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Paris As It Was and As It Is

F >> Francis W. Blagdon >> Paris As It Was and As It Is




Here then is an additional instance of the noble energy manifested by
women during the most calamitous periods of the revolution.
Unappalled by the terrors of captivity or of death, their sensibility
impelled them to brave the ferocity of sanguinary tyrants, in order
to administer hope or comfort to a parent, a husband, a relation, or
a friend. Some of these heroines, though in the bloom of youth, not
content with sympathizing in the misfortunes of others, gave
themselves up as a voluntary sacrifice, rather than survive those
whose preservation they valued more than their own existence. Rome
may vaunt her Porcia, or her Cornelia; but the page of her history
can produce no such exaltation of the female character as has been
exhibited within the last ten years by French women. Examples, like
these, of generosity, fortitude, and greatness of soul, deserve to be
recorded to the end of time, as they do honour to the sex, and to
human nature.

If, according to the scale of Parisian enjoyment, a ball or rout is
dull and insipid, _à moins qu'on ne manque d'y être étouffé_, how
supreme must have been the satisfaction of the company at the _Salon
des Étrangers!_ The number present, estimated at seven or eight
hundred, occasioned so great a crowd that it was by no means an easy
enterprise to pass from one room to another. Of course, there was no
opportunity of viewing the apartments to advantage; however, I saw
enough of them to remark that they formed a suite elegantly
decorated. Some persons amused themselves with cards, though the
great majority neither played nor danced, but were occupied in
conversing with their acquaintance, There was no regular supper, but
substantial refreshments of every kind were to be procured on paying;
and other smaller ones, _gratis_.

From the tickets not being transferable, and the bearer's name being
inserted in each of them, the company was far more select than it
could have been without such a restriction. Most of the foreign
ambassadors, envoys, &c. were present, and many of the most
distinguished persons of both sexes in Paris. More regard was paid to
the etiquette of dress at this ball than, I have ever witnessed here
on similar occasions, The ladies, as I have before said, were all _en
grande toilette_; and the men with cocked hats, and in shoes and
stockings, which is a novelty here, I assure you, as they mostly
appear in boots. But what surprised me not a little, was to observe
several inconsiderate French youths wear black cockades. Should they
persist in such an absurdity, I shall be still more surprised, if
they escape admonition from the police. This fashion seemed to be the
_ignis fatuus_ of the moment; it was never before exhibited in
public, and probably will be but of ephemeral duration.

I cannot take leave of this ball without communicating to you a
circumstance which occurred there, and which, from the extravagant
credulity it exhibits in regard to the effects of sympathy, may
possibly amuse you for a moment.

A widow, about twenty years of age, more to be admired for the
symmetry of her person, than for the beauty of her features, had,
according to the prevailing custom, intrusted her pocket-handkerchief
to the care of a male friend, a gentlemanlike young Frenchman of my
acquaintance. After dancing, the lady finding herself rather warm,
applied for her handkerchief, with which she wiped her forehead, and
returned it to the gentleman, who again put it into his pocket. He
then danced, but not with her; and, being also heated, he, by
mistake, took out the lady's handkerchief, which, when applied to his
face, produced, as he fancied, such an effect on him, that, though he
had previously regarded her with a sort of indifference, from that
moment she engaged all his attention, and he was unable to direct his
eyes, or even his thoughts, to any other object.

Some philosophers, as is well known, have maintained that from all
bodies there is an emanation of corpuscles, which, coming into
contact with our organs, make on the brain an impression, either more
or less sympathetic, or of a directly-opposite nature. They tell you,
for instance, that of two women whom you behold for the first time,
the one the least handsome will sometimes please you most, because
there exists a greater _sympathy_ between you and her, than between
you and the more beautiful woman. Without attempting to refute this
absurd doctrine of corpuscles, I shall only observe that this young
Frenchman is completely smitten, and declares that no woman in the
world can be compared to the widow.

