I have recently been visiting the three great monuments of the reign of Napoleon III.—the completed Louvre, the Bois de Boulogne, and the Halles Centrales. As to the first, those who remember those narrow, nasty streets, which within six years were the approaches to the Louvre and the Palais Royal, and those rickety old buildings reminding one too strongly of cheese in an advanced stage of mouldiness, that used to intrude their unsightly forms into the very middle of the Place du Carrousel,—those who recollect the junk shops that seemed more fitting to the neighbourhood of the docks than to the entrance to a palace and a gallery of art,—feel in a manner lost, when they walk about the courtyards of the noble edifice which has taken the place of so much deformity. If the new wings of the Louvre had been built in one range instead of quadrangles, they would extend more than half a mile! Half a mile of palace, and a palace, too, which in building has occupied one hundred and fifty sculptors for the past five years! Those who have not visited Paris within five years will recollect the Bois de Boulogne only as a vast neglected tract of woodland, which seemed a great waste of the raw material in a place where firewood is so expensive as it is here. It is now laid out in beautiful avenues and walks, the extent of which is said to be nearly two hundred miles. You are refreshed by the sound of waterfalls and the coolness of grottos, the rocks for the formation of which were brought from Fontainebleau, more than forty miles distant from Paris. You walk on, and find yourself on the shores of a lake, a mile or two in length, with two or three lovely islands in it, and in whose bright blue waters thousands of trout are sporting. That wild waste, the old Bois de Boulogne, which few persons but duellists ever visited, has passed away, and in its place you find the most magnificent park in the world. It is indeed a perfect triumph of landscape gardening. It is nature itself, not in miniature, but on such a scale as to deceive you entirely, and fill you with the same feeling of admiration that is awakened by any striking natural beauty. The old French notions of landscape gardening seem to have been entirely cast aside. The carriage roads and paths go winding about so that the view is constantly changing, and the trees are allowed to grow as they please, without being tortured into fantastic shapes by the pruning knife. The banks of the lake have been made irregular, now steep, now sloping gently to the water's edge, and in some places huge jagged rocks have been most naturally worked in, while ivy has been planted around them, and in their crevices those weeds and shrubs which commonly grow in such places. You would about as readily take Jamaica Pond to be artificial as this lovely sheet of water and its surroundings. The Avenue de l'Impératrice is the road from the Arc de Triomphe to the Bois de Boulogne. It is half or three quarters of a mile in length, and is destined to be one of the most striking features of Paris. It is laid out with spacious grass plots, with carriage ways and ways for equestrians and foot passengers, with regular double rows of trees on either side. Many elegant château-like private residences already adorn it, and others are rapidly rising. An idea of its majestic appearance may be had from the fact that its entire width from house to house is about four hundred feet. The large space around the Arc de Triomphe is already laid out in a square, to be called the Place de l'Europe, and the work has already been commenced of reducing the buildings around it to symmetry. The Halles Centrales, the great central market-house of Paris, has just been opened to the public. It is built mainly of iron and glass. As nearly as I could judge of its size, I should think it would leave but little spare room if it were placed in Union Park, New York. It is about a hundred feet in height, and so well ventilated that it is hard to realize when there that one is under cover. A wide street for vehicles runs through its whole length, crossed by others at equal intervals. I have called these three public improvements the great monuments of the reign of Napoleon III.; not that I would limit his good works to these, but because these may be taken as conspicuous illustrations of his care, no less for the amusements than for the bodily wants of his people, and of his zeal for the promotion of art and the adornment of his capital. But these noble characteristics of the Emperor deserve something more than a mere passing notice, and may well form the subject of my next letter.

NAPOLEON THE THIRD[1]

There is a period in the life of almost every man which may justly be termed the romantic period. I do not mean the time when a youth, whose heart is as yet unwarped by the selfishness of the world, and his brow unclouded by its trials and its sorrows, thinks that the performance of his life will fully come up to the glowing programme he then composes for it; neither do I refer to the period when, in hungry expectation, we clutched eagerly at the booksellers' announcements of the last productions of the eloquent Bulwer, or of the inexhaustible James. But I refer to the time when childhood forgets its new buttons in reading how poor Ali Baba relieved his wants at the expense of the wicked thieves; how Whittington heard Bow Bells ring out the prophecy of his greatness; how fierce Blue Beard punished his wife's curiosity; and how good King Alfred merited reproof by his forgetfulness of the herdsman's supper. This is the true period of romance in the lives of all of us; for then all the romance that we read is clothed with the dignity of history, and all our history is invested with the charm of romance. This happy period does not lose its attractions, even when we outgrow the credulity of childhood; for the romance of history captivates us when we no longer are subject to the sway of the novelist; and we leave Mr. Thackeray's last uncut, until we can finish a newspaper chapter in the history of these momentous times.

