Many of these places have grown to be miniature Maximes and quite a few of them keep a chasseur in gilt buttons. They are frequented by the idling jeunesse with more “louis” than brains, who occupy late in the afternoon the high stools and pay accordingly for the flattering bons mots of certain powdered and bediamonded ladies who in years are old enough to be their grandmothers. The fortunes of the callow youths tumble eventually either into the hands of these well-seasoned adventuresses or into the pocket of the card-sharps who patronize many of these bars. Beside these there are many eminently respectable looking old gentlemen who, with unhappy homes and no clubs to go to, prefer passing a restful hour steeped in an atmosphere of mixed drinks, perfume and expensive toilettes. Here Mimi la Duchesse strolls in at five o’clock with her French bulldog, “Mignon,” wearing all the diamonds around his neck that the fair Mimi has not room for on her fingers. Later in the winter, when creditors are pressing and Mimi’s debts have run into several hundred thousands of francs, there will be a very chic catalog issued announcing an absolute auction of her effects, together with her private hotel.

It will contain several full-page photogravures upon hand-made deckle-edged paper of her residence, with a frontispiece showing the interior of the “Great Hall” paneled in Spanish leather, its fireplace taken from a famous chÂteau of the time of FranÇois I., and hanging over the carved shelf a celebrated Madonna, under whose sad eyes have been played nightly so many heavy games of baccarat. Turning another page you will discover the view looking south through the conservatory filled with rare exotic plants and orchids. Another page shows the salon, rich in carved ivory and cloisonne and art nouveau, none of which Mimi knew anything about except that they were expensive and that many of them accompanied the bonbons. Then the dainty boudoir is depicted, paneled in teakwood and lapis-lazuli. Finally her superb jewels are illustrated: priceless strings of pearls; rings of weighty emeralds and pigeon-blood rubies; a gold toilet-set studded with sapphires; and something to adorn Mimi’s neck, composed mostly of diamonds, with a miniature automobile in rubies, pendent from a display of jeweled fruits upheld by two caryatids in diamonds and emeralds. Besides all these, are three ruby collars that Mignon as yet had never worn.

With the publication of this catalogue de luxe, rumors reach the ears of the public of the lady’s dire distress, and the pathetic side of this forced sale will be dwelt upon. At the private view her residence is crowded with the curious of the grand monde. These women of the most exclusive society cross her threshold and block her stairway and pry into every open corner of her domicile—women who would have been shocked to find themselves in front of her doorstep at any other time. So much for the moral hypocrisy of the virtuous.

And while the stairways at this private view are thronged with the fashionable world, Mimi and her most intimate friends are laughing over champagne and biscuits in the kitchen, the only room that has not been turned over to the public.

But when a few days after the sale you learn that Mimi has stayed the cruel hand of the law by the sale of half her jewels, and sent out invitations to her nearest friends for a housewarming and a costume ball chez elle Sunday night, you begin to see the advertising feature of the scheme, and realize something of the naÏvetÉ of Mimi.

The opening of the first small bar in Paris managed by women happened only a score of years ago and met with a furor of popularity, the receipts reaching often three thousand francs a day. Since then the number of bars has grown yearly until now many of them are constantly on a point of failure owing to the increase of competition.

Most of them have become the idling resorts of habituÉs of the new and old jeunesse with small fortunes, who spend hours therein chatting with the Mimis and Claras who chance to drop in daily.

The best class of our bars would never become popular with the average Parisian, for the reason that there are no Mimis or Claras in them to talk to. The Parisian demands that at least a certain part of his day should be spent in the society of women, and it has been the habit of his life to have them about him as much as possible. The hours he is forced to spend at his bureau or in the Bourse he considers only as a necessary means to the pleasures of his leisure.

In these bars it has become a general custom to serve a table d’hÔte dinner at eight to the habituÉs and to any stranger who may feel himself sufficiently at home to stay.

These small public dinner parties are amusing. As a rule the menu is plain and excellent and the guests agreeable.

Just such a place is the new bar in the rue Duphot, a somewhat pretentious little room smartly appointed and crowded nightly. Another is in a corner opposite the Madeleine, its narrow interior dazzling at night in a profusion of yellow brocade and electricity. Such bars as these are of the newer class, but there are others far more attractive in their simplicity, such as the one in the rue du Helder and in the rue Taitbout and the old London bar in the rue Lysly, and others in the rue St. HonorÉ and in the rue Louis-le-Grand, yet in none of these has the character remained unchanged, for some of them have had a dozen new proprietors in the last five years.

