Paris!

Paris is a big city full of red-legged soldiers.

Paris is a forest of pink and white chestnut blossoms under which the inhabitants sit without their hats.

Paris is a collection of vistas; at the end of every vista is a misty masterpiece of architecture; on the summit of every monument is a masterpiece of sculpture.

Paris is a city of several millions of inhabitants, every inhabitant holding both hands out to you for a tip.

Paris is a park, smothered in foliage, under which asphalted streets lead to Paradise.

Paris is a sanitarium so skillfully conducted that nobody can tell the patients from the physicians; and all the inmates are firmly convinced that the outside world is mad.

I looked back at the gilded mass of the Opera—that great pile of stone set lightly there as the toe of a ballet-girl's satin slipper——

"What are you thinking, papa?" asked Alida.