Nooks and Corners of Old Paris Part 10

The Champs Elysees are of almost modern creation. A decade ago, the fine avenues surrounding the Arc de l'Etoile--the Avenue Kleber, the Avenue Wagram, the Avenue Niel, the Avenue de l'Alma--offered most picturesque contrasts; beside a sumptuous mansion, subsisted wretched little houses, remains of old hovels that once were scattered all over this luxurious quarter, where now nothing recalls the waste pieces of land, dangerous even to cross, of sixty years ago. Under the Directory, Madame Tallien's cottage (Notre Dame de Thermidor, she was called) to which the Incroyables and the Merveilleuses dared not go without escort, was situated as far up as the Avenue Montaigne. Dancing-gardens and open-air bars occupied the s.p.a.ce now filled by restaurants and cafes-concerts. An engraving by Carle Vernet shows us a Cossack encampment round a humble, country-looking inn. Now the Le Doyen restaurant stands there!

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE RUE GREUZE IN 1855 _Chauvet, del._]

Under Louis-Philippe, the Champs-Elysees were at length altered: side avenues were laid out, the main avenue was widened; and Emile Augier used to relate that, in the hollow of one of the trees numbered for tr.i.m.m.i.n.g (No. 116, I believe), the ticket porter belonging to the Gymnase Theatre deposited the one intended for Balzac at the time of the rehearsals of _Mercadet_. The great novelist, in order to escape from his numerous creditors, was lodging at this period in the Rue Beaujon, under the name of Madame Dupont, widow. Gozlan, who ultimately discovered his ill.u.s.trious friend's address, added on the envelopes he sent to him--"nee Balzac."

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE MADRID CHaTEAU _L. G. Moreau, pinxit_]

The curious Memoirs of the Abbe de Salamon, a Papal internuncio, give us a striking picture of the Bois de Boulogne under the Revolution: a sort of forest, or jungle, in which those took refuge who, being suspected, were tracked by the Committees and the police, and to whom the precious citizens' card had been refused. "I continually remained in the thickest part of the Bois de Boulogne," he says. "It seemed to me that each person I met read on my face that I was outlawed and was hastening to deliver me to the headsman. I took up my abode in the loneliest place of the wood. I lit a fire with a tinder-box and some twigs, and cooked my vegetables; my soup was excellent.... Later I discovered another fairly convenient spot, on the side of the Bagatelle Villa, quite near to the Pyramid and not far from Madrid.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BAGATELLE PAVILION _L. G. Moreau, pinxit_]

"One night, I was wakened in the middle of my dreams by the piercing cries of two women, who drew back terrified on beholding me through the darkness of night.

"It was a mother and her daughter, who also were flying from an arrest-warrant. I called to them: 'Keep silence, whoever you are! You have nothing to fear.' They asked me what I was doing in the wood so late: 'The same thing as you no doubt are doing yourselves,' I answered."

Subsequently it became the ordinary meeting-place for duellists.

Already, in the time of Louis XV., some ladies, the Marchioness de Nesles and the Countess de Polignac, had exchanged pistol shots in it on account of the Duke de Richelieu. Under the Revolution, in 1790, Cazales and Barnave went there to settle a political quarrel: "I should be sorry to kill you," exclaimed Cazales; "but you annoy us considerably, and I want to keep you away from the rostrum for a while." "I am more generous," retorted Barnave; "I wish merely to touch you; for you are the only orator on your side, whereas on mine my absence would not even be perceived." Afterwards it was Elleviou and Monsieur de Bieville; General Foy and Monsieur de Corday; Marshal Soult and Colonel Briqueville; Benjamin Constant and Forbin des Essarts; with this peculiarity in the last duel that the two adversaries fought at ten yards' distance, sitting in two armchairs, which were not even grazed!

And how many others!...

[Ill.u.s.tration: A PERFORMANCE AT THE HIPPODROME ON EYLAU SQUARE UNDER THE SECOND EMPIRE]

Under Louis-Philippe, the Duke d'Orleans, the Duke de Nemours, Lord Seymour, the Duke de Fitz-James, Ernest Le Roy--the Jockey Club at its formation--organised races there. The stakes were modest; most often, a few bottles of champagne were gained and lost. Then fashion took hold of the thing. More importance was attached to racing; and, to-day, it is the great Parisian event--in festivities. As early as 1850, the Hippodrome of the Eylau Square revived the souvenir of Antiquity's favourite chariot-races.

The Bois de Boulogne became the rendezvous of society. There, was displayed the luxury of the Second Empire. Its trees and avenues formed an exquisite framework to elegance and worldly show. In the _Curee_, Emile Zola was able to write: "It was four o'clock and the Bois awoke from its afternoon sultriness. Along the Empress' Avenue, clouds of dust were flying; and, afar, lawns of verdure could be seen, with the hills of Saint-Cloud and Suresnes beyond, crowned with the grey of Mont Valerien. The sun, aloft on the horizon, sailed in an effulgence of golden light that filled the depths of the foliage, flamed the top branches, and transformed this ocean of leaves into an ocean of luminousness.... The varnished panels of the carriages, the flashing of the copper and steel mountings, the bright colours of the dresses streamed together with the horses' regular trot, and cast on the background of the Bois a broad, moving band, a beam from the welkin, lengthening as it followed the curves of the road. The waved roundness of the sunshades radiated like metal moons."

The sight has not changed. It is the same triumphal defile, which each day gathers within these select surroundings the most elegant women in Paris, fashionable hors.e.m.e.n, vibrating autocars with their _chauffeurs_, clubmen as well as artists and workmen, who come to enjoy the fair spectacle, this feast of the eyes, this unique scenery: the Bois de Boulogne, the Avenue du Bois, the Champs Elysees.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ARC DE TRIOMPHE ABOUT 1850]

From the top of the Arc de Triomphe, 'mid the twilight of May, the vision is a magic one; it is from the terraces of the portico erected to the glory of the Grand Army that a view is obtained of the sumptuous quarters of modern Paris.

Some sixty years ago, Balzac showed his hero dreaming on the hill of Pere-Lachaise, and contemplating, as it lay in the valley, the Monster he intended to tame. To-day Rastignac would have to mount the Arc de Triomphe, if he wished to threaten Paris. Thence, he might launch his famous defiance: "It is a struggle between us now!" for, if the aspect of things has altered, the impression made by the immense City is still and ever the same: an impression of weight, of imperious conflict, of hard victory. In verity, no one disembarks without a sort of anguish in this great Paris,--Paris, so redoubtable to the valiant that attempt its conquest and so prodigal to the fortunate ones that have known how to win its favour.

GEORGES CAIN.

FOOTNOTES:

[3] Successive landlords have more or less spoilt this fine dwelling.

The grand staircase is almost the only part intact, and it is a marvel.

The carving is by Martin Desjardins, and the oval courtyard retains some of its ancient grace.

[4] A word here meaning ultra-naturalistic, broadly satirical.