THE CHAMP DE MARS AND PARIS EXHIBITIONS.
The Royal Military School of Louis XV.--The National Assembly--The
Patriotic Altar--The Festival of the Supreme Being--Other
Festivals--Industrial Exhibitions--The Eiffel Tower--The Trocadéro.
A whole chapter might be devoted to the café concerts, the swings,
the merry-go-rounds, and other entertainments of a constantly varying
kind, which are to be witnessed and, according to taste, enjoyed from
morning to night in the Champs Élysées. But against the frivolity of
these popular diversions may well be placed the great international
exhibitions of which the Champs Élysées have from time to time during
the last thirty-six years been the scene.
[Illustration: THE CHAMP DE MARS, 1889.]
With each of the exhibitions of 1867, 1878, and 1889 the Champ de Mars
has been connected; and its permanent association with these peaceful
celebrations is now marked by the famous Eiffel Tower, which stands in
the warlike field.
Although it lies on the south side of the river, the Champ de Mars is so
closely connected with the Champs Élysées that it may almost be regarded
as belonging thereto.
If the universal exhibitions of Paris were held in the Elysian Fields,
they have, on each of the last three occasions, had an annex in the
field of Mars. It is by the way of the Champs Élysées, moreover, that
the troops march when the army of Paris is exercised and inspected in
the great review-ground.
The Champ de Mars was originally a simple field of exercise for the
pupils of the Royal Military School. Established by Louis XV. in 1751
for five hundred sons of officers, this school came into existence
half a century before the Polytechnic School and the School of St.
Cyr, and formed, during the last years of the Monarchy, a great number
of excellent officers, the most celebrated of all being Napoleon
Bonaparte, who on the 22nd of October, 1784, entered the company of
gentlemen cadets. On the 1st of the following September, having come
out brilliantly in an examination, he was appointed second lieutenant
in the artillery regiment of La Fayette. He had then passed by only
fourteen days his sixteenth birthday. The School of Gentlemen Cadets,
the military cradle of the future Emperor, was not precisely the school
which Louis XV. had founded. His grandson had perceived that to admit,
as a matter of right, children from eight to thirteen years of age would
fill the military school with youths who had no fitness for the military
career. He solved the problem by establishing in various country towns
twelve colleges, where those qualified for admission could study up to
the age of fifteen, after which a selection was made with a view to the
Military School of Paris. One of these colleges was at Brienne, where
the young Napoleon studied before being passed for the Military School.
Until 1789 no one was admitted to the Military School but sons of
officers and noblemen. In the first year of the Revolution the
Constitutional Ministers of Louis XVI. procured a decree from the
Council which abolished the qualification of nobility. This was not so
great an innovation as it may appear, since Louis XV. had by a decree of
the year 1750 granted privileges of nobility to officers; the children,
therefore, of all officers were admissible to the Military School. The
institution was all the same of doubtful origin; and not knowing what
else to do with it the Convention abolished it in June, 1793, took
possession of its funds, and changed the building into a flour magazine
and a cavalry depôt.
Soon afterwards, with a mutability characteristic of the time, the
Revolutionary Government came to the conclusion that a Royal Military
School, however detestable as of royal origin, would become admirable if
the title of Republican were applied to it. It was accordingly decided
in June, 1794, that each district of the Republic should send to Paris
"six young citizens under the name of pupils of the School of Mars, aged
from sixteen to seventeen years, in order to receive a Revolutionary
education with all the knowledge, sentiments, and ideas of a Republican
soldier." The project was voted for on a report of Barère, who had
drawn a droll parallel between the students of the Royal Military
School (descended from "some feudal brigand, some privileged rogue,
some ridiculous marquis, some modern baron, or some court flunkey")
and what the students of the School of Mars would be--"the offspring
of Republican families, of parents of restricted means, or of useful
inhabitants of the country. What," Barère went on to say, "has ever come
out of the Military School? What has this brilliant college produced? No
able officer, not a general, not an administrator, not one celebrated
warrior."
It had produced, all the same, General Bonaparte, who was even then
preparing the plans of his Italian campaign. The very next year the
young cadet of the Royal Military School reentered the École Militaire
to establish his headquarters there as general commanding in chief the
army of Paris. When he became emperor he inscribed on the portico of the
school these words: "Napoleon's headquarters"; which only disappeared in
1815, when a regiment of the Imperial Guard was replaced in the building
by the Royal Guard.
Since it has ceased to be a school the so-called École Militaire has
been used as a cavalry and artillery barrack.
The Champ de Mars, in front of the École Militaire, has a very varied
history. Here in the ninth century the Normans were defeated by Eudes,
son of Robert the Strong, Count of Paris; who called the scene of his
exploit, not Champ de Mars, but more explicitly, Champ de la Victoire.
