WHEN the siege of Paris came to an end and the German troops were withdrawn the provisional government which had been making its headquarters at Bordeaux removed to Versailles. The violent element in Paris which had given Louis Philippe so much trouble had increased both in numbers and in strength of feeling during the third quarter of the century. Now these radicals asserted that Thiers, the head of the provisional government, had betrayed France to the enemy, and they won to their way of thinking the Central Committee of the usually conservative National Guard. From the City Hall they directed the election of a new city government, the Commune of Paris, which held itself independent of the Assembly at Versailles and defied it.

Just a month after the hated Prussians had left Paris the communists made a sortie toward Versailles. As a natural reaction the Versailles government invested the city, and Frenchmen were pitted against Frenchmen as in the days when Henry IV was besieging his own capital town. Nor was the conflict merely between the people inside and the people outside—within Paris there was a constant struggle between the conservatives and the communists and even among the communists themselves. The conservatives disapproved of the drastic social changes made by the new government in closing the churches, and dispersing some of the religious orders, as well as of their confiscations of property on slight warrant and their onslaught upon monuments of sentimental and artistic value, such as the VendÔme Column. The communists, on the other hand, were torn by internal dissensions and their constant quarrels brought about the usual weakness resulting from poor team work.

Ferocity never failed them, however. Constructive measures were postponed; revenge, never. No sufficient excuse ever has been offered for their massacres of hostages, good Archbishop Darboy among them; none for the senseless orgy of destruction with which, after a two months’ struggle, they recognized their defeat by the government troops under Marshal MacMahon. When the soldiers entered Paris their first work was the extinguishing of the fires which the communists had set in a hundred places. Men and women, urged by hatred and fanaticism, piled kegs of gunpowder into

churches, even into Notre Dame, relic and record of centuries, and poured petroleum upon the flames devouring the Palace of Justice, the Sainte Chapelle, the library of the Louvre, the Luxembourg palace, the Palais Royal. The houses on the rue Royale were a mass of broken brick. The Ministry of Finance on the rue de Rivoli was so injured that it was torn down, to be replaced by a hotel. Three hundred years of historical association did not avail to save the palace of the Tuileries whose ruins were considered not sufficient to be restored. The HÔtel de Ville was a mere shell and required practically entire rebuilding. Property amounting to a hundred millions of dollars was destroyed, while the historical and sentimental value of many of the buildings cannot be computed.

The communists were as reckless with their own lives as with the buildings. Some two thousand persons—women and children as well as men—fell in the contest with the government. The last struggle was in the cemetery of PÈre Lachaise whose tombs could serve only as temporary protection against shell and shot from the rash fighters who were soon to need a final resting-place. It was only after the execution of many of the insurgent leaders that Marshal MacMahon brought about a semblance of peace.

With returning quiet all France turned its attention to securing the payment of the war indemnity of a billion dollars due to Prussia. Until that indebtedness was cleared off the hated uniform of the army of occupation was omnipresent. So eager were the French to rid themselves of this sight that every peasant went into his “stocking” or tapped his mattress bank until the necessary amount was subscribed many times over. Two years and a half after the capitulation of Paris not a German soldier was left in the country. There could be no stronger testimony to the national thrift fostered by the pinch of the pre-Revolutionary days and so alive to-day that the French are looked upon as the readiest financiers in Europe, prepared to invest in anything from a Panama Canal to a New York gratte-ciel (skyscraper).

The terms of the peace with Germany required the surrender of one-half of the border province of Lorraine and the whole of Alsace. It was a bitter day not only for these districts but for the whole country when the Germans took possession of the ceded territory. Fifty thousand people left their property behind and went over into France rather than lose the name of Frenchmen. Many came to America. Now, forty years later, the memory of the loss is not dulled, and the statue of Strasbourg in the Place de la Concorde wears perpetual mourning.

Many have been the problems faced by France since the Franco-Prussian war. Political adjustment has been of first importance, of course, but Paris has had her own questions to answer, and, because of her cosmopolitanism, her solutions have been of interest to the whole world. Much time and thought have been spent on the repairs required by the excesses of the communists. The rebuilding of the City Hall on the same spot on which it had stood for five hundred years and in the style which Francis I initiated three centuries before, was a task on which Paris lavished thought and money. The exterior is a finely harmonious example of renaissance. The mural paintings of the interior are a record of the work of the best French artists of the last quarter of the nineteenth century. They are enhanced by heavily handsome gildings and by chandeliers of glittering crystal.

As a whole, however, the city has put more expenditure into the perfecting of public utilities, the beautifying of streets and the construction of parks—works of use to the many—than into the erection of buildings of less general service. The panorama which make the frontispiece of this volume shows the care with which pavements and curbs and tree-guards are ordered. A small tricycle sweeper is 1912’s latest device for removing any last reproach of Lutetia’s mud—a reproach formulated to-day only by Parisians made fastidious by a century of cleanliness.

The panorama shows also the arrangement of the quays and the orderliness which makes them possible in the very center of the city, even when there is discharged upon them huge loads of freight brought from the sea by the strings of barges (seen in the picture of the Eiffel Tower opposite page 360) which are moved by a tug and a chain-towing device.

