PARISPARIS , the capital of France, the seat of the legislature and of the administrative departments, is situated on both banks of the Seine, in 48° 50' 14" N. lat. and 2° 20' 14" E. long. (Observatory). It occupies the centre of the so-called Paris basin, which is traversed by the Seine from south-east to north-west, open towards the west, and surrounded by a line of Jurassic heights. The granitic substratum is covered by Jurassic, Cretaceous, and Tertiary, formations; and at several points building materials—freestone, limestone, or gypsum—have been laid bare by erosion. It is partly, indeed, to the existence of such quarries in its neighbourhood, or on the very ground on which it stands, that the city owes its vast development. The mean elevation of the Seine valley at Paris is from 100 to 130 feet. On the north bank rise the heights of Charonne, of the Buttes-Chaumont (404 feet), of La Villette, and of Montmartre (345 feet); on the left or south bank the Butte-aux-Cailles, and beyond the valley of the Bièvre the hill of Ste Geneviève and Montrouge. Between those lines of heights, the Seine flows from east to west, encircling the island of St Louis, the île de la Cité, and lower down the île aux Cygnes. The Bièvre or Gobelins stream flows for some distance in an open channel on the left side of the river, and then disappears in a sewer. On the right side the brook which used to run from Ménilmontant to Chaillot past the site now occupied by the opera, has at length been dammed by masonry, driven into the sewers, or lost underground.
Climate.— Paris enjoys a fairly uniform climate, subject, however, to frequent changes at all seasons of the year. The mean temperature, calculated by Μ. Flammarion from observations extending over seventy-two years (1804-76), is 51 0, 4 Fahr. The highest reading observed (in July 1874, and again in July 1881) is 101° Fahr., the lowest (in December 1879) is - 14°. The monthly means for the sixty-four years 1806-1870 are—January 36 o, 3, February 40 o, l, March 43 o, 5, April 50° ∙2,, May 57 0, 6, June 63°O, July 66° O, August 65° '3, September 60 o- 3, October 52° ∙3, November 43° ∙7, December 38 o, 7. The river freezes when the temperature falls below 18°. It was frozen in nearly its whole extent from Bercy to Auteuil in the winters of 1819-20, 1829-30, 1879-80; and partially in the winters of 1840-41,1853-54,1857-58, and 1870-71. Rain falls, on an average, on 143 days, of which 38 are in winter, 35 in spring, 34 in summer, and 36 in autumn,—the average quantity in a year being 19’68 inches. The driest month is February, the rainiest July,—the rainfall for these months being respectively 0’87 inch and 2Ί5 inches. There are 12 days on which snow falls, 184 on which the sky is covered, 40 with fogs, and 9 with hail. The following figures show the directions of the winds N. 38 days, N.E. 41, E. 24, S.E. 26, S. 53, S.W. 70, W. 67, and N.W. 36, with 10 calm days. Thunderstorms average 13 per annum,—ranging from 6 (in 1823) to 25 τ(J,811). There is comparatively little variation in the barometer. Its mean height is 29’763 inches at a height of 216 feet above sea-level. On the whole the climate is healthy and agreeable, its variations, though frequent, being comparatively slight.
Boundaries.— Since January 1, 1860, the boundaries of Paris have extended to the fortifications built in accordance with the scheme of 1840. The total area thus included is 30 square miles, of which 6 square miles are occupied by the public streets, 458 acres by squares and gardens, 642J acres by the river and canals, and 224 acres by cemeteries. The line of fortifications measures 22⅜ miles. On the right side of the river it presents 68 fronts, and on the left 26, each consisting of a curtain connecting two demi bastions. It is pierced by 56 gates, 9 openings for railways, and 2 openings for the Ourcq and the St Denis canals. Outside of this enceinte are a number of detached forts arranged in two main lines. First come the forts erected previous to 1870 at St Denis, Aubervilliers, Romainville, Noisy, Rosny, Nogent, Vincennes, Ivry, Bicêtre, Montrouge, Vanves, Issy, and Mont Valérien; and next the new forts of Palaiseau, Villeras, Buc, and St Cyr, which protect Versailles, and Marly, St Jamme, and Aigremont, which surround St Germain. On the right side of the Seine are Forts Cormeilles, Domont, Montlignon, Montmorency, Écouen, Stains, Vaujours, Villiers, and Villeneuve St Georges. Between the two lines the Chatillon fort occupies the site of the German batteries which bombarded Paris in 1871.
Boulevards, Streets, and Squares.— The line of the Boulevards from the Madeleine to the Bastille, nearly 3 miles, is one of the busiest and most fashionable in the world; here are the Porte St Denis, the Porte St Martin, most of the large cafés, the Opera-House, and the various theatres distinguished as Le Vaudeville, Les Nouveautés, L’Opéra Comique, Les Variétés, Le Gymnase, La Porte St Martin, La Renaissance, L’Ambigu, Les Folies Dramatiques, Dejazet, Beaumarchais, and Le Cirque. Traffic passes east and west from the Bastille to the Place de la Concorde by Rue St Antoine and Rue de Rivoli. North and south the line of the Boulevard de Strasbourg and the Boulevard de Sébastopol stretches from the station of the Eastern Railway (Gare de ΓEst) to the Seine, and is continued by the Boulevard du Palais in the Cité and the Boulevard St Michel, on the left side of the river, as far as the observatory. The total length is not less than 2∣ miles. On the right side of the river may also be mentioned the Rue Royale; the Malesherbes and Haussmann boulevards, which cross the most elegant quarters of the town; the Avenue de l’Opéra, which unites the Place du Palais Royal with the Place de l’Opéra, and terminates at the main entrance of the Opera; the Rue de la Paix, Rue Auber, and Rue 4 Septembre, which also terminate in the Place de l’Opéra, and are remarkable for their magnificent shops; Rue Lafayette, one of the longest thoroughfares of Paris, traversing the town from the Opera to the end of La Villette; the Boulevard Magenta, from Montmartre to the Place de la République; Rue de Turbigo, from this place to the Halles Centrales. The older streets known as Richelieu, Vivienne, De la Chaussée d’Antin, St Honoré, Montmartre, St Denis, St Martin, are full of shops and offices. The Place de I’Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile is the centre of twelve avenues stretching out from it like the spokes of a wheel, but not all as yet lined with buildings. On the left side of the river the main thoroughfare is the Boulevard St Germain, from Pont Sully to the Pont de la Concorde, which passes in front of the school of medicine, the Place St Germain des Prés, and the war office. The Rue de Rennes, which extends from St Germain des Prés to the Mont Parnasse Railway station, is to be prolonged as far as the Seine.
The finest of the public squares in Paris are Place de la Concorde; Place de l’Étoile; Place Vendôme, with the column and statue of Napoleon I.; Place du Carrousel, with a small triumphal arch commemorative of the campaign of 1806, which formed the entrance to the palace of the Tuileries, now demolished; Place des Victoires, with the equestrian statue of Louis XIV.; Place des Vosges, formerly Place Royale, with that of Louis XIII.; Place de la Bastille, with the column commemorative of the Revolution of July 1830; Place de la République, with the Republic statue; Place de l’Hôtel de Ville; Place du Châtelet, with a column commemorative of the Italian campaign of 1796; those which take their names from the Bourse, the Palais Royal, and the Opera; Place de Rivoli, with the equestrian statue of Joan of Arc; Place Moncey, adorned with a monument in memory of the defence of Paris in 1814, as Place Denfert, at the opposite extremity of the town, is adorned with a colossal lion symbolizing the defence of 1871. South of the Seine are the Place St Michel, adorned with a monumental fountain, and one of the great centres of traffic in Paris; Place du Panthéon; Place St Sulpice; Place Vauban, behind the dome of the Invalides, and Place du Palais Bourbon, in front of the chamber of deputies. Besides those already mentioned there are monumental fountains in the Places de la Concorde, de la République, and du Châtelet, the Avenue de l’Opéra, and the Place Louvois opposite the national library; and attention must also be called to the Fountain of the Innocents near the markets, which was originally adorned with sculptures by Jean Goujon; the Molière Fountain, in the Rue Richelieu; the Gaillon Fountain; and on the left side of the river the Fountain of Rue de Grenelle.
The, Seine.— The Seine flows for 7 miles (taking five hours) through Paris. As it enters and as it leaves the city it is crossed by a viaduct used by the circular railway and for ordinary traffic; that of Point du Jour has two stories of arches. Two bridges, the Pont des Arts and the Passerelle de Passy, are for foot passengers only; all the others are for carriages as well. The most famous is the Pont Neuf, the two portions of which rest on the extremity of the island called La Cité where the river is at its widest (961 feet). On the embankment below Pont Neuf stands the statue of Henry IV., the people’s king. Between La Cité and the left bank the width of the lesser channel is reduced to 161 feet. The whole river has a width of 532 feet as it enters Paris and of 440 as it leaves it. As it descends it passes under the bridges of Tolbiac, Bercy, and Austerlitz (built of stone), that of Sully (of iron), those of Marie and Louis Philippe between île St Louis and the right bank; that of Les Tournelles between île St Louis and the left bank; that of St Louis between île St Louis and La Cité; and Pont d’Arcole, a very elegant structure connecting La Cité with Place de l’Hôtel de Ville. La Cité besides communicates with the right bank by the bridges of Notre Dame and Au Change; with the left bank by that of the Archevêché, the so-called Pont au Double, the Petit Pont, and Pont St Michel. Below Pont Neuf come the Pont des Arts, Pont du Carrousel (of iron), Pont Royal (a fine stone structure leading to the Tuileries), and those named after Solferino, La Concorde, the Invalides, Alma, Jena, (opposite the Champ de Mars), Passy, and Grenelle.
The houses of Paris nowhere abut directly on the river banks, which in their whole extent from the bridge of Austerlitz to Passy are protected by broad embankments or “quays.” At the foot of these lie several ports for the discharge of goods :—on the right side Bercy for wines, La Râpée for timber, the Port de 1’Arsenal at the mouth of the St Martin Canal, the Port de l’Hôtel de Ville for fruits, and the Port St Nicholas or du Louvre (steamboats for London); on the left bank Port de la Gare for timber, St Bernard for wines, and those named after La Tournelle, the Saints Pères, the Invalides, and Grenelle.
Promenades and Parks.— In the heart of Paris are situated the gardens of the Tuileries (74 acres), laid out in parterres and bosquets, planted with chestnut trees, lindens, and plane trees, and adorned with playing fountains and basins, and numerous statues mostly from the antique. From the terrace along the river side a fine view is to be had over the Seine to the park and palaee of the Trocadéro; and from the terraces along the Place de la Concorde the eye takes in the Place and the Avenue of the Champs Élysées. The gardens of the Luxembourg, i∏ front of the palace occupied by the senate, are rather larger than those of the Tuileries; with less regularity of form they present greater variety of appearance. In the line of the main entrance extends the beautiful Observatory Walk, terminating in a monumental fountain, which is in great part the work of Carpeaux. The Luxembourg conservatories are rich in rare plants; and classes are held in the gardens for the study of gardening, fruit-tree pruning, and bee-keeping. The Jardin des Plantes will be mentioned below in the list of scientific establishments. Besides these three great gardens laid out in the French taste, with straight walks and regular beds, there are several in what the French designate the English style. The finest and most extensive of these, the Buttes-Chaumont Gardens, in the northeast of the city, occupy 62 acres of very irregular ground, which up to 1866 was occupied by plaster-quarries, limekilns, and brick-works. The “buttes” or knolls are now covered with turf, flowers, and shrubbery. Advantage has been taken of the varying relief of the site to form a fine lake and a cascade with picturesque rocks. The Montsouris Park, in the south of the city, 40 acres in extent, also consists of broken ground; in the middle stands the meteorological observatory, built after the model of the Tunisian palace of Bardo, and it also contains a monument in memory of the heroic and unfortunate Flatters expedition. Monceau Park, surrounded by the most aristocratic quarters of modern Paris, is a portion of the old park belonging to King Louis Philippe, and is now the property of the town. The gardens of the Palais Royal are surrounded by arcades and fine shops. There is hardly, it may be further remarked, a district in Paris which has not of recent years its well-planted square kept up at municipal expense on some plot of ground cleared during the improvements. Such arc those named after Tour St Jacques (one of the most graceful monuments of old Paris), the Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, the Temple, Montholon, Cluny, &c. There have recently been added the park of the Champs de Mars, and that of the Trocadéro with its fountains and aquarium.
But the real parks of Paris are the Bois de Boulogne and Bois de Vincennes, which belong to the city, though situated outside of the fortifications. The former is reached by the wide avenue of the Champs Élysées as far as the Arc de Triomphe, and thence by the avenue of the Bois de Boulogne or that of the Grande Armée. The first of these, with its side walks for foot passengers and equestrians, grass-plots, flower-beds, and elegant buildings with gardens and railings in front, affords a wide and magnificent prospect over the Bois and the hills of St Cloud and Mont Valérien.. The Bois de Boulogne covers an area of 2158 acres, onefourth of which is occupied by turf, one-eighth by roads, and the rest by clumps of trees, sheets of water, or running streams. Here are the two race-courses of Longchamps (flat races) and Auteuil (steeple-chases), and the gardens of the Acclimatization Society, which, with their menageries, conservatories, and aquarium, are largely visited by pleasure-seekers. The Bois de Vincennes, a little larger than the Bois de Boulogne, is similarly adorned with streams, lakes, cascades; and from the Gravelie plateau there is a splendid view over the valleys of the Marne and the Seine. Unfortunately the wood is cut in two by an open space comprising a drill-ground for artillery and infantry, a race-course, and a farm (La Faisanderie) for agricultural experiments. Trees for the public parks and squares are grown in the great municipal nurseries at Auteuil and Bois de Boulogne; and the municipal botanical gardens of La Muette, with thirty-five conservatories covering 1∣ acres, and an equal area under frames, contain magnificent collections of azaleas, palm-trees, and other exotics for ornamenting the public gardens or decorating official apartments on fête days.
Public Buildings, Palaces, &c.—The following are among the public buildings of Paris which have most architectural interest. The palace of the Louvre (see pp. 281, 288), which lies on the right side of the Seine in the heart of the city, consists of a quadrangle with an inner court 394 feet square, two galleries extending westwards from two sides of the quadrangle, and two galleries external and parallel to these, and continued till they meet the side wings of the Tuileries. The east front of the Louvre is 548 feet long and 90 feet high, and the first story is occupied by Perrault’s famous colonnade. Towards the west are those portions of the Tuileries which escaped the fire of 1871, —the connecting galleries and (on the south) the Flora pavilion and (on the north) the Marsan pavilion, which was entirely rebuilt between 1872 and 1877. From Perrault’s colonnade to the Flora pavilion the side facing the quay is 2250 feet long. In the matter of sculpture the south and west sides of the inner court are considered the best parts of the Louvre. On the west side lies the oldest part of the palace, and the principal points in the former arrangement of the building are indicated by the paving of the court. In the middle of each façade there is a pavilion rising above an archway. The western archway, which is surmounted by the clock, leads into Place Napoléon III., which has its centre occupied by a square, and its north and south sides bordered with porticos surmounted by statues of eminent Frenchmen. To the west is the Place du Carrousel. On the south side at the junction of the Louvre and the Tuileries is a gateway with three arches, of which the middle one is crowned with the bronze group by Mercier, “The Genius of the Arts,” erected in 1875. The river-front of the Louvre is in an older and more elegant style than the side facing Rue de Rivoli. It is connected with the buildings of the quadrangle by Henry IV.’s pavilion, which contains in its first story the elegant Apollo gallery.
The Palais de Justice in La Cité presents on the W. side, towards Place Dauphine, a Greek façade by Due (1865-1870), one of the finest productions of modern art. From the Boulevard du Palais on the east it is separated by a magnificent 18th-century railing in wrought iron and gilt. On this side lie the. Salle des Pas Perdus and the Sainte-Chapelle. The fine square tower known as the Clock Tower stands at the corner formed by the Quai du Nord and the Boulevard du Palais; and on the north side lies the Conciergerie prison with the dungeon once occupied by Marie Antoinette. Opposite the Palais de Justice on the other side of the Boulevard is the Tribunal de Commerce with a remarkable staircase under the cupola.
On the left bank of the Seine are the Luxembourg palace, the seat of the senate and formerly the residence of Mary de’ Medici; the Bourbon palace, the seat of the chamber of deputies, fronting the river and Pont de la Concorde with a fine columned portico and pediment; the palace of the Legion of Honour, an exquisite building of Louis XIV.’s time; and the palace of the Institute, with a handsome dome. On the right side of the river lie the Élysée palace (in the Champs-Élysées), a vast building in a modern style, the residence of the president of the republic, and the palace of the Trocadéro, built for the Exhibition of 1878, the central rotunda of which contains the largest music-hall in Paris (for 15,000 auditors) and a colossal organ.
