THE PEOPLE--CLIMATE--PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS--HOTEL DES INVALIDES.
THE PEOPLE.
The French people, so far as one may judge from Paris, are very
difficult to study and understand. They are easy of access, but it is
difficult to account for the many and strange anomalies in their
character.
The intense love of gayety and the amount of elegant trifling which
shows itself everywhere as a national characteristic, does not prepare
one to believe that some of the greatest of mathematicians,
philosophers, and scientific men are Frenchmen and Parisians; but such
is the fact. The French are fickle, love pleasure, and one would think
that these qualities would unfit men for coolness, perseverance, and
prolonged research; and I am sometimes inclined to think that the
proficiency of the French in philosophy, the arts, and sciences, is not
so much the result of patient investigation and laborious and continued
study, as a kind of intuition which amounts to genius. The French mind
is quick, and does not plod slowly toward eminence; it leaps to it.
Certainly, in brilliancy of talents the French surpass every other
nation. I will not do them the injustice to speak of them as they are at
this moment--crushed under the despotism of Louis Napoleon--but as they
have been in the last few years, and indeed for centuries. Paris is a
city of brilliant men and women. A French orator is one of the most
eloquent speakers, one of the most impressive men, any country can
furnish. The intelligence of the Paris artisans would surprise many
people in America. We have only to examine the journals which before the
advent of the empire were almost exclusively taken by the
working-classes of Paris, to see the proof of this. Their leaders were
written in the best essay-style, and were the result of careful thought
and application. Such journals could never have gained a fair support
from the artisans of New York. They were not mere news journals, nor
filled up with love-stories. They contained articles of great worth,
which required on the part of the reader a love of abstract truth and
the consideration of it. Such journals sold by thousands in Paris before
Napoleon III. throttled the newspapers. These very men were fond of
pleasure and pursued it, and I have been told by residents, that often
persons of a foppish exterior and fashionable conduct, are also
celebrated for the extent of their learning. At home we rarely look for
talent or learning among the devotees of fashion, or at least, among
those who exalt fashion above all moral attributes.
It seems to me that the French are more gifted by nature than the
English. The English mind is more sluggish, but in all that is
practical, it gains the goal of success, while the French mind often
fails of it. In theory, the French have always had the most delightful
of republics--in fact, a wretched despotism. So, too, they have had an
idea of liberty, such as is seldom understood even in America, but real
liberty has existed rarely in France.
The laboring men of Paris perhaps never saw the inside of a school-room,
but they are educated. They know how to read, and through the
newspapers, the library, the popular lecture and exhibition, they have
gained what many who spend most of their earlier years in school never
gain. From an experience which justifies it, I believe the soberest part
of Paris is its class of artisans. They may possess many wrong and
foolish opinions, but they are a noble class of men. They are a majority
of them republicans, and though they consent to the inevitable
necessity--obedience to the monarch and endurance of a monarchy--yet
they indulge in hopes of a brilliant future for France. They know very
well how their rights are trampled upon, and feel keenly what a
disgraceful condition Paris and all France occupies at the present time,
but are by no means satisfied with it. They well know that there is no
real liberty in Paris to-day; that no journal dares to speak the whole
truth for fear of losing its existence; and that the noblest men of the
republic are in exile. The trouble is, that the lower classes of the
provinces are grossly ignorant, and do not desire a republic, nor care
for liberty. Thus, those who are intelligent and have aspirations after
freedom, are borne down by the ignorant.
