Historic Paris

by Jetta Sophia Wolff

In Rue du Mail, at what is now hôtel de Metz, Buonaparte lodged in 1790. We see many old houses. Spontini lived here, and No. 12 was inhabited by Madame Récamier and also by Talma. The modern Rue du Quatre-Septembre has swept away many an interesting old thoroughfare. At No. 100 the Passage de la Cour des Miracles recalls the ancient cour of the name, done away with in 1656, of which some traces still remain—the scene in olden days of feats of apparent healing and of physical transformation whereby the truands, persons of no avowed or avowable occupation, gained precarious deniers. Out of this long modern street we may turn into many shorter ancient ones. Rue du Sentier, recalling by its name a pathway through a wood—sentier, a corruption of chantier—has fine old houses and knew in its time many inhabitants of mark. At No. 8 lived Monsieur Lebrun, a famous picture dealer, husband of Madame Vigée Lebrun. At No. 2 dwelt Madame de Staël, at Nos. 22-24, in rooms erewhile decorated by Fragonard, Le Normand d’Étioles, husband of La Pompadour, after his separation from her. No. 33 was the home of his wife in her girlhood and at the time of her marriage. At No. 30 lived Sophie Gay.

Rue St-Joseph, so named from a seventeenth-century chapel knocked down in 1800, of which we find some traces, was previously Rue du Temps-Perdu; in the graveyard attached to St-Eustache—later a market—La Fontaine and Molière were buried, their ashes transferred in 1818 to Père-Lachaise. At No. 10 Zola was born (1840). Rue du Croissant (seventeenth century) is a street of ancient houses and the chief newspaper street of the city. Paper hawkers crowd there at certain hours each day, then rush away, vying with one another to call attention to their stock-in-trade. At No. 22, Café du Croissant, at the corner where this street meets the Rue Montmartre, journalists assemble, and there the notable Socialist, Jaurès, was shot dead on the eve of the outbreak of war, July 31st, 1914. The sign at No. 18 is said to date from 1612. In Rue des Jeûneurs (1643)—the name a corruption from des Jeux-Neufs—we see more ancient houses and leading out of it the old Rue St-Fiacre, once Rue du Figuier. No. 19 was inhabited in recent years by a lady left a widow after one year’s married life, who, owner of the building, dismissed the tenants of its six large flats and shut herself up in absolute solitude till her death at the age of eighty-nine. No. 23 was designed by Soufflot le Romain (1775). Rue Montmartre in its course continued from arrondissement I, which it leaves at Rue Étienne-Marcel, shows many interesting vestiges. At No. 178 we see a bas-relief of the Porte Montmartre of past days. Within the modern Brasserie du Coq, a copy of the automatic cock of Strasbourg Cathedral, dating from 1352. On the frontage of No. 121 a curious set of bells, and a quaint sign, “A la grâce de Dieu,” dating from 1710. No. 118 was known in past days as the house of clocks. Thirty-two were seen on its frontage, the work of a Swiss clockmaker. Going up this old street in order to visit the streets leading out of it, we turn into Rue Tiquetonne, which recalls by its aspect fourteenth-century times, by its name a prosperous baker of that century, a certain M. Rogier de Quinquentonne. Among the ancient houses there, Nos. 4 and 2 have very deep cellars stretching beneath the street. In Rue Dussoubs, which under other names dates back to the fifteenth century, we see more quaint houses. At No. 26 Goldoni died. The short street Marie-Stuart recalls the days when for one brief year the beautiful Scotswoman was Queen Consort of France. The name of Rue Jussienne is a corruption of Marie l’Égyptienne, patron saint of a fourteenth-century chapel which stood there till 1791. At No. 2 lived Madame Dubarry after the death of Louis XV. Rue d’Argout dates as Rue des Vieux-Augustins from the thirteenth century. Here, at No. 28, lived in more modern times, Savalette de Langes, supposed for many years and proved at her death to be a man. In Passage du Vigan at No. 22, we find bas-reliefs in a courtyard. At No. 56, a small ancient hôtel.

Rue Bachaumont is on the site of the vanished Passage du Saumur, a milliner’s quarter, the most ancient of Paris passages, demolished in 1899. Rue d’Uzès crosses the site of the ancient hôtel d’Uzès. Rue de Cléry was till 1634 an ancient roadway. Madame de Pompadour was born here. Pierre Corneille and Casanava, the painter, lived here; and, where the street meets Rue Beauregard, Baron Batz made his frantic attempt to save Louis XVI on his way to the scaffold. No. 97, now a humble shop with the sign “Au poète de 1793,” was the home of André Chenier. Nos. 21-19 belonged to Robert Poquelin, the priest-brother of Molière, later to Pierre Lebrun, where in pre-Revolution days theatrical performances were given, and the Mass said secretly during the Terror. Leading out of Rue Cléry, we find Rue des Degrés, six mètres in length, the smallest street in Paris, a mere flight of steps.

Rue St-Sauveur (thirteenth century) memorizes the church once there. From end to end we see ancient houses, fine old balconies, curious signs, architectural features of interest. In Rue des Petits-Carreaux, running on from this end of Rue Montorgueil (see [p. 40]) we see at No. 16 the house where, till recent days, musicians assembled for hire each Sunday. Now they meet at the Café de la Chartreuse, 24, Boulevard St-Denis. In a house in a court where the house No. 26 now stands, lived Jean Dubarry. Rue Poissonnière, “Fishwives Street,” once “Champ des Femmes” (thirteenth century), shows us many ancient houses.