This circumstance reminds me of a still more remarkable effect,
ascribed to a similar cause, experienced by Henry III of France. The
marriage of the king of Navarre, afterwards Henry IV, with Marguerite
de Valois, and that of the Prince de Condé with Marie de Cleves, was
celebrated at the Louvre on the 10th of August, 1572. Marie de
Cleves, then a most lovely creature only sixteen, after dancing much,
finding herself incommoded by the heat of the ball-room, retired to a
private apartment, where one of the waiting-women of the
queen-dowager, seeing her in a profuse perspiration, persuaded her
to make an entire change of dress. She had scarcely left the room
when the Duke of Anjou, afterwards Henry III, who had also danced a
great deal, entered it to adjust his hair, and, being overheated,
wiped his face with the first thing that he found, which happened
to be the shift she had just taken off. Returning to the ball, he
fixed his eyes on her, and contemplated her with as much surprise
as if he had never before beheld her. His emotion, his transports,
and the attention which he began to pay her, were the more
extraordinary, as during the preceding week, which she had passed
at court, he appeared indifferent to those very charms which now
made on his heart an impression so warm and so lasting. In short,
he became insensible to every thing that did not relate to his
passion.

His election to the crown of Poland, say historians, far from
flattering him, appeared to him an exile, and when he was in that
kingdom, absence, far from diminishing his love, seemed to increase
it. Whenever he addressed the princess, he pricked his finger, and
never wrote to her but with his blood. No sooner was he informed of
the death of Charles IX, than he dispatched a courier to assure her
that she should soon be queen of France; and, on his return, his
thoughts were solely bent on dissolving her marriage with the Prince
de Condé, which, on account of the latter being a protestant, he
expected to accomplish. But this determination proved fatal to the
princess; for, shortly after, she was attacked by a violent illness,
attributed to poison, which carried her off in the flower of her age.

No words can paint Henry's despair at this event: he passed several
days in tears and groans; and when he was at length obliged to shew
himself in public, he appeared in deep mourning, and entirely covered
with emblems of death, even to his very shoe-strings.

The Princess de Condé had been dead upwards of four months, and
buried in the abbey-church of _St. Germain-des-Prés_, when Henry, on
entering the abbey, whither he was invited to a grand entertainment
given there by Cardinal de Bourbon, felt such violent tremblings at
his heart, that not being able to endure their continuance, he was
going away; but they ceased all at once, on the body of the princess
being removed from its tomb, and conveyed elsewhere for that evening.

His mother, Catherine de Medicis, by prevailing on him to marry
Louise de Vaudemont, one of the most beautiful women in Europe, hoped
that she would make him forget her whom death had snatched from him,
and he himself perhaps indulged a similar hope, but the memoirs of
those times concur in asserting that the image of the Princess de
Condé was never effaced from his heart, and that, to the day of his
assassination, which did not happen till seventeen years after,
whatever efforts he made to subdue his passion, were wholly
unavailing.

Sympathy is a sentiment to which few persons attach the same ideas.
It may be classed in three distinct species. The first seems to have
an immediate connexion with the senses; the second, with the heart;
and the third, with the mind. Although it cannot be denied that the
preference we bestow on this or that woman is the result of the one
or the other of these, or even of all three together; yet the
analysis of our attachments is, in some cases, so difficult as to
defy the investigation of reason. For, as the old song says, some
lovers

Will "whimper and whine
For lilies and roses,
For eyes, lips, and noses,
Or a _tip of an ear_."

To cut the matter short, I think it fully proved, by the example of
some of the wisest men, that the affections are often captivated by
something indefinable, or, in the words of Corneille,

_"Par un je ne sais quoi--qu'on ne peut exprimer."_



LETTER XXXIII.

_Paris, December 14, 1801._

I have already spoken to you of the _Pont Neuf_. To the east of it,
as you will see by the Plan of Paris, the small islands in the middle
of the Seine are connected to its banks by several bridges; while to
the west, there are two only, though a third is projected, and,
previously to the late rise of the river, workmen were employed in
driving piles for the foundation. I shall now describe to you these
two bridges, beginning with the

PONT NATIONAL.

Before the revolution, this bridge bore the appellation of _Pont
Royal_, from its having been built by Lewis XIV, and the expenses
defrayed but of his privy purse, to supply the place of one of wood,
situated opposite to the _Louvre_, which was carried away by the ice
in 1684. It is reckoned one of the most solid bridges in Paris, and,
till the existence of the _Pont de la Concorde_, was the only one
built across the river, without taking advantage of the islands
above-mentioned. It stands on four piles, forming with the two
abutments five elliptical arches of a handsome sweep. The span of the
centre arch is seventy-two feet, that of the two adjoining sixty-six,
and that of the two outer ones sixty. On each side is a raised
pavement for foot-passengers, in the middle of which I should imagine
that there is breadth sufficient to admit of four carriages passing
abreast.