Among the Government and administrative buildings may be mentioned the Hôtel de Ville, burnt in 1871, but rebuilt finer than before on the old site; the ministry of foreign affairs, where the congress of Paris was held in 1856; the ministry of marine, which occupies on Place de la Concorde one of the two pavilions erected by Gabriel on each side of Rue Royale; the ministry of war in the Boulevard St Germain; the Bank, formerly the De la Vrillière “hôtel,” built by Mansard; the Mint, with a fine façade stretching 394 feet along Quai Conti not far from Pont Neuf; the national printing establishment, formerly Cardinal Rohan’s mansion; and the national record office, close at hand, formerly the Soubise mansion. These last two buildings are in the Quartier du Marais, where a great many ancient mansions are now used as warehouses and workshops. Besides the Hôtel Carnavalet and the Hôtel de Cluny may be mentioned the tower of Rue aux Ours, the last remnant of the Hôtel de Bourgogne; the Hôtel de Sens, formerly the residence of the archbishop of the province; the Hôtel Lambert at the head of île St Louis, adorned with paintings by Lesueur; the turret of the Hôtel Barbette (Rue vieille du Temple).
The largest and finest of the religious buildings of Paris is the cathedral of Notre Dame (426 feet long by 164 wide), restored between 1846 and 1879 by Viollet-le-Duc. As it now exists this church has five naves running the whole length of the building, and square chapels; the central flèche, recently restored, is 312 feet high, and two massive square towers worthily crown the principal façade, which is one of the most beautiful that has come down to us from the Middle Ages. The transept has also two façades, which, while less imposing, are more richly decorated with chiselled work, dating from about the middle of the 13th century. Of the elaborate decoration of the interior all that is old is a part of the screen of the choir, from the 14th century.
St Geneviève or the Panthéon, consecrated by the Convention to illustrious men, but since restored to Christian worship, has the form of a Greek cross with a dome in the centre and a columned portico in front, the pediment of which contains an immense bas-relief by David of Angers representing great men crowned by their country. Fénelon, Rousseau, Voltaire, Mirabeau, Laplace, Cuvier, <kc., may be distinguished. The crypt contains the tombs of Soufflot (the architect of the church), Rousseau, Voltaire, <kc. Near St Geneviève stand St Étienne du Mont with a magnificent roodloft, and the chapel of St Geneviève with the tomb of this patroness of Paris. The Madeleine, intended by Napoleon I. for a temple of victory, has consequently the form of a Greek temple. At St Germain des Près, St Severin, and St Vincent de Paul are beautiful frescos by Hippolyte Flandrin, to whom a monument has been erected in St Germain. St Eustache contains Colbert’s tomb; St Germain 1’Auxerrois has a curious porch; and St Sulpice, which is nearly as large as Notre Dame, presents in its main front the most vigorous effort yet made to apply classical architecture in the building of Christian churches. Notre Dame des Victoires is a great resort of pilgrims. The church of the Vow of the Sacred Heart, at present in course of erection on Montmartre, will when finished be one of the most remarkable buildings in Paris from its commanding site, the extent of its crypt, and the vast proportions of its dome and tower, respectively 197 and 262 feet in height.
Theatres.— Of the many buildings in Paris devoted to theatrical entertainments there is only one, at once the largest and the most beautiful, which is of real architectural importance—the Grand Opéra, or national academy of music and dancing. The opera house, which covers 2∣ acres, is the finest theatre in the world. The process of erection, directed by Charles Garnier, lasted from 1861 to 1875, required 673,295 days’ work, and cost £1,440,000. The front is decorated on the ground story by allegorical groups (music by Guillaume; lyrical poetry by Jouffroy; lyrical drama by Perraud; and dancing by Carpeaux) and allegorical statues. In the first story a row of coupled Corinthian columns (each consisting of a single block) forms an open gallery, above which are seven busts of famous musicians, Mozart, Beethoven, &c. Above the architrave of the front appears the dome which covers the auditorium, and behind that rises the vast pediment above the stage decorated at the corners with enormous groups. On the summit of the pediment an Apollo, raising aloft his lyre, is seen against the sky and forms the culminating point of the whole edifice. The sides are not so richly decorated as the front, but each has in the centre an elegant cylindrical pavilion with a carriage entrance. Behind are the buildings occupied by the managers and staff. The interior is decorated throughout in the most gorgeous manner with massive gilding, flamboyant scroll-work, statues, paintings, <fcc. The grand vestibule with statues of Lully, Rameau, Gluck, and Handel, the grand staircase (an indubitable masterpiece), the avant-foyer or corridor leading to the foyer, and the foyer or crush-room itself are especially worthy of mention. This last, which is 197 feet long, 43 broad, and 59 high, has its ceiling brilliantly painted by Baudry, whose work, however, can hardly be appreciated properly from the excess of light. The auditorium is seated for 2156; its ceiling is painted by Lenepveu. Behind the stage is the foyer de la danse or green-room for the ballet, adorned with large allegorical panels and portraits of the most eminent danseuses.
The comic opera has a theatre to itself, L’Opéra Comique; and operettas are played at La Renaissance, Les Bouffes, Les Folies Dramatiques, and Dejazet. The Théâtre Français and the Odéon represent the works of the classical dramatists, as well as modern pieces tragic or comic. Comedy and vaudevilles are played at the Gymnase and the Vaudeville; and the Palais Royal, the Variétés, and the Nouveautés devote themselves especially to farce. Pieces of the popular class, fairy scenes and spectacular displays, are the main attraction of the Châtelet, the Gaiété, the Porte St Martin, and the Ambigu. The Chateau d’Eau now gives popular operatic performances. Equestrian entertainments are supplied by the hippodrome and three circuses. The café concerts— which during the summer season abound in the Champs Elysées—remove in winter to the Boulevard de Strasbourg and the Montmartre and Poissonnière faubourgs, where there are also some permanent establishments of the kind. Several companies give concerts of classical music on stated days in the winter season; the finest are those of the Conservatoire and the Château d’Eau, Châtelet, and Cirque theatres.
Arrondissements.— The city is divided into twenty arrondissements. Only the first twelve belonged to Paris previous to 1860; the others correspond to the old suburban communes then annexed. The first four arrondissements occupy the space on the right of the river, extending from the Place de la Concorde to the Bastille, and from the Seine to the line of the Grands Boulevards; the 5th, 6th, and 7th arrondissements lie opposite them on the left side; the 8th, 9th 10th, llth, and 12th surround the first four arrondissements on the north; the 13th, 14th, and 15th are formed out of the old suburban communes of the left side; and the 16th, 17th, 18th, 19th, and 20th out of the old surburban communes of the right side.
Population and Vital Statistics.— The growth of the population during the last six hundred years is shown in the following table [table]
The figures for December 1881, like the rest of those in the table, represent the number of people legally domiciled at Paris at the date given, but the number actually present in the city at last census was only 2,239,928 (1,113,326 males and 1,126,602 females).
The following table (II.) shows the distribution of the population in the several arrondissements :— [table]
The number of births and of deaths in Paris during the five years 1876-80—278,785 births and 252,500 deaths—apparently shows nothing exceptional as compared with the rest of France. It is to be observed, however, that the population is composed to a larger extent than usual of adults, young children being sent to the country, and old men withdrawing. The number of marriages, 20,993 for 1881, with an average of 18,427 for the five previous years, is rather small for the proportion of marriageable persons. Of the 1,113,326 males in 1881, 621,569 were unmarried, 440,022 married, and 51,735 widowers; of the 1,126,602 females, 557,054 were unmarried, 446,297 married, and 123,251 widows. The subjoined table (HI.) shows the proportion of individuals of the various ages specified, in each 10,000 of the inhabitants, according to the census of 1881. It will be seen that the proportion was greater in Paris from 20 to 55, and smaller below and above those ages. [table]
The following table shows the occupations of the population in 1881:—
Table TV.— Distribution of Population according to Occupation (1881). [table]
Barely a third. (322 per 1000) of the population are Parisians by birth,—38'2 per 1000 having been born in the other communes of the department of Seine, 565 in the other departments of France or in French colonies, and 74 , 8 abroad. The foreign population shows a tendency to increase; in 1876 380 per 1000 were natives of the department, the proportion of foreigners being only 60. In 1881 the English numbered 10,789; Germans, 31,190; Belgians, 45,281; Dutch, 9250; Italians, 21,577; Swiss, 20,810; Americans, 5987; and other nationalities, 19,154.
The following were the principal causes of death in 1882: — phthisis, 10,342 deaths; diarrhoea, 5095; pneumonia, 4127; congestion of the brain, 2668; organic diseases of the heart, 2873; meningitis, 2605; chronic bronchitis, 2630; cancer, 2251; typhoid fever, 3352; acute bronchitis, 1730; croup and diphtheria, 1805; small-pox, 661; infantile weakness, 1458; senile debility, 1350.
Municipal Administration.— Each arrondissement is divided into four quarters, each of which nominates a member of the municipal council. The functionaries of the arrondissement are—a mayor (maire) and three deputies (adjoints) nominated by the prefect of Seine, who act as registrars, and preside over the poor-relief (bureau de bienfaisance) of their arrondissement, and a justice of the peace (juge de paix) nominated by the Government. There is no elective mayor of Paris: the president of the municipal council, who is nominated by his colleagues, merely acts as chairman of their meetings. When occasion requires, the function of mayor of Paris is discharged by the prefect of Seine. The municipal council discusses and votes the budget of the city. The importance of the business thus transacted will be seen below. The prefect of Seine and the prefect of police (both magistrates named by the Government, but each with a quite distinct sphere of action) represent the executive authority as opposed to the municipal council, which latter has no power by refusing a vote of credit to stop any public service the maintenance of whicn legally devolves on the city: in case of such refusal the minister of tlι'e interior may officially insert the credit in the budget. And in like manner he may appeal to the head of the state to cancel any decision in which the council has exceeded its legal functions. The prefecture of Seine comprises a departmental service, differing in no essential particular from that of other prefectures, and a municipal service for the city of much more importance. Elections, rates, municipal debt, city schools, public lands, municipal buildings, markets and market-places (in respect to the collection of dues), cemeteries, roads and streets, public edifices, water-works and sewers, promenades and plantations, river navigation and river ports, public pawnbroking establishments, and the relief of the poor are all under the control of the prefecture of Seine.
The prefecture of police includes the whole department of Seine and the neighbouring communes of the department of Seine-et-Oise—Meudon, St Cloud, Sèvres, and Enghien. It consists of three sections—political police, police of public safety, and administrative police, the two former being rather national than municipal. The state consequently repays two-fifths of the annual budget of about £800,000 which this prefecture receives from the city.
The municipal police deals with public health, civil order, and repression of crimes and misdemeanours, whether against person, property, or morals. It exercises surveillance over lodging houses, the insane, and prostitutes, tests weights and measures, and has charge of the markets, the public vehicles, the fire department, sanitary arrangements, and exhumations and reinterments in the cemeteries.
The prefect of police has a staff of 8500 officials— commissaires de police, officiers de paix, gardiens de la paix (a kind of police-magistrate), and inspectors. He has also under his orders the sapeurs pompiers or fire-brigade (1742 men), and the republican guard, long called the municipal guard, which numbers 3295 men, besides a mounted force of 726. He has full control over the budget of his department, which is voted en bloc by the municipal council.
Revenue and Expenditure.— The heaviest item of expenditure is the public debt: the sum at 31st December 1883, represented by the series of annuities terminable in 1950, amounts to a total of £171,730,965. The annuity for 1883 was £3,693,303. Over and above this the city is authorized to have a floating debt of £800,000. The following are in round numbers the main items of the ordinary budget for 1883,—the exact sum varying from year to year [table]
By the addition of the expenses of the Collège Bollin (an institution for secondary education belonging to the city), and some miscellaneous expenses of less amount, the ordinary budget for 1883 reached the sum of £10,106,533, and by the further addition of £44,000 belonging to the previous year, a grand total of £10,150,533.
The extraordinary budget shows expenses to the amount of £298,444 on general funds, and £90,000 on special funds. The former is specially devoted to architectural works (rebuilding the Hôtel de Ville) and keeping up streets and roadways, and the latter to the erection of buildings (Sorbonne, faculty of law, and canal St Denis).
The following are the principal items of ordinary revenue :— [table]
Including less important items, the total ordinary revenue in 1882 was £10,489,373; and the arrears of former years’ revenue paid up amounted to £1,218,883.
The extraordinary budget on general and special funds amounts to £6,450,037; but a large proportion of this consists of sums which are carried forward from one fiscal year to another, till the expenses which they are meant to cover are liquidated. [table]
Streets.— The public streets, covering an area of 3877 acres, make a total length of 580 miles, 143 miles being bordered with trees. The municipality is going on with the work of planting as rapidly as possible, though each new tree costs about £8.
The staff entrusted with maintaining and cleaning the public streets comprises 320 engineers, overseers, and timekeepers, who have under their orders 2123 paviors and roadmen and 3185 permanent and supernumerary scavengers. The maintenance of the streets costs £406,800; that of the pavements and sidewalks, £62,224; cleaning, £259,480. The streets are for the most part paved (1525 acres on January 1, 1883), usually with Yvette sandstone from the neighbourhood of Paris. The most frequented crossings are laid with Belgian porphyry. The metalled roadways cover 445 acres, the asphalted 83 acres, the earthen 26. Wooden paving, previously e∏)ployed only for 2 acres, was in 1883 laid down in the Champs Elysées, and in 1884 extended to the Avenue de l’Opéra, Eue de Rivoli, the line of the Grands Boulevards, and Rue Royale. Of the total area of 1131 acres occupied by pavements and sidewalks, two-ninths are covered with asphalt, one-third with sand, one-seventh with granite, and the rest with pavingstone.
There are 5070 plugs for the watering of the streets, and 400 water-carts. The annual consumption of water for this purpose amounts to 130,174,478 cubic feet (195 days). The sweeping of the streets in the morning devolves on the householders, and is commuted by payment of a tax (see above); during the day the whole cost falls on the municipality.
The point of greatest traffic in Paris is the Place de la Bastille; one current passing from Rue St Antoine to the Faubourg St Antoine and another from the Grands Boulevards to the railway stations for Vincennes, Lyons, and Orleans. On an average 42,000 carriages and 55,900 draught horses pass through this square in the twenty-four hours. Next in amount of traffic come Rue de Rivoli, 33,232 vehicles; Avenue de Γ0pera, 29,460; Rue du Pont Neuf, 20,668; Boulevard des Italiens, 20,124; Place de ΓEtoile, 18,311; Rue Royale, 14,095. The most frequented of the bridges are Pont de la Concorde, 10,003; Pont Neuf, 8519; and Pont d’Austerlitz, 7340.
Means of Conveyance. — Cabs, omnibuses, tramways, steamboats, and a railway (the Chemin de Fer de Ceinture) are the local means of transit in Paris. The steamboats ply up the river to Charenton, down the river to Suresnes. Within the city, in 1882, they plied on 329 days, made an aggregate of 8162 days of service, traversed 479,997 miles, and conveyed 11,170,980 passengers. Outside the limits of the city, up the river, the days were also 329— aggregate days 2265, aggregate distance 123,007 miles, passengers 3,122,593; down the river the days were 329—aggregate days 2356, miles 180,138, and passengers 1,262,680. The omnibus company employs both ordinary omnibuses and tramway-cars. In 1882 it employed 610 omnibuses and 255 tram-cars, conveying 200,187,455 passengers. The two tramway companies distinguished as Northern and Southern have conveyed respectively 26,076,761 and 27,067,951 passengers. The Chemin de Fer de Ceinture, which runs round the city just within the fortifications, conveyed 21,617,909 passengers. As cab-hiring is an open industry (though the cabmen are restricted in their charges by a tarif, and are subject to police control), the movement of the cabs cannot be given exactly. In 1882 the number of horses belonging to private persons and bound to be at the service of the army in case of mobilization was found to be 95,847; in 1878 the number of carriages was 13,372.