One of the characteristics of the people of Paris, for which they are
known the world over, is their politeness. I noticed this in all circles
and in all places. In England John Bull stares at your dress if it
differs from his own, and hunts you to the wall. Or if anything in your
speech or manners pleases him, he laughs in your face. But in Paris, the
Frenchman never is guilty of so ill-bred an action as to laugh at
anybody in his presence, however provoking the occasion. If you are lost
and inquire the way, he will run half a mile to show you, and will not
even hear of thanks, I remember once in Liverpool asking in a
barber's-shop the way to the Waterloo hotel. A person present, who was
so well-dressed that I supposed him a gentleman, said that he was going
that way and would show me. I replied that I could find the spot, the
street having been pointed out by the barber. The "gentleman" persisted
in accompanying me. When we reached the hotel I thanked him, but he was
not to be shaken off. He raised his hat and said, "I hope I may have the
happiness of drinking wine with you!" I was angry at such meanness, and
I gave him a decided negative. "But," he persisted, "you will drink ale
with me?" I replied, "I never drink ale." "But," said he, "you will give
_me_ a glass?" This persistence was so disgusting that I told the man I
would give him in charge of the police as an impostor if he did not
leave, which he did at this hint, instantly.
The only time that I ever experienced anything but politeness in Paris,
was when in a great hurry I chanced to hit a workman with a basket upon
his head. The concussion was so great that the basket was dashed to the
pavement. He turned round very slowly, and with a grin upon his
countenance said, "Thank you, sir!" This was politeness with a little
too much sarcasm. It was spoken so finely that I burst into a laugh, and
the Frenchman joined me in it.
The shop-keepers of Paris are a very polite class, and are as avaricious
as they are polite. The habit which they have of asking a higher price
than they expect to get is a bad one. It is a notorious fact that
foreigners in Paris can rarely buy an article so cheaply as a native.
There are always quantities of verdant Englishmen visiting Paris, and
the temptation to cheat them is too great to be resisted by the
wide-awake shop-keepers. Besides, it satisfies a grudge they all have
against Englishmen. I always found it an excellent way not to buy until
the shop keeper had lowered his price considerably. Sometimes I state my
country, and the saleswoman would roguishly pretend that for that reason
she reduced the price. I remember stopping once in the Palais Royal to
gaze at some pretty chains in the window. A black-eyed little woman came
to the door, and I asked the price of a ring which struck my fancy. She
gave it, and I shook my head, telling her that in the country which I
came from I could get such a ring for less money. She wanted to know the
name of my country, and when I told her it was America, she said in a
charming manner, "Oh! you come from the grand republic! you shall have
the ring for so many francs," naming a sum far less than she had at
first asked. Of course, I did not suppose she sacrificed a _sou_ for the
sake of my country, but it showed how apt are the Paris shop-keepers at
making excuses. An Englishman or American would have solemnly declared
he would not take a penny less--and then very coolly give the lie to his
assertion; at any rate, I have seen English and American tradesman do
so.
A majority of the shop-keepers of Paris are women, and many of them
young and pretty. I certainly have seen more beauty of face in the shops
than on the Boulevards of Paris. Young girls from the ages of fifteen to
twenty-five, are usually the clerks in all the shops, which are often
presided over by a grown-up woman who is mistress of the establishment,
her husband being by no means the first man in the establishment, but
rather a silent partner.
The grisettes are often girls of industry and great good-nature, but the
morals of the class are lamentably low. They are easily seduced from the
path of right, and are led to form temporary alliances with men, very
often the students of the Latin Quarter. They rarely degrade themselves
for money or for such considerations, but it is for love or pleasure
that they fall. They are given to adventures and intrigues, until they
become the steady paramours of men, and then they are true and constant.
Often they are kept and regarded more like wives than mistresses. I
should not do entire justice to this class if I were to convey the idea
that all of them are thus debauched. Many marry poor young men, but such
is not usually the case; a poor young man seeks a wife with a small
dowry. They have little hope of wedded life--it will never offer itself
to them. Their shop-life is dreary, monotonous, and sometimes exacting.
If they will desert it, pleasure presents an enticing picture; a life of
idleness, dancing, and a round of amusements.
I was very much struck by a remark made to me by one of the purest men
in France--that a Frenchman is more apt to be jealous of his mistress
than his wife, and that as a general rule, a mistress is more true to
her lover than a wife is to her husband. This is horrible, yet to a
certain extent I am convinced it is true. And it may be so, and women be
no more to blame in the matter than the other sex. To-day, in the
fashionable society of our great cities, how much does it injure a
wealthy young man's prospects for matrimony, if it is a well-known fact
that he is a libertine? And how long can such a state of things continue
without dragging down the women who marry such men? If a lady cares not
if her lover is a libertine, she cannot possess much of genuine virtue.
