Volume 74 — OUR COMMISSIONER IN PARIS.

It was on the evening of the 22d of August, 1853, that a party consisting of a gentleman, two ladies, and four packages, emerged from the door of the Castle Inn at Southampton, and bestowed themselves in and upon a one-horse fly. Something had happened which apparently had disturbed the equanimity of the paternal leader of the flock; and as an attentive bystander might have heard him mutter in no very benevolent accent, while he indignantly crumpled up a small bit of paper and thrust it into his waistcoat-pocket—“We might have dined at the Clarendon for the same sum”—it is not an unlikely conjecture that the entertainment had been bad, and the charge excessive. A drive of three minutes conducted them to the pier; when a demand for an infinite variety of shillings and twopences still farther increased the traveller’s dissatisfaction, which, however, only reached its climax when Jehu, wet and tipsy, insisted on a crown. It was now eight o’clock; the Grand Turk lay alongside the jetty, fretting, and fuming, and spurting out angry ejaculations from its funnel; the deck was strewed with boxes of all imaginable shapes and sizes; the rain was falling, porters swearing, deck slippery, companion-ladder dark, and, when the cabin was at last attained, the glimmering lamp threw a melancholy light over the visages of twenty or thirty people who sat in solemn silence, or anxiously whispered to each other as to the safety of hat-box or umbrella. The party we have mentioned took their seats with the rest; and, if we pursued the very novel style in which we have begun this narrative, now would be the time to introduce a description of the travellers’ personal appearance. It was manifest the relationship between them was rather close; a father, mother, and daughter were on their way to the gay city of Paris, and adopted the route by Southampton and Havre, intending to spend a few days at Rouen by the way. The description of any of the party would, however, be useless; for before it had got beyond the bold and intellectual glance of the senior traveller, his hair glossy black, clustering in rich ringlets around his well-shaped, head—his majestic features, now radiant with an indefinable expression and now sunk in serene repose—and the tones of his voice redolent of scholarship and romance—the dullest of readers would at once perceive that it was no other but Our Commissioner on his way to France; determined, as in duty bound, to communicate to Maga the result of his observations—

“To talk of sciences and arts,

And knowledge gained in foreign parts.”

So, leaving to the reader’s imagination the discomforts of a night passage in an over-crowded boat, with a sharp wind, and an angry chopping sea, he will merely state that he arrived weary, but safe, at the excellent Hôtel de l’Europe, in the bustling town of Havre; and, after a copious breakfast, proceeded to survey the place. A very pleasant, active, clean place it is. The docks so intersect the town that half the streets have their frontage occupied by the shipping. It looks more like what we have read of Amsterdam than what we had expected to find in France. The tide rises three-and-twenty feet, so that, though there is depth of water enough for vessels of large burthen, the docks are not available for them at all hours; and the outside harbours did not strike us as either capacious or safe. The fortifications as they at present stand are contemptible, and could not stand the attack of the “Duke of Wellington” for an hour; but batteries of great strength are soon to be begun, and the maritime capital placed out of danger of a coup-de-main. At five o’clock we got into the train for Rouen; and, through a rich, flat, uninteresting country, very much resembling the Isle of Thanet, we careered at twenty-five miles an hour, and reached our destination as comfortably as on the best of our English lines. Let all men who stop at Rouen go to the Hôtel d’Albion; it is situated on the quay, and nowhere is the beautiful Seine more beautiful than here. It is spanned by several bridges, from which the view both up and down is of extraordinary richness. Towers, and pinnacles, and great high houses, all breathing of the middle ages, surround, and are reflected in a river, which is bright to-day with the gay sails and flags of all nations, and which is the same that bore William the Conqueror on his way to England. Somehow or other, this same William the Conqueror gives us a sort of vested interest in the scenery of Normandy. We feel a kind of property in his castles; and can’t help a small sensation of enmity to Joan of Arc for ousting us from our hereditary domains. However, let us look on her statue in the marketplace without a blush, for the English did not burn her as an enemy, but the French ecclesiastics burned her as a witch. The cathedral is gaudy, and over-ornamented outside, but solemn and grand within; a hurried glance is sufficient for all the internal sights of the place, but the fine old streets, the gable-ended houses, the projecting balconies, the straight, steep roofs, would furnish food for contemplation for a month. Then the walks around it are delightful, the heights that encompass it very rich and finely moulded, fruit and provisions very cheap, and the people good-humoured and obliging—no wonder many English families have established themselves here, and taken possession of the most charming situations—a sort of reprisal for the behaviour of the Normans in 1066.