A most excellent establishment is Henry’s bar in the rue Volnay, the most American in its type existing in Paris. It is patronized by old and young from the incoming steamers. If you wish to shut out Paris from your mind, drop in at Henry’s any afternoon at five; it is precisely as tho you had been magically transported back to the Hoffman House.

You will hear Southern colonels there still harping on the war, and shrewd politicians from up York State telling personal anecdotes of Mr. Platt, you will find well-groomed men dropping in for a friendly cocktail before dinner, and you will learn all about the fall business in ladies’ “plain velours,” the button trust, the latest details of the corner on babies’ caps, and how Max Dindlehoofer held up Poughkeepsie with a new brand of champagne brut—but all this is not Parisian and we may dismiss it.

The annual invasion of foreigners supports the big hotels and the shops of the rue de la Paix and the adjacent neighborhood, but the foreigner makes little impression upon the average Parisian, who regards the coming of the “Étranger” as a small incident in the life of his beloved city. He passes him unconsciously as one passes the corner of his street.

“They come and go and we are not conscious of them,” said a Parisian to me. “Besides,” he added, “there are tens of thousands of Parisians whose daily life is confined to the quartiers in which they live—big sections of the city where the foreigner seldom finds himself.”

If you wish to see every type of Parisian go by in an endless stream of swarming humanity, seat yourself upon any of the terrasses of the grand cafÉs that line the sides of the grand Boulevards stretching from the Madeleine to the ThÉÂtre du Gymnase. It is of all Paris the most frequented—the broad highway of this vast city into which pour the inhabitants of thousands of connecting byways.

Its stones are worn by the tramp and scuffle of countless thousands pausing to gaze at the crowded terrasses or to stop for an apÉritif. The system with which these popular terrasses are managed by the generals and their lieutenants in charge of an army of hurrying waiters is perfect. These head-waiters in command of the sidewalk portion of these establishments will note your arrival and departure with the quickness with which a telephone operator detects the dropping of one of a thousand numbers on a central switchboard. During the rush you can spend hours over a six sous bock, but when you leave, your table will be filled before you have mingled with the passing stream of humanity in front.

The types composing this multitude are as varied as the ever-changing pattern in a kaleidoscope. Every step you take brings you past a dozen individuals each one different from the other. Turn quickly, and count them if you can. The last moment has brought you by a motley score of merchants, a cocotte, an Arab sheik, a ragpicker, a lady, a Japanese, a boulevardier, a simple soldier, an officier, two gamins, and a pretty girl with a bundle. As you turn, a camelot, running in a pair of dirty canvas slippers, screams the latest edition of “La Patrie” in your ears, and a man in a top hat begs your pardon for having jostled you in the ribs. There is no time for formalities—he disappears in the stream and you are borne on with the tide to the corner. Taking advantage of a second’s halt of the passing cabs, you dodge over to the opposite curb and into another section of the multitude. The crossing which you have just left behind is noisy with the snapping of whips and swearing cochers. In many of these carriages one catches a glimpse of fair women. In a passing cab a blanchisseuse and her sweetheart are enjoying a chance drive, with madame’s tardy wash deposited in a huge basket beside the good-natured cocher. Old women pushing small carts cry their wares: “Les belles pÊches, voilÀ les belles pÊches, dix sous la livre!”

Three long-haired students go whistling by. In the midst of the throng you hear bits of conversation:

“Listen!” says a pretty woman radiant over some news to her companion—but they are gone.

Two more go by furious. “It was he then who lied!” cries one to the other—but the crowd swallows them up.

Sentences from strange languages reach your ears in the throng, scraps of Turkish, the guttural of some passing savage, now the cold drawl of an Englishman, again the soft lisp from a Spanish signorita.

“Say, Bill, you’d orter seen Charley, they didn’t do a thing to him, I told Lil, says I ...” and two fellow-citizens stride on.

At the corner, jostled by the human tide, two chic demoiselles fresh from a rehearsal at a nearby theater pass, laughing over some recent adventure. The next instant they are climbing to the top of an omnibus and are rattling away toward La Villette.

At night this great highway is ablaze with lights and the swarm still passes, augmented by the masses who have poured from the shops. By eight the restaurants and theaters are full to overflowing, but there is no diminution in the stream of passers-by along the boulevards. The only hours when the life there seems slack is when the masses are at work or in bed. There are no people who enjoy their city more than do Parisians, or who use its thoroughfares so much as a place of pleasure.

The cafÉs along the boulevards are frequented by a vast clientÈle of men and women of every clime and occupation. These cafÉs are favorite places for rendezvous. In one of them a man glances from time to time to his watch over his paper as he awaits his friend. At the next table a blonde with steel-gray eyes awaits someone, she does not know whom. But there is no hurry in either case.