The fashionable men of Paris keep mistresses--so do those of all
classes, the students, perhaps, according to their numbers, being worse
in this respect than all others. It is not strange, such being the
case, that the women are frail.
One thing is specially noticeable among the ladies of Paris--the care
with which they are guarded before marriage, and the freedom of their
conduct after. In countries where there is almost universal virtue among
women, the faith in them is strong, and a freedom of intercourse between
the sexes is allowed previous to marriage, which is never tolerated in
such a place as Paris. In New England it is not thought improper for a
young gentleman and lady to enjoy a walk together in the country, and
alone, but in France it would ruin the reputation of a woman. A friend
of mine in London warmly invited a young friend of his in Paris to come
over and make his family a visit on some special occasion. The Parisian
wrote back that he should like nothing better than such a trip, but that
business would not allow of it. "Then," wrote back my friend, "let your
sister come." The reply was decided: "Oh, no! it would never do for the
young lady to make such a trip alone, for the sake of her reputation."
It would have struck this Frenchman as a very singular fact, if he had
known that in America a young lady will travel thousands of miles alone,
without the slightest harm to her reputation.
But when the French woman _marries_, the tables are turned. Then she
possesses a freedom such as no American lady, thank heaven, wishes to
enjoy. She may have half a dozen open lovers, and society holds its
tongue. Her husband probably has as many mistresses. It is not
considered improper in Paris either for a husband and father to love his
mistress, or a wife and mother to love her acknowledged lover, and that
man not her husband. The intrigues which are carried on by married
people in Paris, would shock sober people in America, or at least,
outside our largest and wickedest cities.
The social state of France is exceedingly bad, and when American
religious writers profess to be shocked at the theories of the French
Socialists, I am inclined to ask them what they think of the _actual
condition_ of the French people. Some of the Socialists have been driven
to extremes, because Paris has no conception of the home and the family.
The enemies of Socialism in France are, in practice, worse than their
enemies in theory. Who is the man now ruling France? Does the world not
know him to have long been an open and thoroughly debauched libertine?
The same is true of other distinguished friends of "law and order."
The outward condition of the streets of Paris often deceives the
stranger as to the morality of the city. Said one gentleman to me, who
had spent several weeks at a fashionable Paris hotel, "Paris is one of
the quietest, pleasantest towns in the world, and as for its morals, I
can see nothing which justifies its bad reputation abroad." After a
week's stay in it, such was my own opinion. Things which are tolerated
in London and New York streets, are not permitted in the streets of
Paris. A street-walker ventured to accost an Englishman in Paris at
night, and was taken in charge by the police. But this outward fairness
only indicates that in Paris, even the vices are regulated by the state.
Bad women cannot make a display and accost men in the street, but they
abound, and what is far worse, in all the circles and gradations of
society. It is society which is corrupt there. One need but to look at
the morals of its great men, to see this at once. What is the moral
character of the first men in the empire? Bad, as no Frenchman will
deny. Some of the very men who have won in America golden opinions for
their noble and eloquent advocacy of liberty, have been in their private
lives devoid of all virtue. It only shows the social condition of the
country. Some writers deny these allegations against Paris, but no man
will who has lived in it, and is honest and candid. Paris abounds with
illegitimate children. The statistics tell the story. Ten thousand
illegitimate children are born every year in that city! What can be the
morality of any town, while such facts exist in reference to its
condition?
I hate all cant, but am satisfied that the chief reason why France does
not succeed better in her revolutions is, because she lacks the
steadiness which a sincere devotion to religion gives to a nation. The
country needs less man-worship and more God-worship. It needs less
adulation of beautiful women, and more real appreciation of true
womanhood.