In some parts of this city of three million inhabitants the quays disclose scenes that are almost rural. Under the fluttering leaves of a slender tree a rotund housewife is making over a mattress, exchanging witticisms with a near-by vender of little cakes. Not far off the owner of a poodle is engaging his attention while a professional dog clipper is decorating him with an outfit of collar and cuffs calculated to rouse envy in the breasts of less favored caniches.

When the hero of an old English novel orders his servant to call a “fly” we wonder whether the misnamed vehicle which responds has been christened from the verb or the noun. There is no doubt in Paris as to the origin of the “fly boats” on the Seine. These busy little travelers are of insect origin—they are bateaux mouches.

What these boats are on the river the fiacres have been on land. These small open carriages

are now being replaced by motor taxis. The use of the meters on the horse-propelled vehicles as well as on the machines has deprived the tourist of one of the daily excitements of his visit—the heated argument with the driver concerning his charge. Another change which has been consummated since 1913 began is the passing of the horse-drawn omnibus with its “imperial” or roof seats, from whose inexpensive vantage many travelers have considered that they secured their best view of the city streets. The two subway systems have many excellent points, not least of which is a method of ventilation which makes a summer’s day trip below ground a relief rather than a seeming excursion on the crust of the infernal regions.

The Champs ÉlysÉes is thought to offer the finest metropolitan vista in the world, when the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile is seen across the Place de la Concorde from the Tuileries gardens, over two miles away.

Such vistas are frequent in Paris, offering a “point of view” in which a handsome building or monument finds its beauty enhanced. The regularity of the skyline adds to this effect. By a municipal regulation no faÇade may be higher than the width of the street and the consequent uniformity provides a not unpleasing monotony.

Paris parks are world famous, not only for the beauty of such great expanses as the Bois de Boulogne, just outside the fortifications, with its forest and lake and stream, its good roads and its alluring restaurants, but for the intelligent utilization of small open spaces in crowded parts of the city. Wherever any readjustment of lines or purposes gives opportunity, there a bit of grass rests the eye and a tree casts its share of shade. If there is space enough a piece of statuary educates the taste or the bust of some hero of history or of art makes familiar the features of great men. The demolition of the old clo’ booths of the Temple gave such a chance, and amid tall tenements and commonplace shops mothers sew and babies doze and one-legged veterans read the newspapers beneath the statue of the people’s poet, BÉranger.

At one end of this square rises the Mairie of the Third Arrondissement (ward). These Mairies, of which there are twenty, are decorated with paintings, often by artists of repute, and always symbolic of the Family, of Labor or of the Fatherland. The Hall of Marriages in which the Mayor of the arrondissement performs the civil ceremony required by law, receives especial attention and usually is a room handsomely appointed and adorned.

The French imagination likes to express itself

in symbols. Throughout the city there are many large groups, such as the Triumph of the Republic, unveiled in 1899, which dominates the Place de la Nation—a figure representative of the Republic attended by Liberty, Labor, Abundance and Justice. Even statues or busts or reliefs of authors, musicians or statesmen frequently are supported by allegorical figures. Such is the monument to Chopin which includes a figure of Night and one of Harmony, and such is the monument of Coligny whose portrait statue stands between Fatherland and Religion. In the Fountain of the Observatory seahorses, dolphins and tortoises surround allegorical figures of the four quarters of the globe. The young women lawyers who, in cap and gown, pace seriously through the great hall of the ancient Palace of Justice, are living symbols of twentieth century progress.

Haussmann’s plan of laying out broad streets radiating from a center served the further purpose of adding to the city’s beauty by providing wide open spaces and of wiping out narrow streets and insanitary houses. The Third Republic has continued to act on this scheme and has succeeded wonderfully well in achieving the desired improvement with but a small sacrifice of buildings of eminent historic value. On the CitÉ a web of memories clung to the tangle of streets swept away to secure a site for the new HÔtel Dieu on the north of Notre Dame which replaced the ancient hospital which has stood since Saint Louis’ day on the south side of the island.

The completion in 1912 of the new home of the National Printing Press near the Eiffel Tower brings to mind a Parisian habit indicative of thrift and of a respect for historical associations. The Press has been housed for many years in the eighteenth century hÔtel of the Dukes of Rohan built when the Marais was still fashionable. Anything more unsuitable for a printing establishment it would be hard to find. The rooms of a private house become a crowded fire trap when converted to industrial purposes. This use of the house has tided over a crisis, however, and once the last vestige of printer’s ink has been removed the old building probably will be restored to the beauty which the still existing decorations of some of the rooms show, and will be used for some more suitable purpose. One proposal is that it be used as an addition to the National Archives, since its grounds adjoin those of the HÔtels Clisson and Soubise, their present home. The HÔtel Carnavalet houses the Historical Museum of Paris, and part of the Louvre is used for government offices—two other instances of Paris wisdom.

