Whether or not this assertion be strictly correct, I will not pretend to determine: but, certain it is that the Palais du Tribunat is a vortex of dissipation where many a youth is ingulfed. The natural manner in which this may happen I shall endeavour briefly to explain, by way of conclusion to this letter.
A young Frenchman, a perfect stranger in Paris, arrives there from the country, and, wishing to equip himself in the fashion, hastens to the Palais du Tribunat, where he finds wearing apparel of every description on the ground-floor: prompted by a keen appetite, he dines at a restaurateur's on the first-floor: after dinner, urged by mere curiosity, perhaps, if not decoyed by some sharper on the look-out for novices, he visits a public gaming-table on the same story. Fortune not smiling on him, he retires; but, at that very moment, he meets, on the landing-place, a captivating damsel, who, like Virgil's Galatea, flies to be pursued; and the inexperienced youth, after ascending another flight of stairs, is, on the second-floor, ushered into a brothel. Cloyed or disgusted there, he is again induced to try the humour of the fickle goddess, and repairs once more to the gaming-table, till, having lost all his money, he is under the necessity of descending to the entresol to pawn his watch, before he can even procure a lodging in a garret above.
What other city in Europe can boast of such an assemblage of accommodation? Here, under the same roof, a man is, in the space of a few minutes, as perfectly equipped from top to toe, as if he had all the first tradesmen in London at his command; and shortly after, without setting his foot into the street, he is as completely stripped, as if he had fallen into the hands of a gang of robbers.
To cleanse this Augæan stable, would, no doubt, be a Herculean labour. For that purpose, Merlin (of Douay), when Minister of the police, proposed to the Directory to convert the whole of the buildings of the ci-devant Palais Royal into barracks. This was certainly striking at the root of the evil; but, probably, so bold a project was rejected, lest its execution, in those critical times, should excite the profligate Parisians to insurrection.
[LETTER XX.]
Paris, November 20, 1801.
One of the private entertainments here in great vogue, and which is understood to mark a certain pre-eminence in the savoir-vivre of the present day, is a nocturnal repast distinguished by the insignificant denomination of a
THÉ.
A stranger might, in all probability, be led to suppose that he was invited to a tea-drinking party, when he receives a note couched in the following terms:
"Madame R------ prie Monsieur B--------- de lui faire l'honneur de venir au thé quelle doit donner le 5 de ce mois."