There is a great deal of art-worship in Paris, but it does not seem to
really elevate the condition of the people. The pictures and the statues
are generally of the most sensuous kind. Do these things improve the
morals of a city or nation? If so, why is it that wherever naked
pictures and sensual statuary abound, the people are licentious and
depraved? In America such things are not tolerated by the mass of the
people, and there prevails a higher style of virtue than in any other
land. But in France and in Italy, the beauty of the human form upon
canvas or in marble, in however offensive a manner, is adored--and in
those countries the people have little morality.
The French _home_ is not the home of England or America. The genuine
Parisian lives on the street, or in the theater or ball-room. He never
lives at home. Hence, the mothers and daughters of England and America
are not there to be found. "Comparisons are odious" but I cannot express
my meaning so plainly without making them, and I state but the simple
truth. Young men and women are not taught to seek their pleasure at the
family fireside, but beyond it, and a man marries not to make a home,
but to make money or a position in society. Women, too, often marry
simply to attain liberty of action.
Another characteristic of the French, and especially of Parisians, is
that they educate their sons to no such independence as is everywhere
common in America. The young Parisian is dependent upon his father--he
cannot support himself; and men of thirty and forty, who are helpless,
are to be seen in all classes throughout the great cities of France.
Whether there is just ground for expecting that France will very soon
throw off the despotism which now weighs her down, I am incompetent,
perhaps, to judge; but I fear not. There is a very noble class of men in
Paris--I know this by experience--who hate all despotism and love
freedom, but I fear they will for centuries be overcome by ignorance and
the love of pleasure, on the part of the people, and knavery and brute
force on the part of rulers.
CLIMATE--POPULATION--POLICE, ETC.
The weather of Paris during the summer months is warm and usually
delightful, but in winter it is very cold--much colder than it is in
London. But Paris escapes the horrible fogs which envelop London in
November and December. The weather, too, though cold, is wholesome and
often conducive to health. The two months of fog in London are often
termed the suicidal months, because of the number of persons who destroy
their own lives in those months. The people of Paris with their
mercurial temperaments would never endure it for a long time, at least.
Fuel is exceedingly dear in Paris, and the buildings are not made for
in-door comfort. If they were as warmly made as the houses of New York,
they would be comfortable in winter, but such not being the case, and
fuel being costly, comfort in private apartments is rarely to be had by
any but the rich. Coal is not used to any great extent, though charcoal
is burned in small quantities, but wood is the fuel principally used. It
is sold in small packages, and is principally brought up from the
distant provinces by the canals. The amount of wood required to make
what a Frenchman would call a glowing fire, would astonish an American.
A half a dozen sticks, not much larger or longer than his fingers, laid
crosswise in a little hearth, is sufficient for a man's chamber. A log
which one of our western farmers would think nothing of consuming in a
winter's evening, would bring quite a handsome sum in Paris on any
winter day. The truth is, the economical traveler had better not spend
his winter in Paris, for comfort at that time costs money. The houses
admit such volumes of cold air, the windows are so loose and the doors
such wretched contrivances, and that, too, in the best of French cities,
that the stranger sighs for the comforts of home. Nowhere in the world
is so much taste displayed as in Paris, in the furnishing of apartments.
This is known as far as Paris is, but it is always the _outside
appearance_ which is attended to, and nothing more. It is like the
Parisian dandy who wears a fine coat, hat, and false bosom, but has no
shirt. The homes of Paris are got up, many of them at least, upon this
principle. The rooms are elegantly furnished, and in pleasant weather
are indeed very pleasant to abide in, but let a cold day come, and they
are as uncomfortable as can be, and the ten thousand conveniences which
a New York or London household would think it impossible to be without,
are wanting.
The longest day in Paris is sixteen hours, the shortest eight. The
cities of Europe are distant from it as follows: Brussels, one hundred
and eighty-nine miles; Berlin, five hundred and ninety-three; Frankfort,
three hundred and thirty-nine; Lisbon, one thousand one hundred and
four; Rome, nine hundred and twenty-five; Madrid, seven hundred and
seventy-five; Constantinople, one thousand five hundred and
seventy-four; St. Petersburgh, one thousand four hundred and five. These
places are all easily reached from Paris in these modern days of
railways and steamers.
