Paris: With Pen and Pencil

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omitted. I make no pretensions to critical skill in reference to paintings or architecture, I only give the impressions of a man who loves both when they seem beautiful to him. I am no such art enthusiast that I love to w

on of the Louvre, but record the th

hough certain days are specified for the public to enter, and upon others th

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nter to me from the fact that no crowd of visitors was present, and it was a novel sight to behold the young artists of Paris engaged in their work. I have mentioned in another part of this book that no pictures of living artists are allowed a place in the Louvre. The Luxembourg Gallery is the place for all

ough many of the finest pictures were taken away by the allies in 1815, yet it is still one of the largest collections in the world. To stand in this room and gaze at leisure upon some of the finest paintings in the world, was a delight I had never before felt. It is indescribable, yet it was none the less real. I could not, as my friend the artist did, point out the peculiar excellences of each, and the faults, nor compare one with another critically, but I could feel the same thrill of pleasure which he did, and I found that the picture which he declared to be the finest, was that before which I delayed longest. It certainly is no more necessary for a man to be an art-critic to love pictures, than it is to be a botanist to love flowers. I admit that one

ly cups. I was much pleased with an Arabian basin of splendid workmanship. There were also articles of toilette gi

he southern part of Italy and Etruria, Herculaneum and Pompeii, are all represented in the collection. One striking feature of this hall is, that the ceilings are covered with paint

l on which are written the names of the heroes of France-the warriors, statesmen, and great writers. There are in this apartment many exquisite vases, and among them four

xecuted not upon canvas, but upon the hard ceiling. One of the paintings represents Egypt as being saved by Joseph-another, and one of the finest of the ce

inters. Many of them are unquestionably fine specimens of art, but as they were principally portraits

cess the suit of armor which Henry II. wore on the day of his death, is shown to the stranger. It was in the year 1559. The day was very hot and the king let down his helmet

specimens of the works of the Spanish m

paintings, and a bible once owned by Cardinal Ximenes, now valued at twenty-five thousand francs. Before Louis Phillippe died, he claimed this collection as

. It contains fourteen rooms, all well-filled with curiosities. Among them I noticed some excellent models of brigs, ships, men-of-war, Chinese junks, etc. There

contains the finest specimens of French sculpture, as well as the master-pieces of foreign sculptors. In the first room there is one of Michael Angelo's

The colonnade is composed of twenty-eight Corinthian columns. There is a gallery behind them in which you may promenade, looking out upon the streets belo

nger will find that he has completed the circuit. The gateways are fine and richly ornamented with scul

aced the Royal Library in it. The present building was begun by Francis I., in 1528, and the southern side of the Louvre as it now exists was his work. Henry II., Hen

oor victims of the massacre of St. Bartholomew. In July, 1830, the people made a terrible attack

frequent it, yet I must, to be honest, confess that many of its pictures are too sensual and licentious to suit my taste. A

lush. I now allude to the most licentious pictures in the collection. I saw French women stop and criticise pictures which I could not look at, in their presence, at least-pictures which exhibited the human form in a state of nudity, and at the same time expressed the most shameful sensuality and portr

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lass is great in numbers, from the aristocratic Jardin d' Hiver down to La Chaumiere. In the first you meet the fashionable and rich, and

e Seine, outside the walls of the garden, for the whole grove looks exactly as if it had been sheared like a hedge. The branches have been so cared for and trimmed, that the side presented is perfectly even and a mass of green. Still this, though curious, is not beautiful. Trees need to grow naturally for that. Art cannot surpass nature in this way. The grove is full of beauty. Walks run every way over it, and the trees are so trimmed and cultivated that beautiful arches are formed over nearly all the paths. This constitutes the forest, one of the most singular in Paris, and it is a novel sight to the stran

n of statuary. There are some magnificent groups, but again others are disgusting in their sensuality. There are several pieces of statuary scattered among the trees of the grove. One of them, a statue of Venus, is an exquisite conception, and so very pure that I wondered it should have found a place

among its cool recesses sit and talk the hours away. When the weather is colder and sunshine is desirab

ve spoken of with some part

ofed hot-houses. The public are admitted by the payment of o

most dazzling scenes in the night that ever eye beheld. I well remember that on my first visit to Paris, I wandered out of my hotel and saw the Champs Elysees in the evening. The sight was almost overpowering. The whole place was a scene of splendor. The trees and grounds were one blaze of lamps. Scattered over it were little theaters, concerts in the open air, every kind of show, coffee-houses, restaurants, and every kind of amusement. The concerts charge nothing. But if you enter within the ring you pay for a seat a trifle, and also for your refreshments. Almost everyone who entered, (it was all in the

revolutionary times, much neglected, but it continued to prosper through everything, unlike many of the other gardens. It consists of a botanical garden with several large hot-houses and green-houses attached; several galleries with scientific natural coll

of Paris and French institutions and public buildings. If possible, that which the people wish to see they can see for nothing. Painting-galleries, gardens, churches, and lectures are open to the crowd. This is in striking contr

