, I know," I interrupted. "One was at last year's Salon, and one at -the World's Fair, and the other took a prize at Munich. Is that all?"</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p> - -<p>He flushed a little, and laughed, and said, "Yes, that is all."</p> - -<p>"Do you get much inspiration here?" I asked, pointing to the colored -fountain and the piles of luggage and the ugly glass roof.</p> - -<p>"I don't understand you," he said.</p> - -<p>He put the card he had held out to me back in his case, and bowed -grandly, and walked back to the girl he had left at one of the tables, -and on my way out from the offices I saw him frowning into a glass -before him. The girl was pulling him by the sleeve, but he apparently -was not listening.</p> - -<p>The American artist who has taken Paris properly has only kind -words to speak of her. He is grateful for what she gave him, but -he is not unmindful of his mother-country at home. He may complain -when he returns of the mud in our streets, and the height of our -seventeen-story buildings, and the ugliness of our elevated roads—and -who does not? But if his own art is lasting and there is in his heart -much constancy, his work will grow and continue in spite of these -things, and will not droop from the lack of atmosphere about him. New -York and every great city owns a number of these men who have studied -<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> -in the French capital, and who speak of it as fondly as a man speaks -of his college and of the years he spent there. They help to leaven the -lump and to instruct others who have not had the chance that was given -them to see and to learn of all these beautiful things. These are the -men who made the Columbian Fair what it was, who taught their teacher -and the whole world a lesson in what was possible in architecture and -in statuary, in decoration and design. That was a much better and a -much finer thing for them to have done than to have dragged on in Paris -waiting for a ribbon or a medal. They are the best examples we have -of the Americans who made use of Paris, instead of permitting Paris -to make use of them. And because they did the one thing and avoided -the other, they are now helping and enlightening their own people and -a whole nation, and not selfishly waiting in a foreign capital for a -place on a jury for themselves.</p> - -<div class="topspace2"></div> -<p class="center">THE END</p> - -<hr class="full" /> - - - - -<div class="transnote"> -<p>Transcriber's Note:<br /></p> - -<p class="p2">1. Obvious punctuation and typographical errors repaired.</p> -</div> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of About Paris, by Richard Harding Davis - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ABOUT PARIS *** - -***** This file should be named 52706-h.htm or 52706-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/2/7/0/52706/ - -Produced by Clarity, Brian Wilsden and the Online -Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This -file was produced from images generously made available -by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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