GABRIEL had undertaken this bridge from the designs of MANSARD. The
work was already in a state of forwardness, when, at a pile on the
side of the _Faubourg St. Germain_, the former could not succeed in
excluding the water. A Jacobin, not a clubist, but a Jacobin friar,
one FRANÇOIS ROMAIN, who had just finished the bridge of Strasburg,
was sent for by the king to the assistance of the French architects,
and had the honour of completing the rest of the work.

In the time of Henry IV, there was no bridge over this part of the
river, which he used frequently to cross in the first boat that
presented itself. Returning one day from the chace, in a plain
hunting dress, and having with him only two or three gentlemen, he
stepped into a skiff to be carried over from the _Faubourg St.
Germain_ to the _Tuileries_. Perceiving that he was not known by the
waterman, he asked him what people said of the peace, meaning the
peace of Vervins, which was just concluded. "Faith! I don't
understand this sort of peace," answered the waterman; "there are
taxes on every thing, and even, on this miserable boat, with which I
have a hard matter to earn my bread."--"And does not the king,"
continued Henry, "intend to lighten these taxes?"--"The king is a
good kind of man enough," replied the waterman; "but he has a lady
who must needs have so many fine gowns and gewgaws; and 'tis we who
pay for all that. One would not think so much of it either, if she
kept to him only; but, they say, she suffers herself to be kissed by
many others."

Henry IV was so amused by this conversation, that, the next morning,
he sent for the waterman, and made him repeat, word for word, before
the Dutchess of Beaufort, all that he had said the preceding evening.
The Dutchess, much irritated, was for having him hanged. "You are a
foolish woman," said Henry; "this is a poor devil whom poverty has
put out of humour. In future, he shall pay no tax for his boat, and I
am convinced that he will then sing every day, _Vive Henri! Vive
Gabrielle!_"

The north end of the _Pont National_ faces the wing of the palace of
the _Tuileries_ distinguished by the name of the _Pavillon de Flore_.
From the middle of this bridge, you see the city in a striking point
of view. Here, the celebrated Marshal de Catinat used frequently to
make it part of his morning's amusement to take his stand, and, while
he enjoyed the beauty of the prospect, he opened his purse to the
indigent as they passed. That philosophic warrior often declared that
he never beheld any thing equal to the _coup d'oeil_ from this
station. In fact, on the one side, you discover the superb gallery of
the _Louvre_, extending from that palace to the _Tuileries_; and, on
the other, the _Palais du Corps Législatif_, and a long range of
other magnificent buildings, skirting the quays on each bank of the
river.

These quays, nearly to the number of thirty, are faced with stone,
and crowned with parapets breast high, which, in eighteen or twenty
different spots, open to form watering-places. The Seine, being thus
confined within its bed, the eye is never displeased here by the
sight of muddy banks like those of the Thames, or the nose offended
by the smell arising from the filth which the common sewers convey to
the river.

The galiot of _St. Cloud_ regularly takes its departure from the
_Pont National_. Formerly, on Sundays and holidays, it used to be a
very entertaining sight to contemplate the Paris cocknies crowding
into this vessel. Those who arrived too late, jumped into the first
empty boat, which frequently overset, either through the
unskilfulness of the waterman, or from being overloaded. In
consequence of such accidents, the boats of the Seine are prohibited
from taking more than sixteen passengers.

Not many years ago, an excursion to _St. Cloud_ by water, was an
important voyage to some of the Parisians, as you may see by
referring to the picture which has been drawn of it, under the title
of "_Voyage de Paris à Saint Cloud par mer, et le retour de Saint
Cloud à Paris par terre_."

Following the banks of the Seine, towards the west, we next come to
the

PONT DE LA CONCORDE.

This bridge, which had long been wished for and projected, was begun
in 1787, and finished in 1790. Its southern extremity stands opposite
to the _Palais du Corps Législatif_; while that of the north faces
the _Place de la Concorde_, whence it not only derives its present
appellation, but has always experienced every change of name to which
the former has been subject.