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l further on, are new geological, mineralogical, and botanical galleries, all warmed in winter and summer, if necessary, by hot water, and capable of receiving the tallest tropical plants. Between the conservatories there are two beautiful mounds-one a labyrinth, and the other a collection of fir-trees. The labyrinth is one of the best and most beautiful I ever saw, far surpassing the celebrated one at Hampton court. The mound is of a conical shape, and is completely covered by winding and intricate paths. The whole is surmounted by a splendid cedar of Lebanon. On the summit there are also seats covered with a bronze pavilion, and taking one of them the visitor can look over all the garden portions of Paris, and several of the villages near Paris. It is an exquisite view, and I know of no greater pleasure in

e wandering over a forest and meeting the animals in their native wilds. After passing beneath the boughs of dark trees, it is startling to look up and see a Bengal tiger within a few feet of you, though he is cage

le tribe, and many marine animals; in the next, are skeletons of the human species from every part of the globe. A suite of eleven rooms is taken up for the anatomy of birds, fishes, and reptiles. Several rooms are taken up with the exhibition of the muscles of all animals, including man. Others exhibit arms and legs

in length, and fronts the east end of the garden. The ot

ollection. It contains six thousand drawings, thirty thousand volumes, and fi

s illustrated, without them. This is one reason why Parisians are universally intelligent, even to the artisans. The poorer classes can scarcely help understanding botany, anatomy, zoology, an

URG PALACE

it is now occupied by the Senate. It is a fine old building, and the impression it makes upon the stranger is

of women and children. Troops of the latter, beautiful as the sky which covers them, come to this place and play the long hours of a summer afternoon away, with their mothers and nurses following them about or sitting quietly under the shade of the trees, engaged in the double employment of knitt

PALAIS DU

children, to listen to the delicious music and the gathering in itself is a sight worth seeing. The great majority promenade slowly around the band, some stand still, and a very few rent chairs and sit. Nearly all the men smoke, and occasionally a woman does the same. But the flavor of

least ashamed to make such a public display of their vices. The women present might be divided into four classes; the gay but not vicious, students' mistresses, ordinary strumpets, and the poor but virtuous, by far the majority belonging to those clas

Four nude marble boys support a central basin, from which the water pours. The ground directly in front of the palace is lower than it is on either side, and a row of fine orange trees extends out on either hand from the palace, and flowers

but now nothing is allowed a place in the Luxembourg gallery but pictures of living artists. As soon as the artist dies, his pictures which hang in th

tious. I can put up with anything not positively indecent for the sake of art, but I cannot put up with French pictures. Their nakedness is too disgusting, for it is not relieved by sentiment, unless of the basest kind. This remark of

his terrible agony, while one of the attendants of the boat with an oar endeavors to beat him back. On the other side a ghostly wretch has fastened his long teeth into a fellow-sufferer. The shades of light and darkness are so mingled that the effect is very striking. It is the most horrible picture I ever looked at, and I would much rather sleep in Madame Tassaud's chamber of horrors, than look at it again. In the next apartment there is a picture of Christ, which struck me as the best I ever looked at. The divine sweetness of the human and the grandeur of the God were unit

urg, and in 1612 Marie de Medicis bought it for ninety thousand francs, and then commenced the present palace. During the first year of the revolution it was used for a prison; then for an assembly-room for the consuls; still later

in Paris for seventeen years. Taking his arm we fell into the current of people, and soon met a couple of quite pretty looking ladies arm-in-arm. They were dressed e

men, and among the students were reckoned as fine specimens of the class. Four happy years passed away, when one morning the poor girls awoke to a sad change. The collegiate course was through, and the young collegians were going back to their fathers' mansions in the provinces. Of course the grisettes could not be taken with them, and the ties of years were suddenly and rudely to be snapped asunder. At first they were frantic in their grief. When they entered upon their peculiar relations with the students, they well knew that this must be the final consummation, but then it looked a great way off. That they really loved the young men, no one can doubt. It would not be strange for a little shop-girl to even adore a talented university student, however insignificant he might be to other people. To her he is everything that is great and noble. These girls knew well that they were not wives, but mistresses, yet when the day of separation came, it was like

ot sketch a sadder picture. To the stranger the social system of France may seem very pleasant and gay, but it is in reality a sorrowful one. While the mistress is y

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the Rue Mouffetard. The walk is quite a long one from the Garden of Plants, but the wonders of art and in

intings of the highest order are not before you. Yet all the shades and expressions are wrought into the web, by the hands of the skillful workmen. I visited six of the work-rooms, where the men were manufacturing the tapestries. It was a wonderful sight. The workman stands immediately behind the web, and a basket containing woolen yarn, or a thread of every variety or color, is at his feet. The design, usually an exquisite picture, stands behin

t, in the manufactory, and as men of great skill and refined tastes are required, a good rate of wages is paid. The workmen seemed to be very intelligent, and were dressed, many of them, at least, like gentlemen. The tapestries, carpets, &c. &c., which are manufactured at this place, are intended for the emperor, the palaces, and for other monarchs to whom they may be presented in the name of the French

red here. It often takes five and ten years to make a carpet, and the cost is as high sometimes as thirty thousand dollars. None are

est pictures in Europe, and when one reflects that each tint is of wool, worked into the web by the careful fingers of the workman, that every line, every muscle, is wrought as distinctly a

hile, I entered a restaurant and ordered dinner, as I could scarcely wait to return to the hotel, and in Paris, where a bargain is mad

t the hotel. It was so poor that a little while after, I tried a cup of coffee and a r

f all persons who patronized the restaurant. A multitude of ladies and gentlemen were ranged under the tr

ost entirely excluded by the trees and shrubs, in gardens attached to a restaurant. I had a capital