beautiful panel will be unrolled and installed in the dome of the hard-wood billiard-room, where its rich, mellow scheme of color will count as naught; and the cupids and the flesh-tones of the chic little model, who came at two, will appear jaundiced; and Aunt Maria and Uncle John, and the twins from Ithaca, will come in after the family Sunday dinner of roast beef and potatoes and rice pudding and ice-water, and look up into the dome and agree “it’s grand.” But the painter does not care, for he has locked up his studio, and taken his twenty thousand francs and the model—who came at two—with him to Trouville.
At night you will find a typical crowd of Bohemians at the Closerie des Lilas, where they sit under a little clump of trees on the sloping dirt terrace in front. Here you will see the true type of the Quarter. It is the farthest up the Boulevard St. Michel of any of the cafés, and just opposite the “Bal Bullier,” on the Place de l’Observatoire. The terrace is crowded with its habitués, for it is out of the way of the stream of people along the “Boul’ Miche.” The terrace is quite dark, its only light coming from the café, back of a green hedge, and it is cool there, too, in summer, with the fresh night air coming from the Luxembourg Gardens. Below it is the café and restaurant de la Rotonde, a very well-built looking place, with its rounding façade on the corner.
At the entrance of every studio court and apartment, there lives the concierge in a box of a room generally, containing a huge feather-bed and furnished with a variety of things left by departing tenants to this faithful guardian of the gate. Many of these small rooms resemble the den of an antiquary with their odds and ends from the studios—old swords, plaster casts, sketches and discarded furniture—until the place is quite full. Yet it is kept neat and clean by madame, who sews all day and talks to her cat and to every one who passes into the court-yard. Here your letters are kept, too,
in one of a row of boxes, with the number of your atelier marked thereon.
At night, after ten, your concierge opens the heavy iron gate of your court by pulling a cord within reach of the family bed. He or she is waked up at intervals through the night to let into and out of a court full of studios those to whom the night is ever young. Or perhaps your concierge will be like old Père Valois, who has three pretty daughters who do the housework of the studios, as well as assist in the guardianship of the gate. They are very busy, these three daughters of Père Valois—all the morning you will see these little “femmes de ménage” as busy as bees; the artists and poets must be waked up, and beds made and studios cleaned. There are many that are never cleaned at all, but then there are many, too, who are not so fortunate as to be taken care of by the three daughters of Père Valois.
VOILÀ LA BELLE ROSE, MADAME!
There is no gossip within the quarter that your “femme de ménage” does not know, and over your morning coffee, which she brings you, she will regale you with the latest news about most of your best friends, including your favorite model, and madame from whom you buy your wine, always concluding with: “That is what I heard, monsieur,—I think it is quite true, because the little Marie, who is the femme de ménage of Monsieur Valentin, got it from Céleste Dauphine yesterday in the café in the rue du Cherche Midi.”
In the morning, this demure maid-of-all-work will be in her calico dress with her sleeves rolled up over her strong white arms, but in the evening you may see her in a chic little dress, at the “Bal Bullier,” or dining at the Panthéon, with the fellow whose studio is opposite yours.