Water and Drainage.— Paris derives its water-supply (1) from the Seine and the Marne, (2) from the Oureq Canal, (3) from artesian wells, and (4) from springs. (1) The two steam-pumps at Chaillot on the Seine raise each at their ordinary rate 635,688 cubic feet and at their maximum 1,518,588 in the twenty-four hours. The ten pumps at Port à Γ Anglais and Maisons-Alfort above Paris, at St Ouen below Paris, and at the Quai d’Austerlitz and Auteuil (within the city), can supply about 600,372,000 cubic feet per annum. In 1880 about 2,119,000 cubic feet on an average were taken daily from the Seine. The water is stored in reservoirs at the highest points in Passy, Montmartre, Charonne, and Gentilly. The establishment at St Maur, situated on the canal which closes the loop of the Marne, and partly moved by the head of water and partly by steam, supplies the Bois de Vincennes and the elevated districts of Belleville and Ménilmontant. It can furnish 2,896,000 cubic feet in the twenty-four hours. (2) The Oureq Canal, which is also used as a water-way, comes from the department of Aisne, and terminates at the La Villette basin, which also receives the St Denis and St Martin Canals. It brings a volume of 4,414,500 cubicfeetper day, to which are added in summer from 2,000,000 to 2,500,000 cubic feet procured from the Marne near the confluence of the Ourcq, and discharged into the canal. The water is hardly suitable for domestic use owing to the quantity of foreign matter which it contains. (3) The water of the artesian wells is much purer. The Grenelle well is 1797 feet deep, and reaches the greensand; its daily yield is 12,360 cubic feet of water at a temperature of 80° Fahr., which rises to a height of 238 or 239.feet, and can thus be carried to the summit of Mont St Geneviève. The Passy well is 1922 feet deep, and yieldsan average of 233,000 cubic feet in the twenty-four hours. By the hydrometer Seine water registers 18°, that of the Ourcq 28°, that of the Passy well only 9°. A new well is being sunk (1884) at La Chapelle, and another at Butte-aux-Cailles. (4) Till quite recently all the spring water was brought to Paris by two aqueducts. The Arcueil aqueduct, 8 miles long, on the left of the Seine, furnishes 67,100 cubic feet per day; that of Belleville, on the right side, which up to the beginning of the 17th century fed all the fountains of Paris with the waters of Belleville and the Prés St Gervais, now yields only 6000 cubic feet in the twenty-four hours. This insufficiency of spring water has been supplied by the Dhuis and the Vanne, two streams of La Champagne. The former is diverted near Château Thierry (Aisne) and conveyed by an aqueduct 81 miles long into the Ménilmontant reservoirs (354 feet above the sea, or more than 250 feet above the level of the Seine), which consist of two stories, one above the other, with a united capacity of 4,538,000 cubic feet, and usually containing a store equal to five average days’ influx. In the valley of the Vanne (a tributary of the Yonne, which it reaches at Sens), Paris has obtained possession of a great number of springs, which, when the rivers are at their lowest, yield in the twenty-four hours 3,531,600 cubic feet of a perfectly pure water at a steady temperature of 52° Fahr. The aqueduct from the Vanne ends at Montrouge at a height of 262 feet, in reservoirs capable of holding 10,594,800 cubic feet, equal to three average days’ influx. Every year new works are constructed to increase the quantity of water distributed. In June 1883 the machines raised for the first time 2,825,000 cubic feet on the plateau of Villejuif. The total quantity of water supplied to Paris will now be 20,130,000 cubic feet in the twenty-four hours. The quantity actually required is not less than 14,127,000 cubic feet, or not quite 44 gallons per head of the population, a proportion exceeded in several other great cities. This water is distributed by 66 monumental fountains, 763 bornes-foniaines (i.e., smaller fountains or wells, similar in appearance to a boundary stone or milestone), 5249 common street taps, 53 pumps, 181 plugs for the use of the watering carts, 4175 plugs for attachment of watering hose, 363 fire-plugs, 178 cocks at cab-stands, in the Wallace fountains, and the urinals. There is a certain number of fountains not open to the public where water is retailed to the water-carriers; and a large number of private houses have water laid on to their courts, or in many cases to the several stories. The public baths (151 in number) and the washing establishments (263, with 21,911 stands) receive daily 2,358,000 gallons of water. The water-pipes, varying in diameter from a little more than an inch to upwards of 4 feet, the commonest size being about 8 inches, have a total length of 94,904 miles.
Since about the middle of the present century all houses have been bound to discharge their rain an<l waste water directly into the sewers; but, though these are annually being extended, there are still streets into which they have not been introduced. On the 31st of December 1881 their total length was nearly 441 miles. The drainage of both sides of the river is collected in a great sewer ending in the Seine at Clichy opposite Asnières; the main sewer of the left side of the river is connected with that of the right side by a siphon which passes under the Seine by a tunnel near the Pont de 1’Alma. A departmental sewer, receiving the waters of the elevated districts of Charonne, Ménilmontant, Belleville, and Montmartre, terminates at St Denis. These sewers are much more than great drains: they are used as passages for water-pipes, gaspipes, telegraph wites, and pneumatic tubes. The two largest classes of then» have a height respectively of 14⅜ feet and 17 feet 6 inches at the keystone, and a width respectively of 18 feet 5 inches and 17 feet at the spring of the arch. The smallest class is only 6 feet high and 3 feet wide. The most usual class, of which there are 171 miles, has a height of 7⅛ feet and a width of 4⅜ feet.
The sewage from these mains is partly employed in irrigation in the plain of Gennevilliers on the left bank of the Seine opposite St Denis and Clichy. At the close of 18811216 acres were under treatment, though the system was only commenced in 1872 on a tenth of that area; and the drains employed, varying from 1 to 4 feet in diameter, had an extent of 21 miles, and discharged the sewage by 571 outlets. The quantity of sewage discharged daily by the sewers varies from 10,171,000 cubic feet to 13,112,266 cubic feet (1881). The amount absorbed by.irrigation varies according to the season. Thus in May 1881 it was 95,907,555 cubic feet, and in September only 15,719,780 cubic feet. The daily average throughout the year shows 54,935,945 cubic feet, watering 213 acres.
The value of the land (originally sandy) at Gennevilliers has considerably increased since the introduction of this system. The rent of a hectare (2'47 acres), which was 152 francs between 1865 and 1870, reached 300 francs in 1878 and 450 in 1880. The cultivation of the plain gives employment to 1350 hands, and the population of the commune has steadily increased—1897 in 1872, 2389 in 1876, 3192 in 1881. The municipality proposes to extend this system of irrigation, which absorbs only a part of the sewage, to the foot of the St Germain forest, and thus to utilize the masses of foul water which still go to pollute the Seine.
Nightsoil is collected in three different ways :—(1) in cesspools of mason-work, which ought to be watertight and to communicate with the open air by a ventilating pipe rising above the tops of the neighbouring houses; (2) in movable buckets, placed in suitably ventilated cellars; (3) in filtering tinettes, which discharge their liquids directly into the sewer. On the 31st December 1882 the number of cesspools was 66,610, of movable buckets 14,952, and of tinettes 17,033. The nightsoil contractors have to be authorized by the prefect of Seine. The cesspools must not be emptied except by night. The quantity removed in 1881 was 39,797,810 cubic feet—35,098,453 cubic feet from the cesspools, 3,682,187 from the movable buckets, and 1,017,170 from the tinettes.
Lighting.— The lighting of Paris is practically in the hands of the gas company, electric lighting being still in the experimental stage (28 burners in the public streets in 1882), and oil being used only in a small and ever-diminishing number of out-of-the-way streets (472 burners in 1881). The gas company manufactured in 1861 2,974,690,553 cubic feet of gas, in 1875 6,213,435,025 cubic feet, and in 1882 9,726,709,281 cubic feet, this last quantity being obtained from 917,867 tons of raw material (10,597 ctιbic feet per ton). The gas mains belonging to the company make a total length of 1222 miles; those in the public streets feed 42,514 burners, consuming 1,301,226,027 cubic feet forpublic lighting. Thecompany further supplies 7,163,994,098 cubic feet to 154,962 private customers in the city, and 600,208,654 cubic feet to 53 communes in the outskirts. About 660,593,880 cubic feet, or 6 - 8 per cent., is lost in transmission. The daily consumption reaches a maximum (36,005,949 cubic feet) in December and a minimum (14,073,112 cubic feet) in July.
Public Instruction.— The so-called salles d'asile are infant schools for children from three to six years of age, i.e., from the time when their mothers place them in the crèches or day-nurseries (see below) and the time when they may be admitted to the primary schools. The municipality maintains 126 secular salles d’asile receiving 15,939 children, and one salle congréganiste (i.e., under the management of a religious society) with 279 children. The private establishments comprise 23 secular “salles” with 1243 children, and 39 congreganist “salles” with 4231.
In 1882 the municipality supported 173 primary secular schools (56,369 pupils) for boys, 161 secular schools (46,579 pupils) and 2 congreganist schools (765 pupils) for girls. The private primary schools are 183 secular schools and 70 congreganist for boys, 577 secular schools and 136 congreganist for girls,—number of pupils unknown. At certain hours the primary schools are transformed into classes for adults—116, with 14,288 pupils. The “higher schools” (écoles supérieures) supply education for industrial or commercial careers. They have 677 pupils between six and thirteen years of age and 2956 above thirteen, who are distributed among the Collège Chaptai and the Turgot, Lavoisier, Colbert, J. B. Say, and Arago schools. The apprentice school (école d’apprentis) with 228 pupils, the normal schools (for males, 205 pupils; for females, 68 pupils), and the Pape-Carpentier school, which trains matrons for the salles d’asile, complete the list of the municipal establishments for primary education. Besides there are private normal schools for Protestant teachers (male and female), a private normal school for girls, normal classes for ladies under the auspices of the Society for Elementary Instruction, and; rofessional schools for both girls and boys. Commercial instruction is given in two schools placed under the patronage of the chamber of commerce, and a special commercial high school established about 1880. In 1881 a fund was established for placing indigent but deserving pupils in free primary boarding-schools, at the expense of the city. Between Oct. 1881 and Oct. 1882 494 pupils were thus dealt with at a cost of £9367. Municipal libraries, subsidized by the city, have been established in all the arrondissements; in 1882 they lent 401,415 works, the number of books contained in the libraries being 89,355.
Secondary education is provided by the municipal Collège Rollin; in the national lycées (Louis le Grand, Henry IV., St Louis, and. Vanves), which have both boarders and day pupils; the Charlemagne and Condorcet lycées, for day pupils only; and the Collège Stanislas, more especially for boarders. It is between these establishments, subjected to the same university programme, and the Versailles lycée that the great competition of the Sorbonne takes place at the close of each school year. The number of their pupils in 1882 (Stanislas excepted) was 8048. Among the private establishments giving secondary education mention must be made of the College Ste Barbe, the Monge, Bossuet, Fénelon, and Massillon schools, the old Jesuit colleges at Vaugirard, Rue de Madrid, and Rue Lhomond, the two lesser seminaries of Notre Dame des Champs and St Nicolas, and numerous institutions preparatory for the examinations and special schools. In 1881 there were 11,608 pupils in the secular and 15,811 in the ecclesiastical establishments, of which 1584 in addition attended a lycée course. For some years there have been at the Sorbonne special classes for young ladies, but the secondary education of girls is only beginning to be organized. Higher education is given in the faculties of science, literature, and Catholic theology, which are together in the Sorbonne, and in the faculties of law and of medicine, each of which is by itself. There is also a faculty of Protestant theology transferred to Paris from Strasburg. These faculties confer the degrees of bachelor, licentiate, and doctor. The Catholic Institute, a private foundation, has faculties of law, literature, and science, but has no right of conferring degrees. The Sorbonne, the seat of the Academy of Paris and of its rector, who is the head of the whole educational system, contains a library of 100,000 volumes belonging to the university, and a well-appointed museum of physical science, and laboratories. The school of law has a library of 30,000 volumes and the school of medicine 60,000 volumes, forming the most complete medical collection in the world. Connected with the school of medicine are the Orfila museum of comparative anatomy, the Dupuytren pathological museum, the practical school of anatomy, and a botanic garden, and the midwifery schools of the Maternity and De la Pitié hospitals; the higher school of pharmacy and the dissecting amphitheatre for hospital students are also affiliated institutions.
Whilst the “faculties” are specially intended to prepare for and confer university degrees (though their lectures are open to the public), the Collège de France is meant to give instruction of the highest order to the general public (men or women); and the various sciences are there represented by thirty-seven chairs. The École des Hautes Etudes supplements the theoretical instruction provided by the public lectures of the higher education by practical training. The upper normal school is for the training of “professors” for secondary classical education and forthe faculties. TheÉcole desHautes Études Ecclesiastiques prepares ecclesiastical “professors” for the institutions and lesser seminaries which supply secondary education, and are placed in the hands of the clergy. The free school of the political sciences prepares more especially candidates for administrative employments (council of state, &c. ). The École des Chartes trains record-keepers in the reading and study of ancient documents. The school of living Oriental languages teaches the principal languages from Russian and Modern Greek to Malay, Chinese, and Japanese. The Polytechnic school (École Polytechnique) trains military and naval engineers for the artillery corps, the corps of engineers, and the navy-yards, and civil engineers for the national corps of the roads and bridges, the mines, and the state manufactories (tobacco, powder, and saltpetre). As for infantry and cavalry officers, they usually come from the special military school of St Cyr, when they do not rise from the ranks. In Paris too are situated—the École Supérieure de Guerre; the practical schools of roads and bridges and of mines, for the training of civil engineers, with libraries and collections of models and classes in some cases open to the public; the École d’Application des Tabacs; the school of military medicine and pharmacy. The central school of the arts and manufactures, though some years ago it became a Government institution, still educates engineers for ordinary industrial careers. The school of the fine arts (École des Beaux Arts), intended for painters, sculptors, and architects, contains valuable collections, which render the palace in which they are exhibited one of the most interesting museums in Paris. The instruction in this institution is at once theoretical and practical. It is open to all Frenchmen from fifteen to thirty years of age, and even in some cases to foreigners. Of the various competitions open to the pupils the most important is for the prix de Rome. The successful competitor is rewarded with four years’ residence in Italy at Government expense, two years being spent at the Medici palace in Rome. Schools of design for boys and girls serve as preparatory for the school of the fine arts, or train designers for industrial occupations. There is a free school of architecture. Music and elocution are taught at the Conservatoire, which possesses a musical library and a ver5 r curious collection of musical instruments. The diocesan seminary of St Sulpice receives clerical pupils from all France to the number of 200; the foreign mission seminary trains missionaries for the far East, and the seminary of St Esprit missionaries for the French colonies. The Lazarists have also a noviciat of their own. The Irish, English, and Scotch colleges, as their names suggest, prepare priests for the Roman Catholic dioceses of the United Kingdom.
A district at one time almost exclusively occupied by students and known as the Quartier Latin or Pays Latin was situated on the left side of the river mainly in the arrondissement of Luxembourg; the old houses have, however, been almost entirely demolished since about 1850. It corresponded on the whole to the pre-Revolutionary quarter of St Benoit or the University, otherwise called the Faubourg St Jacques. The most distinctive portion lay between Rue St Jacques and Boulevard St Michel. Rue de la Harpe opens into Boulevard St Michel; and Rue du Fouarre, frequently mentioned in mediaeval and Renaissance writers, strikes N. E. from Rue St Jacques. The students now live for the most part in the vicinity of Sorbonne and the schools of medicine and law. They frequent the cafés and beershops of Boulevard St Michel and its neighbourhood.
The principal libraries in Paris have already been described under Libraries (vol. xiv. pp. 524-6), and an account of the observatory will be found in vol. xvii. p. 712.
The Bureau des Longitudes, which was founded in 1795 for the advancement of astronomy and navigation, and publishes the Connaissance des Temps, is located at the Institute. The meteorological office and observatory is situated in the Montsouris Park, and in connexion with it is a school of nautical astronomy and practical geodesy. The observatory for physical astronomy is at Meudon.
The Conservatoire des Arts et des Métiers, in the old priory of St Martin des Champs, was founded (1794) as a public repository of machines, models, tools, plans, descriptions, and books in regard to all kinds of arts and trades. Various courses of lectures on the applications of science to commerce and industry have been added from time to time; they are all open to the public without fee, and are addressed rather to workmen and artisans than to the wealthy or learned. The Agronomic Institute has recently been removed to the Conservatoire.
The Jardin des Plantes (1626), about 75 acres in extent, forms one of the most interesting promenades in Paris; its museum of natural history (1793), with its zoological gardens, its hothouses and greenhouses, its nursery and naturalization gardens, its museums of zoology, anatomy, anthropology, botany, mineralogy, and geology, its laboratories, and its courses of lectures by the most distinguished professors in all branches of natural science, make it an institution of universally acknowledged eminence.
Learned Societies.— Among the learned societies of Paris the first in importance is the Institut de France, which has already been described (see Institute of France, vol. xiii. p. 160). The committee of learned societies at the ministry of public instruction forms, as it were, the centre of the various societies not maintained by the Government; and the French Association for the Advancement of the Sciences, founded in 1872, is based on the model of the older British society, and like it meets every year in a different town. The other societies may be classified as follows :—1. Historical or Geographical— History of France, Antiquaries of France (till 1814 known as Celtic Academy), Historic Studies, Numismatics and Archaeology, Bibliophiles, School of Charters, Ethnography, Geography (1821, and thus the oldest of its class), Asiatic (1822), French Alpine Club (Club Alpin); 2. Natural and Medical Sciences— Anthropology, Zoological Acclimatization (which has the direction of the zoological gardens in the Bois de Boulogne), Entomological, Geological, Surgery, Anatomy, Biology, Medical of the Hospitals, Legal Medicine or Medical Jurisprudence, Practical Medicine, Pharmacy, Agriculture, Horticulture; 3. Industrial and Moral Sciences— Encouragement of National Industry, Statistics, Elementary Instruction, Franklin (for the foundation of popular libraries); 4. Positive Sciences and Fine Arts— Philomathic, Physical, Philotechnic, Athenaeum of the Arts, Sciences, and Literature (1792), Concerts of the Conservatoire de Musique (1795).
Newspapers.— Paris is very largely supplied with newspapers of all descriptions. See Newspapers, vol. xvii. pp. 423-8.