We know how eagerly we pursue the vicissitudes of fortune which have marked the career of so many of the world's heroes; and this will teach us how future generations will read the history of the present century. Surely the whole range of romance presents no parallel to the simple history of the wonderful man who now governs France. It is easy to see that his varied fortunes will one day perform a conspicuous part in that juvenile classical literature of which I have spoken; and perhaps it may not be unprofitable, dear reader, for us to endeavour to raise ourselves above the excitement of partisanship and the influences of old prejudices, and look upon his career as may the writers of the twenty-fifth century.

It is a popular error in America to regard Louis Napoleon as a singular combination of knavery and half-wittedness. Even Mr. Emerson, in his English Traits, so far forgets the kindliness of his nature as to call him a "successful thief." The English journalists once delighted to ridicule him as the "nephew of his uncle," and the shadow of a great name, and Punch used to represent him as a pygmy standing upon the brim of his uncle's hat, and wondering how he could ever fill it; but he has lived down ridicule, and they have long since learned that there is such a thing as the possibility of a mistake in judgment, even among journalists and politicians. It is time that we Americans got over a notion which has long since been exploded on this side of the Atlantic. I know that I am flying in the face of those who believe in the plenary inspiration of the New York Tribune, when I claim for the Emperor any thing like patriotism or capacity as a statesman. I know that the Greeleian, "philanthropic" code exacts that we should not "give the prisoner the benefit of the doubt," and that when any one whom we dislike does any good, we should attribute it to nothing but a selfish or ambitious motive. I know that this new-fangled love of all mankind requires us to hate those who differ from us politically, and never to lose an opportunity to blacken their characters and diminish their reputation; and therefore I make all due allowances for the refusal of the Tribune, and journals of the same amiable family, to see the truth. In April, 1856, I was waiting for a train in a way station on the Worcester Railroad. A sun-burned, hard-working man was reading the news of the proclamation of peace at Paris from a penny paper, and he commented upon it to two or three others who were present, as follows: "Well, I don't know how 'tis, but it seems to me that we've been most almightily mistaken about this 'ere Lewis Napoleon. We used to think he was a shaller kind o' feller any how, but it really looks now, judging from the position of France in European affairs, as if he was turning out to be altogether the biggest dog in that tanyard!" The old fellow's conclusion was a true one, though his rhetoric would not have been commended at Cambridge; and it is to prevent this conclusion forcing itself upon the public sense, that the sympathizers with socialism have been labouring ever since. We are told that it is our duty as Americans and republicans to wish for the overthrow of Napoleon and his empire, and the establishment of the république démocratique et sociale. Now, having received my political principles from another source than the Tribune, I may be pardoned for having a prejudice in favour of allowing the people of France to govern France; and, as they elected Louis Napoleon President in 1848 by more than five millions of votes, and in 1851 chose him dictator (in their fear of the very party which the Tribune wishes to see in power) by more than seven millions of votes, and finally, in 1852, made him their Emperor by a vote of more than seven millions against a little more than three hundred thousand, we may suppose France to have expressed a pretty decided opinion on this matter. The French empire rests upon the very principle that forms the basis of true republicanism—universal suffrage. Louis Napoleon restored that principle after it had been suppressed or restricted, and proved himself a truer republican than his opponents. For nine years, Napoleon has been sustained by the people of France with a unanimity such as the United States never knew, except in the election of Washington as first President, and his majority has increased every time that he has appealed to the people. It is idle to say that there are parties here that are opposed to him; it would be a remarkable phenomenon if there were not. But there is a more united support here for the Emperor than there is in our own country for the constitution of the United States, and any right-minded man would regret a revolutionary movement in one country as much as in the other.

If there was ever a position calculated to test the capabilities of its occupant, it was that in which Louis Napoleon found himself when he obeyed the voice of the French people, and accepted the presidency of the French republic. Surrounded by men holding all kinds of political opinions, from the agrarian Proudhon to the impracticable Louis Blanc, and men of no political opinions whatever,—he found himself obliged to use all the power reposed in him by the constitution, to keep the government from falling asunder. History bears witness to the fact that republican governments deteriorate more rapidly than those which are based upon a less changeable foundation than the popular will. But there was little danger of the French republic deteriorating, for it was about as weak and unprincipled as it could be in its very inception. There were a few men of high and patriotic character in the Assembly, but (as is generally the case) their voices were drowned amid the clamourings of a crowd of radical journalists and ambitious littérateurs, whose only bond of union was a fierce hatred of law and religion, and a desire for the spoils of office. These were the men with whom Napoleon had to deal. They had favoured his election to the presidency, for, in their misapprehension of his character, they thought him the mere shadow of a name, and expected under his government to have all things their own way. But they were not long in discovering their mistake.