Next day saw us on the way to Paris, careering through a country still flat and monotonous, except when here and there the windings of the Seine showed us the chalky banks through which it had forced its way; or, at a remote distance, a few hills, or rather elevations, crowned with an occasional ruin. For, though this is the highway to the capital, and one of the richest provinces in the kingdom, there is an appearance of desolation spread over all the district, as if it had very recently been the scene of some devastating war. The villages are all either half finished, or half destroyed. Instead of the three or four gentlemanly dwellings—the surgeon’s, the retired tradesman’s, the neighbouring manufacturer’s, besides the squire’s, and the rectory—which you see dotted among the humble cottages in almost every English village—here you see nothing but straight, narrow stone huts, no fruit on the walls, no garden attached—but single, bare, and comfortless, clustered, like some recent fungi, round an old squat-spired church, which seems to look with blank astonishment out of its broken clock-face at the railway carriages hissing past it, and disturbing its “ancient, solitary reign” over a trampled peasantry and roadless country. There are not above three chateaus visible between Havre and Paris; and the tale of at least one of them is told by the appearance of three or four great high factory-chimneys, which were of course utterly unknown to the original seigneur, but are very convenient for the present owner of the mansion, as they are situated just at one end of the long-terraced garden, and must be a comfortable accession to the view from the drawing-room windows. All old things have died away in this part of France, and a new order of things has not yet risen. Here are houses dismantled in the riots of ’93 still unroofed. Even the old chateau inhabited by the great Sully, and giving the title “de Rosny,” by which he was originally known, does not seem to have a tree about it more than thirty years old. Yet the chimneys are all shaky with age, and if there were any cracks in the wall that gave rheumatism to the great councillor of Henry IV., depend upon it they are there still. We did not see a house under repair all the time we were in France. The owner seems to wait till it is actually uninhabitable, and then he builds another. The result is a combination of novelty and decay which it is very unpleasant to look upon.

One style of building, however, it must be confessed, is carried to great perfection in France. As you approach Paris, you see on all hands barracks and fortifications. At intervals you hear far-distant military music, and catch the glimpses of long rows of bayonets in the sunlight; and on the elevation commanding the plain you see enormous lines of strong low walls crowded with embrasures for cannon, and on a stout little post swings in the summer air the universal tricolor. Universal we call it; for, go where you like, the blue, white, and red, are sure to meet your eyes: they hang over book-stalls, and auction-rooms, and restaurateurs, and theatres. Over small cabarets in rural villages you still see the flag; over all the government offices, small and great; over merry-go-rounds at a fair; over a conjuror’s booth; over the tilted waggon of a perambulating quack; and, finally, over the central pavilion of the majestic Tuileries. Flags, therefore, and fortifications are the principal characteristics of the capital. But, in fact, the massive style of masonry, and the isolated nature of the dwelling-houses, fit every mansion in Paris to stand a siege. Any lodging-house in the street could be converted into a fortification at a moment’s notice, and would only require to hoist the tricolor from the roof to become a citadel at once. In the mean time, it was our object to get into lodgings as soon as we could; and with this view we hurried from the railway station to the office of an excellent English agent in the Rue de Rivoli. Fortunately an appartement of eight rooms was vacant on the first floor above; half an hour saw the bargain made, the trunks deposited, the services of a native cook secured, and everything as comfortable as heart could desire.

The rooms were intensely French. There were nine windows in the lodging, and nineteen doors; there were five clocks, enamelled, gilded, and otherwise ornamented, which did not go, and one in the kitchen which was always wrong; there were four arm-chairs in the drawing-room, with square gilded legs, and tapestry-covered backs, which it required an enormous exertion of strength to move from beside the wall; there was a sofa so tremendously elastic that you kept swinging up and down for a minute or two after you had taken your seat; there was a round table, so small that it couldn’t hold the smallest tea-tray, and so heavy, by means of a marble top, that it couldn’t be moved from its place; and, what with tables and chairs, and sofas and clocks, and jars and mirrors, and curtains and firescreens, and brackets and other useless encumbrances, there was only left a narrow serpentine walk across the floor more intricate than, and quite as dangerous as, the entrance into Portsmouth harbour. The bedrooms had the same characteristics of over-furnishing and encumbered space; but the colours of everything were so gay, the gilding so bright, the mirrors so glossy, that our spirits were never depressed, and we entirely escaped the Penitentiary-at-Millbank sort of feeling which invariably takes possession of us on being ushered into the dull, heavy, monotonous apartments of a London lodging-house.

