It is a mistake to suppose that the whole of Paris has been rebuilt; for, apart from Notre Dame and such well-known Romanesque and Gothic churches as St. Étienne-du-Mont, St. Germain, the tower of St. Jacques, and the Sainte Chapelle, there are gabled houses of considerable age in many of the by-ways. These are almost invariably covered with a mask of stucco that does its best to hide up their seventeenth-century or earlier characteristics. The beautiful and dignified quadrangular building that is now called the Musée Carnavalet, was the residence of the Marquise de Sévigné and was built in the sixteenth century, although altered and added to in 1660. Earlier than this is the fascinating Hôtel Cluny, a late Gothic house built as the town residence of the abbots of Cluny. This building even links up modern Paris with the Roman Lutetia Parisiorum. Another interesting architectural survival is the Hôtel de Lauzan, a typical residence of a great aristocrat of the days of Le Roi soleil. The Palais du Louvre, dating in part from the days of François I., the Tuileries, begun in 1564 and finished by Louis XIV., and the Conciergerie wherein Marie Antoinette and Robespierre were confined, are buildings of such world-renown that it is scarcely necessary to mention them.
In many ways Paris is similar in arrangement to London. It is divided in two by its river, which cuts it from east to west, and the more important half is on the northern bank. The wealthy quarters are on the west and the poorer to the east. The great park, the Bois de Boulogne, is also on the west side of the city. In Paris, the ancient nucleus of the city was an island in the river, but London, although it originated on a patch of land raised high above the surrounding marshes, was never truly insulated. The Bastille, which may be compared with the Tower of London, occupied a very similar position not far from the north bank of the river and at the eastern side of the mediaeval city. All the chief theatres and places of amusement are on the north side of the river, and, as in London, so are all the Royal Palaces; but here the parallels between the cities appear to end, and one observes endless notable differences.
The Seine divides the city much more fairly than does the Thames. London has no opulent quarter south of its river, but Paris has the Faubourg St. Germain, where her oldest and most distinguished residents have their residences—houses possessing solemnly majestic courtyards guarded by stupendous gateways. In the same quarter are some of the more important foreign embassies. And the river of Paris being scarcely half the width of that of London has made bridging comparatively cheap and resulted in more than double the number of such links. There is no marine flavour in Paris. No vessels of any size reach it, and its banks are not therefore made ugly by tall and hideous wharf buildings. It is a walled city, being encompassed by a circle of very formidable fortifications, still capable of resisting attack by modern military methods. Its broad avenues and boulevards, tree-planted and perfectly straight, give the whole city an atmosphere of spaciousness and of dignity that is lacking in London, if one excepts the vicinity of Regent Street and Piccadilly, and a few other west-end thoroughfares.
Wherever one goes in France among the cities and larger towns the ideas of big and eye-filling perspectives are aimed at by the municipal authorities and architects. Lyons, Nice, Orleans, Tours, Havre, Montpellier, Nîmes, Marseilles, to mention places that come readily into the mind, have all achieved something of the Parisian ideal, and even the more mediaeval towns, whenever an opportunity presents itself, expand into tree-shaded boulevards of widths that would make an English municipal councillor rub his eyes and gasp. It is curious to witness how, in many of the older towns, the narrow and cramped quarters, necessitated in the days when city walls existed, are continuing their existence in wonderful contrast to spacious suburbs. The glamour of these narrow ways is so entrancing to the visitor and the lover of history that he trembles to think that a day may come when all these romantic nuclei of French cities have been rebuilt on the ideals of Hausmann.
Wherever one wanders in France, even in mere villages, one can scarcely find a place that has not at least one café with inviting little tables on the pavement, giving that subtle Latin atmosphere so refreshing to the Anglo-Saxon (who, however, would never dream of wishing to imitate the custom in his own country), and so full of that curiously fascinating Bohemianism which Mr. Locke has caught in the pages of The Beloved Vagabond. Could Britain exchange the public-house for the café half the temperance reformer's task would be done, but one can scarcely contemplate without a shiver the prospect of eating and drinking in the open air anywhere north of the Thames for more than a few weeks of summer.
CHAPTER VII
OF RURAL LIFE IN FRANCE
Peasant ownership of land does not always imply prosperity, and because such a vast majority of French peasants possess their own few acres, one must not jump to the conclusion that all these little farmers live comfortable and prosperous lives. In very large tracts of what has so often been called "the most fertile country in Europe,"[9] the peasant is only able to tear from the soil he owns the barest existence. By unremitting toil he makes his land produce enough to give him and his family a diet mainly composed of bread and vegetables. Meat, coffee, and wine come under the heading of luxuries, and so much that is nutritious is missing from the normal dietary that it would seem as though the minimum requirements of health were not met. Long hours of steady toil, and food which the Parisian would consider insufficient to make life tolerable, is the lot of the peasant proprietors of France wherever the soil is ungenerous or distance from railways and markets keeps prices low.