The lightness of its apearance is less striking to those who have
seen the _Pont de Neuilly_, in which PERRONET, Engineer of bridges
and highways, has, by the construction of arches nearly flat, so
eminently distinguished himself. He is likewise the architect of this
bridge, which is four hundred and sixty-two feet in length by
forty-eight in breadth. Like the _Pont National_, it consists of
five elliptical arches. The span of the centre arch is ninety-six
feet; that of the collateral ones, eighty-seven; and that of the
two others near the abutments, sixty-eight. Under one of the latter
is a tracking-path for the facility of navigation.

The piles, which are each nine feet in thickness, have, on their
starlings, a species of pillars that support a cornice five feet and
a half high. Perpendicularly to these pillars are to rise as many
pyramids, which are to be crowned by a parapet with a balustrade: in
all these, it is intended to display no less elegance of workmanship
than the arches present boldness of design and correctness of
execution.

On crossing these bridges, it has often occurred to me, how much the
Parisians must envy us the situation of our metropolis. If the Seine,
like the Thames, presented the advantage of braving the moderate
winds, and of conveying, by regular tides, the productions of the
four quarters of the globe to the quays which skirt its banks, what
an acquisition would it not be to their puny commerce! What a
gratification to their pride to see ships discharging their rich
cargoes at the foot of the _Pont de la Concorde_! The project of the
canal of Languedoc must, at first, have apparently presented greater
obstacles; yet, by talents and perseverance, these were overcome at a
time when the science of machinery of every description was far less
understood than it is at the present moment.

It appears from the account of Abbon, a monk of the abbey of St.
Germain-des-Prés, that, in the year 885, the Swedes, Danes, and
Normans, to the number of forty-five thousand men, came to lay siege
to Paris, with seven hundred sail of ships, exclusively of the
smaller craft, so that, according to this historian, who was an
eye-witness of the fact, the river Seine was covered with their
vessels for the space of two leagues.

Julius Cæsar tells us, in the third book of his Commentaries, that,
at the time of his conquest of the Gauls, in the course of one
winter, he constructed six hundred vessels of the wood which then
grew in the environs of Paris; and that, in the following spring, he
embarked his army, horse and foot, provisions and baggage, in these
vessels, descended the Seine, reached Dieppe, and thence crossed over
to England, of which, he says, he made a conquest.

About forty years ago, the scheme engaged much attention. In 1759,
the Academy of Sciences, Belles-Lettres, and Arts of Rouen, proposed
the following as a prize-question: "Was not the Seine formerly
navigable for vessels of greater burden than those which are now
employed on it; and are there not means to restore to it, or to
procure it, that advantage?" In 1760, the prize was adjourned; the
memoirs presented not being to the satisfaction of the Academy. In
1761, the new candidates having no better success, the subject was
changed.

However, notwithstanding this discouragement, we find that, on the
1st of August, 1766, Captain Berthelot actually reached the _Pont
Royal_ in a vessel of one hundred and sixty tons burden. When, on the
22d of the same month, he departed thence, loaded with merchandise,
the depth of the water in the Seine was twenty-five feet, and it was
nearly the same when he ascended the river. This vessel was seven
days on her passage from Rouen to Paris: but a year or two ago, four
days only were employed in performing the same voyage by another
vessel, named the _Saumon_.

Engineers have ever judged the scheme practicable, and the estimate
of the necessary works, signed by several skilful surveyors, was
submitted to the ministry of that day. The amount was forty-six
millions of livres (circa £1,916,600 sterling).

But what can compensate for the absence of the tide? This is an
advantage, which, in a commercial point of view, must ever insure to
London a decided superiority over Paris. Were the Seine to-morrow
rendered navigable for vessels of large burden, they must, for a
considerable distance, be tracked against the stream, or wait till a
succession of favourable winds had enabled them to stem it through
its various windings; whereas nothing can be more favourable to
navigation than the position of London. It has every advantage of a
sea-port without its dangers. Had it been placed lower down, that is,
nearer to the mouth of the Thames, it would have been more exposed to
the insults of a foreign enemy, and also to the insalubrious
exhalations of the swampy marshes. Had it been situated higher up the
river, it would have been inaccessible to ships of large burden.

Thus, by no effort of human invention or industry can Paris rival
London in commerce, even on the supposition that France could produce
as many men possessed of the capital and spirit of enterprise, for
which our British merchants are at present unrivalled.