Here, then, we were established in the most beautiful part of Paris—just opposite the Tuileries gardens—the bright sun of France shining upon us all day long, and a month before us in which to survey the astounding scene. For astounding it certainly is, if you remember how often these beautiful streets have been filled with thousands of infuriated citizens, cutting and shooting each other; cannon resounding in all parts of the town, and blood flowing in torrents over the pavement, and all these horrors occurring not in the distant reigns of Charles the Ninth, or Henry the Third; but a year ago,—when this old hat was new—some months after our new drawing-room paper was put on, which is still in its first gloss. And now look at the place, nothing but peace and gaiety apparently were ever heard of here. The people walk about as if every man was just let out for a holiday, and requested to enjoy it as much as he could. The shops are shining with gold and silver, with laces, and silks, and satins, in every window; the blue sky bends over all without a cloud, and we will forth into the gardens of the Tuileries to see the world. What a pleasant, bright, glittering world it is. There are groups scattered all about in the shady walks, under these crowded trees. A gentleman, his wife, three children, and a maid in a long-flapped white cap, are all as busy as if they were in their own house. The mother is sewing, and hearing the eldest girl her lesson; the maid is also active with her needle; the two smaller children are poring over the same book; and the father, with his back to a tree, and his hat over his brows, is deep in the milk-and-water politics of the Assemblée, or the platitudes of that wonderful misnomer, the Constitutionnel. Now, all these people have left their appartement for the day. The key is in the coat-pocket of the absorbed politician; they will dine in the quietest and most economical way at some humble restaurant, and returning to their position in the gardens, they will enjoy the gay scene before them, stroll from fountain to fountain, or from statue to statue, listen to the band, and finally, when the shades of night begin to fall, they will retire to their modest lodging, having spent a day of open-air enjoyment, which makes them utterly independent of the size or situation of the rooms they nominally occupy. This seems the mode of life of an immense number of the Parisians. Houses seem mere accommodations for the night; for, from morn till eve, they are in as full possession of the Tuileries as if they had been crowned monarchs of France—their empire in the Luxembourg gardens, there’s none to dispute—and a few sous puts them at any time into the plenary usufruct of St Cloud or Versailles. Now, who are all those people who disport themselves in the sunshine? Are they gentlemen living on the small remains of their property, or shopkeepers out for a ploy, or visitors from the country, or play-actors retiring to study their parts, or literary men catching glimpses of life? We confess ourselves utterly unable to answer these questions. Perhaps the numberless groups we see consist of specimens of all those classes—small rentiers economising, flourishing epiciers relaxing, country visitors reposing; but, whatever they may be, they present the appearance of the most careless, happy population, ever known. It is a complete “cure for the heartache” to walk down these murmuring avenues at any hour from ten till seven. There is such an amazing amount of enjoyment in the indolent repose of the seniors, the merry plays of the children, the air, the trees, the flowers, the company walking before you in endless procession, as if intended entirely for your gratification, that again we go back with astonishment to the appalling consideration, that less than a year ago there were battle, murder, and sudden death in all parts of this gay metropolis; and, in less than another year, they may be all let loose again. Those very idlers probably would be on the top of a barricade, and, according to circumstances, either installed in a few days in the Hôtel de Ville or on their way to Cayenne. So we will shake off these disagreeable impressions by walking down the centre walk, and admiring the pillar of Luxor in the Place de la Concorde. This is agreed, in all quarters, to be the finest site in Europe; and all the accessories are worthy of their situation. The fountains are very fine, and give issue to a body of water which would drown the dumb-waiters in Trafalgar Square. At the four ends are the Tuileries, the Madeleine, the Arc de Triomphe, and the Corps Legislatif—four specimens of building, we will be bold to say, unequalled—taken separately, and in their joint effect as seen from this noble centre, the greatest triumphs of taste and architecture the world contains. The spaces are so vast that the Luxor column, though seventy-two feet high, and raised on a plinth of twenty, appears dumpy and out of proportion. We doubt the congruity of Egyptian obelisks in the midst of our modern styles. It carries the mind too far away. Grecian temples retain their place because they have at no time been lost sight of, and have often been reproduced; but this Egyptian monument, rising all of a sudden like an animated mummy, is frightful for its very resuscitation. Let it lie like a well-preserved corpse in the sands of its native country, and we can read of it without a shudder; but really, to look on this tremendous stone, set up amidst the shouts of a hundred and fifty thousand spectators in 1836, and see it looking as juvenile and unwrinkled as if it had been quarried on Montmartre, is a sort of anachronism which jars upon the taste. If the wretched thing looked old, the case would be different; but it looks newer than the Arc de Triomphe; the inscriptions on it are finer in the edge, and deeper cut than the victories recorded on its rival; and yet has any one reflected on the antiquity of this monster? It was set up in Luxor amid the shouts of more than a hundred and fifty thousand spectators in the reign of Rameses of Egypt, three thousand two hundred years ago,—a few years after Pharaoh was drowned in the Red Sea, and while Joshua was conquering the tribes of Palestine. This is such a confusion of dates and eras that we wish the pillar were removed—removed to some granite hill as old as itself, and no more permitted to put our perishing materials to shame by parading its immortal youth unhurt amidst the war of elements.