There have been three Expositions in Paris under the Third Republic. Each has left behind a permanent memorial. The Palace of the TrocadÉro, dating from 1878, is a huge concert hall where government-trained actors and singers often give for a strangely modest sum the same performances which cost more in the regular theaters with more elaborate accessories. The architecture of the TrocadÉro is not beautiful but the situation is imposing and the general effect impressive when seen across the river from the south bank where the Eiffel Tower has raised its huge iron spider web since the World’s Fair of 1889.

The tower is a little world in itself with a restaurant and a theater, a government weather observatory and a wireless station. Since aviation has become fashionable the frequent purr of an engine tells the tourist sipping his tea “in English fashion” on the first stage that yet another aviator is taking his afternoon spin “around the Tour Eiffel.”

The latest exposition, that of 1900, gave to Paris the handsome bridge named after Czar Alexander III, the Grand Palais, where the world’s best pictures and sculptures are exhibited every spring, and the Petit Palais which holds several general collections and also the paintings and sculpture bought by the city from the Salons of the last thirty-five years. Such public art galleries are found throughout France, a development of Napoleon’s idea of bringing art to the people. Like Paris the provinces take advantage of the Salons to add to the treasures of their galleries.

Near the two palaces is the exquisite chapel of Our Lady of Consolation. It is built on the site of a building destroyed during the progress of a fashionable bazaar by a fire which wiped out one hundred thirty-two lives. The architectural details are of the classic style popular in the reign of Louis XVI.

Already rich in beautiful churches Paris has been further graced in recent years by the majestic basilica of the Sacred Heart gleaming mysteriously through the delicate haze that always enwraps Montmartre. The style is Romanesque-Byzantine, and the structure is topped by a large dome flanked by smaller ones. The interior lacks the colorful warmth of most of the city churches, but time will remedy that in part. Construction has been extremely slow for the same reason that the building of the Pantheon was a long process—the discovery that the summit of the hill was honeycombed by ancient quarries. It became necessary to sink shafts which were filled with masonry or concrete. Upon this strong sub-structure rises the splendid

work of expiation for the murder of Archbishop Darboy. The city owns the church.

To the tourist whose attention is not confined to the stock “sights” of Paris the city streets offer a wide field of interest. They show the stranger within the walls the neatness of the people and the orderliness which manifests itself in the automatic formation of a queue of would-be passengers on an omnibus or a bateau mouche. They disclose little that looks like slums to the eye of a Londoner or a New Yorker, for dirt and sadness rather than congestion make slums, and the poor Parisian looks clean and cheerful even when a hole in his “stocking” has let all his savings escape.

History lurks at every corner of these streets. It commands attention to the imposing pile of Notre Dame, it piques curiosity by the palpably ancient turrets of the rue Hautefeuille. The non-existent is recalled by the tablet on the site of the house where Coligny was assassinated, by the outline of Philip Augustus’s Louvre traced on the eastern courtyard of the palace, by the name of the street that passes over the mad king’s menagerie at the HÔtel Saint Paul. Étienne Marcel sits his horse beside the City Hall he bought for Paris; Desmoulins mounts his chair in the garden of the Palais Royal to make the passionate speech that wrought the destruction

of the Bastille. Even the boucheries chevalines, the markets that sell horse steaks and “ass and mule meat of the first quality,” bring back the days when Henry IV cut off supplies coming from the suburbs of Paris and when, three hundred years later, the Prussians used the same means to gain the same end. That the Parisians of to-day are willing to take chances on universal peace in the future seems attested by the recent vote (1913) of the Municipal Council to convert the fortifications and the land adjacent into parks. The people of the markets, at any rate, are not worrying about any possibilities of hunger for they continue as hard-working and as fluent as when they acted as Marie Antoinette’s escort on the occasion of the “Joyous Entry” from Versailles, though kinder now in heart and action.

Paris charms the stranger as the birdman of the Tuileries Gardens charms his feathered friends—making hostile gestures with one hand and popping bread crumbs into open beaks with the other. The great city of three million people, like all great cities, threatens to overcome the lonely traveler; then, at the seeming moment of destruction, she gives him the food he needs most—perhaps a glimpse of patriotic gayety in the street revels of the fourteenth of July, perhaps the cordial welcome that she has bestowed on students since Charlemagne’s day, perhaps the less personal appeal of the beauty of a wild dash of rain seen down the river against the western sky, perhaps the impulse to sympathy aroused by the passing of a first communion procession of little girls, wide-eyed from their new, soul-stirring experience.

In a quiet corner behind a convent chapel where nuns vowed to Perpetual Adoration unceasingly tend the altar, rests the body of America’s friend, Lafayette. If for no other reason than because of his friendship, Americans must always feel an interest in the city in which he did his part toward crystallizing the bourgeois rule which makes the French government one of the most interesting political experiments of Europe to-day. Yet Paris needs no intermediary. In her are centered taste, thought, the gayety and exaggeration of the past, light-heartedness in the stern present. The city is a record of the development of a people who have expressed themselves in words and in deeds, and by the more subtle methods of Art. The story is not ended, and as long as the writing goes on, vivid and alluring as the “Gallic spirit” can make it, so long there will be no lack of readers of all nations, our own among the most eager.