Rollo in Paris Part 7

"Hotel of the Rhine, Place Vendome," said Mr. George, in French, to the coachman, by way of directing him where to go.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ARRIVAL.]

"Yes--yes--yes--yes," said the coachman.

It is so natural and easy for the French to talk, that they generally use all the words they can to express their meaning, besides an infinity of gestures. Thus, when they wish to say yes, they often repeat the yes four or five times, in a very rapid manner, thus:--

Yes--yes--yes--yes.

Mr. George got into the coach, and Rollo followed him. As they drove along the streets, Rollo tried to look out the window and see; but the window was so small, and the streets were so narrow, and the coachman, moreover, drove so fast, that he had very little opportunity to make observations. At length he caught a momentary glimpse of a monstrous column standing in the middle of an open square; and immediately afterward the carriage drove in under an archway, and came to a stand, in a small, open court, surrounded with lofty buildings. This was the hotel. There was a small room, which served as a porter's lodge, in this court, near where the coach stopped. A girl came to the door of this lodge to receive the guests. She bowed to Mr. George and Rollo with great politeness, and seemed glad to see them. Mr. George spoke to her in French, to say what rooms he wished to engage. What he said, literally translated, was this:--

"We want two chambers for ourselves, at the third, and an apartment of three pieces, at the second, for a gentleman, lady, and their young girl, whom we attend to-morrow."

The girl, who was very neatly and prettily dressed, and was very agreeable in her manners, immediately said, "Very well," and rang a bell. A servant man came at the summons, and, taking the trunks, showed Mr. George and Rollo up to their rooms.

CHAPTER IV.

THE GARDEN OF THE TUILERIES.

The first Sunday that Rollo spent in Paris he met with quite a singular adventure.

His father and mother had arrived the evening before, and had established themselves quite comfortably in the "apartment of three pieces," which Mr. George had engaged for them. An apartment, according to the French use of the term, is not a single room, but a group of rooms, suitable to be occupied by one family. The number of _pieces_ is the number of rooms.

Mr. Holiday's three rooms were a small but beautifully furnished parlor, where they had breakfast, and two bed rooms. One bed room was for himself and Mrs. Holiday, and the other was for Jennie. There were a great many splendid mirrors in these rooms, and other elegant furniture.

The floors were not carpeted, but were formed of dark and polished wood, curiously inlaid, with rugs here and there at the doors and before the sofas and chairs. There was a small, square rug before every chair, and a large one before the sofa. There were a great many other curious things to be observed in the arrangements of the room. The fireplace, for example, was closed by plates of sheet iron, which could be shoved up and down like the sashes of a window; while the windows themselves opened like doors, each having a great bra.s.s fastening, like a latch, in the middle, and hinges at the sides.

Rollo had gone with his father and mother to church in the morning, and at about one o'clock they returned. Rollo and Jennie remained at home, after one, for an hour or two, waiting for their uncle George to come.

He had gone away somewhere, and had not yet returned. While thus waiting, the children sat at the window of their parlor, which they opened by swinging the two sides of the sash entirely back, so that they could see out to great advantage. The window opened down quite low; but there was a strong iron bar pa.s.sing across from side to side, to keep them from falling out. The children sat at this window, amusing themselves with what they could see in the square. The name of the square was the Place Vendome. There was a very large and lofty column in the centre of it. This column is very greatly celebrated for its magnitude and its beauty. It is twelve feet in diameter, and nearly a hundred and forty feet high. But what is most remarkable is, that the whole exterior of it, enormous as the ma.s.s is, is formed of bra.s.s. The bra.s.s was obtained by melting up the cannons which Napoleon took from his enemies. At the end of one of his campaigns he found that he had twelve hundred cannons which he had taken from the Russians and Austrians, with whom he had been at war; and after reflecting for some time on the question, what he should do with them, he concluded to send them to Paris, and there to have them made into this enormous column, to ornament the centre of the Place Vendome.

The column, though made of bra.s.s, is not bright upon the outside, but dark, like bronze, and the surface is ornamented with figures in what are called bas relief, representing the battles and victories in which the cannon out of which the column was composed were taken from the enemy.

Rollo and Jennie, in looking at this column from the window of their hotel, observed that around the foot of it there was a square s.p.a.ce enclosed by an iron railing, forming a sort of yard. There was a gate in the front side of this railing. This gate was open; but there were two soldiers standing by it, with guns in their hands, as if to prevent any body from going in.

The column itself, as is usual with such columns, did not stand directly upon the ground, but upon a square pedestal, which was built of ma.s.sive blocks of granite, resting on a deep and strong foundation; and as the column itself was twelve feet in diameter, the pedestal, being necessarily somewhat larger, was quite a considerable structure. In the front of it, opposite the gate in the iron railing, was a door. The door was open, but nothing was to be seen but darkness within.

"I wonder what they do in there?" said Rollo. "The gate is open, and the door is open; but I suppose the soldiers would not let any body go in to see. Do you suppose, Jennie, that it can be possible that there is any way to get up to the top of the column by going in at that door?"

"Yes," replied Jennie; and so saying, she pointed eagerly to the top of the column, and added, "For there are some boys up there now."