The situation of Paris is much more favorable to health than that of
London. London is a low plain--Paris is upon higher ground; yet London
is the healthiest city. The reason is, that the latter is so thoroughly
drained, and the tide of the Thames sweeping through it twice a day,
carries away all the impurities of the sewers. Paris might surpass
London in its sewerage easily, but as it is, some of its narrow streets
in warm weather are fairly insupportable, from the intolerable stench
arising in them.
The population of Paris is considerably more than a million. The number
of births in a year is a little more than thirty thousand, and of these,
ten thousand are illegitimate. This fact speaks volumes in reference to
the morals of Paris. The deaths usually fall short of the births by
about four thousand. The increase of population in France is great,
though it is now a very populous country.
The increase in forty years is more than nine millions. The births in
France in one year are about eight hundred and ninety-seven thousand,
and the deaths eight hundred and sixty-five thousand. Of the births,
more than seventy thousand are illegitimate. This fact shows that the
morals of Paris, in one respect, are worse than those of the provinces.
It is calculated that one-half of the inhabitants of Paris are _working_
men; the rest are men who live by some trade or profession, or have
property and live upon it. Paris has more than eighty thousand servants,
and at least seventy thousand paupers. The latter class, as a matter of
course, varies with the character of the times; sometimes, a bad season
enlarging the number by many thousands. There is an average population
of fifteen thousand in the hospitals; five thousand in the jails; and at
least, twenty thousand foundlings are constantly supported in the city.
The annual number of suicides in France is nearly six thousand. Yet the
French are a very gay people!
The police regulations of Paris are very good, but not so good as those
of London, though New York might learn from her many useful lessons.
Rogues thrive better in Paris than in London. The Paris policeman wears
no distinctive dress, and there are streets in which if you are attacked
by night, your cries will call no officer to the rescue. The police have
been proved often to be in league with bad men and bad women, and these
cases are occurring from day to day. I should not like to walk alone on
a winter's night, after midnight, anywhere for half a mile on the
southern side of the Seine. Some of the streets are exceedingly narrow,
and are tenanted by strange people. Still, one might have many curious
adventures in them, and escape safely--but _La Morgue_ tells a
mysterious tale every day of some dark deed--a suicide or a murder,
perhaps.
Getting lost after midnight in one of the narrow streets of Paris, is
not particularly pleasant, especially if every person you meet looks
like a thief. The police system of Paris is in one respect far more
strict than that of London--in political matters. Every stranger, or
native, suspected in the least of tendencies to republicanism, is
continually watched and dogged wherever he moves. While in Paris, my
whereabouts was constantly known to the police, and though I made
several changes in my abode, I was followed each time, and my address
taken; yet I was but an in offensive republican from America. A man must
be careful to whom he talks of French despots, or despotism. For
speaking against Louis Napoleon in an omnibus, a Frenchman was sentenced
to two years imprisonment, and men have been exiled for a less offense.
The police are everywhere to detect conspiracy or radicalism, but are
more slack in reference to the safety of people in the streets.
One pleasant feature of Paris is its great number of baths, public and
private. The artisan who has little money to spare can go to the Seine
any day, and for six cents take a bath under a large net roofing. A
gentleman, to be sure, would hardly like to try such a place, but the
working people are not particular. It is cheap, and in the hot weather
it is a great luxury to bathe, to say nothing of the necessity of the
thing. To take a bath in a first-rate French hotel is quite another
matter. Every luxury will be afforded, and the price will be quite as
high as the bath is luxurious.
Pleasure trips are getting to be quite common in France, in imitation of
the English, on a majority of the railways. The fares for these pleasure
trips are very much reduced. I noticed the walls one day covered with
advertisements of a pleasure trip to Havre and back for only seven
francs. The second and third class carriages on the French railroads are
quite comfortable, but the first are very luxurious. Trains run from
Paris to all parts of the country, at almost all hours of the day and
night.
PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS.