Then for many centuries the Field of Victory, or of Mars, seems to have
witnessed nothing in particular until, at last, under the reign of Louis
XV., it became the scene of a grand review in which the students of
the Royal Military School took part. While the review was going on a
young officer, nephew of Orry, controller of finance, who had suffered
from the persecution of the king's favourite, was brought before a
court-martial on an accusation of treason, suggested by the defeat of
the French army in Germany. He was about to be condemned, when the king
was informed by express, that not only was young Orry no traitor, but
that the whole army, compromised by a serious mistake on the part of
its commander, Marshal Maillebois, owed its safety to Orry's presence
of mind, and to a vigorous charge of cavalry directed by him. Louis XV.
gave the young man a new commission, thus marking the opening of the
Champ de Mars by an act of justice.
During the early days of the Revolution the Champ de Mars played an
important part; and through the course of the Revolution it was the
scene of all the most important national celebrations. Nor under the
Empire did it lose the character it had thus acquired. In July, 1790,
the year after the taking of the Bastille, the general federation of
the nation was celebrated; and a quarter of a century later, after
Napoleon's return from Elba, and immediately before the Waterloo
campaign, the emperor assembled in the Champ de Mars the authorities and
representative bodies of the country in order to swear fidelity to the
new Constitution which he had just promulgated, even as Louis XVI. had
sworn fidelity to the Constitution adopted by the National Assembly.
On the 5th of June all military and naval bodies, national or foreign,
were invited to send a number of delegates, according to the forces
represented, to an assembly which was to be held in the Champ de Mars
on the 14th of the month following. The details of the celebration were
regulated by special decree; and artists of all kinds were invited to
make suggestions towards the arrangement and decoration of the plain.
It was determined in the first instance to convert this plain into a
sort of basin or amphitheatre with sloping sides and a hollow in the
middle. Many thousands of labourers were employed in this work, and they
were ultimately joined by the whole population of Paris, just as two
years afterwards all classes and conditions of people took part in the
preparations for the festival of the Altar to the Country.
On the day appointed deputations arrived from all parts of France, the
visitors being hospitably entertained by private citizens, or received
by innkeepers at reduced charges. Special seats were reserved for them
at the meeting of the National Assembly; and they, in their turn, were
full of enthusiasm for the Assembly, for the people of Paris, but above
all for King Louis XVI. On the 13th, the day before the festival, the
king reviewed the troops, the deputations, and a good portion of the
Paris National Guard, on the Place Louis XV., and in the Champs Élysées.
At five o'clock in the morning the National Guard and the entire
population were on foot. Many had passed the night in the Champs
Élysées, and several regiments of National Guards had marched there at
midnight in order to be in good time for the approaching celebration.
The deputies from the provinces assembled at the Bastille, where
eighty-three white flags bearing the names of their respective
departments were distributed among them. At seven o'clock the march
began, headed by a body of cavalry belonging to the National Guard of
Paris, which was followed by a body of infantry, the electors of Paris,
the Paris Commune, and the National Assembly, preceded by a regiment of
children, and followed by a regiment of old men with the flags of the
sixty battalions of Paris around them. Then came the representatives of
the federated departments, preceded by two marshals of France with a
numerous staff, and followed by a number of officers of various corps,
including the King's Body Guard. The procession passed through the town
amid the acclamations of the people and to the sound of artillery,
approaching the Champ de Mars by way of the Champs Élysées, and crossing
the river by a bridge of boats constructed the night before just
opposite the village of Chaillot.
At the entrance to the Champ de Mars, now transformed into a vast
circus, had been raised a triumphal arch bearing a number of
inscriptions, among which may be cited the following:--
The rights of man were ignored for centuries; they have been
re-established for the whole of humanity.
You love that liberty which you now possess; prove your
gratitude by preserving it.
In the Champ de Mars 300,000 persons had assembled, men, women, and
children, on the slopes of the newly-made amphitheatre, all wearing the
national colours. The hillsides of Chaillot and of Passy were equally
filled; as further on were the amphitheatres of Meudon and St. Cloud,
of Mont Valérien and Montmartre. In front of the Military School were
ascending rows of seats, covered with blue and gold drapery, for the
king, the court, the National Assembly, the various constituted bodies
and the most distinguished guests. In the centre of the Champ de Mars,
on a raised piece of ground, was a monumental altar to the country with
four immense staircases on the four sides. This altar was itself two
years later made the object of a festival.
The king had for this day only been named Chief of the National Guards
of France. He appointed La Fayette to perform the duties of the post.