Museums.— The richest museum in Paris occupies the Louvre, the finest of its palaces. On the ground floor are museums (1) of ancient sculpture, containing such treasures as the Venus of Milo, the Pallas of Velletri (the most beautiful of all statues of Minerva), the colossal group of the Tiber, discovered at Rome in the 14th century, &c.; (2) of mediaeval and renaissance sculpture, comprising works by Michelangelo, Jean Goujon, Germain Pilon, John of Bologna, &c., and special rooms devoted to early Christian monuments and to Jewish antiquities (this last a feature peculiar to the Louvre); (3) of modern French sculpture, with works by Puget, Coustou, Coysevox, Chaudet, Houdon, Rude, David of Angers, &c.; (4) of Egyptian sculpture and inscriptions; (5) of Assyrian antiquities; (6) of Greek and Phoenician antiquities; (7) of engraving. On the first floor are (1) the Lacaze museum, a magnificent collection of pictures presented to the state by Μ. Lacaze in 1869; (2) the splendid musée de peinture; (3) the Campana museum; (4) a museum of Greek antiquities; (5) a museum of Egyptian antiquities; (6) an Oriental museum (Persian pottery, Chinese vases, lacquered work, &c. ); (7) the Lenoir museum (snuff-boxes, jewels, miniatures, lacquered wares, bequeathed to the Louvre by Μ. and Madame Lenoir in 1874); (8) the Duchatel room, bequeathed by the widow of the minister of that name (La Source, a masterpiece by Ingres); (9) the Timbal, His de la Salle, and Davilliers collections, consisting respectively of furniture drawing and curiosities, drawings, and pottery, furniture, and tapestry; (10) a mediaeval and renaissance museum, comprising French, Italian, or Hispano-Moorish pottery and terra cotta ware, as well as objects in bronze, glass, and ivory— the Sauvageot collection being of note; (11) the museum of drawings and chalks, of which the more valuable are preserved in drawers; (12) a museum of ancient bronzes; (13) the Apollo gallery, adorned by the leading artists who have been employed on the palace, and containing the royal gems and jewels, articles of goldsmith’s work, and enamels. The second floor accommodates the naval museum, the ethnographic museum (African, Chinese, Mexican), part of the French school of painting, and rooms for the study of Egyptian papyrus-rolls.
The museum of the Luxembourg, installed in a portion of the palace occupied by the senate, is devoted to works of living painters and sculptors acquired by the state. They remain there for ten years after the death of the respective artists, that the finest may be selected for the Louvre.
The Cluny museum occupies the old mansion of the abbots of that order, built in the 15th century by Jacques d’Amboise. It was founded by Μ. du Sommerard, whose collections were acquired by the state in 1843. Increased from year to year since that date, it now contains about 10,000 articles—pieces of sculpture in marble and stone, carvings in wood, ivories, enamels, terra cottas, bronzes, furniture, pictures, stained glass, pottery, tapestry, glass ware, locksmith work, and jewellery of mediaeval and Renaissance times. In the neighbourhood are the remains of the 'ancient palace of the emperor Julian; in the midst of the ruins, and in the garden which surrounds them, has been collected a Gallo-Roman museum, to which have been added many fragments of mediaeval sculpture or masonry, found in the city or its vicinity. The Carnavalet museum occupies the mansion in which Madame de Sévigné resided; it is a municipal museum, in which are brought together all objects of interest for the history of Paris. The artillery museum, in the Hôtel des Invalides, comprises ancient armour, military weapons, flags, and an ethnographic collection reproducing the principal types of Oceania, America, and the coasts of Africa and Asia. The permanent exhibition of the products of Algeria and the colonies is in the Palais de ΓIndustrie; and finally the Trocadéro palace contains a museum of comparative sculpture and ethnographic galleries for exhibiting curiosities brought home from distant countries by the principal French official travellers.
Public Charity—Hospitals, &c.—The administration of public charity is entrusted to a responsible director, under the authority of the Seine prefect, and assisted by a board of supervision consisting of twenty members. The funds at his disposal are derived (1) from the revenue of certain estates, houses, farms, woods, stocks, shares (£250,680 in 1882); (2) from taxes on seats in the theatres (one-tenth of the price), balls, concerts, the Mont de Piété, and allotments in the cemeteries (£252,117); (3) from subsidies paid by the town, the department, and the state (£976,368); (4) from other sources (£522,398, including £130,787 from voluntary donations). The charges on the administration consist of “outside relief” to the poor (secours à domicile) the "service” of the hospitals, and the support of charity children. In each arrondissement there is a bureau de bienfaisance, consisting of the maire, his assistants, twelve administrators, and an indefinite number of ladies and gentlemen (known as commissaires and dames de charité) who give voluntary and gratuitous assistance. The secretary and treasurer is a paid official; and 180 doctors, 110 midwives, and 207 religieuses, distributed among fifty-eight houses of relief (maisons de secours), are employed in the service of the bureaus, which in 1880 received 104,236 applications for aid presented by 63 "visitors.” The expenses for that year amounted to £69,843 for food, £13,140 for clothing, £6114 for fuel, £29,361 for medicine and medical advice, £15,032 for other assistance in kind, and £83,843 for assistance in money. The pauper population, enumerated every three years, consisted in 1880 of 123,735 persons (53,591 males, 70,144 females) in 46,815 families, or at the rate of 1 person for every 16'07 inhabitants in the city,—an increase of 3153 families and 10,418 persons since 1877, and 10,102 families and 33,448 persons since 1861. Of the families assisted in 1880,18,125 obtained temporary relief and 28,690 relief throughout the entire year. This destitute class is very unequally distributed among the several arrondissements. Whilst in the 9th arrondissement there is only 1 pauper in 50 inhabitants, and in the 1st, 8th, and 2d 1 pauper in 46, 45, and 44 inhabitants, in the 13th arrondissement there is 1 in 7, in the 20th 1 in 8, and in the 19th 1 in 9. The paupers are for the most part under sixty years of age, and occupy single rooms, at a rent of from £4 to £8 per annum, generally with a single fireplace and a single bed. There are usually no children under fourteen years of age.
The doctors in 1880 gave 453,036 consultations at the dispensaries, and performed vaccination in 31,549 cases. The midwives attended 5126 women boarding in their houses for their confinement, and gave assistance to 14,178 during pregnancy. Domiciliary visits were paid by the medical staff in 1880 to 30,322 patients and to 48,269 necessitous persons.
The doctors, surgeons, chemists, both resident and non-resident, connected with the hospitals, are all admitted by competitive examination. In 1880 the staff for the hospitals of Paris and the auxiliary hospitals of Forges, Garches, and Roche Guyon (Seine-et-Oise), and Berck (Pas de Calais) consisted of 32 doctors or surgeons at the central office of admission, 118 hospital doctors or surgeons, 8 doctors for the insane, 18 chemists, 291 internes, 470 externes, 575 probationers, and 9 midwives or midwives’ assistants. The hospitals are classified as general hospitals—Hôtel Dieu, Pitié, Charité, Saint Antoine, Necker, Cochin, Beaujon, Lariboisière, Tenon, Laennec, Tournelles; special hospitals—St Louis (skin diseases), Midi or South (venereal diseases, men), Lourcine (venereal diseases, women and children), Maternity, Clinical (operations); children’s hospitals—Enfants Malades, Trousseau, Berck-sur-Mer, La Roche·Guon; hospices—Bicêtre (old men), La Salpétrière (old women), Ivry (incurables); maisons de retraite—lssy, La Rochefoucauld, Ste Périne; fondations—Boulard St Michel, Brézin at Garches (for ironworkers), Devillas, Chardon Lagache, Lenoir-Jousseran; and asylums for the insane—Bicêtre (men), Salpêtrière (women). The following table (V.) gives details regarding these institutions in 1882:— [table]
Several of the hospitals are of recent construction—Hôtel-Dieu, Tenon, Lariboisière. The Hôtel-Dieu was rebuilt in La Cité at an outlay of £1,800,000, or £4000 per bed; the arrangements for practical education are excellent, and secure the institution a world-wide reputation. La Salpêtrière (oldest of all the hospital buildings) is remarkable for its extent, occupying 74 acres, with 45 large blocks lighted by 4682 windows.
The benefits of the hospitals or hospices are generally given gratuitously, but a certain number of patients pay their expenses, and in 1880 the funds of the department were in this way augmented by £89,262. In connexion with these establishments are a bakery, a slaughter-house, a wine cellar, a central drug-store, a purveyor for purchasing provisions in the open market, a central depot for bedding, linen, clothing, furniture, and utensils; and a certain number of articles are retailed to other departments or private institutions.
Foundlings and orphans are sent to the Hospice des Enfants Assistés, which also receives children whose parents are patients in the hospitals or undergoing imprisonment. In 1882 the hospice received 9620 children; the inmates from the preceding year numbered 274. Of these children 2549 were restored to their parents, 2814 were boarded out in the country, 561 died, and 2594 were formally enrolled among the enfants assistés, or charity children. There are in the hospice 102 resident wet-nurses; infants, however, are not kept in the institution, but are boarded out with nurses in the country, ofwhαm 1707 were engaged under the supervision of 361 matrons. Up to twelve years of age these children are kept at the expense of the department of Seine, and they remain under the guardianship of the poor-board till twenty-one years of age. On December 31, 1882, there were 13,861 children of the first class and 12,135 of the second distributed among 32 agencies and 257 medical circuits situated in Nivernais, Burgundy, Bourbonnais, Normandy, Artois, Picardy, and Brittany.
The Qιιinze-Vingts still gives shelter to the 300 (fifteen score) blind for whom it was founded by St Louis, and gives outdoor assistance to 1550 besides. The blind asylum for the young (Institution des Jeunes Aveugles) has 250 pupils (one-third girls, two-thirds boys); the course of study lasts for eight years; most of the pupils are bursars of the state or the departments; some pay a small fee; suitable trades are taught. The deaf-mute institution is for boys only, and they are generally paid for by the state, the departments, and the communes. During a course of seven years they are taught articulation and lip-reading. The Charenton asylum for the insane receives 300 male and 280 female patients, most of them paying for their board, and classed according to their means. Those of Vincennes (522 beds formale patients) and Le Vesinet (300beds for female patients) take in convalescents from the hospitals sent by the charity boards or friendly societies which subscribe to the institution. The Hôtel des Invalides is for old and infirm soldiers. The pensioners, who have numbered at times as many as 5000, are now only a few hundred, and their immense edifice accommodates the Ecole Supérieure de Guerre, the artillery museum, the galleries for plans in relief of fortified posts, and numerous storehouses of the war department. Under the dome of the Invalides is the tomb of Napoleon I., and in the church the funeral obsequies of distinguished soldiers are performed. There are four military hospitals in Paris—Val de Grâce (960 beds for all ranks), Gros Caillou (630 beds), Saint Martin (425 beds), and Vincennes (630).
Private beneficence maintains a great variety of institutions in Paris. There are 30 crèches or day-nurseries in the city and 14 in the suburbs (capable of accommodating respectively 1093 and 398 infants), where mothers who have to go out to work may leave their infants under two years; they are under the direction of the sisterhood of St Vincent de Paul. The Society of St Vincent de Paul, which must not be confounded with the sisterhood, is a society of laymen founded in 1833 and divided into as many conferences as there are parishes, for the purpose of visiting the poor and giving them advice and assistance. The Société Philanthropique distributes food rations in its “kitchens” by means of a system of cheap tickets. The Société de Charité Maternelle devotes its attention to women in childbed; the Petites Soeurs des Pauvres have five houses for poor old men, for whom they collect scraps from the restaurants. The Frères St Jean de Dieu take care of children suffering from incurable diseases. A large number of institutions known as ouυroirs or workrooms bring up orphan and destitute girls and fit them for various industrial occupations, especially the use of the needle. The night asylums offer shelter to the homeless. The Society for the Protection of the Alsace-Lorrainers, and the charity office of the British embassy, are naturally limited to special nationalities. Friendly societies, supported by ordinary subscriptions, donations from honorary members, and state subsidies, are numerous; they give assistance to their members when they are sick or out of work, and pay their funeral expenses.
An evangelistic mission, commenced in 1872 by the Bev. B. W. Μ‘All in the district of Belleville has met with remarkable success. By 1884 it had between thirty and forty stations in Paris and the suburbs, and had extended its activity to various towns in the provinces, to Corsica, and to Algiers. Its income in 1883-4 was £10,607. Homes for English girls were established in 1872 by Miss Ada Leigh, and the association to which they have since been transferred has been presented with an orphanage by Μ. Galignani.
The Mont de Piété is a national pawnbroking establishment. Charging 9 per cent, for working expenses, it hands over all its proceeds to the public charity funds. The average number of articles pawned per day is 5205, of which 5 only are of suspicious origin (theft); the average sum lent on each was 23 francs in 1881. When the depositor does not redeem his pledge or purchase a renewal the article is sold. In 1882 there were 1,669,582 new transactions and 664,617 renewals, while 1,401,944 articles were redeemed, and 214,340 sold,—the loans amounting respectively to £1,619,621, £676,671, £1,320,888, and £144,315. If the sale involves a loss this falls on the agent who overestimated the value when the article was deposited; any profit, on the contrary, is divided between the administration and the person concerned.
The Caisse d’Épargne, or savings bank, the natural complement of the Mont de Piété, was founded in Paris in 1818. It began that year with 351 depositors, and deposits to the amount of £2153; in 1882 it had 440,728 depositors, and owed them £3,513,432. The new deposits for the year reached a sum of £1,874,697, and the repayments £1,236,060. The number of new pass-books issued was 63,146, of accounts closed 24,228. Three per cent, interest was paid to the depositors. The maximum deposit is £80.
Law and Justice.— Paris is the seat of four courts having jurisdiction over all France :—(1) the Tribunal des Conflits, for settling disputes between the judicial and administrative authorities on questions as to their respective jurisdiction; (2) the Council of State, for litigations between private persons and public departments; (3) the Cour des Comptes; and (4) the Cour de Cassation. The first three sit in the Palais Royal, the fourth in the Palais de Justice, which is also the seat of (1) a cour d’appel for seven departments (five civil chambers, one chamber of appeal for the correctional police, one chamber for preliminary proceedings), (2) a cour d’assises (members nominated for a term of three months; two sessions per month), (3) a tribunal of first instance for the department of Seine (seven civil chambers for civil affairs, sequestration of real estate, and sale of personal property; four chambers of correctional police), (4) a police court where each juge de paix presides in his turn assisted by a commissaire de police. Litigations between the departmental or municipal administrations and private persons are decided by the conseil de préfecture.
The prefect of police, charged with the maintenance of public safety, nas the prison department under his supervision. There are eight prisons in Paris—Mazas, La Santé, Ste Pélagie, St Lazare (for females), the dépôt (police station) of the prefecture of police, the Conciergerie or lock-up at the Palais de Justice, the Grande Boquette (for condemned criminals), and the Petite Roquette reformatory. In 1882 there passed through these prisons 108,231 prisoners (83,022 men, 25,209 women), the daily average being 5529. Out of the total number, 30,990 were kept in solitary confinement, and 2905 (males) worked in company by day and were placed in separate cells at night. The prisons also received 1067 young children who accompanied their mothers, and 732 children lost in the streets. The mendicity-station at Villers-Cotterets (Aisne) has besides a daily roll of 919 prisoners (male and female). In the so-called House of Bepression at St Denis are confined those mendicants who cannot be removed to Villers-Cotterets, or those discharged prisoners who have not acquired a sufficiency for their im∙ mediate necessities; 3240 persons passed through St Denis in 1882. The same year 46,457 persons were arrested in Paris,—44,955 being taken flagrante delicto or arrested as vagabonds; 41,207 were brought before the judges. Of the whole number eight-ninths were males. Against five-ninths no previous charge had been made: 899 were ticket-of-leave men, 3291 were foreigners (959 Belgians, 759 Italians, 376 Swiss, 379 Germans, and 126 English). The most frequent causes of aιτest were—vagabondism and begging, 16,985; theft in its various forms, 8604; rioting, 5619; assaults and acts of violence, 1338; offences against morals, 825; breach of certificate by ticket-of-leave men, 899; murders, assassinations, and assault by night, 330; drunkenness, 312.
The prefect of police has the control of the locating, discharging, or maintaining of the insane in the six public asylums of Ste Anne, La Salpêtrière, Bicêtre, Charenton, Vaucluse, and La Ville Evrard,—the last two situated in the department of Seine-et-Oise. The financial and administrative management of these establishments is entrusted to the prefect of Seine. At the 1st of January 1882 there were in the different asylums 8260 lunatics, and during 1882 3670 were admitted, while 3938 left or died. Private asylums for the insane cannot be opened within his prefecture without the permission of the prefect of police. Children put out to nurse, and women wishing to be engaged as wet-nurses, are also under his supervision. In 1881 18,527 infants were registered by their parents as requiring to be put to nurse in the various departments; on December 31, 1881, 4398 infants under three years of age were out at nurse within the prefecture; 407 died during the year. An institution of a reformatory character commenced operations on January 1, 1881. In 1881 and 1882 it received 1644 children—1131 brought by their parents, 262 by the magistrates, and 251 by the prefect of police. On December 1882 there remained 1330 children boarded out in the country. The expense for the two years was £18,160.