There is no city in the world so blessed with educational institutions
of the first class as Paris, and no government fosters the arts and
sciences to such an extent as the French government, whether under the
administration of king, president, or emperor. The government constantly
rewards discoveries, holds out prizes to students and men of genius. The
educational colleges are without number, and the lectures are free.
There is one compliment which the stranger is forced to pay the French
government--it encourages a republicanism among men of genius in
learning, the arts and sciences, if it does put its heel upon the
slightest tendency toward political republicanism.
And not Paris, or France alone, reaps the advantage of this
liberality--the whole civilized world does the same. Go into the
university region, and you will always see great numbers of foreigners
who have come to take advantage of the public institutions of Paris. The
English go there to study certain branches of medicine, which are more
skillfully treated in the French medical schools than anywhere else in
the world. Many young Americans are in Paris, at the present time,
studying physic or law.
The difference between the cost of education in England and France is
great. Three hundred dollars a year would carry a French student in good
style through the best French universities. To go through an English
college five times that sum would be necessary.
[Illustration: Palais de l'Institut.]
The _Institut de France_ lies upon the southern branch of the Seine,
just opposite the Louvre, which is north of the river. The _Institute_
is divided into five academies, and the funds which support the
institution are managed by a committee of ten members, two from an
academy, and the minister of public instruction, who presides over the
committee. The academies are--first the _Academie Francaise_; second,
the _Academie Royale des Inscriptions et Belle-Lettres_; third, the
_Academie Royale des Sciences_; fourth, the _Academie Royale des Beaux
Arts_; and fifth, the _Academie Royale des Sciences Morales et
Politiques_. Members of one academy are eligible to the other four, and
each receives a salary of three hundred dollars. The Institute has a
library common to the five academies, the whole number of members
amounting to two hundred and seventeen. If a member does not attend the
proceedings and discussions, and cannot give a good reason for his
absence, he is liable to expulsion.
The _Academie Francaise_ consists of forty members, who are devoted to
the composition of the dictionary and the purification of the French
language. An annual prize is awarded of two thousand francs for poetry,
a prize of ten thousand francs for the best work of French history and
fifteen hundred francs is given every other year to some deserving but
poor student, for his attainments.
The Belle-Lettres Academy is composed of forty members, and ten free
academicians--the latter receive no salary. It has many foreign
associates or honorary members. Its members pursue the study of the
learned languages, antiquities, etc. etc. A yearly prize of ten thousand
francs is awarded by it for memoirs, and another for medals.
The Academy of Sciences has sixty-five members, beside ten free
academicians. It is divided into eleven sections, as follows: six
members are devoted to geometry, six to mechanics, six to astronomy, six
to geography and navigation, three to general philosophy, six to
chemistry, six to minerology, six to botany, six to rural economy and
the veterinary art, six to anatomy and geology, six to medicine and
surgery. Prizes are awarded by this academy, yearly, for physical
sciences, statistics, physiology, mechanics, improvements in surgery and
medicine; for improvements in the art of treating patients, for
rendering any art or trade less insalubrious, for discoveries, for
mathematical studies, and also a prize to the best scholar in the
Polytechnic school.
The Academy of Fine Arts has forty members, who are divided into five
sections--painting, sculpture, architecture, engraving, and musical
composition. It awards prizes to the best students in the arts, and
sends to the French Academy at Rome, free of all expense, the successful
students, who are educated at the expense of the state.
The Academy of _Sciences Morales et Politiques_ has thirty members,
divided into the following sections: philosophy, moral philosophy,
legislation, jurisprudence, political economy, history, and the
philosophy of history.
The building of the Institute is surmounted by a splendid dome, and it
presents a striking appearance to the stranger. It immediately fronts
the foot-bridge which crosses the Seine to the Louvre.
The university of France it is supposed was founded by Charlemagne. It
is a magnificent and truly liberal institution, and is under the
authority of the minister of public instruction. It has five
departments, an immense library and funds for aged or infirm teachers.