Pending the commencement of the ceremony, 1,200 musicians played various
pieces of music, including the national dances of Brittany, Auvergne,
and Provence. French music of this period was, with the notable
exceptions of the "Marseillaise" and of the "Chant du Départ," by no
means impressive in itself, though hymns that are sung by thousands of
voices can scarcely fail, from the volume of sound and the unanimity of
feeling, to produce a certain effect. Patriotic hymns were in any case
sung, and they excited general enthusiasm.
At half-past three a salvo of artillery announced the beginning of
the festival. The king was seated in his tribune, having on his
right the President of the National Assembly at the same level as
himself. La Fayette came forward to take the king's orders, and the
ceremony commenced with a solemn mass, celebrated, according to
general tradition, by Talleyrand, Bishop of Autun, afterwards to be
known under every kind of government in France, including the Empire,
the Restoration, and the Monarchy of Louis Philippe, as Talleyrand
the Minister. According, however, to credible accounts, it was not
Talleyrand, Bishop of Autun, but Montmorency, Grand Almoner of France,
who performed mass on this solemn occasion. The prelate was in any
case assisted by two hundred priests, who, wearing tricolour sashes,
surrounded the altar; then the oriflamme symbol of the federation was
blessed, together with the banners given to the deputations from the
provinces. Finally La Fayette ascended the staircase, radiant, but full
of emotion, and placing the point of his sword on the Altar of the
Country, pronounced in a loud firm voice this sacred oath: "We swear
to be for ever faithful to the nation, to the law, and to the king; to
maintain with all our power the Constitution decreed by the National
Assembly and accepted by the king; to protect the persons and property
of all, and to remain united to all Frenchmen by the indissoluble bonds
of fraternity."
[Illustration: THE MILITARY SCHOOL, CHAMP DE MARS.]
The general excitement seemed now to have reached its highest pitch. But
it was raised still higher when the king in his turn swore fidelity to
the Constitution. Many, however, complained at the time that he took the
oath, not from the altar, but from the tribune, where he was sitting;
and this was generally looked upon as of bad augury. From that time,
throughout the Revolution, the Champ de Mars was known as the Champ de
la Fédération, and the anniversary of the 14th of July was celebrated
until the time of the Consulate.
Some two years later the altar on which the Mass of the Federation
had been celebrated was itself to be made the object of a festival.
Enlarged and newly decorated, it became the Altar of Patriotism or
_autel à la patrie_, and once more the whole population took part in
the preparations, when, to judge by a letter on the subject left by
an actress of the Théâtre Français, the work of the day was varied by
a certain amount of pleasantry. "Every gentleman," says the actress,
"chose a lady to whom he offered a very light spade decorated with
ribands; then, headed by a band, the lovers of liberty hastened to the
general rendezvous."
In the centre of the Champ de Mars was at last constructed a colossal
altar, at which the deputies from the National Guards of France and from
the various army corps assembled, and swore allegiance to the Republic.
Patriotic altars or _autels à la patrie_ had already been raised in
various parts of France, when, by a decree of July, 1792, it was ordered
that in every commune a patriotic altar should be erected, to which
children should be brought, where young people should get married, and
on which should be registered births, marriages, and deaths. Above all
it was thought necessary that round the altars solemn deliberations
should be held concerning the fate of the country, which was threatened
by the whole continent of Europe.
[Illustration: GENERAL LA FAYETTE.]
After the flight of the king a petition was laid on the patriotic altar
of the Champ de Mars demanding the monarch's formal dethronement. At the
Jacobin Club the question of the fall of the monarchy had been boldly
put forward; and after a long debate the petition just referred to was
drawn up and forwarded for general acceptation to the patriotic altar of
the Champ de Mars. The document set forth that the nation would no more
acknowledge Louis XVI. or any other king. That very evening, however,
the Jacobins were themselves alarmed by the revolutionary turn of
affairs, and withdrew their petition, declaring it to be illegal in form.
General La Fayette, at the head of the army and the National Guards,
was meanwhile determined under all circumstances to keep order, and
it soon became necessary for his troops to act. Two wretched men had
concealed themselves beneath the staircase of the patriotic altar; and
some insults said to have been addressed by them to women ascending
the stairs led to their being attacked--trivial origin of a sanguinary
massacre--by a number of washerwomen from the neighbourhood. The
practical jokers in hiding beneath the staircase had with them a barrel
of water, which popular indignation converted into a barrel of gunpowder
intended to blow up the altar, together with the faithful assembled on
its steps. The patriotic altar was at that time an object of religious
veneration, and the conduct of the two men beneath the staircase was
looked upon as nothing less than sacrilegious. Some fanatics fell upon
them and put them to death; and the incident, commented upon from
the most different points of view, was in the end represented as an
onslaught by reactionists on the sworn friends of liberty.