Rue Beauregard was so named in honour of the fine view Parisians had of old after mounting Rue Montorgueil. The notorious sorceress, Catherine Monvoisin—“la Voisin”—implicated in a thousand crimes, built for herself a luxurious habitation on this eminence—somewhat higher in those days than in later years. We find several ancient houses along this old street, notably No. 46. We see ancient houses also in Rue de la Lune (1630). No. 1 is a shop still famed for its brioches du soleil. Between these two streets stretched in olden days the graveyard of Notre-Dame de Bonne-Nouvelle, a church built in 1624 on the site of the ancient chapel Ste-Barbe. The name is said to refer to a piece of good news told to Anne d’Autriche one day as she passed that way. The tower only of the seventeenth-century church remains; the rest was rebuilt in 1823. Four short streets of ancient date cross Rue de la Lune: Rue Notre-Dame de Bonne-Nouvelle (eighteenth century), Rue Thorel (sixteenth century), the old Rue Ste-Barbe, Rue de la Ville-Neuve, Rue Notre-Dame de la Recouvrance—with old houses of interest in each. At No. 8 Rue de la Ville-Neuve we see médaillons of Jean Goujon and Philibert Delorme.

Surrounded by old streets, just off the boulevard des Italiens, is the Opéra-Comique, originally a Salle de Spectacles, built on the park-lands of their fine mansion by the duke and duchess de Choiseul, who reserved for themselves and their heirs for ever the right to a loge of eight seats next to the royal box. Its name, at first, Salle Favart, has changed many times. Burnt down twice, in 1838 and 1887, the present building dates only from 1898. Rue Favart, named after the eighteenth-century actor, has always been inhabited by actors and actresses. Rue de Grammont dates from 1726, built across the site of the fine old hôtel de Grammont. Rue de Choiseul, alongside the recently erected Crédit Lyonnais, which has replaced several ancient mansions, recalls the existence of another hôtel de Choiseul. At No. 21 we find curious old attics. Passing through the short Rue de Hanovre, we find in Rue de la Michodière, opened in 1778, on the grounds of hôtel Conti, the house (No. 8) where Gericault, the painter, lived in 1808, and at No. 19, the home of Casabianca, member of the Convention where Buonaparte, at one time, lodged. At No. 3, Rue d’Antin, then a private mansion, Buonaparte married Joséphine (9 March, 1796). Though serving as a banker’s office, the room where the marriage took place is kept exactly as it then was. In a house in Rue Louis-le-Grand, opened in 1701, known in Revolution days as Rue des Piques, Sophie Arnould was born. Rue Daunou, where at No. 1 we see an ancient escutcheon, leads us into the Rue de la Paix, opened in 1806 on the site of the ancient convent of the Capucines and called at first Rue Napoléon. All its fine houses are modern, as are also those of Rue Volney and Rue des Capucines, on the even number side. In the latter street, formed in the year 1700, the Crédit Foncier is the old hôtel de Castanier, director of the East India Company (1726), and the hôtel Devieux of the same date. Nos. 11, 9, 7, 5 (fine vestiges at No. 5) were the stables of the duchesse d’Orléans in 1730.

CHAPTER VI
ROUND ABOUT THE ARTS ET MÉTIERS (THE ARTS AND CRAFTS INSTITUTION)

ARRONDISSEMENT III. (TEMPLE)

A LONG stretch of the busy boulevard Sébastopol forms the boundary between arrondissements II and III. Several short old streets run between the Boulevard and Rue St-Martin. Rue Apolline (eighteenth century), Rue Blondel, Rue Notre-Dame de Nazareth, where curiously enough is a Jewish synagogue, show us some ancient houses. The latter, in the fifteenth century a roadway, in the seventeenth century a street along the course of a big drain, memorizes the convent once there. We find vestiges of an ancient hôtel at No. 6, and close by old passages: Passage du Vertbois, Passage des Quatre-Voleurs, Passage du Pont-aux-Biches. In Rue Papin we find the théâtre de la Gaîté, first set up at the Fair St-Laurent in the seventeenth century, here since 1861, when it was known as théâtre du Prince Impérial. Crossing Rue Turbigo, we reach Rue Bourg l’Abbé, reminding us of a very ancient street of the name swept away by the boulevard Sébastopol, and Rue aux Ours, dating from 1300, originally Rue aux Oies, referring maybe to geese roasted for the table when this was a street of turnspits. On the odd number side some ancient houses still stand. Rue Quincampoix, beginning far down in the 4th arrondissement, runs to its end into Rue aux Ours. It is through its whole course a street of old-time associations. In this bit of it we find interesting old houses, arched doorways, sculptured doors, etc., at Nos. 111, 99, 98, 96, 92, 91, 90. At No. 91 the watchman’s bell rang to bid the crowds disperse that pressed tumultuously round the offices of the great financier Law, who first set up his bank at the hôtel de Beaufort, on the site of the house No. 65. The Salle Molière was at No. 82, through the Passage Molière, dating from Revolution days, when it was known as Passage des Nourrices. The Salle began as the théâtre des Sans-Culottes, to become later the théâtre École. There Rachel made her debut. Many traces of the old theatre are still seen.