The Academy of Paris consists of five faculties--science letters,
theology, law, and medicine. In the department of sciences, which
includes that of mathematical astronomy, Leverrier occupies a
professor's chair--the man who demonstrated the existence of another
planet by mathematical Calculations, and pointed out the place where it
must be found.
The Faculty of Law has seventeen professors. Four years of study are
necessary to gain the highest honors, or the title of _Docteur en
droit_.
The Faculty of Medicine has twenty-six professorships, with salaries
varying from two thousand to ten thousand francs a year. Every student
before taking his degree must serve the government one year, at least,
in a hospital. This is an admirable regulation. The lectures are all
gratuitous, and what is better still, they are open to the people and
the world. Any foreigner can attend the course of lectures of the most
celebrated men in France, and indeed in the world, for nothing. The law
students number about three thousand; those studying medicine about
three thousand; and those studying the sciences about fifteen hundred.
Foreign students are admitted upon the same terms as French, and a
diploma given by an American college, if it be of high repute, will put
the student upon the same footing as a French _bachelier et lettres_
when the object is to study law or medicine.
The College Royal has twenty-eight professors, who give gratuitous
lectures on astronomy, mathematics, philosophy, medicine, chemistry,
natural history, law, ethics, etc. etc. There is a college of Natural
History, connected with the _Jardin des Plantes_, with fifteen
professors. The _Ecole Normale_ is an institution for the education of
students who intend to become candidates for professorships. There are
in Paris besides these, five royal colleges where a student is boarded
as well as educated. The charge for board is two hundred dollars a
year; the additional charges, educational and otherwise, are only twenty
dollars, which the published terms state, "_does not include music or
dancing!_"
Among the literary and scientific societies is the _Institut
Historique_, where public and gratuitous lectures are given. A journal
is published, and all that members pay for it, and the advantages of the
institution, is about four dollars a year. There is a flourishing
agricultural society, a society for the encouragement of national
industry, one for the improvement of national horticulture, one for the
civilization and colonization of Africa, one for the promotion of
commercial knowledge, etc. etc.
Besides the many colleges to which I have barely alluded, and the
societies, there are twenty or thirty literary and scientific societies
of note in Paris.
It will not be necessary to be more particular to convince the reader
that no other city in the world has the educational advantages of Paris.
What a privilege it must be to a poor Parisian to live near such schools
and colleges, we can at once perceive. If a young man has talents or
genius, his poverty need be no bar to his advancement. He is taken up at
once. He is not the charity student of America, for the very fact that
without money and friends he has by sheer force of native genius made
his way into the places given only to students poor and talented, adds
to his fame, and he is quite as well if not better liked for it. What an
advantage the many kinds of lectures, which are given to all who please
to attend gratuitously, must be to all inquiring minds in Paris, we can
feel at once. The artisan if he can spare an hour can listen to one of
the most brilliant lectures upon history, either of the sciences, or
medicine, side by side with the young aristocrat. Nothing higher in
character is to be had in Paris or out of it than that which he listens
to without cost. The effect of this vast system of public instruction is
very great, and the influence of the colleges and learned societies upon
society is wonderful. There is no spirit of exclusiveness, such as
characterizes the English and some of the American colleges, and the
people are not prejudiced against them. This system of instruction is
almost perfect, _of its kind_ but France lacks one thing which America
has--a system of common schools, which shall educate _the children_. Far
better have this system and lack the one she has now, but if she only
had our common school system together with her colleges and academies,
she would surpass, by far, any other nation. America very much needs
such a system. It is free, broad, and liberal, and with ordinary care
will make any country glorious in the sciences and arts. Certainly until
America cares less for mere cash and more for the arts and sciences,
until she is generous enough to foster them and appropriate money to
help young men of genius, and offer prizes to men of talent, the fine
arts will not prosper with us. Only the arts which in a pecuniary sense
_pay_, will thrive, and the rest will live a starveling life. Can we
rest content with such a prospect? No country is better able to be
generous in such matters than America.