Parisians never rush. They do not say, “Meet me at three thirty-five,” as we do. “Good, it is understood, my friend,” the Parisian will say as he bids you good-bye; “I shall look for you then for the apÉritif at Pousset’s.” You must not remind him of his tardiness if he does not arrive until half past six, or be surprised if you see him patiently waiting for you at three. They do things that way in France.

From Christmas to New Year’s the boulevards become still more picturesque. Hundreds of booths are erected along the entire route. At night gasoline lamps flare from the stands of fakirs and venders of toys and cheap novelties who cry their wares. For ten sous you can buy “The Last Sigh of Madame Humbert.”

There are endless mechanical toys for children, and the latest inventions for the household, the inevitable lamp-burner so economical that it actually puts a dividend in your bank if used long enough.

There are to be had for a few sous marvelous potato-peelers which turn with one twist of the wrist the most modest cuisiniÈre into a cordon bleu. And lightning eradicators for bachelors’ grease-spots, altho many of the benedicts who came to buy needed a stronger mixture than was contained in the neat package with instructions, to render themselves immaculate.

“Allons! allons! mesdames et messieurs,” shouts a man in a wig and a silk hat. “With my wonderful invention the misery of old age vanishes. It is a veritable fountain of youth! With it the old become young and youth stays off advancing years! I not only sell it but I give you free the receipt, and all for the price of ten sous.” And the fakir runs his fingers through his wig and throws back the lapels of his shining frock-coat stained green by years of inclement weather.

And there is still another, the gentleman fakir, robust and faultlessly dressed, who is an expert in drawing a crowd, accenting words of promises that stay the feet of those hurrying in front of his flaring lamps. He shows the glittering contents of the box he offers complete for a franc. Pandora would have thrown her own away in the ash heap had she seen half its tempting contents. “Mesdames et messieurs, I would have to lie if I told you that ever before was such an offer made to the public, and, as you may be justly inquisitive as to how it is possible to give all this for the small sum of one franc, let me tell you that it is for an advertisement only that I make this stupendous offer—for the night only, and nowhere else and at no other time will you get such an opportunity. Now, mesdames et messieurs, follow me closely; for one franc I give this watch, a superb present by itself; with the watch, this chain and cross, bound to please any young lady; with the chain and cross, this silver bracelet that will fit any arm; with the bracelet, this exquisite pocket-book, also in silver, lined with silk; with the purse, a handsome set of studs for a gentleman. Who would not be proud to own such as these?” And he placed his fat hand over his heart. “And, finally, with all this,” he bellowed on, “a miniature brooch. Now, mesdames et messieurs, see for yourselves. Step up, step up!” And the fakir pushed back his silk hat on the back of his head, wiped his perspiring forehead, dived in a little red trunk studded with brass nails, and took out a dozen boxes to satisfy the outstretched hands. He had the crowd going and he knew it.

At a distance of ten feet, under the glare of the light and handled cleverly, the display of gorgeous trinkets might have come from the Rue de la Paix. His audience became enthusiastic. The hypnotist in the shining tile rattled on, and, while his hands were making change and producing from the two small brass coffers the packages of treasures, his eyes searched for those about to weaken. The francs poured in, and I recalled the words of Mr. Barnum: “The public the world over likes to be fooled.”

On fÊte days and holidays the Boulevard SÉbastopol is swarming with an ever-moving mass of humanity. It is one continuous bargain counter from the Place du ChÂtelet to the Grand Boulevard. Here the bazaars and dry-goods and provision stores do most of their trade on the sidewalk. The fronts of some are festooned with whole cartloads of pheasants, rabbits and hares, and with dozens of deer and wild boar strung up at a bargain. There are other faÇades ornamented with cheap clothes of the “nobby suits for gents’ order,” and hardware bazaars and cut-rate sales on roasted coffee, boots, shoes and cheap silk petticoats.

The cafÉs along the boulevard are for the most part dingy and unpretentious, but they suffice as resting-places to many from the passing stream of humanity. Women without hats, with their market baskets; the pretty daughters of concierges out for a day’s bargaining; hundreds of the wretchedly poor; families of country bourgeois; the tough with his middle swathed in a red scarf and his black hair reversed in greasy wisps slicked over his ears, his mate a girl in a red jacket, with a bit of ribbon serving as a collar, her black hair twisted on the top of her head and shining in pomade. This pair hurry along together, he with the easy gait of a thief, she with her red hands in her pockets, her feet in low-heeled slippers buttoned with a strap, treads on by his side, her eyes scanning the pavement. He has promised to give her a new pair of slippers with high red heels. To-night she will be a queen at the ball of the “Boule Rouge,” coveted by other thieves. Farther along a crowd is struggling to take advantage of a cut-price in chickens, and a fat commerÇant with a red face squeezes his way out holding a pair of bargain broilers. It is a boulevard of the people, a rendezvous for the thrifty and the hard-working, the thoroughfare of the outcast and the unfortunate. It is sordid, but it is intensely human. It is this distinct character of Parisian thoroughfares, each one differing from its neighbor, which makes the highways and byways of the city so interesting to those who delight in walking abroad with their eyes open.