Meanwhile the crowd in the Champ de Mars was constantly increasing;
and soon it was summoned by beat of drum, and with all the usual
formalities, to disperse. Nothing came of this demand except a shower
of stones hurled at the National Guard. The regular troops, composed
principally of Royal Guards, replied by firing wildly at all around
them. The patriotic altar was soon covered with blood and surrounded by
corpses.
The crowd fled as rapidly as its numbers would permit, but it was now
charged by cavalry, and afterwards fired into by artillery. To stop the
carnage La Fayette rode up to the guns, himself exposed to their shots.
The number of persons killed has, of course, been differently--very
differently--estimated; but according to a moderate computation, at
least 1,500 persons were slain.
General La Fayette, and Bailly, Mayor of Paris, had given a general
order to repel force by force, and the responsibility of the massacre
was accepted by Bailly. It was for this reason, indeed, that in
November, 1793, he was sentenced to death, his execution taking place on
the very scene of the massacre.
When armies were being hastily formed for repelling the invasion of the
German sovereigns the recruiting office was in the Champ de Mars, where
amphitheatres were erected with flags bearing this inscription, "Our
country is in danger." On a table, supported by two drums, the officers
of the Municipality inscribed the names of those who wished to enlist,
and the enthusiasm, now wide-spreading, gave to France fourteen armies,
which, untrained as bodies, (though they contained numbers of trained
men disbanded from the royal army) proved themselves valiant, and indeed
invincible, in the field.
The next great festival which was held in the Champ de Mars was that
of the Supreme Being. All that was done during the Revolution against
religion was aimed particularly at the clergy and the monks, the
Inquisition and the stake. The celebration of the Festival of the
Supreme Being had been fixed, according to the Revolutionary calendar,
for the 20th Prairial, and the famous painter David had been charged
with the elaboration of the programme. The day which Robespierre had
chosen for the celebration coincided precisely this year with one of the
great Catholic festivals--that of Whitsuntide.
Robespierre had been elected President of the Assembly. At eight
o'clock in the morning the beginning of the Festival was announced by
a discharge of artillery from the Tuileries. Flowers had been brought
to Paris from thirty miles round, and every house in the City had its
garland, while all the women carried bouquets and all the men branches
of oak. A vast amphitheatre constructed in the National Garden (the
garden of the Tuileries, that is to say) held the members of the
Convention, each of whom carried in his hand a bouquet of flowers and of
ears of corn.
Robespierre, detained by his duties at the Revolutionary Tribunal,
arrived late, at which there was some amusement. Dressed in the blue
coat worn by the representatives of the people, and holding in his hand
a bouquet of flowers and wheat, he exclaimed: "O Nature, how delightful,
how sublime is thy power! How tyrants must tremble and grow pale at the
idea of such a Festival!"
After the founder of the new religion had, in accordance with the
programme, delivered his discourse, whence a few words have been cited,
he walked down from the amphitheatre in company with his fellow-members
of the Convention. At the entrance to the Palace had been erected a
pyramid consisting of dolls representing atheism, ambition, egotism,
and false simplicity; then came the rags of misery, through which
could be seen the decorations and splendour of the slaves of Royalty.
Robespierre went forward with a torch and set fire to these impostures.
When wretchedness and vice had been consumed, the statue of Wisdom was
discovered unfortunately a little scorched by the flames in which its
opposites had perished.
The whole procession next moved towards the Champ de la Réunion, as
the Champ de Mars was now called. The Convention marched in a body
surrounded by a tricolour ribbon, which was carried by children, young
men, middle-aged men, and old men, all crowned with oak and myrtle. No
arms were worn, but every deputy exhibited in token of his mission a
tricolour sash, and carried a feather in his hat. In the centre of the
procession eight oxen with gilded horns drew an antique car bearing, as
tributes, instruments of art. When the Convention established itself on
a symbolical mountain, it was surrounded by the fathers and mothers sent
officially by the sections; also by their young daughters, crowned with
roses, and older children adorned with violets. Everyone, moreover, in
the procession wore national colours.
Then there was a fresh discourse from Robespierre, after which hymns by
Chénier and Désorgues, with music by Gaveaux, were sung. The music of
the hymns, from one or two specimens preserved, seems to have been poor,
but given forth by thousands of voices it was doubtless impressive.
