All through the Bois one is struck with the characteristic French passion for vistas. There is none of the natural wildness of Central Park, or the uninterrupted sweep of green fields that gives the charm of air and openness to the parks of London; but—though here in Paris we are in a “wood”—everywhere there is the elaborate simplicity of French landscape gardening: trees cut into tall Gothic arches, or bent into round, tunnel-like curves; brush trimmed precisely into formal box hedges; paths leading into avenues, that in turn lead into other avenues—so that before, behind, and on every side there is that prolonged silver-grey perspective. One sees the same thing at Versailles and St. Cloud: in every French forest, for that matter. The artist cannot stay her hand, even for the hand of nature.
And so, in the Bois, rocks have been built into grottos, and trickling waterfalls trained to form cascades above them; and little lakes and islands have been inserted—everything, anything, that the artistic imagination could conceive, to enhance the sylvan scene for the critical actors who frequent it. Which reminds us that these last will be on view now—it is eleven o’clock, their hour for riding and the promenade. So let us leave Les Rochers, and the greedy goats of the Pré Catalan, and hasten back to the Avenue des Acaçias and the famous Sentier de Vertu.
Here, a chic procession of élégantes and their admirers are strolling along, laughing and chatting as they come upon acquaintances, forming animated little groups, only to break up and wander on to join others. Cavaliers in smart English coats, or the dashing St. Cyr uniform, canter by; calling gay greeting to friends, for whose benefit they display an elaborately careless bit of clever horsemenship en passant. Ladies and “half-ladies” in habits of startling yet somehow alluring cut and hue—heliotrope and brick pink are among the favourites—allow their mounts to saunter lazily along the allées, while their own modestly veiled eyes spy out prey. They are viewed with severity by the bonne bourgeoise of the tortoise-shell lorgnettes and heavy moustache; who keeps her limousine within impressive calling distance, while she, with her fat poodle under her arm, waddles along ogling the beaux.
A doughty regiment of these there are: young men with marvellous waists and eager, searching eyes; middle-aged men with figures “well preserved,” and eyes that make a desperate effort at eagerness, but only succeed in looking tired; and then the old gallants, waxed and varnished, and gorgeously immaculate, from sandy toupée to gleaming pointed shoes—the three hours they have spent with the barber and in the scrupulous hands of their valet have not been in vain. They do the honours of the Sentier, with a courtliness that brings back Louis Quatorze and the days of Ninon and the lovely Montespan.
But there are as lovely—and perhaps as naughty?—ladies among these who saunter leisurely down the grey-green paths today. In wonderfully simple, wonderfully complicated toilettes de matin, they stroll along in pairs—or again (with an oblique glance over the shoulder, oh a quite indifferent glance), carelessly alone with two or three little dogs. I read last week in one of the French illustrated papers a serious treatise on ladies’ dogs. It was divided into the three categories: “Dogs for morning,” “Dogs for afternoon,” “Dogs of ceremony”—meaning full-dress dogs. And the article gravely discussed the correct canine accessory that should be worn with each separate costume of the élégante’s elaborate day. It omitted to add, however, the incidental value of these costly scraps of fuzz, as chaperones. But with a couple of dogs, as one pretty lady softly assured me, one can go anywhere, feeling quite secure; and one’s husband, too—for of course he realizes that the sweet little beasts must be exercised!
So the conscientious ladies regularly “exercise” them; and if sometimes, in their exuberance, Toto and Mimi escape their distressed young mistresses, and must be brought back by a friend who “chanced” to be near at hand—who can cavil? And if the kind restorer walks a little way with the trio he has reunited, or sits with them for a few moments under the trees, why not? They are always three—Toto and Mimi and the lady—and one’s friends who may happen to pass know for themselves how hard dogs are to keep in hand!
So we have a series of gay, well-dressed couples wandering down the intimate allées, or scattered in the white iron chairs within the trees: a very different series from those who will be here at eleven o’clock tonight—and every night. The Bois is far too large to be policed, and the grotesque shapes that haunt it after dark—crouching, low-browed figures that slink along in the shadows, greedy for any sort of prey—make one shudder, even from the security of a closed cab. All about are the brilliant, bright-lit restaurants with their crowds of feasting sybarites; yet at the very door of these—waiting to fall upon them if they take six steps beyond the threshold—is that grisly, desperate band, some say of Apaches, others say monsters worse than those.
At all events, it is better in the evening to turn one’s eyes away from the shadowy paths, and towards the amusing tableaux to be seen in passing fiacres and taxis. To the more reserved Anglo-Saxon, French frankness of demonstration in affairs of the affections comes always as a bit of a shock. To see a lady reclining against the arm of a gentleman, as the two spin along the boulevard in an open horse-cab; to watch them, quite oblivious of the world looking on, ardently turn and kiss one another: this is a disturbing and meanly provocative scene to put before the susceptible American. No one else pays any attention to it—they have acted that scene so many times themselves; and when, in the friendly darkness of the Bois at night, all lingering discretion is thrown to the winds, and behind the cabby’s broad, habituated back anything and everything in the way of fervid love-making goes on—who cares? Except to smile sympathetically, and return to his own affair, more ardently than ever. The silhouettes one sees against taxi-windows and the dust-coloured cushions of fiacres are utterly demoralizing to respectable American virtue.
Let us turn on the light of day, therefore, and in a spasm of prudence mount a penny-bus that traffics between the Étoile and the Latin Quarter. It is a flagrant faux-pas to arrive in the Latin Quarter by way of anything more sumptuous than a penny-bus or a twopenny tram. It shrieks it from the cobbles, that one is a “nouveau”; and that, in the Quarter, is a disgrace too horrible to be endured.
We rock across the Pont Royal, then, on the precarious upper story of an omnibus; and wind along the narrow Rue du Bac, which, since our visit of early morning, has waked to fitful life in its old plaster and print shops. Second-hand dealers of all kinds flourish here, and the medley of ancient books, musty reliquaries, antique jewelry, and battered images minus such trifles as a nose or ear, makes the street into one continuous curiosity-shop. Until one reaches the varnish and modern bustle of the Bon Marché stores; then, when we have been shot through the weather-beaten slit of the Rue des Saints Pères, I insist that we shall climb down and go on foot up quaint, irregular Notre-Dame-des-Champs to the garden where I spent many joyous days as a student.