Establishments which are dangerous or unhealthy are of three classes, according as they have to be kept absolutely at a distance from dwelling-houses or simply subjected to certain precautions. They can be opened only with the permission and under the surveillance of the prefect of police. The first class comprises slaughter-houses, nightsoil reservoirs, vitriol works, &c. In 1882 there were of all the three classes 3049 establishments within the city of Paris; in 1881 there were 2922 in the suburban communes. The shops for mineral oils (3615) and those for mineral waters (1133) are also subject to inspection, and the groceries, drug-stores, and chemists’ shops in which medicines are sold (9224) are under the supervision of the upper school of pharmacy. Steam machinery, (3317 machines, of 29,529 horse-power) which must be registered, is inspected by the engineers.
Eighty local committees —forty composed of men and forty of women—are entrusted with the duty of visiting the 12,316 workshops in which 27,402 children are employed (16,945 boys or girls between twelve and sixteen years of age, and 10,336 girls between sixteen and twenty-one, i.e., still minors). Street porters (commissionaires), rag-pickers, hawkers, and lodging-house keepers are under police surveillance. The bodies of the drowned or of those who have died in the streets aie conveyed to the Morgue, where post-mortem examinations are performed at the command of the court, and lectures delivered on medical jurisprudence. The number of bodies is increasing (718 in 1878; 879 in 1882). Of this total 673 were adults (committed suicide, 219; killed by accident, 105; murdered, 45; died suddenly, 86). Drowning is the most frequent cause of death (321 cases). Of the 673 adults 588 were identified; the 85 unidentified were photographed before burial.
Cemeteries.— A corpse cannot be buried in Paris without a certificate from a medical man who has ascertained that death has really taken place; and at. least twenty-four hours must be allowed to elapse. In most cases (30,825 out of 57,871 deaths) the families are too poor to pay any funeral expenses, and the body is consequently buried free of charge. Other interments are divided into nine classes, the cost of which ranges from 15s. to £287, without counting secondary and religious expenses. There are twenty cemeteries in Paris or outside the gates. Père la Chaise, the most extensive, contains 106⅛ acres; it is there that the most illustrious personages are generally buried. In 1882 the number of interments was no less than 3043 (all permanent). Montmartre, or the Northern Cemetery (26 acres), received 970 (all permanent); Montparnasse, or the Southern Cemetery (46 acres), 1945 (10 being temporary). The two cemeteries of St 0uen (61 acres) received 12,462 gratuitous and 5761 temporary interments, but only 10 permanent; and the two cemeteries at Ivry (69 acres) 20,380 gratuitous interments and 7038 temporary. It is towards St Ouen and Ivry that most of the funerals now make their way and those graveyards, though but recently formed, will before long prove insufficient. The other Paris cemeteries are due to the incorporation of the suburban communes in 1860. The little graveyard at
Piepus is the property of a few families. Old cemeteries, long ago abandoned, in the heart of the city have gradually been built over. The bones found on breaking up the ground are collected in the ossuary of the Catacombs at ΛIontrouge. The Catacombs are ancient quarries extending under a great part of the city south of the Seine; they are subjected to continual inspections and shoring-up to prevent subsidences such as have taken place on several occasions.
Fires. — The fire brigade has a military organization, and consists of 1742 officersand men. On 31st December 1882 they had at their disposal 1678 fire-plugs. In the course of that year they extinguished 982 fires (127 in January, the maximum; 55 in September, the minimum) and 1656 burning vents; and there were 72 false alarms. They used 1778 fire-engines, 139 of them worked by steam. Eight individuals perished in tire conflagrations; 55 were saved by the firemen. Only 19 of the fires were serious. In 703 cases the damage was less than £40. The total loss for the year was £309,200. The most frequent cause of fires was some defect in the buildings (157 cases); lights ranked next (142 cases), and the falling of petroleum or naphtha lamps accounted for 84.
Military.— Paris is the seat of a military government, whose commandant has under him all the troops stationed in the departments of Seine and Seine-et-Oise. The soldiers recruited in the two departments are distributed among the 2d, 3d, 4th, and 5th corps d’année, whose headquarters are at Amiens, Rouen, Le Mans, and Orleans. The principal barracks belonging to the state in Paris are those of the military school of Prince Eugene and N apoleon; the town possesses the barracks of the republican guard, the gendarmes, and the firemen in different quarters. The most important are those of La Cité, to which the prefecture of police was transferred after the destruction of its former buildings by fire in 1871. Besides the war office and the hospitals named above, the main establishments comprise the dépôt of the fortifications, the central artillery dépôt with the workshops of St Thomas d’Aquin, and the dépôt of the commissariat department Food Supply.— The following table (VI. ) show’s the annual average of food consumed per head of the inhabitants of Paris :— [table]
The average annual consumption of bread is 349’46 pounds per head. Wholesale merchandise in food stuffs, though legal in all the market-places of Paris, is, as a matter of fact, concentrated in the central markets (halles centrales), with the exception of the butchermeat trade, which is carried on by public auction or private sale both in the central markets and the slaughter-houses. The central markets comprise ten elegant “pavilions” of iron and glass, each about ⅜ acre, and separated from each other by streets which are for the most part covered. Dealers from the neighbourhood of Paris took to these markets, in 1882, 80,472 vehicles loaded with fruit, 723,257 with vegetables, 39,740 with potatoes, and 37,584 with pease and beans. These are entered as market-garden produce. There was also sold wholesale in the pavilions 1506 tons of “choice” fruits and vegetables, 6896 of “fine” fruits and vegetables, 6903 of ordinary vegetables, 4837 of cresses, 321,047,149 eggs (at an average price of 51s. per thousand), 192,629 “hundreds” of oysters, 21,144 tons of fish, 5746 tons of shell-fish, 6167 tons of “new” cheese, 697 tons of dry cheese, 12,419 tons of butter, 21,931 tons of poultry and game (comprising 6,454,876 fowls, 3,102,269 rabbits, 2,819,083 pigeons, 1,936,560 larks, Ac., at an average price of 10|d. per ⅛), 33,086 tons of beef, veal, mutton and pork,—these last figures including butcher meat sold by public auction in the market of the -La Villette slaughter-house. Through the same market there passed to the shambles in 1882 354,277 oxen, cows, and bulls, 199,416 w calves, 2,054,680 sheep, 315,306 pigs. This cattle-market, connected with the Chemin de Fer de Ceinture so that the trains bring the cattle trucks right into the market, occupies with its slaughter-houses an area of 111 acres. The places of sale (pavillons de vente) are capable of containing 4600 horned cattle, 22,000 sheep, 7000 pigs, 4000 calves. Horned cattle are liable to an entry fee of 3 francs, calves and pigs 1 franc, sheep 0’30 franc. Animals not sold are kept in sheds, cattle paying ⅜ franc per night, and the others in proportion. The slaughter-houses can accommodate 1200 butchers, and contain a tallow-melting house (fondoir). Most of the cattle come from Maine-et-Loire, Nièvre, Calvados; sheep from Seine-et-Oise, Seine-et-Marne, Côte d’Or, Nord, Aisne, Allier, Indre,Cher; calves from Seine-et-Marne, Eure-et-Loir, Loiret, Nord, Aube; pigs from Sarthe, Allier, Creuse, Indre-et-Loire, and Maine-et-Loire. Foreign countries also contribute to the supply, especially of sheep. Germany in 1882 sent 576,563, Austria-Hungary 352,376, Russia 156,005, Algeria 38,172, and Italy 37,694. Beside the Halles Centrales is the Halle aux Blés or corn-market. A certain number of full sacks are stored under the cupola (which, architecturally considered, is a bold and striking design), but the whole of this class of goods arriving at Paris does not necessarily pass through the building. Brought by boat or rail, they are either stored at the stations or taken directly to the bakers, the general warehouses, or the military stores. In 1881 71,961 tons of grain and 208,374 tons of flour reached the city.
The consumption of wine has not increased in Paris during the last decade, allowance being made for the growth of the population. For 1872 the figures were 85,407,322 gallons of wine in cask and 404,272 gallons in bottle; for 1880, 92,840,374 in cask and 428,450 in bottle. But the average consumption of spirits (1,312,498 in 1872, 2,907,190 in 1880) has doubled in the interval. More than the half of the wines and spirits consumed in Paris pass through the entrepôts of Bercy, Quai St Bernard, or Pont de Flandre. To these great markets must be added the market for skins and hides (which, according to the latest returns—taken, however, in 1872—did business to the amount of £880,000), the horse-market (£414,200), charcoal-markets on the boats along the Seine (£180,000), flower-markets (£80,000), and the markets for fodder, dogs, birds, Ac. The Marché du Temple, rebuilt about 1864, is devoted to the sale of old clothes and second-hand articles of all sorts. All the market-houses and market-places are placed under the double supervision of the prefect of Seine and the prefect of police. The former official has to do with the authorization, removal, suppression, and holding of the markets, the fixing and collecting of the dues, the choice of sites, the erection and maintenance of buildings, and the locating of vehicles. The latter maintains order, keeps the roads clear, and watches against fraud. A municipal laboratory has recently been established, where any purchaser can have the provisions he has bought analysed, and can obtain precise information as to their quality. Spoiled provisions are seized by the agents of the prefecture; in 1880 458 tons of butcher meat, 123 tons of horse flesh, 52 tons of tripe, fish, vegetables, fruit, mushrooms, Ac., were seized in this way.
Industries and Commerce.— Returns issued by the chamber of commerce for 1872 eslimated the industrial production of Paris as in the following table :—
Table VII.— Industries of Paris. [table]
The larger manufacturing establishments of Paris comprise engineering and repairing works connected with the railways, similar private works, foundries, and sugar refineries. Government works are the tobacco factories of Gros Caillou (2000 workmen) and Reuilly (1000), the national printing establishment (1000), the mint (where money and medals are coined by a contractor under state control), and the famous tapestry factory and dye-works of the Gobelins. The list of minor establishments is a very varied one; most of them devoted to the production of the so-called articles de Paris, and carrying the principle of the division of labour to an extreme. The establishments which rank next to those above mentioned in the number of workmen are the chemical factories, the gas-works, the printing offices, cabinetmakers’ workshops, boot factories, tailoring establishments, hat factories, and works for the production of paperhangings.
Among the workers are included 189,401 women, girls, and boys, and 123,369 masters—this last a figure which shows how great is the number of the small establishments. The total value produced was estimated at £134,763,717 in 1860, and must have since increased enormously. (Compare Table IV. p. 278.) In 1881 the average day’s wages paid in the petite industrie were estimated at 4s. 5d. for the men and 2s. 5d. for the women. Since 1878 an increase has taken place year by year, at least for the men. Clerks in warehouses earn about £48 per annum, shop women £32, shop girls £16, male domestics £24, and female domestics £20.
In 1882 2400 new houses were built and 1883 old houses enlarged; on the other hand, 997 old houses were entirely demolished and 777 partially. The last official industrial valuation of rental is for the year 1876. At that date there were 76,129 houses containing 1,038,124 separate establishments, 699,175 being used as dwelling-houses at a rental of £13,981,836, and 338,949 for industrial purposes at a rental of £10,049,542.
Between 1872 and 1881 the navigation of the Seine doubled in importance. It has been free from all dues since 1880. There are three divisions—the navigation of the upper Seine and the Marne (above Paris), that of the lower Seine and the Oise (below Paris), and that of the Canal de ΓOurcq with its terminus at the La Villette basin, whence the St Denis Canal branches off to the lower Seine and the St Martin Canal to the upper Seine.
Table VIII. — Navigation of the Seine. [table]
The goods arriving by the upper Seine are chiefly building sand, paving-stones, firewood, timber, grain, coal and coke, pyrites, charcoal, and wines; those by the lower Seine, coal and coke, sand, paving-stones, wines, building materials, grain, and timber; and those by the Canal de ΓOurcq, building materials. By the upper Seine Paris despatches mainly refuse and manure; by the lower Seine, manure, pyrites, grain, and refined sugars; by the Canal de Γ Ourcq, agricultural produce and manure. To the traffic of the river ports situated within the city must be added that of the ports along the canals, and especially that of La Villette, the third port of all France, judged by its commercial activity. The following table (IX.) shows the tonnage of the merchandise that passed through each of the canals in 1882 (the same merchandise may sometimes figure on two canals, or may have also been entered for the ports within the city): — [table]
The Ourcq Canal brings down wood, building stones, bricks, flour, and especially plaster, and takes in return coal, manure, and nightsoil for the Bondy manure-works. The St Denis Canal brings up coal from Nord, Pas de Calais, Belgium, and England; freestone from the valley of the Oise, sands from the lower Seine, wood for industrial purposes, grain, sewage for the works at Aubervilliers, colonial wares for La Villette, &c., and the most important articles taken down are sewage for Aubervilliers, and the various wares embarked at La Villette for Rouen or La Havre. Along the St Martin Canal, on the upward passage, sand, gravel, paving-stones or blocks, firewood, lime or cement, freestone, bricks, tiles, slates are discharged, and sewage especially is taken in for Aubervilliers. On the downward passage are discharged plasters from the Ourcq Canal, coal, and stones and sand from the Oise and the Ourcq. There is besides a large transit traffic.
Five of the great railway companies have a terminus at Paris. The “Nord” and the “Paris, Lyons, and Mediterranean” lines have each only one station; the “Ouest” has two, St Lazare and Montparnasse; the “Est” two, one of which, Bastille, is only a passenger station for the use of the Vincennes line and its prolongation; the “Orleans” two, of which one, Barrière d’Enfer, is restricted to the short line from Paris to Sceaux and Limours.
The following table (X.) shows the number of passengers and quantity of goods that left Paris in 1880:— [table]
Some goods are registered and pay dues at the Paris customhouse; but many pay these dues at the frontier. The following returns (Table XI.) must therefore be considered only as showing the importance of the Paris custom-house, and not the extent of the trade of the city :— [table]
The “special” trade is for home consumption. The duty paid on the imports was £3,774,407.
Till 31st December 1897 the Bank of France has the exclusive privilege of issuing bank-notes. Notes are at present issued for 1000, 500, 100, and 50 francs (£40, £20, £4, and £2); at different times there have been notes for 5000, 2000, 25, 20, and 5. The Bank of France, which has already been described in Banking (see vol. iii. p. 337-39), has 90 branch offices in the provinces. In 1877 the bank received bills and stock to the value of £56,022,532; its advances on securities amounted to £15,038,072; and the change of bank-notes into gold caused a movement of £33,288,000.
The other chief financial establishments in Paris are the Caisse des Dépôts et des Consignations, which receives voluntary deposits or those which are obligatory in certain cases fixed by law; the Crédit Foncier de France, which gives advances to landowners on real property; the Comptoir National d’Escompte, which carries on the same branches of business as the bank, with the exception of the issue of notes.
Among the great private joint-stock banks must be mentioned the Société Générale, the Crédit Industriel et Commercial, the Crédit Lyonnais, the Banque de Paris et des Pays Bas, the Société de Dépôts et Comptes Courants, the Banque d’Escompte, &c. The Bourse or Exchange is open from noon to 3 o’clock for the negotiation of public stock, and from 3 to 6 for commercial transactions. The former is effected by means of brokers (agents de change) named by ministerial decree, and possessing the exclusive right of dealing in public stocks and bills. Brokers for the purchase and sale of goods enjoy freedom of trade, but the tribunal of commerce issues a list of the brokers who have taken the oath. These brokers meet to decide the prices current of the various goods.
The conseils de prud'hommes settle differences between workmen and workmen, or between workmen and masters; the whole initiative, however, rests with the parties. There are four of these bodies in Paris (for the metal trades, the chemical trades, the textile trades, and miscellaneous industries), composed of an equal number of masters and men. They succeed in settling without litigation 95 per cent, of the disputes submitted to them.
The tribunal of commerce, composed of business men elected by the “notables” of their order, deals with cases arising out of commercial transactions; declarations of bankruptcy are made before it; and it acts as court of appeal to the conseils de prud’hommes. In 1882, out of 75,660 cases brought into this court, judgment was given in 66,156, of which 20,696 were cases of first and 45,460 cases of last instance; 4584 cases were compromised. In the same year 1696 bankruptcies were declared, 10 applications made for rehabilitation, and 7 such applications granted by the Paris court of appeal. Money due to bankrupt estates is paid into the Caisse des Dépôts et des Consignations. In 1882 the tribunal of commerce registered 1963 deeds of partnership, 1167 dissolutions of partnership, 1340 home trade marks, and 175 foreign trade marks.
The chamber of commerce (under the honorary presidency of the Seine prefect) consists of twenty-one elective members, of whom a third are renewable every two years. Its duty is to present its views on the means of increasing and developing Parisian commerce. The Condition des Soies, as its name indicates, has to determine exactly the quality of the silk purchased by the dealers. The Chambre Syndicale des Tissus, a non-official association, is the recognized mouthpiece of the textile industries and trade in their dealings with the public administration.