After an invocation to the Eternal, the young girls strewed their
flowers on the ground, mothers raised their children in their arms, and
old men stretched out their hands to bless the young ones, who swore to
die for their country and their liberty. Revolutionary in its origin,
the Festival of the Supreme Being, celebrated throughout France, helped
everywhere to raise the Catholic party; which was not precisely what its
founders had aimed at.
Another solemn festival was held in the Champ de Mars, to celebrate
the capture of Toulon from the English, as brought about by a young
artillery officer named Bonaparte, whose name was being repeated from
mouth to mouth by admirers as yet unable to foresee that the object of
their admiration would before many years be the ruler of France; for,
"born of the Republic," he was, in the energetic words of Chateaubriand,
"to kill his own mother."
On the 3rd of December, 1804, the day after the coronation of the
Emperor at Notre-Dame, the Champ de Mars was to be the scene of yet
another festival--the distribution of eagles among the different
regiments of the French Army.
It was in the Champ de Mars that Napoleon, after his return from
Elba, gave a banquet to some 15,000 soldiers and National Guards; and
again in the Champ de Mars that he assembled deputations from all the
army-corps and all the State bodies convoked to hear the promulgation
of the "additional Act" which gave new character to the old Napoleonic
Constitution. This was the assembly known as that of the Champ de Mai,
so called from the month in which it was held.
Under the Restoration the Champ de Mars became the scene of a military
representation in which the Duke of Angoulême, at the head of the army
which had fought, or rather had executed a military promenade, in Spain,
attacked some battalions playing the part of the Spanish army, which at
the proper moment retreated. Then the high ground since known as the
Trocadéro was stormed, as the Trocadéro of Spain had been stormed in
the war just terminated; and it was now that the idea was conceived of
treating the Arc de Triomphe as a triumphal arch erected to the glory of
the army of Louis XVIII.
Under the reign of Louis Philippe, the military representation of
which under Louis XVIII.'s reign the Trocadéro had been made the scene
was repeated, with the replacement of the Trocadéro by Antwerp. This
display, on a very grand scale, was attended with a crush, a panic, and
almost as many accidents as were caused by the celebrated fireworks on
the Place Louis XV., on the occasion of Marie Antoinette's marriage.
It was under the Restoration that the Champ de Mars was used as a course
for the first races, or at least the first races of a popular character,
established in France. They were, after some years, as already
mentioned, transferred to Longchamps. Under the Second Empire, or rather
when the Second Empire was about to be proclaimed, the Champ de Mars
witnessed a magnificent review and distribution of eagles--the prelude,
in fact, to the establishment of the imperial form of government. "Take
back these eagles," said the prince president on this occasion, "not as
a symbol of threats against the foreigner, but as a recollection of an
heroic epoch, as a sign of nobility for each regiment in the service.
Take back these eagles which so often led your fathers to victory, and
swear, if necessary, to die in their defence." This was the last of the
many political scenes of which the Champ de Mars has been the theatre.
In 1867 it furnished a site for the annex or supplementary building
where, in connection with the Universal Exhibition of that year, the
machinery was displayed.
If the Champs Élysées became during the first half of the century a
portion of Paris, this was also to happen during the second half to the
more distant Bois de Boulogne; and as Paris is still constantly growing
the time may come when Sèvres and Saint-Cloud, whither the Bois de
Boulogne leads, will no longer be regarded as suburbs, but as integral
parts of the French metropolis, from which they are now distant
(counting from the Place de la Concorde) some six miles.
* * * * *
No account, whether of the Champs Élysées or of the Champ de Mars, would
be complete without some mention of the Universal Exhibitions of which
the Elysian Fields and the Field of Mars have both been the scene. The
first Universal Exhibition was held in England during the summer of
1851, but the first Industrial Exhibition on a large scale, without
assistance or competition from the foreigner, took place in France
immediately after the Revolution, of which it was one of the natural
consequences.
[Illustration: THE PALAIS DE L'INDUSTRIE, CHAMPS ÉLYSÉES.]
Before 1789 the industrial system of France, as of other countries,
was made up of corporations and guilds rigidly bound by rules and
traditions; and many industrial processes were so many secrets into
which apprentices, duly articled, were initiated, but which were
jealously guarded from the knowledge of the outer world. A general
exhibition of arts, manufactures, and machinery would, under the ancient
_régime_, have been in direct opposition to the spirit of the time; it
would have been impossible, that is to say.
When, however, guilds and corporations were broken up and labour was
throughout the country rendered free, the desirability soon became
apparent of familiarising workmen with the best methods of work; and
manufacturers of all kinds were brought together and invited to send
specimens of their handicraft to a great Exhibition, of which Paris
was to be the scene. The idea was conceived under the Directory, six
years after the Revolution; and with a rapidity characteristic of the
period it was at once carried out. Of some hundred exhibitors, nearly
all belonged to Paris. But at a second exhibition held three years
afterwards, thirty-eight departments, including some of the most distant
ones, sent examples of their industry. These exhibitions were to be
triennial; though their recurrence at fixed intervals was sometimes
interfered with by political or military events.