His conduct soon showed that he was the proper man for the crisis. That unflinching republican, General Cavaignac, had before pointed out the dangers to all European governments, and to civilization itself, that would spring from the continuance of the sanguinary and sacrilegious Roman Republic; and Napoleon, accepting his suggestions, took immediate measures to put an end to the atrocities which marked the sway of Mazzini and his assassins in the Roman States.[2] The success which attended these measures is now a part of history. There is a kind of historical justice in this part of Napoleon's career which must force itself upon every reflecting mind. From the day when St. Remy told his royal convert, Clovis, to "burn what he had adored, and adore what he had burned," the monarch of France had always been considered the "eldest son of the Church." The Roman Pontiff was indebted to Pepin and Charlemagne for those possessions which rendered him independent of the secular power. In the hour of need it was always to the Kings of France that he looked for aid; and whether he sought aid against the oppressors of the Holy See or the infidel possessors of the Holy Sepulchre, he seldom appealed to them in vain. It was meet, therefore, that Napoleon should inaugurate his power by thus reviving the ancient traditionary spirit of the French monarchy; for he could not better prove his worthiness to sit on the throne which had been occupied by so many generous and heroic spirits, than by fighting the battles of the Church they loved so well.

The foreign and domestic policy which the Prince-President pursued excited at the same time the anger of the ultra republican faction, and the hopes of the religious and conservative portion of society. Order was restored, and an impetus was given to commercial enterprise and to the arts of peace such as France had not known since the outbreak of 1848. Still the discordant elements of which the Assembly was composed, were a just cause of alarm to all friends of good order, and all parties, conservative and radical, regarded the existing state of affairs as a temporary one. Napoleon saw that the only obstacle in the path of the nation to peace and prosperity was the Assembly—the radicals of the Assembly that the Prince-President was the only obstacle to their plans of disorganization and anarchy; and they also saw that, if the question were allowed to go to the people at the expiration of Napoleon's term of office, he would surely be reëlected, and that his policy would be triumphantly confirmed. So, as the time drew near for the new election, the struggle between the President and the Assembly—between order and anarchy—grew more and more severe. Plots were formed against Napoleon, and were just ripening for execution, when, on the second of December, 1851, he terminated the suspense of the nation by seizing and throwing into prison all the chief conspirators against the public peace, and then appealed to the people to sustain him in his efforts to preserve his country from the state of anarchy towards which it seemed to be hastening. The people answered promptly and with good will to the call, and Napoleon gained an almost bloodless victory.

But we are told that by the coup d'état, "Napoleon violated his oath to sustain the constitution of the republic—that he is a perjurer, and all his success cannot diminish his crime." So might one of the old loyalists have said about our own Washington. "He was a British subject—by accepting a commission under Braddock, he formally acknowledged his allegiance to the crown—by drawing his sword in the revolution, he violated not only his fidelity as a subject, but his honour as a soldier." And what would any American reply to this? He would say that Washington never bound himself to violate his conscience, and that conscientiously he felt bound to defend the old English principles of free government even against the encroachments of his own rightful sovereign. And so, with equal reason, it may be said of Louis Napoleon, when the term of his presidency was approaching, and the radical members of the Assembly were forming conspiracies to dispose of him so as to prevent his reëlection, he was bound in conscience, as the chief ruler of his country, to prevent the anarchy that must result from such a movement. And how could he do this save by dissolving the Assembly and appealing to the people as he did? The constitution was nullified by the plots of the Assembly, and France in 1851 was really without a government, until the coup d'état inaugurated the present reign of public prosperity and peace. The coup d'état was not only justifiable—it was praiseworthy. When the prejudices and party spirit of the present time shall have passed away, the historian will grow eloquent in speaking of that fearless and far-sighted statesman, who, when his country was threatened with a repetition of the civil strife which had too often shaken her to her centre, threw himself boldly upon the patriotism of the people with those noble words, "The Assembly, instead of being what it ought to be, the support of public order, has become a nest of conspiracies. It compromises the peace of France. I have dissolved it; and I call upon the whole people to judge between it and myself."—The coup d'état excited the anger only of the socialists and of those partisans of the houses of Bourbon and Orléans who loved those families more than they loved their country's welfare; for they saw, by the revival of business, that confidence in the stability of the government was established, and that Napoleon had obtained a place in the affections of the French people from which he could not easily be dislodged.

From this dictatorship, which the dangers of the time had rendered necessary, it was an easy transition to the empire, and Louis Napoleon found his succession to the throne of his uncle confirmed by almost the unanimous vote of the French people. It was a tribute to the man, and to his public policy, such as no ruler in modern times has ever received, and for unanimity is unparalleled in the history of popular elections. His marriage followed quickly upon the proclamation of the empire; and in this, as in all his acts, we can discern his manly and independent spirit. He sought not to ally himself with any of the royal families of Europe, for he felt himself to be so sure of his position, that he could without risk consult his affections rather than policy or ambition.