Post-office and Telegraphs.— The post and telegraph department comprised at the close of 1881 56 mixed offices, 22 post offices, 24 telegraph offices, and 862 letter boxes. The postal communications are collected eight times per day, and conveyed to one or other of the 15 sorting-offices (bureaux depasse), which arrange them according to their destinations. All are then brought together in the General Post Office (Recette principale de la Seine), which in 1881 sent out 277,588,000 letters or post cards and 366,816,144 lower-rate packets' (objets affranchis à prix réduits), and received 188,815,000 letters and post cards, and 40,716,000 lower-rate packets. In 1882 there were issued 2,143,952 ordinary money orders, 45,823 telegraphic orders, and 240,734 international orders; 3,841,335 ordinary orders, 30,693 telegraphic orders, and 188,430 international orders were cashed. The greatest number of foreign orders is from Belgium (36,835) and from Germany (35,684). Great Britain sent only 19,314 in 1881.
Telegraphic communication is effected partly by pneumatic tubes and partly by electric apparatus. The year 1881 showed a great increase over 1880 in the matter of pneumatic missives.
Table XII. [table]
The pneumatic system had at the close of 1881 64 miles of tube and 49 offices, and by 1884 it was extended as far as the fortifications, and into almost all quarters of the town. The Government electric telegraph system has 27,000 miles of double wires; the branch offices being connected with the central office by 94 wires and with the Bourse office by 53. The municipal system, used by the various departments of the local administration, the police, the fire-brigade, &c., and for the indication of observatory time, has a length of 534 miles. The telephonic system on the 1st January 1882 had a length of 1392 miles and 2144 subscribers,— increased to 2306 miles and 2637 subscribers on the 1st of January 1883. The central telegraphic office has 315 instruments at work in direct communication with 22 foreign towns and 124 offices in the provinces. In 1880 it sent 11,559,200 messages, and in 1881 13,955,291. (G. ME.)
History.
At its first appearance in history there was nothing to foreshow the important part which Paris was to play in Europe and in the world. An island in the Seine, now almost lost in the modern city, and then much smaller than at present, was for centuries the entire site. The sole importance of the town lay in its being the capital of a similarly insignificant Gallic people, which navigated the lower course of the Seine, and doubtless from time to time visited the coasts of Britain. So few were its inhabitants that they early put themselves under the protection of their powerful neighbours the Senones, and this vassalship was the source of the political dependence of Paris on Sens throughout the Roman period, and of a religious subordination which lasted till the 17th century. The capital did not at once take the name of the Parisii, whose centre it was, but long kept that of Lucetia, Lucotetia, or Lutetia, of which Lutèce is the generally recognized French form.
During the war of Gallic independence, after being subjugated by Caesar, who even in 53 b.c. made then-territory the meeting-place of deputies from all Gaul, the Parisii took part in the great rising of the year 52, at the same time separating their cause from that of the Senones, who were held in check by Caesar’s lieutenant, Labienus. They joined their forces to the army commanded by an Aulercian, the old Camulogenus, which in turn was to unite with the Bellovaci to crush Labienus advancing from Sens to attack the Parisians. Having marched along the right bank of the river till opposite Lutetia, Labienus learned that the Bellovaci were in arms, and, fearing to find himself between two armies at a distance from his headquarters, he sought to get rid of Camulogenus, who, posted on the left bank, endeavoured to bar his way. The bridges had been cut and the town burned by order of the Gallic chief. By means of a stratagem Labienus drew his opponent up the river to the district now occupied by the Jardin des Plantes, and quietly by night crossed the Seine lower down in the neighbourhood of Grenelle, near a place which Caesar calls Metiosedum, identified, but not conclusively, with Meudon. The Gauls, retracing their steps a little, met the Romans and allowed themselves to be routed and dispersed; their leader fell in the fore-front of the battle. Still unsubdued, the Parisii were called upon by the general council assembled in Alesia to furnish eight thousand men to help in raising the siege of that city. It is doubtful whether they were able to ’ contribute the whole of this contingent, when their powerful neighbours the Bellovaci managed to send only two thousand of the ten thousand demanded of them. This was their last eSort, and after the check at Alesia they took no part in the desperate resistance offered by the Bellovaci.
Lutetia was somewhat neglected under the Roman emperors of the first centuries. Its inhabitants continued quietly carrying on their river traffic, and devoted part of their wealth to the maintenance of a great temple to Jupiter built on the site of the present cathedral of Notre Dame. It is not known at what date Christianity was introduced into the future capital of France; but it is probable, judging by the use of the title “city,” that Lutetia was the see of one of the earliest of the bishoprics of Gallia Celtica. The name of the founder of the church is known, but a keen controversy, not yet settled, has recently been raised with regard to the date when the first Roman missionary, St Dionysius or Denis, reached the banks of the Seine, along with his two deacons Rusticus and Eleutherius. A pious belief, which, in spite of its antiquity, has its origin in nothing better than parochial vanity, identifies the 6rst-named with Dionysius the Areopagite, who was converted by St Paul at Athens, and thus takes us back to the middle of the 1st century of the Christian era. Better founded is the opinion which dates the evangelization of the city two centuries later; the regular list of bishops, of whom, after Denis, the most famous was St Marcel, begins about 250.
Lutetia was in some sort the cradle of Christian liberty, having been the capital, from 292 to 306, of the mild Constantius Chlorus, who put an end to persecution in Brittany, Gaul, and Spain, over which he ruled. This emperor fixed his residence on the banks of the Seine, doubtless for the purpose of watching the Germans without losing sight of Brittany, where the Roman authority was always unstable; perhaps he also felt something of the same fancy for Lutetia which Julian afterwards expressed in his works and his letters. Be that as it may, the fact that these two princes chose to live there naturally drew attention to the city, where several buildings now rose on the left side of the river which could not have been reared within the narrow boundaries of the island. There was the imperial palace, the remains of which, a magnificent vaulted chamber, beside the Hôtel de Cluny, are now known, probably correctly, as Julian’s Baths. At some distance up the river, in the quarter of St Victor, excavations in 1870 and in 1883 laid bare the foundations of the amphitheatre, which was capable of holding about 10,000 spectators, and thus suggests the existence of a population of 20,000 to 25,000 souls. Dwelling-houses, villas, and probably also an extensive cemetery, occupied the slope of the hill of St Geneviève.
It was at Lutetia that, in 360, Julian, already Caesar, was in spite of himself proclaimed Augustus by the legions he had more than once led to victory in Germany. The troops invaded his palace, which, to judge by various circumstances of the mutiny, must have been of great extent. As for the city itself, it was as yet but a little town (πολίχνη) according to the imperial author in his Misopogon. The successive sojourns of Valentinian I. and Gratian scarcely increased its importance. The latest emperors preferred Treves, Arles, and Vienne in Gaul, and, besides, allowed Paris to be absorbed by the powerful Armorican league (c. 410). When the patricians Aetius, Aegidius, and Syagrius held almost independent sway over the small portion of Gaul which still held together, they dwelt at Soissons, and it was there that Clovis fixed himself during the ten or eleven years between the defeat of Syagrius (486) and the surrender of Paris (497), which opened its gates, at the advice of St Geneviève, only after the conversion of the Frankish king. In 508, at the return of his victorious expedition against the south, Clovis made Paris the official capital of his realm— Cathedram regni constituit, says Gregory of Tours. He chose as his residence the palace of the Thermae, and lost no time in erecting on the summit of the hill, as his future place of interment, the basilica of St Peter and St Paul, which became not long afterwards the church and abbey of St Geneviève. After the death of Clovis, in spite of the supremacy granted to the kingdom of Austrasia or Metz, Paris remained the true political centre of the various Frankish states, insomuch that the four sons of Clothaire, fearing the prestige which would attach to whoever of them might possess it, made it a sort of neutral town, though after all it was seized by Sigebert, king of Austrasia, Chilperic, king of Neustria (who managed to keep possession for some time, and repaired the amphitheatre), and Gontran, king of Burgundy. The last sovereign had to defend himself in 585 against the pretender Gondowald, whose ambition aspired to uniting the whole of Gaul under his dominion, and marching on Paris to make it the seat of the half barbarian half
Roman administration of the kingdom of which he had dreamed.
Numerous calamities befell Paris from 586, when a terrible conflagration took place, to the close of the Merovingian dynasty. During a severe famine Bishop Landry sold the church plate to alleviate the distress of the people, and it was probably he who, in company with St Éloi (Eligius), founded the Hôtel-Dieu. The kings in the long run almost abandoned the town, especially when the Austrasian influence under the mayors of the palace tended to shift the centre of the Frankish power towards the Rhine.
Though the Merovingian period was for art a time of the deepest decadence, Paris was nevertheless adorned and enriched by pious foundations. Mention has already been made of the abbey of St Peter, which became after the death of Clovis the abbey of St Geneviève. On the same side of the river, but in the valley, Childebert, with the assistance of Bishop St Germain, founded St Vincent, known a little later as St Germain-des-Prés, which was the necropolis of the Frank kings before St Denis. On the right bank the same king built St Vincent le Rond (afterwards St Germain l ’ Auxerrois), and in La Cité, beside the cathedral of St Étienne, the basilica of Notre Dame, which excited the admiration of his contemporaries and in the 12th century obtained the title of cathedral. Various monasteries were erected on both sides of the river, and served to group in thickly-peopled suburbs the population, which had grown too large for the island.
The first Carlovingian, Pippin the Short, occasionally lived at Paris, sometimes in the palace of Julian, sometimes in the old palace of the Roman governors of the town, at the lower end of the island; the latter ultimately became the usual residence. Under Charlemagne Paris ceased to be capital; and when feudal France was constituted under Charles the Bald it was liberally bestowed, like any ordinary place, on mere counts or dukes. But the dangers of the Norman invasion attracted general attention to the town, and showed that its political importance could no longer be neglected. When the suburbs were pillaged and burned by the pirates, and the city regularly besieged in 885, Paris was heroically defended by its “lords,” and the emperor Charles the Fat felt bound to hasten from Germany to its relief. The pusillanimity which he showed in purchasing the retreat of the Normans was the main cause of his deposition in 887, while the courage displayed by Count Eudes procured him the crown of France. Robert, Eudes’s brother, succeeded him; and, although Robert’s son Hugh the Great was only duke of France and count of Paris, his power counterbalanced that of the last of the Carlovingians, shut up in Laon as their capital.
With Hugh Capet in 987 the capital of the duchy of France definitively became the capital of the kingdom, and in spite of the frequent absence of the kings, several of whom preferred to reside at Orleans, the town continued to increase in size and population, and saw the development of those institutions which were destined to secure its greatness. Henry I. founded the abbey of St Martin-des-Champs, Louis the Stout that of St Victor, the mother-house of an order, and a nursery of literature and theology. Under Louis VII. the royal domain was the scene of one of the greatest artistic revolutions recorded in history: the Roman style of architecture was exchanged for the Pointed or Gothic, of which Suger, in his reconstruction of the basilica of St Denis, exhibited the earliest type. The capital could not remain aloof from this movement: several sumptuous buildings were erected; the Roman choir of St Germain-des-Prés was thrown down to give place to another more spacious and elegant; and when, in 1163, Pope Alexander had solemnly consecrated it, he was invited by Bishop Maurice de Sully to lay the first stone of Notre Dame de Paris, a cathedral on a grander scale than any previously undertaken. Paris still possesses the Roman nave of St Germain-des-Prés, preserved when the building was rebuilt in the 12th century; the Pointed choir, consecrated in 1163; and the entire cathedral of Notre Dame, which, completed sixty years later, underwent various modifications down to the beginning of the 14th century. The sacristy is modern; the site previous to 1831 was occupied by the episcopal palace, also built by Maurice de Sully, who by a new street had opened up this part of the island.
Philip Augustus may be considered the second founder of Paris. He seldom quitted it save for his military expeditions, and he there built for himself, near St Germain l ’ Auxerrois, the Louvre, the royal dwelling par excellence, whose keep was the official centre of feudalism. He created or organized a regular system of administration with its headquarters at Paris; and under his patronage the public lectures delivered at Pré-aux-Clercs were regulated and grouped under the title of a university in 1200.
This university, the most famous and flourishing in Christendom, considerably augmented the local population, and formed as it were a new town on the left side of the river, where the important abbeys of St Geneviève, St Gêrmain-des-Prés, and St Victor, and a vast Carthusian monastery already stood. Colleges were erected to receive the students of the different countries, and became the great meeting-place of the studious youth of all Europe. Returning to their native lands, where rank and honours awaited them, the pupils of the Paris university spread abroad the name and prestige of France; and sometimes they took home with them, or afterwards sent for, French artists, to whose wanderings must be ascribed the astonishing propagation in other countries of Pointed architecture.
The right side of the river, where commerce and industry had taken up their abode, and where the Louvre, the abbey of St Martin, and a large number of secondary religious establishments were already erected, became a centre of activity at least as important as that on the left. The old suburbs, too, were now incorporated with the town and enclosed in the new line of fortifications constructed by Philip Augustus, which, however, did not take in the great abbeys on the left side of the river, and thus obliged them to build defensive works of their own.
Philip Augustus issued from the Louvre a celebrated order that the streets of the town should be paved. Not far from his palace, on the site of the present Halles Centrales, he laid out an extensive cemetery and a market-place, which both took their name from the Church of the Innocents, a building of the same reign, destroyed at the Revolution. Fountains were placed in all the quarters. As for the lighting of the town, till the close of the 16th century the only lamps were those in front of the madonnas at the street corners. But the first “illumination” of Paris occurred under Philip Augustus: on his return from a victorious expedition to Flanders in 1214 he was welcomed by the. Parisians as a conqueror; and the public rejoicings lasted for seven days, “interrupted by no night,” says the chronicler, alluding to the torches and lamps with which the citizens lighted up the fronts of their houses. Ferrand, count of Flanders, the traitor vassal, was dragged behind the king to the dungeons of the Louvre, whose doors closed on him for ever.
In 1226 there was held at Paris a council which, by excommunicating Raymond VII., count of Toulouse, helped to prepare the way for the most important treaty which had as yet been signed in the capital. By this treaty (12th April 1229) Blanche of Castile obtained from Raymond VII. a great part of his possessions, while the remainder was secured to the house of Capet through the marriage of Alphonse of Poitiers, brother of St Louis, with Jeanne, the last natural heiress of Languedoc.
In affection for his capital St Louis equalled or even surpassed his grandfather Philip, and Paris reciprocated his goodwill. The head of the administration was at that time the provost of Paris, a judiciary magistrate and police functionary whose extensive powers had given rise to the most flagrant abuses. Louis IX. reformed this office and filled it with the judge of greatest integrity to be found in his kingdom. This was the famous Etienne Boileau, who showed such vigilance and uprightness that the capital was completely purged of evil-doers; the sense of security thus produced attracted a certain number of new inhabitants, and, to the advantage of the public revenue, increased the value of the trade. It was Étienne Boileau who, by the king’s express command, drew up those statutes of the commercial and industrial guilds of Paris which, modified by the necessities of new times and the caprice of princes, remained in force till the Revolution.
St Louis caused a partial restoration of St Germain l ’ Auxerrois, his parish church (completed in the 15th century, and deplorably altered under Louis XV.); and, besides preferring the palace of La Cité to the Louvre, he entirely rebuilt it, and rendered it one of the most comfortable residences of his time. Of this edifice there still remain, among the buildings of the present Palais de Justice, the great guard-room, the kitchens with their four enormous chimneys, three round towers on the quay, and, one of the marvels of the Middle Ages, the Sainte Chapelle, erected in 1248 to receive the crown of thorns sent from Constantinople. This church, often imitated during the 13th and 14th centuries, is like an immense shrine in open work; its large windows contain admirable stained glass of its own date, and the basements are adorned inside with pictures recently restored. It has a lower story ingeniously arranged, which served as a chapel for the palace servants. The Sainte Chapelle was designed by Pierre de Montereau, one of the most celebrated architects of his time, to whom is attributed another marvel still extant, the refectory of the abbey of St Martin, now occupied by the library of the Conservatoire des Arts et des Métiers. This incomparable artist was buried in the abbey of St Germain-des-Prés, where, too, he had raised magnificent buildings now no longer existing. Under St Louis, Robert de Sorbon, a common priest, founded in 1253 an unpretending theological college which afterwards became the celebrated faculty of the Sorbonne, whose decisions were well-nigh as authoritative as those of Rome.
The capital of France had but a feeble share in the communal movement which in the north characterizes the 11 th, 12th, and 13th centuries. Placed directly under the central power, it was never strong enough to force concessions; and in truth it did not claim them, satisfied with the advantages of all kinds secured for it by its political position and its university. And, besides, the privileges which it did enjoy, while they could be revoked at the king’s pleasure, were of considerable extent. Its inhabitants were not subjected to forced labour or arbitrary imposts, and the liberty of the citizens and their commerce and industry were protected by wise regulations. The university and all those closely connected with it possessed the fullest rights and liberties. There was a municipal or bourgeois militia, which rendered the greatest service to Philip Augustus and St Louis, but afterwards became an instrument of revolt. The communal administration devolved on échevins or jurés, who, in conjunction with the notables, chose a nominal mayor called provost of the merchants {prévôt des marchands). The powers of this official had been grievously curtailed in favour of the provost of Paris, and his lieutenants named by the sovereign. His main duties were to regulate the price of provisions and to control the incidence of taxation on merchandise. He was the chief inspector of bridges and public wells, superintendent of the river police, and commander of the guard of the city walls, which it was also his duty to keep in repair. And, finally, he had jurisdiction in commercial affairs until the creation of the •consular tribunals by L’Hôpital (Lalanne, Diet, historique de la France). The violent attempts made by Étienne Marcel in the 14th century, and those of the communes of 1793 and 1871, showed what reason royalty had to fear too great an expansion of the municipal power at Paris.
