Paris, August 18.
The boulevards of Paris are one of the wonders of the world. Strictly speaking there are a number of broad avenues which are called boulevards, but usually “the boulevards” is a phrase which means the one long wide boulevard extending for several miles, from near the Place de la Concorde to the Place de la Bastille, built in a semi-circle on the north of the old city and on the fortifications which defended the city in the Middle Ages. Of course later walls and fortifications were built farther out, and the “grand boulevards” are through the heart of the present Paris. The boulevard—for it is one continuous highway—changes its name every few blocks, a fact that is characteristically French and somewhat confusing to the stranger. The beginning is a short distance from the Place de la Concorde at the church of the Madeleine, the fashionable church of Paris. The building is in the style of a Roman temple, and has an imposing colonnade of Corinthian columns. The interior decorations are very good, and include a large fresco above the altar in which Christ, Napoleon and Pope Pius the Seventh are classified more or less together. The boulevard is called The Madeleine for about 200 yards, when the name changes to the Capucines and sticks for a couple of blocks until the grand opera house is reached. Along this short stretch are some of the wildest music halls and the greatest cafés of the world. The greatest is the Café de la Paix, where everybody who visits Paris goes for at least one drink of ginger ale or cold coffee.
The Opera is the largest theatre in the world, covering about three acres. The site alone cost $2,000,000 and the building over $7,000,000. The materials are marble and costly stone, and there are statues of Poetry, Music, Drama, Dance, with other figures, medallions and allegorical statuary until your head swims. The front of the roof is sculptured with gilded masks and with collossal groups representing Music and Poetry attended by the Muses and Goddesses of Fame. Apollo with a golden lyre and two Pegasuses occupy the dome. The interior has a grand staircase of marble with a rail of onyx, and the rest of the interior is be-columned and be-frescoed to match. It is the most beautiful building in Paris, and could hardly be surpassed if the attempt were made regardless of expense. I would not try a detailed description, for it would not convey the real effect, best described by the word gorgeous.
From the Opera a street runs southerly called the Avenue de l’Opera, the great shopping street of Paris, and at another angle goes the Street de la Paix, where the most expensive jewelry stores and millinery establishments are located. The name of this street is properly pronounced de la Pay.
But the Boulevard continues, no longer the Capucines, but the Italiens. Some years ago this was the great shopping-place, and it is not bad now. As the ladies promenade past the Opera and into the Italiens, the skirts unconsciously go a little higher. The boulevard proceeds, the next section being called the Montmartre. This part interested me a great deal. On the rue Montmartre, a side street to the right, is the Y. M. C. A., and on Mt. Montmartre, a little to the left, is the Moulin Rouge.
The Y. M. C. A. in Paris is one of the best things in the city, but it does not get much newspaper notoriety. It is an English-speaking organization, with convenient quarters, parlor, reception, billiard, smoking-and dining-rooms. It is one place in Paris where there is no café or bar, and it is a great help to young men from America who are in this city by reason of their business or to study or to visit the historic places. A great many use the Y. M. C. A. facilities, and a membership card from Hutchinson or any other association in the world is good for these privileges in the heart of Paris. I would recommend to every American that when he goes to Paris he make his headquarters at the Y. M. C. A., but I am not going to count on many of them doing it. The Paris atmosphere has the same effect on a Y. M. C. A. that a nice, warm August sun has on a cake of ice left on the sidewalk in Hutchinson. I am not telling what I would like to, but I setting down the facts as they appear to me. The man who goes to Paris and sticks to the Y. M. C. A. as his loafing-place should have his halo ordered at once. He has a cinch.
In the other direction, on Mt. Montmartre, is the Moulin Rouge. I do not recommend it to nervous men, but it is one of the sights of this city. When I was a boy I read somewhere about a “gilded palace of sin,” and now I know what that means. The cowboys out west used to have what they called “free-and-easies,” but the Moulin Rouge is not free. I shut my eyes as the dancers loped by until a friend said the next dance would be a quadrille. I once danced quadrilles myself, and I thought there would be a breathing-place. The young people arranged themselves as if they were going to dance a Virginia Reel, and I could feel consciousness returning. The music struck up and the quadrille began. At first it went as smooth as if it were at the Country Club. Then each young lady passed the toe of her right foot over the head of her partner. Then she turned and pointed the toe of her left foot at the chandelier which hung from the ceiling. And then came the most wonderful display of things that are put in the store windows at home and marked “white goods sale,” or “lingerie.”
THE PLAIN QUADRILLE AT THE MOULIN ROUGE
It was dreadfully embarrassing to me, as it must have been to any other Kansas man present, but I braced myself, for I knew the worst was yet to come. I felt like getting right up on my chair and saying, “Ladies, there are gentlemen present.” But I didn’t, and I have been glad ever since, for they might not have understood English and thought I wanted a partner for the next quadrille.