Rollo looked up to the top of the column. There was a statue of Napoleon upon the summit, which appeared to be of about the ordinary size of a man, though it is really about eight times as large as life, being twice as large in every dimension. It looks small, on account of its being so high in the air. Beneath this statue and around the top of the column the children saw that there was a small gallery, with a railing on the outside of it. Several persons were standing on this gallery, leaning on the railing. At first Rollo thought that they were sculptured figures placed there, like the statue of Napoleon on the top, for ornament; but presently he saw some of them move about, which convinced him that they were real men. Two of them were soldiers, as was evident from the red uniform which they wore. But they all looked exceedingly small.

"There must be a staircase inside," said Rollo, "or else some ladders.

If not, how could those men get up?"

"Yes," said Jennie.

"I should like to go up there very much," said Rollo, "if I could only get by the soldiers."

"I should not dare to go up to such a high place," said Jennie, shaking her head solemnly.

At the foot of the column and outside of the railing which formed the enclosure around the pedestal was a very broad and smooth place, as smooth as a floor, and raised like a sidewalk above the street. It was very broad, and people walked over it in pa.s.sing through the square.

There was only one way of pa.s.sing through the square, and that was from north to south. From east to west there was no street, but the ranges of houses and palaces continued on those sides unbroken. These edifices presented a very fine architectural frontage toward the square, and gave to the whole s.p.a.ce which they enclosed a very rich and grand appearance.

Over the doors of two or three of the houses there were small tricolored flags flying; and wherever these flags were, there were soldiers on the sidewalk below guarding the doors. But neither Rollo nor Jennie was able to imagine what this could mean.

About three o'clock, when Rollo and Jennie had began to be tired of looking at the column, their mother came into the room. She said that Mr. Holiday was fatigued and was going to lie down, and that neither he nor herself would go out again. Rollo then asked if he and Jennie might go out and take a walk. His mother seemed to hesitate about it, but presently said that she would go and ask Mr. Holiday if he thought it would be safe. She accordingly went into the bed room, and very soon returned, saying that Mr. Holiday thought it would be safe for them to go if he gave them some directions.

"He says," added Mrs. Holiday, "that you may get ready, and then go into his room, and he will give you the directions. Only you must not talk much with him, for it hurts him to talk. Hear what he has to say, and then come out immediately."

So the children made themselves ready, and then went into their father's room. They found him sitting in a great arm chair by a window where the sun was shining. He looked pale and tired. When the children came in, however, he turned to them with a smile, and said,--

"Children, I am glad you are going out to take a walk. You can go very safely, if you follow my directions.

"This is the Place Vendome. There are only two ways of going out of it.

One leads to the north, and the other to the south.

"If you take the road which goes to the north, that is, that way," said Mr. Holiday, pointing, "you will go out by the street which is called the Street of Peace.[D] The Street of Peace is straight, and pretty broad; and if you follow it to the end of it, you will come to the Boulevards."

[D] Mr. Holiday called this street, of course, by its French name; but we give its name here in English, for the convenience of the reader, who may, perhaps, not be able to p.r.o.nounce French.

"What are the Boulevards?" asked Rollo.

"Hush!" said Jennie, gently touching Rollo at the same time with her hand.

"Boulevards," said Mr. Holiday, "means bulwarks. A great many years ago there was a line of bulwarks or fortifications all around Paris; but at length, when the city grew too large for them, they levelled them down and made a very broad and handsome street where they had been, and then afterward made a new line of fortifications farther out. This broad and handsome street, or rather, series of streets, is called the Boulevards.

It extends almost entirely around the city. Of course, when you get into the Boulevards, you are in no danger of losing yourselves; for you can go on as far as you please, either way, and then come back to the Street of Peace again, and then come home."

"Yes," said Rollo, "I understand."

Here Jennie gently touched Rollo again, to remind him that he was not to talk.

"You will know the Boulevards at once when you come to them," continued Mr. Holiday, "they are so much broader and more beautiful than any of the other streets of Paris. Even the sidewalks are as wide as many ordinary streets; and there are rows of young trees along the edges of the sidewalks. Now, if you choose, you can go out from the Place Vendome on the northern side, by the Street of Peace, and so walk on till you come to the Boulevards. Then you can walk along the Boulevards as far as you please.

"Or," continued Mr. Holiday, "you can take the opposite course. You can go out of the Place Vendome on the southern side. That will bring you directly in the garden of the Tuileries."

"I should like to go into a garden," said Jennie, "and see the flowers."

"You will see," continued Mr. Holiday, "as soon as you begin to go out of the Place Vendome, at a little distance before you, perhaps as far as two or three blocks in New York, a wall of green trees."

"A wall of green trees!" exclaimed Rollo.

"Yes," said his father. "It is a thick row of trees growing in the garden, and having the side toward the street trimmed smooth and straight like a wall. The entrance through this range of trees, opposite the gateway where you go into the garden, looks like an archway in a green wall. You will see it before you as soon as you turn the corner of this hotel into the street that leads that way. You can walk straight on till you come to the place. There you will find the entrance to the garden. There is a very high iron palisade along the side of the garden toward the street, with the rows of trees which I have spoken of inside of it. There is a gateway through this palisade where you can go in.

There are two soldiers there to guard the gateway."

"Then how can we get in?" asked Jennie.