There is not a street one turns down but which is unique in itself. In the shops along the “Rue de la Paix” the art of satisfying the demands of vanity and the whims of the luxurious has been brought to perfection. The Rue de la Paix is looking its prettiest at noon, the hour when all the little ouvriÈres and modÈles from the smart dressmaking and millinery establishments pour out for their luncheon, happy as school-girls during recess.

If it happens to be a sunny noon with the blue sky as a setting to the gilded balconies brilliant in roses, geraniums and trailing ivy, you will see the street below alive with these merry little women, each one vying with the other in the neatness of her coiffure and the chic of her simple black frock and fourreau. They promenade chatting, joking and gossiping, without their hats, for no little ouvriÈre ever thinks of wearing one until her day’s work is over.

With the exception of the working classes, the average Parisienne is not beautiful. It is her chicness, her vivacity, and her innate knowledge of the artificial which makes her attractive, for not all the actresses in Paris are in the theaters.

In stormy weather you may go to the arcades. These covered passages, which have existed through so many Parisian epochs, are honeycombed with shops full of novelties. Such are the Passage de l’OpÉra, the Passage des Panoramas and the Passage Choiseul. How many hearts of French children have palpitated as they were dragged through the Passage Jouffroy, containing the very workshop of Santa Claus himself! It is a paradise of things that squeak and wind up; rattling railroad trains which swing around tin curves and under painted tunnels with a rapidity sufficient to suffocate the helpless toy passengers within; toys for poor little good children and rich little spoiled ones, dolls whose deportment is faultless and whose vocabulary is limited to “papa” and “maman” and those who can not say a word, but whose clothes, from the tiny hat to their walking-boots, with an accompanying trousseau containing a summer and winter automobile coat, goggles and all, might have been fashioned by a Worth. Not even in the public squares are the soldiers of France more immortalized than in the Passage Jouffroy. There are whole forts full of Germans ready to be blown to smithereens by the gallant advancing force of Les FranÇais, and formidable cannons mounted on sanded ramparts with pill boxes containing enough ammunition for the most glorious of victories, to say nothing of the gorgeous piÈce de rÉsistance, the satin pantalooned balanceur with violet eyes that close like an owl’s, who accomplishes the most difficult gymnastics by little fits and starts to the accompaniment in liquid tones of a music-box tearing through the overture of William Tell in waltz time.

There are also tens of thousands of people who come to gaze at the shops and the passing throng, to whom it is a treat to pass an evening among the throng and lights, and to whom from childhood the mere fact of a promenade has been accepted as a pleasure. You can see them with their wives and children, for Paris counts an endless number of these petits mÉnages where money is scant, work ill paid, and where the habit of the most rigid economy is practised from one year’s end to the other. There is next to no allowance in the budget for pleasure, and the glamour of the street, the ever changing interest of the shop windows, and the warmth and comfort of the cafÉs, are the only recreations within their means.

Christmas eve is celebrated in every cafÉ and brasserie by a “rÉveillon,” and for days tables are taken in advance for this gay celebration. Supper is served at midnight and the champagne flows on until broad daylight, and by 2:00 A.M. the cafÉs are in an uproar of jollity. Their interiors present a brilliant sight, and the informality and good nature of a bal masquÉ reign supreme until the light of dawn creeps through the windows. So great is the crowd at many of the rÉveillons that the entrance doors are forced to be closed at midnight. At the Taverne Royale, at Pousset’s, at the CafÉ de Paris and dozens of other places equally celebrated, there is no gayer sight to be seen throughout a Parisian year.

On New Year’s Eve all Paris is merry.

New Year’s is of more importance to the French than Christmas and is made much of. It is the custom to send bonbons and flowers to one’s friends, and to acquaintances cards ad libitum.

In the booths the “ready-while-you-wait” printers do a thriving trade, and the stores for bonbons are open until long past midnight. The stroke of twelve announcing the new year is a signal for all of Paris to embrace. In the cafÉs along the thronged boulevards and in the public balls you will see the general custom carried out with considerable zest.