Yet, may not this pre-eminence in commercial prosperity lead to our
destruction, as the gigantic conquests of France may also pave the
way to her ruin? Alas! the experience of ages proves this melancholy
truth, which has also been repeated by Raynal: "Commerce," says that
celebrated writer, "in the end finds its ruin in the riches which it
accumulates, as every powerful state lays the foundation of its own
destruction in extending its conquests."



LETTER XXXIV.

_Paris, December 16, 1801._

No part of the engagement into which I have entered with you, so
fully convinces me of my want of reflection, and shews that my zeal,
at the time, got the better of my judgment, as my promising you some
ideas on

FRENCH LITERATURE.

It would, I now perceive, be necessary to have inhabited France for
several years past, with the determined intention of observing this
great empire solely in that single point of view, to be able to keep
my word in a manner worthy of you and of the subject. It would be
necessary to write a large volume of rational things; and, in a
letter, I ought to relate them with conciseness and truth; draw
sketches with rapidity, but clearness; in short, express positive
results, without deviating from abstractions and generalities, since
you require from me, on this subject, no more than a letter, and not
a book.

I come to the point. I shall consider literature in a double sense.
First, the thing in itself; then, its connexions with the sciences,
and the men who govern. In England, it has been thought, or at least
insinuated in some of the papers and periodical publications, that
literature had been totally annihilated in France within the last
twelve years. This is a mistake: its aberrations have been taken for
eclipses. It has followed the revolution through all its phases.

Under the Constituent Assembly, the literary genius of the French was
turned towards politics and eloquence. There remain valuable
monuments of the fleeting existence of that assembly. MIRABEAU,
BARNAVE, CAZALÈS, MAURY, and thirty other capital writers, attest
this truth. Nothing fell from their lips or their pen that did not
hear at the same time the stamp of philosophy and literature.

Under the Legislative Assembly and the Convention, the establishments
of the empire of letters were little respected. Literati themselves
became victims of the political collisions of their country; but
literature was constantly cultivated under several forms. Those who
shewed themselves its oppressors, were obliged to assume the refined
language which it alone can supply, and that, at the very time when
they declared war against it.

Under the Directorial government, France, overwhelmed by the weight
of her long misfortunes, first cast her eye on the construction of a
new edifice, dedicated to human knowledge in general, under the name
of _National Institute_. Literature there collected its remains, and
those who cultivate it, as members of this establishment, are not
unworthy of their office. Such as are not admitted into this society,
notwithstanding all the claims the most generally acknowledged, owe
this omission to moral or political causes only, on which I could not
touch, without occupying myself about persons rather than the thing
itself.

The French revolution, which has levelled so many gigantic fortunes,
is said (by its advocates) to have really spread a degree of comfort
among the inferior classes. Indeed, if there are in France, as may be
supposed, much fewer persons rolling in riches, there are, I am
informed, much fewer pining in indigence. This observation, admitting
it to be strictly true, may, with great propriety, be applied to
French literature. France no longer has a VOLTAIRE or a ROUSSEAU, to
wield the sceptre of the literary world; but she has a number of
literary degrees of public interest or simple amusement, which are
perfectly well filled. Few literati are without employ, and still
fewer are beneath their functions. The place of member of the
Institute is a real public function remunerated by the State. It is
to this cause, and to a few others, which will occur to you
beforehand, that we must attribute the character of gravity which
literature begins to assume in this country. The prudery of the
school of DORAT would here be hissed. Here, people will not quarrel
with the Graces; but they will no longer make any sacrifice to them
at the expense of common sense.

In this literary republic still exist, as you may well conceive, the
same passions, the same littleness, the same intrigues as formerly
for arriving at celebrity, and keeping in that envied sphere; but all
this makes much less noise at the present juncture. It is this which
has induced the belief that literature had diminished its intensity,
both in form and object: that is another mistake. The French literati
are mostly a noisy class, who love to make themselves conspicuous,
even by the clashing of their pretensions; but, to the great regret
of several among them, people in this country now attach a rational
importance only to their quarrels, which formerly attracted universal
attention. The revolution has been so great an event; it has
overthrown such great interests; that no one here can any longer
flatter himself with exciting a personal interest, except by
performing the greatest actions.

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