The town council met in the 13th and 14th centuries in an unpretending house on Ste Geneviève, near the city walls on the left side of the river. The municipal assemblies were afterwards held near the Place de Grève, on the right side of the river, in the “Maison aux Piliers,” which Francis I. allowed to be replaced by an imposing hôtel de ville.
The last of the direct descendants of Capet, and the first two Valois did little for their capital. Philip the Fair, however, increased its political importance by making it the seat of the highest court in the kingdom, the parlement, which he organized between 1302 and 1304, and to which he surrendered a part of his Cité palace. Under the three sons of Philip the Fair, the Tour de Nesle, which stood opposite, on the site now occupied by the buildings of the Institute, was the scene of frightful orgies, equally celebrated in history and romance. One of the queens who, if the chronicles are to be trusted, took part in these expiated her crimes in Château-Gaillard, where she was strangled in 1315 by order of her husband, Louis X. During the first part of the war of the Hundred Years, Paris escaped being taken by the English, but felt the effects of the national misfortunes. Whilst destitution excited in the country the revolt of the Jacquerie, in the city the miseries of the time were attributed to the vices of the feudal system, and the citizens seemed ready for insurrection. The provost of the merchants, Étienne Marcel, equally endowed with courage and intellect, sought to turn this double movement to account in the interest of the municipal liberties of Paris and of constitutional guarantees. The cause which he supported was lost through the violence of his own acts. Not content with having massacred two ministers under the very eyes of the dauphin Charles, who was regent whilst his father John lay captive in London, he joined the Jacquerie, and was not afraid to call into Paris the king of Navarre, Charles the Bad, a notorious firebrand who at that time was making common cause with the English. Public sentiment, at first favourable to Marcel’s schemes, shrank from open treason. A watch was set on him, and, at the moment when, having the keys of the town in his possession in virtue of his office, he was preparing to open one of the gates, he was assassinated by order of Jean Maillard, one of the heads of the milice, on the night of July 31, 1358. Marcel had enlarged Philip Augustus’s line of fortifications on the right side of the river, and had commenced a new one.
When he became king in 1364, Charles V. forgot the outrages he had suffered at the hands of the Parisians during his regency. He robbed the Louvre to some extent of its military equipment, in order to make it a convenient and sumptuous residence; his open-work staircases and his galleries are mentioned in terms of the highest praise by writers of the time. This did not, however, remain always his favourite palace; having built or rebuilt in the St Antoine quarter the mansion of St Paul or St Pol, he was particularly fond of living in it during the latter part of his life, and it was there that he died in 1380. It was Charles V. who, in conjunction with the provost of the merchants, Hugues Aubriot, erected the famous Bastille to protect the St Antoine gate. A library which he founded—a rich one for ths times—became the nucleus of the national library. With the exception of some of the upper portions of the Sainte Chapelle, which were altered or reconstructed by this prince or his son Charles VI., there are no remains of the buildings of Charles V.
The reign of Charles VI. was as disastrous for the city as that of his father had been prosperous. From the very accession of the new king, the citizens, who had for some time been relieved by a great reduction of the taxes, and had received a premise of further alleviation, found themselves subjected to the most odious fiscal exactions on the part of the king’s uncle, who was not satisfied with the well-stored treasury of Charles V., which he had unscrupulously pillaged. Aubriot, having ventured to remonstrate, was thrown into prison as a heretic, and in 1382 a riot took place for the purpose of delivering the provost and seizing the fiscal agents. Preoccupied with his expedition against the Flemings, Charles VI. delayed putting down the revolt, and for the moment remitted the new taxes. On his victorious return on 10th January 1383, the Parisians in alarm drew up their forces in front of the town gates under the pretext of showing their sovereign what aid he might derive from them, but really in order to intimidate him. They were ordered to retire within the Avails and to lay down their arms, and they obeyed. The king and his uncles, having destroyed the gates, made their way into Paris as into a besieged city; and with the decapitation of Desmarets, one of the most faithful servants of the crown, who perished at the age of seventy, began a series of bloody executions. Ostensibly through the intercession of the regents an end was put to that species of severities, a heavy fine being substituted, much larger in amount than the annual value of the abolished taxes. The municipal administration was suspended for several years, and its functions bestowed on the provost of Paris, a magistrate nominated by the crown.
The calamities which followed were due to the weakness and incapacity of the Government, given over because of the madness of Charles VI. to the intrigues of a wicked queen and of princes who brought the most bloodthirsty passions to the service of their boundless ambition. First came the rivalry between the dukes of Orleans and Burgundy, brought to an end in 1407 by the assassination of the former in Rue des Francs-Bourgeois. Next followed the relentless struggle for supremacy between two hostile parties, the Armagnacs on one side, commanded by Count Bernard of Armagnac (who for a brief period had the title of constable), and supported by the nobles and burgesses, and on the other side the Burgundians, depending on the common people, and recognizing the duke of Burgundy (John the Bold) as their head. The mob was headed by a skinner at the Hôtel-Dieu called Jean Caboche, and hence the name Cabochians given to the Burgundian party. They became masters of Paris in 1412 and 1413; but so violent were their excesses that the most tiinid rose in revolt, and the decimated bourgeoisie managed by a bold stroke to-recover possession of the town. The Armagnacs again entered Paris, but their intrigues with England and their tyranny rendered them odious in their turn; the Burgundians were recalled in 1418, and returned with Jean Caboche and a formidable band of pillagers and assassins. Perrinet Leclerc, son of a bourgeois guard, secretly opened the gates to them one night in May. The king resided in the Hôtel St Paul, an unconscious spectator of those savage scenes which the princes Louis and John, successively dauphins, were helpless to prevent.
The third dauphin, Charles, afterwards Charles VII., managed to put an end to the civil war, but it was by a crime as base as it was impolitic—the assassination of John the Bold on the bridge of Montereau (1419). Next year a treaty, from the ignominy of which Paris happily escaped, gave a daughter of Charles VI. to Henry V. of England, and along with her, in spite of the Salic law, the crown of France. The king of England made his entry into Paris in December 1420, and was there received with a solemnity which ill concealed the misery and real consternation of the poor people crushed by fifteen years of murders, pillage, and famine. Charles VI. remained almost abandoned at the Hôtel St Paul, where he died in 1422, whilst his son-in-law went to hold a brilliant court at the Louvre and Vincennes. Henry V. of England also died in 1422. His son Henry VI., then one year old, came to Paris nine years later to be crowned at Notre Dame, and the city continued under the government of the duke of Bedford till his death in 1435.
The English rule was a mild one, but it was not signalized by the execution of any of those works of utility or ornament so characteristic of the kings of France. The choir of St Severin, however, shows a style of architecture peculiarly English, and Sauvai relates that the duke of Bedford erected in the Louvre a fine gallery decorated with paintings. Without assuming the mission of delivering Paris, Joan of Arc, remaining with Charles VII. after his coronation at Rheims, led him towards the capital; but the badly conducted and abortive enterprise almost proved fatal to the Maid of Orleans, who was severely wounded at the assault of the gate of St Honoré on the 8th September 1429. The siege having been raised, Charles awaited the invitation of the Parisians themselves upon the defection of the Burgundians and the surrender of St Denis. The St Jacques gate was opened by the citizens of the guard to the constable Arthur of Richemont on April 13, 1436; but the solemn entry of the king did not take place till November 12 of the following year; subsequently occupied by his various expeditions or attracted by his residences in Berry or Touraine, he spent but little time in Paris, where he retired either to the Hôtel St Paul or to a neighbouring palace, Les Tournelles, which had been acquired by his father.
Louis XI. made equal use of St Paul and Les Tournelles, but towards the close of his life he immured himself at Plessis-les-Tours. It was in his reign, in 1469, that the first French printing press was set up in the Sorbonne. Charles VIII. scarcely left Plessis-les-Tours and Amboise except to go to Italy; Louis XII. alternated between the castle at Blois and the palace of Les Tournelles, where he died January 1, 1515.
Francis I. lived at Chambord, at Fontainebleau, at St Germain, and at Villers-Cotterets; but he proposed to form at Paris a residence in keeping with the taste of the Renaissance. Paris had remained for more than thirty years almost a stranger to the artistic movement begun between 1498 and 1500, after the Italian expedition. Previous to 1533, the date of the commencement of the Hôtel de Ville and the church of St Eustache, Paris did not possess, apart from the “Court of Accounts,” any important building in the new style. Between 1527 and 1540 Francis I. demolished the old Louvre, and in 1541 Pierre Lescot began a new palace four times as large, which was not finished till the reign of Louis XΓV. The buildings were not sufficiently advanced under Henry II. to allow of his leaving Les Tournelles, where in 1559 he died from a wound received at a tournament. His widow, Catherine de’ Medici, immediately caused this palace to be demolished, and sent her three sons—Francis II., Charles IX., and Henry HL—to the unfinished Louvre. Outside the line of the fortifications she laid the foundations of the Château des Tuileries as a residence for herself.
Of the three brothers, it was Charles IX. who resided most at the Louvre; it was there that in 1572 he signed the order for the massacre of St Bartholomew. Henry III. remained for the most part at Blois, and hardly came to Paris except to be witness of the power of his enemies the Guises.
Taking advantage of the absence of the kings, the League had made Paris a centre of opposition. The municipal militia were restored and reorganized; each of the sixteen quarters or arrondissements had to elect a deputy for the central council, which became the council or rather faction of The Sixteen, and for four years, from 1587 to 1591, held the city under a yoke of iron. Henry HI., having come to the Louvre in 1588, unwillingly received there the duke of Guise, and while endeavouring to take measures for his own protection provoked a riot known as the Day of the Barricades. It was with difficulty that he escaped from his palace, which at that time had no communication with the country, and which Henry IV. afterwards proposed to unite with the Tuileries in order to provide a sure means of escape in case of need.
When, after the murder of the duke of Guise at Blois at the close of 1588, Henry III. desired to return to Paris, he was not yet master of the city, and was obliged to besiege it in concert with his presumptive heir the king of Navarre. The operations were suddenly interrupted on August 1, 1589, by the assassination of the king, and Henry IV. carried his arms elsewhere. He returned with his victorious forces in 1590. This second siege lasted more than four years, and was marked by terrible suffering, produced by famine and the tyranny of The Sixteen, who were supported by the intrigues of the king of Spain and the violent harangues of the preachers. Even the conversion of the king did not allay the spirit of fanaticism, for the king’s sincerity was suspected, and the words (which history, however, fails to substantiate), “Paris is surely worth a mass,” were attributed to him. But after the coronation of the king at Chartres the commonalty of Paris, weary of intriguing with strangers and Leaguers, gave such decided expression to its feelings that those of its leaders who had kept aloof or broken off from the faction of The Sixteen attached themselves to the parlement, which had already evaded the ambitious designs of the king of Spain; and after various negotiations the provost of the merchants, L’Huillier, offered the keys of the city to Henry IV. on March 22, 1594. The king met no resistance except on the part of a company of German landsknechts, which was cut in pieces, and the students of the university, who, steeped in the doctrines of the League, tried to hold their quarter against the royal troops, but were dispersed. The Spanish soldiers who had remained in the town decamped next day.
Henry IV., who carried on the building of the Louvre, was the last monarch who occupied it as a regular residence. Attempts on his life were made from time to time, and at last on May 14, 1610, he fell under Ravaillac’s knife near the market-house in Rue de la Ferronnerie.
Whether royalty gave it the benefit of its presence or not, Paris continued all the same to increase in political importance and in population. Here is the picture of the city presented about 1560 by Michel de Castelnau, one of the most celebrated chroniclers of the 16th century:—
“Paris is the capital of all the kingdom, and one of the most famous in the world, as well for the splendour of its parlement (which is an illustrious company of thirty judges attended by three hundred advocates and more, who have reputation in all Christendom of being the best seen in human laws and acquainted with justice) as for its faculty of theology and for the other tongues and sciences, which shine more in this town than in any other in the world, besides the mechanic arts and the marvellous traffic which render it very populous, rich, and opulent; in such sort that the other towns of France and all the magistrates and subjects have their eyes directed thither as to the model of their decisions and their political administrations.”
Castelnau spoke rather as a statesman and a magistrate, and he did not look close enough to see that the university was beginning to decline. The progress of the sciences somewhat lessened the importance of its classes, too specially devoted to theology and literature; the eyes of men were turned towards Italy, which was then considered the great centre of intellectual advance; the colleges of the Jesuits were formidable rivals; the triumphs of Protestantism deprived it of most of the students who used to flock to it from England, Germany, and Scandinavia; and finally the unfortunate part it played in political affairs weakened its influence so much that, after the reign of Henry IV., it no longer sent its deputies to the states-general.
If the city on the left side of the river neither extended its circuit nor increased its population, it began in the 16th century to be filled with large mansions (hôtels), and its communications with the right bank were rendered easier and more direct when Henry IV. constructed across the lower end of the island of La Cité the Pont Neuf, which, though retaining its original name, is now the oldest bridge in Paris. On the right side of the river commerce and the progress of centralization continued to attract new inhabitants, and old villages become suburbs were enclosed within the line of a bastioned first enceinte, the ramparts of Étienne Marcel being, however, still left untouched. Although Louis XΠI., except during his minority, rarely stayed much in Paris, he was seldom long absent from it. His mother, Mary de’ Medici, built the palace of the Luxembourg, which, after being extended under Louis Philippe, became the seat of the senate.
Louis XIII. finished, with the exception of the eastern front, the buildings enclosing the square court of the Louvre, and carried on the wing which was to join the palace to the Tuileries. Queen Anne of Austria founded the Vai de Grâce, the dome of which, afterwards painted on the interior by Mignard, remains one of the finest in Paris. Richelieu built for himself the Palais Royal since restored, and rebuilt the Sorbonne, where now stands his magnificent tomb by Girardon. The island of St Louis above La Cité, till then occupied by gardens and meadows, became a populous parish, whose streets were laid out in straight lines, and whose finest houses still date from the 17th century. Building also went on in the Quartier du Marais (quarter of the marsh); and the whole of Place Royale (now Place des Vosges), with its curious arcaded galleries, belongs to this period. The church of St Paul and St Louis was built by the Jesuits beside the ruins of the old Hôtel St Paid; the church of St Gervais received a façade which has become in our time too famous. St Étienne du Mont and St Eustache were completed (in the latter case with the exception of the front). The beautiful Salle des Pas-Perdus (Hall of Lost Footsteps) was added to the Palais de Justice. Besides these buildings and extensions Paris was indebted to Louis XIII. and his minister Richelieu for three important institutions—the royal printing press in 1620, the Jardin des Plantes in 1626, and the French Academy in 1635. The bishopric of Paris was separated from that of Sens and erected into an archbishopric in 1623.
As memorials of Mazarin Paris still possesses the Collège des Quatre-Nations, erected with one of his legacies immediately after his death, and since appropriated to the Institute, and the palace which, enlarged in our own time, now accommodates the national library.
The stormy minority of Louis XIV. was spent at St Germain and Paris, where the court was held at the Palais Royal. The intrigues of the prince of Condé, Cardinal de Retz, and (for a brief space) Turenne resulted in a siege of Paris, during which more epigrams than balls were fired off; but the cannon of the Bastille, discharged by order of Mademoiselle de Montpensier, enabled Condé to enter the city. Bloody riots followed, and came to an end only with the exhaustion of the populace and its voluntary submission to the king. Though Louis XIV. ceased to stay in Paris after he grew up, he did not neglect the work of embellishment. On the site of the fortifications of Étienne Marcel, which during the previous hundred years had been gradually disappearing, he laid out the line of boulevards connecting the quarter of the Bastille with that of the Madeleine. Though he no longer inhabited the Louvre (and it never was again the seat of royalty), he caused the great colonnade to be constructed after the plans of Claude Perrault. This immense and imposing façade, 548 feet long, has the defect of being quite out of harmony with the rest of the building, which it hides instead of introducing. The same desire for effect, altogether irrespective of congruity, appears again in the observatory erected by the same Perrault, without the smallest consideration of the wise suggestions made by Cassini. The Place Vendôme, the Place des Victoires, the triumphal gates of St Denis and St Martin, and several fountains, are also productions of the reign of Louis XIV. The hospital of La Salpêtrière, with its majestically simple dome, was finished by Libéral Bruant. The Hôtel des Invalides, one of the finest institutions of the Grand Monarque, was also erected, with its chapel, between 1671 and 1675, by Bruant; but it was reserved for the architect Hardouin Mansart to give to this imposing edifice a complement worthy of itself: it was he who raised the dome, admirable alike for its proportions, for the excellent distribution of its ornaments, and for its gilded lantern, which rises 344 feet above the ground. “Private persons,” says Voltaire, “in imitation of their king, raised a thousand splendid edifices. The number increased so greatly that from the neighbourhood of the Palais Royal and of St Sulpice there were formed in Paris two new towns much finer than the old one.” All the aristocracy had not thought fit to take up their residence at Versailles, and the great geniuses of the century, Corneille, Racine, La Fontaine, Molière, Madame de Sévigné, had their houses in Paris; there also was the Hôtel de Rambouillet, so famous in the literary history of the 17th century.
