There were formerly to be seen in the Samaritan fountain numerous red
fish, which were placed there in 1813 and thrived, but have now
disappeared. The quarries are not without animal life,--in the region of
the Jardin des Plantes have been found various insects, species of
coleoptera, myriapod and thysanoura, and several small crustacea, all
more or less blind. One of these latter, a species of small crayfish,
inhabits the waters of a little stream which traverses the Ossuaire. The
bones of the combatants of 1789 and 1790, and those of the victims of
September, 1792, are collected and arranged by themselves in this
ossuary. The walls of the galleries are set off with numerous quotations
drawn from sacred literature and engraved on pillars in French, Latin,
Greek, Italian, and Swedish.
One of the most remarkable of these curiosities, one which was the
favorite show-place of the young doctors of the Cochin when they had
guests and sufficient candles, is now no longer to be seen. This was a
representation of the fort of Port-Mahon, in which he had been
imprisoned by the English, cut in the face of the rock in high relief by
an old soldier of the king, named Lescure, who had become a stone-cutter
after his retirement from the army. This is situated in the quarry of
Port-Mahon, under another quarry in the quarter of the Tombe-Issoire,
which was discovered by Lescure, who kept his discovery to himself and
passed his leisure in executing this record of his past career. When it
was completed, he began to talk, and in order to enable his visitors to
reach it easily he undertook the construction of a stairway uniting the
two quarries; he had scarcely commenced it, when the earth gave way,
and the unfortunate artist was crushed in the débris.
Notwithstanding the care taken to shore them up, the roofs of the
abandoned quarries still give way occasionally under the superincumbent
weight. In May, 1879, a house in the Passage Gourdon, Boulevard
Saint-Jacques, sank through the earth; in the following year, a tree in
the Luxembourg garden, near the Médicis fountain, did the same thing,
and in July of this year, 1880, the lightning fell in this garden, and
at almost the same moment two houses in the Boulevard Saint-Michel began
to sink, as well as a large section of the sidewalk. These events
naturally produced a great excitement in the quarter, and measures were
taken to prevent a possible recurrence of such happenings. Proprietors
proposing to build in these suspected districts are now required to
conform to certain regulations of the inspector-general of quarries, who
examines the subsoil under their properties.
[Illustration: PARTY OF STUDENTS LUNCHING DURING A VISIT TO THE
CATACOMBS.