The Industrial Exhibitions of France, however, increased in
importance until, under the reign of Louis Philippe, they took a
prodigious development. After the Revolution of 1848 workmen as well
as manufacturers were for the first time encouraged to exhibit, and
many of them gained prizes. Now, too, an exhibition was held at which
agriculture as well as industry was represented, and among the products
and manufactures were a good number sent from the newly-acquired
Algeria. Then came the English Universal Exhibition of 1851, held
in Hyde Park; adorned for the occasion with a building of new
architecture, to which Douglas Jerrold, writing in _Punch_, gave the
name of "Crystal Palace."
In 1855 France, not to be outshone by England, opened in her turn a
Universal Exhibition in the Champs Élysées, imitated in part from the
glass structure designed by Sir Joseph Paxton, but less fairylike
though, it may be, more substantial. Sixty years have passed since the
opening of France's first Industrial Exhibition; held at a time when,
before the introduction of steamboats and railways, it would have
been difficult, even if it had been thought desirable, for foreign
manufacturers to compete with the manufacturers of France. The French
Exhibition was held at the very height of the Crimean war; a sad reply
to those who in the Universal Exhibition of 1851 saw a promise, if not a
guarantee, of perpetual peace. Once more in 1867 the illusory nature of
the belief that international commerce must put an end to international
war was at least indicated by the important part played in the midst of
the steel manufactures by Herr Krupp's breech-loading cannons, which
were seen to do such dreadful work in the campaign of 1870. Even while
the Exhibition was being held the Luxemburg difficulty seemed on the
point of bringing France and Prussia into the field.
The building erected for the first of France's International Exhibitions
having been found too small, the second and third, in 1867 and 1878,
took new territory in the Champ de Mars; and in addition to the
principal building a number of so-called annexes or supplementary
buildings were established, chiefly for the display of machinery; while,
besides the Champ de Mars, the fourth, held in 1889, took in the Avenue
Suffren, the Quai d'Orsay, the terrace of the Invalides, the banks of
the Seine, and the Garden of the Trocadéro.
[Illustration: VIEW SHOWING EXHIBITION OF 1889.]
The Champ de Mars in its old character had now entirely disappeared.
The Minister of War had strongly objected to its utilisation for peace
purposes when it was first proposed that a temporary building for
machinery in connection with the Exhibition of 1867 should be erected
on a plain which had hitherto been reserved for military exercises and
manoeuvres. Once invaded, the Champ de Mars was soon to be fully
occupied, and the last and greatest of the Paris Universal Exhibitions
swallowed up the Champ de Mars without even finding its vast space
sufficient. The desert of former days had become the most frequented
place in the world. More than that, it was now a spot where the whole
world was represented--Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Australasia,
with their different human types, their animals, their plants, their
minerals, their natural products, their industries, their sciences, and
their fine arts. An immense number of buildings in every form, in every
style, and of every period had been erected. Domes, steeples, towers,
cupolas, minarets, and factory chimneys stood out against the clear sky
of Paris; and in the midst of this confused architecture were seen the
large green masses of the winter gardens.
The whole, beheld from afar in a bird's-eye view, formed an enormous
ellipsis, with the marvellous Eiffel Tower in the centre. M. Eiffel,
a French engineer, whose name would seem to denote a German origin,
proposed the tower with which his name is now for ever associated
five years before the date fixed for the Universal Exhibition. He was
already known by some important works, such as the great iron bridge at
Bordeaux, and several other bridges in the south of France; also by the
Douro Viaduct, and by the bridge over the Szegedin Road, in Hungary. He
had been employed in connection with the Universal Exhibition of 1867,
where he had charge of the machinery annex.
The Americans had proposed to commemorate the Philadelphia Exhibition of
1875 by a tower one thousand feet in height, equal to about 305 French
metres. But they abandoned the project, which was to be realised by M.
Eiffel, whose tower is within five metres of the height contemplated
by the architects and engineers of Philadelphia. The calculations for
the Eiffel Tower, formed entirely of iron trellis work, had been so
carefully made that when the component parts, prepared separately,
were brought to the workshops of the Champ de Mars to be verified and
adjusted, they fitted to the greatest perfection. To give an idea of the
dimensions of the Eiffel Tower it may be mentioned that the towers of
Notre-Dame rise to a height of sixty-six metres above the level of the
soil, while the Cathedral of Cologne, the loftiest in the world, does
not exceed 159 metres. To go back to the remotest antiquity, the Eiffel
Tower is half as high again as the notorious Tower of Babel, of which
the altitude was 625 feet, otherwise 208 metres and a few centimetres.