While in Paris I made the acquaintance of several students of law and
medicine from America, and from them I learned that the professors in
all the different institutions are exceedingly polite and kind to
foreign students, and especially to Americans. Foreign diplomas are
granted by the different colleges, and no difference is made between a
native and a foreign scholar.
The students of Paris are an intellectual class, and as a body are
inclined at all times to be democratic. In England and in America
learning seems always to incline to conservatism. The great schools and
colleges are opposed to radicalism. This is generally true in America,
in the old institutions of learning, and it is emphatically true of
England. Cambridge and Oxford are the strong-holds of the blindest
toryism. They are two hundred years behind the age. But in Paris this is
not the case. The colleges are reformatory and radical. The Academies
have the same disposition, only it is modified. Many of the members of
the French academy are sincere republicans. I cannot account for this
singular fact, unless it be that the French mind is so active and so
brilliant that it easily arrives at the truth. A Frenchman, if he
considers the matter of government and politics, very soon arrives at
his conclusion--that man has rights, and that a form of government which
comes least in collision with them is the best. It is entirely a matter
of theory with him. Everything tends to theory. The practical is
ignored. Hence, while Paris abounds with theoretical democrats and
republicans, there are few men in it capable of administering the
affairs of a democratic republic.
[Illustration: HOTEL DES INVALIDES]
The Hotel des Invalides is visited by a vast crowd of people, Parisians,
provincials, and foreigners, for it is the final resting place of
Napoleon the Great. It is an imposing structure, and aside from the
interest felt in it as the receptacle of the remains of Napoleon, it is
well worth a visit. It is situated on the south side of the Seine, not
far from the chamber of deputies, its front facing the south. It
presents a magnificent appearance from the street, perhaps the finest of
any like building in Europe. It has long been a celebrated military
hospital for the reception of disabled and superannuated soldiers. Under
Louis XIV. the present hospital was instituted, and building after
building was added, together with a fine church, until the vast pile
covers sixteen acres of ground, and encloses fifteen courts. At the time
of the revolution, the hospital was called the Temple of Humanity, under
Napoleon the Temple of Mars, and now the Hotel des Invalides. It is
under the control of the minister of war, has a governor and a
multiplicity of inferior officers. It is divided into fourteen
sections, over each of which an officer is appointed. All soldiers who
are disabled, or who have served thirty years in the army, are entitled
to the privileges of the institution, and are boarded, clothed, and
lodged. For breakfast they have soup, beef, and vegetables, for dinner,
meat, vegetables, and cheese. They have but two meals a day. They also
receive pay at the rate of two francs a day, and the officers higher in
proportion to their rank. Before the northern face of the building there
is a large open space, in which many trophies of war are placed, and
there are beds of flowers interspersed among them. On the southern front
there is a fine statue of Napoleon. The library of the hospital contains
fourteen thousand volumes, and is of course open to all the inmates. The
church is a very important part of the great pile of buildings, and is
filled with statues of great military men, trophies of different
campaigns, etc. etc. The dome of this church is one of the finest in
Paris, and is decorated in the interior in a gorgeous style.
Beneath the dome lies the tomb of Napoleon, the great attraction of the
place. It is, for a wonder, simple and massive in its style, and upon it
are laid Napoleon's hat, sword, imperial crown, etc. etc. To this tomb
thousands of admirers have come and will come to the latest generations,
for whatever were the faults of the great military hero, he had the
faculty of making passionate admirers. The old soldiers in the
institution seem to regard the tomb as an object of adoration, and guard
it as carefully as they would the living body of the hero.
Across the Seine from the Hotel des Invalides, on the avenue des Champs
Elysees, is the fashionable Jardin d'Hiver, a roofed garden of
hot-houses, and which is open in winter as a flower-garden. The
admittance is not free, but costs a franc. It often contains very fine
collections of the costliest and rarest of plants and flowers. The
French exquisites in the cold and chilly weather are fond of frequenting
its exhibitions, and to the stranger who would like to see the higher
classes of Paris, in a public garden, it is an interesting place.
[Illustration: Jardin d'Hiver.]