The halls of the Palais Royal during the minority of Louis XV. were the scene of the excesses of the regency; later on the king from time to time resided at the Tuileries, which-henceforward came to be customarily regarded as the official seat of the monarchy. To the reign of Louis XV. are due the rebuilding of the Palais Royal, the “Place” now called De la Concorde, the military school, the greater part of the church of Ste Geneviève or Panthéon (a masterpiece of the architect Soufflot), the church of St Roch, the palace of the Élysée (now the residence of the president of the republic), the Palais Bourbon (with the exception of the façade) now occupied by the chamber of deputies, and the mint, a majestic and scholarly work by the architect Antoine, as well as the rebuilding of the Collège de France.
Louis XVI. finished or vigorously carried on the works begun by his grandfather. He did not come to live in Paris till compelled by the Revolution. That historical movement began indeed at Versailles on June 17, 1789, when the states-general were transformed into a constituent assembly; but the first act of violence which proved the starting-point of all its excesses was performed in Paris on July 14, 1789, when Paris inaugurated, with the capture of the Bastille, its “national guard,” organized and then commanded by the celebrated La Fayette. At the same time the assassination of the last provost of the merchants, Jacques de Flesselles, gave the opportunity of establishing, with more extended powers, the “mairie” (mayoralty) of Paris, which was first occupied by Bailly, and soon became, under the title of commune, a political power capable of effectively counterbalancing the central authority.
Paris had at that time once more outgrown its limits. The quarter on the left side of the river had more than doubled its extent by the accession of the great monasteries, the faubourgs of St Germain and St Marceau, the Jardin des Plantes, and the whole of Mont Ste Geneviève. The line of the new enceinte is still marked by a circuit of boulevards passing from the Champs de Mars at Pont d’Austerlitz by Place de l ’ Enfer and Place d’Italie. Similar enlargements, also marked out by a series of boulevards, incorporated with the town on the right side the faubourgs of St Antoine and Poissonnière and the quarters of La Chaussée d’Antin and Chaillot. In 1784 was begun, instead of a line of fortifications, a simple customs-wall, with sixty propylaea or pavilions in a heavy but characteristic style, of which the finest are adorned with columns or pilasters like those of Paestum. In front of the Place du Trône (now Place de la Nation), which formed as it were a façade for Paris on the east side, there were erected two lofty rostral columns bearing the statues of Philip Augustus and St Louis. Towards the west, the city front was Place Louis XV. (Place de la Concorde), preceded by the magnificent avenue of the Champs Élysées. Between the barriers of La Villette and Pantin, where the highways for Flanders and Germany terminated, was built a monumental rotunda flanked on the ground floor by four peristyles arranged as a Greek cross, and in the second story lighted by low arcades supported by columns of the Paestum type. None of these works were completed till the time of the empire. It was also in the latter part of the reign of Louis XIV., and under the first republic, that the quarter of La Chaussée d’Antin was built.
It does not enter into the plan of the present sketch to narrate the history of Paris during the Revolutionary period; that is the history rather of France, and to a certain extent of the whole world (see France). During the consulate hardly anything of note took place at Paris except the explosion of the infernal machine directed against Bonaparte on December 24, 1800.
The coronation of Napoleon by Pope Pius VII. was celebrated in Notre Dame on December 2, 1804. Eight years later, during the Russian campaign, the conspiracy of General Malet, happily suppressed, was on the point of letting loose on all France a dreadful civil war. The empire, however, was then on the wane, and Paris was witness of its fall when, after an heroic resistance of two days, the city was obliged to surrender to the allies on March 30, 1814.
After the return of the Bourbons, Paris had to submit to a treaty more humiliating than the capitulation. Already in 1763 Louis XV. had signed in his capital the treaty with England known as the shameful (Honteuse), by which he surrendered a great part of the American and Indian colonies, and notably Canada. That of May 30, 1814, was more truly disastrous, since it dismembered the mothercountry, cancelled almost all the conquests of the republic and the empire, and lessened the military strength of France by robbing it of half its fleet. And worse even than this was the treaty of 28th November 1815, which not only suppressed the slight accessions of territory recognized by the treaty of 1814, and doomed to. demolition the fortifications of Huningue, but exacted a war indemnity of 700 million francs (£28,000,000), and demanded the maintenance in seven departments of 150,000 soldiers of the allied army until the payment of the entire sum.
Under Louis XVIII. the only event of note that occurred in Paris was the assassination of the duke of Berry by Louvel, February 13, 1820. Ten years later the revolution of 1830, splendidly commemorated by the Column of July in Place de la Bastille, put Charles X. to flight and inaugurated the reign of Louis Philippe, a troublous period which was closed by the revolution of 1848 and a new republic. It was this reign, however, that surrounded Paris with bastioned fortifications with ditches and detached forts. The republic of 1848 brought no greater quiet to the city than did the reign of Louis Philippe. The most terrible insurrection was that of June 23 to 26, 1848, distinguished by the devotion and heroic death of the Archbishop Afire. It was quelled by General Cavaignac, who then for some months held the executive power. Prince Louis Napoleon next became president of the republic, and after dissolving the chamber of deputies on December 2, 1851, caused himself to be proclaimed emperor just a year later.
The second empire completed that material transformation of Paris which had already been begun at the fall of the ancient monarchy. First came numerous cases of destruction and demolition caused by the suppression of the old monasteries and of many parish churches. A number of mediaeval buildings, civil or military, were cleared away for the sake of regularity of plan and improvements in the public streets, or to satisfy the taste of the owners, who thought more of their comfort or profit than of the historic interest of their old mansions or houses. Destructions of this kind, in some instances of advantage, in other cases without excuse, still continue with more or less frequency. It was under the first empire that the new series of improvements were inaugurated which have made Paris a modern city. Napoleon began the Rue de Rivoli, built along this street the wing intended to connect the Tuileries with the Louvre, erected in front of the court of the Tuileries the triumphal arch of the Carrousel, in imitation of that of Septimius Severus at Rome. In the middle of the Place Vendome was reared, on the model of Trajan’s column, the column of the grand army, surmounted by the statue of the emperor. To immortalize this same grand army he ordered from the architect Pierre Vignon a Temple of Victory, which without changing the form of its Corinthian peristyle has become the church of the Madeleine; the entrance to the avenue of the Champs Élysées was spanned by the vast triumphal arch De l’Étoile (of the star), which owes its celebrity not only to its colossal dimensions and its magnificent situation, but also to one of the four subjects sculptured upon its faces—the Chant du Depart or Marseillaise, one of the masterpieces of Rude and of modern sculpture. Another masterpiece was executed by David of Angers, the pediment of the Panthéon, not less famous than Soufflot’s dome. The museum of the Louvre, founded by decree of the Convention on July 27, 1793, was organized and considerably enlarged; that of the Luxembourg was created in 1805,. but was not appropriated exclusively to modern artists till under the Restoration. The Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers, due to the Convention, received also considerable additions in the old priory or abbey of St Martin des Champs, where the council of the Five Hundred had installed it in 1798.
Under the Restoration and under the government of July many new buildings were erected; but, with the exception of the Bourse, constructed by the architects Brongniart and Labarre, and the colonnade of the chamber of deputies, these are of interest not so much for their size as for the new artistic tendencies affected in their architecture. People had grown weary of the eternal Graeco-Roman compilations rendered fashionable by the Renaissance, and reduced under the empire to mere imitations, in producing which all inspiration was repressed. The necessity of being rational in architecture, and of taking full account of practical wants, was recognized; and more suggestive and plastic models were sought in the past. These were to be found, it was believed, in Greece; and in consequence the government under Louis Philippe saw itself obliged to found the French school at Athens, in order to allow young artists to study their favourite types on the spot. In the case of churches it was deemed judicious to revive the Christian basilicas of the first centuries, as at Notre Dame de Lorette and St Vincent de Paul; and a little later to bring in again the styles of the Middle Ages, as in the ogival church of Ste Clotilde.
Old buildings were also the object of labours more or less important. The Place de la Concorde was altered in various ways, and adorned with eight statues of towns and with two fountains; on October 25, 1836, the Egyptian obelisk, brought at great expense from Luxor, was erected in the centre. The general restoration of the cathedral of Notre Dame was voted by the Chamber in 1845, and entrusted to Viollet-le-Duc; and the palace of the Luxembourg and the Hôtel de Ville were considerably enlarged at the same time, in the style of the existing edifices.
But the great transformer of Paris in modern times was Napoleon III. To him or to his reign we owe the Grand Opéra, the finest theatre in the world, and the masterpiece of the architect Garnier; the new Hôtel-Dieu; the finishing of the galleries which complete the Louvre and connect it with the Tuileries; the extension of the Palais de Justice and its new front on the old Place Dauphine; the tribunal of commerce; the central markets; several of the finest railway stations; the viaduct at Auteuil; the churches of La Trinité, St Augustin, St Ambroise, St François Xavier, Belleville, Ménilmontant, &c. For the first international Paris exhibition (that of 1855) was constructed the “palace of industry”; the enlargement of the national library was commenced; the museum of French antiquities was created by the savant Du Sommerard, and installed in the old “hôtel” built at the end of the 15th century for the abbots of Cluny.
All this is but the smallest part of the memorials which Napoleon III. left of his presence. Not only was the city traversed in all directions by new thoroughfares, and sumptuous houses raised or restored in every quarter, but the line of the fortifications was made in 1859 the limit of the city. The area was thus doubled, extending to 7450 hectares or 18,410 acres, instead of 3402 hectares or 8407 acres. It was otherwise with the population; to the 1,200,000 inhabitants which Paris possessed in 1858 the incorporation of the suburban zone only added 600,000.
Paris had to pay dear for its growth and prosperity under the second empire. This Government, which, by straightening and widening the streets, thought it had effectually guarded against the attempts of its internal enemies, had not sufficiently defended itself from external attack, and at the first reverses of 1870 Paris found itself prepared to overthrow the empire, but by no means able to hold out against the approaching Prussians.
The two sieges of Paris in 1870-71 are among the most dramatic episodes of its history. The first siege began on September 19, 1870, with the occupation by the Germans of the heights on the left side of the river and the capture of the unfinished redoubt of Châtillon. Two days later the investment was complete. General Trochu, head of the French Government and governor of the city, had under his command 400,000 men—a force which ought to have ^been able to hold out against the 240,000 Germans by whom it was besieged, had it not been composed for the most part of hurried levies of raw soldiers vdth inexperienced officers, and of national guards who, never having been subjected to strict military discipline, were a source of weakness rather than of strength. The guards, it is true, displayed a certain warlike spirit, but it was for the sole purpose of exciting disorder. Open revolt broke out on October 31; it was suppressed, but increased the demoralization of the besieged and the demands of the Prussians. The partial successes which the French obtained in engagements on both sides of the river were rendered useless by the Germans recapturing all the best positions; the severity of winter told heavily on the garrison, and the armies in the provinces which were to have co-operated with it were held in check by the Germans in the west and south. In obedience to public opinion a great sortie was undertaken; this, in fact, was the only alternative to a surrender; for, the empire having organized everything in expectation of victory and not of disaster, Paris, insufficiently provisioned for the increase of population caused by the influx of refugees, was already suffering the horrors of famine. Accidental circumstances combined with the indecision of the leaders to render the enterprise a failure. Despatches sent by balloon to the army of the Loire instructing it to make a diversion reached their destination too late; the bridge of Champigny over the Marne could not be constructed in time; the most advantageous positions remained in the hands of the Germans; - and on the 2nd and 3rd December the French abandoned the positions they had seized on the 29th and 30th of November. Another sortie made towards the north on December 21st was repulsed, and the besieged lost the Avron plateau, the key to the positions which they still held on that side. The bombardment began on December 27th, and great damage was done to the forts on the left of the Seine, especially those of Vanves and Issy, directly commanded by the Châtillon battery. A third and last sortie (which proved fatal to Régnault the painter) was attempted in January 1871, but resulted in hopeless retreat. An armistice was signed on January 27th, the capitulation on the 28th. The revictualling of the city was not accomplished without much difficulty, in spite of the generρus rivalry of foreign nations (London alone sending provisions to the value of £80,000).
On the 1st of March the Germans entered Paris. This event, which marked the close of the siege, was at the same time the first preparation for the “commune;” for the national guard, taking advantage of the general confusion and the powerlessness of the regular army, carried a number of cannon to the heights of Montmartre and Belleville under pretext of saving them. President Thiers, appreciating the danger, attempted on March 18th to remove the ordnance; his action was the signal of an insurrection which, successful from the first, initiated a series of terrible outrages by the murder of the two generals, Lecomte and Thomas. The Government, afraid of the defection of the troops, who were demoralized by failure and suffering, had evacuated the forts on the left side of the river and concentrated the army at Versailles (the forts on the right side were still to be held for some time by the Germans). Mont Valérien happily remained in the hands of the Government, and became the pivot of the attack during the second siege. All the sorties made by the insurgents in the direction of Versailles (where the National Assembly was in session from March 20) proved unsuccessful, and cost them two of their improvised leaders—Generals Flourens and Duval. The incapacity and mutual hatred of their chiefs rendered all organization and durable resistance impossible. On Sunday May 21st .the Government forces, commanded by Marshal M‘Mahon, having already captured the forts on the right side of the river, made their way within the walls; but they had still to fight hard from barricade to barricade before they were masters of the city; Belleville, the special Red Republican quarter, was not assaulted and taken till Friday. Meanwhile the communists were committing the most horrible excesses: the archbishop of Paris (Georges Darboy, q.v. ∖ President Bonjean, priests, magistrates, journalists, and private individuals, whom they had seized as hostages, were shot in batches in the prisons; and a scheme of destruction was ruthlessly carried into effect by men and women with cases of petroleum (netroleurs and pétroleuses). The Hôtel de Ville, the Palais de Justice, the Tuileries, the Ministry of Finance, the palace of the Legion of Honour, that of the Council of State, part of the Rue de Rivoli, <fcc., were ravaged by the flames; barrels of gunpowder were placed in Notre Dame and the Panthéon, ready to blow up the buildings; and the whole city would have been involved in ruin if the national troops had not gained a last and crowning victory in the neighbourhood of La Roquette and Père-la-Chaise on May 28th. Besides the large number of insurgents who, taken in arms, weré pitilessly shot, others were afterwards condemned to death, to penal servitude, to transportation; and the survivors only obtained their liberty by the decree of 1879.
From this double trial Paris emerged diminished and almost robbed of its dignity as capital; for the parliamentary assemblies and the Government went to sit at Versailles. For a little it was thought that the city would not recover from the blow which had fallen on it. All came back, however—confidence, prosperity, and, along with that, increasing growth of population and the execution of great public works. The Hôtel de Ville has been rebuilt, the school of medicine adorned with an imposing façade, a vast school of pharmacy established in the old gardens of the Luxembourg, and boulevards completed. The exhibition of 1878 was more marvellous than those of 1855 and 1867, and unlike that of the latter year has left a lasting memorial, the palace of the Trocadéro. Finally the chambers in 1879 considered quiet sufficiently restored to take possession of their customary quarters in the Palais Bourbon and the Luxembourg. This happy event closes for the present the annals, at times only too dramatic, of the capital of France. (a. s.-p.) Bibliography.— From the immense list of works relating to Paris it is possible to make but a small selection here. For the history of the city the reader may consult Sauvai, Histoire de Paris, 3 vols, fol., 1724; Dom Félibien, Histoire de Paris, 5 vols, fol., 1725; Lebeuf, Histoire de la ville et du diocèse de Paris, 15 vols. 12mo, 1754-57, new ed. by Cocheris, 1863 sq.; Jaillot, Recherches sur Paris, 5 vols. 8vo, 1772-74; Dulaure, Histoire de Paris, often reprinted; Berty, Topographie historique du vieux Paris, 2 vols. 4to, 1866-68, and Atlas des anciens plans de Paris, published by the city and edited by Ducher. For the libraries and art treasures of Paris the following works may be refeιτed to :—Francklin, Les anciennes bibliothèques de Paris (1867); L. Delisle, Le cabinet des manuscrits de la bibliothèque impériale (1868); Inventaire général des richesses d'art de la France, publié par le Ministère de Γ Instruction publique et des Beaux Arts (the volumes relati ιg to Paris), and the Inventaire général des oeuvres d'art appartenant à la ville de Paris, in course of publication by the municipality. As regarde the modern ?ity, see the official Annuaire statistique de la ville de Paris; the Atlas de la ville de Paris par arrondissement, published by the municipality; Maxime Ducamp, Paris, ses organes, ses fonctions, sa vie (6 vols. 8vo and 6 vols. 18mo, 1869-1875); Lacroix and Verbaeckhoven, Paris-Guide, par les principaux écrivains et artistes de la France, 1867; and A. Joanne. Paris illustré, 1881.