At its base the tower measures, on each of its four sides, 100 metres,
and it slopes up to a platform at the summit which measures, on each
side, ten metres.
The first platform, with immense rooms for different purposes, is
sixty-six metres above the level of the soil; just eight metres less
than the towers of Notre-Dame, and it presents a surface of 5,000 square
metres. It may be reached either by a staircase of 350 steps, or by a
lift. The second platform stands 115 metres above the level of the soil,
and measures thirty metres on each side, the area of the floor being
1,400 square metres. Here the Paris _Figaro_ established a printing
office, whence issued the special edition of the _Eiffel Figaro_, in
which were printed the names of all the visitors. The third platform,
276 metres in height, can only be reached by lift. It is surmounted by
a campanile, or bell tower, in the Italian style, twenty-four metres in
height, which is divided into apartments for scientific experiments,
and which includes M. Eiffel's reception rooms. At the very top of
the structure is a light, of the power employed in the great French
lighthouses. The view from the Eiffel Tower becomes naturally more and
more vast as one ascends; and M. Eiffel has had maps drawn showing the
points visible from the third, or highest platform, to the ordinary
sight. This map is exhibited on the third platform.
On the north may be distinguished two villages in the department of the
Somme, seventy kilometres from Paris (four kilometres = two-and-a-half
miles); on the north-east the forest of Hallatte, at the back of
Cenlis, distant seventy-five kilometres; on the east two hills in the
direction of Château Thierry, eighty-two kilometres; on the south-east
the environs of La Ferté-Bernard, in the department of the Marne,
eighty-two kilometres; on the south, the other side of Étampes,
sixty-two kilometres; on the south-west the Cathedral of Chartres and
a hill at the back, eighty-three kilometres; on the west the Château
of Versailles, the chapel of Dreux, and the environs of Dourdan, at a
distance of fifty kilometres; and finally on the north-west the forest
of Lyons, ninety kilometres.
Telescopic distances have not been published. It can be seen, however,
that this loftiest of observatories would be of immense use to Paris in
case of her being again approached by invading armies.
The Eiffel Tower was one of the greatest attractions of the Exhibition
of 1889; and it remains a lasting memorial of that greatest of great
exhibitions, which, on certain Sundays and holidays, attracted as many
as 400,000 visitors. It has been calculated that it received altogether
twenty-five million visitors--or, what is not quite the same thing,
twenty-five million visits--which gives an average of 139,000 daily.
Apart from the rich and varied interest belonging to the manufactures,
the works of art, the products of all kinds, natural and artificial,
that were on view, the Exhibition possessed a high significance in a
political sense. It showed to Europe and to the world that France had
more than recovered from the calamities of the war, and that she was
once more in the very foremost rank of civilised powers. As in all
exhibitions, the scientific departments attracted less attention, and
were less frequented than the restaurants and the refreshment rooms;
though here, also, there were opportunities for study, especially for
those interested in ethnology.
Universal exhibitions have been compared to small towns, but they bear a
greater resemblance to small worlds; and this was particularly the case
with the Paris Exhibition of 1889, which was a microcosm on rather a
large scale. There was no part of the world unrepresented in its varied
departments, especially in the departments consecrated to eating and
drinking, where national dishes and beverages were served by attendants
in national costume. Here, side by side with an Algerian or Turkish
coffee-house, where Mocha of guaranteed authenticity was provided,
with narghilis, chiboucks, and Oriental cigarettes as appropriate
accompaniments, stood a Dutch tavern purveying genuine curaçoa, or a
Bavarian beerhouse. Vienna was in evidence by its so-called "cutlets"
of chopped meat, and Austria generally, together with Hungary, by
rare and characteristic wines. The Spanish Café was as remarkable
for the black mantillas, with eyes to match, of the waitresses, as
for its Malaga and its Xeres. The Danish Café was distinguished by
its kümmel, and the Swedish Café by its punch, made in the Swedish
style, and handed to the customer (also in the Swedish fashion) by
fair-haired, fresh-complexioned Swedish maidens. The Russian traktir,
taken in connection with specimens of Russian village huts, formed a
compendium of Russian popular life, in a country where the popular and
the aristocratic, often strangely opposed, are sometimes strangely
intermingled. The wooden _isbas_, with their high roofs, curiously
surmounted by semblances of horses' heads, which have not only a
picturesque, but a mystical significance--true examples of Russian
rural architecture--showed such artistic carving above the portico,
and at other points, that many a dull cynic declined to regard them as
authentic, and held them to be mere fabrications, intended to astonish
and delude the foreigner, even as Catherine II. is supposed to have been
deluded by the village panoramas got up for her benefit in desert tracts
by the ingenious Potemkin.
In England and other countries which are supposed to have attained
the highest point of civilisation, the humbler classes know nothing
of art work in connection with their daily life. But the Russian
peasant, poor and uneducated, tasting meat once, perhaps, in a
month, and living principally on black bread, salt cucumbers, dried
mushrooms, and porridge, wears a costume full of colour, a red shirt,
or a blue kaftan with a scarlet sash; and he adorns in his own rough
but picturesque fashion the house he lives in, and every article of
its modest furniture. The Russian peasant, like the peasant in other
countries, makes none too frequent a use of the towel; but every towel
that he possesses is ornamented with an embroidered fringe, worked by
women who have never studied in any sort of art school, but who have
acquired certain arts by tradition, and possibly through inherited
aptitude. The Russian peasantry are still, for the most part, ignorant
of reading and writing. But when the whole population of the Russian
Empire is sent to school its native artistic faculties will, it is to be
feared, disappear. At present the brain of the poor moujik must somehow
occupy itself during his periods of leisure; and it works for the most
part--and exclusively when he happens to be quite unlettered--through
eye and hand.
At the Russian restaurant, or traktir, such national delicacies as
caviar, dried salmon, pickled cucumbers, salt mushrooms, the ordinary
components of the Russian zakouska or præprandium, were tasted by the
visitor to the great Exhibition with less avidity than curiosity. These
excellent comestibles (only one has got to know them first) were, if the
Russian mode was followed, washed down with a glass of _vodka_; not, it
must be admitted, the ordinary _vodka_ of the Russian rural districts,
but _vodka_ of a more refined description, as swallowed (at least by
the men) at the simple preparatory lunches given immediately before
dinner at the houses of the great.
[Illustration: VIEW FROM THE FIRST PLATFORM OF THE EIFFEL TOWER.]
Those were wrong who, at the Russian restaurants of the Exhibition,
confined themselves to making the acquaintance of the strange
preparations offered at every well-ordered zakouska; for Russia has a
cuisine of her own well worthy of practical study--a cuisine which, like
Russian civilisation, consists partly of what is truly Russian, but
largely of what has been adapted or simply borrowed from various foreign
nations. The _stchee_, or cabbage soup, the _borsch_, or beetroot soup,
the _oukha_, or fish soup, and the _batvinia_, or iced soup of Russia,
are thoroughly national, and, except that the Poles have also an iced
soup called _cholodiec_, are not to be found in any other country. The
Russians have many solid dishes, too (such as boiled sucking-pig with
horse-radish sauce) which are quite peculiar to Russia; but, on the
other hand, they have adopted all kinds of entrées from the French,
together with various dishes of German and of Viennese origin; while
they have likewise, in the art of cookery, taken lessons from their
eastern neighbours.
Roumania, Servia, and what remains of Turkey were represented by dishes,
drinks, and graceful female figures, all intensely national. Even such
unpicturesque countries as England and America had their characteristic
refreshment places. The English bars, served by much admired English
barmaids, practised in the wiles and stratagems of casual flirtation,
had many frequenters; while the American bars, typical of a country
where women and liquor are becomingly kept apart, attracted amateurs
of all classes and from all countries. Nor must Italy be forgotten; the
land which gave to France not only its music and its drama, but also
its ices and its pastry. It is believed that in some of the cafés whose
appearance was most strikingly foreign, France was secretly represented;
for numbers of young women attired in garments of Oriental make, while
perfectly ignorant of Eastern languages, talked fluently, and often very
agreeably, in French.
[Illustration: THE TROCADÉRO.]
"Trocadéro" is the name of one of the forts which the army of the Duke
of Angoulême, operating in Spain, found it necessary to take before
advancing upon Cadiz. The stronghold in question was constructed on
an island of the same name, which, apart from walls, bastions, and
batteries, was defended against assailants by a broad canal, in which,
even at low tide, the water was four feet deep. The French approached
the Trocadéro by regular siege works, and, after completing their second
parallel, prepared to take the place by assault. The attack was made on
the 15th of August, 1823, at three o'clock in the morning, just before
daybreak, that is to say, when the Spanish garrison, trusting overmuch
to the supposed efficiency of the water defences, were by no means on
the alert. The French troops passed the water without firing a shot,
scaled the walls, turned the guns and wall-pieces against the Spaniards,
and, acting with great rapidity, were soon in possession of the fort.