We will therefore, by way of treating ourselves to the sight of a little decay, proceed to inspect the Invalides—a noble palace for worn-out soldiers and sailors,—not so magnificent outside as our unequalled Greenwich, but more richly supported, and giving refuge and maintenance to a much greater number of men. A stout old fragment of the Grand Army showed us round the building. Nearly three thousand men find accommodation within the walls, tolerably fed while in health, and most carefully attended to when ill. They are apparently admissible at an earlier age, and with fewer titles to compassion, than is the case at either Greenwich or Chelsea—many of them were hale-looking active men, of not more than forty-five years old, with many campaigns in them yet; and all of them, except the maimed and very old, had the buoyant step and intelligent look, which, we confess with some regret, is the characteristic of the French militaire. Whether the old warrior who did the honours on this occasion was a chosen representative of his class, we do not know, but he had the politeness of a marshal of Louis XIV., and the information of a member of the Institute. The little biographical hints he gave of the different governors of the institution, when we entered the room adorned with their portraits, were very short, sharp, and decisive. Some of the older race, dukes and marquises who had obtained the office by their influence and rank, he passed over with a magnanimous disdain, merely enumerating their names and titles,—but when others of more distinction came under his notice, he sounded forth the names of their victories as if they had only recently appeared in the Gazette; and this is a peculiarity which we observed among all classes of the French population. They seem to keep a catalogue of their glories from Chalons to Isly, and remember the smaller actions of Condé and Turenne with an accuracy which few Englishmen of a humble class possess of Salamanca or Waterloo. In the chapel are suspended flags of all nations conquered in war. There are standards of Austria, and Prussia and Russia, and Africa in great profusion. We looked round with great satisfaction as we failed to discover the Union Jack among these spoils of victory.—“You don’t happen to have any English specimens here?” we asked with a chuckle, which we felt at the moment was horribly impolite.

“Look,” he said, “high up, just under the roof”—and there we certainly saw a small bit of bunting which it was impossible to mistake for anything but the meteor flag.

“And how and where was that taken?” we inquired, somewhat crestfallen.

“It was seized at Dantzic,” he replied, “when we took Monsieur Corbet prisoner.”

There was nothing more to be said; we had never heard of any battle or victory at Dantzic; but then we are so apt to forget those military events, and the French are so accurate. We had and have no books of reference; but we heard from a friend that the flag fell into the hands of the French when they garrisoned Dantzic at the time of the Moscow campaign, and it had formed part of the colours of a mercantile brig, at that time in the harbour, commanded by a skipper of the name of Corbet. But our venerable guide seemed to forget Vittoria and Waterloo when gazing on this proof of his countrymen’s prowess; and as it was the only one they could show, we were well pleased to leave him to his triumphant meditations. The tomb of the Emperor was under repair, and could not be seen; but a bust of Napoleon was dwelt upon with great admiration, while a companion bust of the nephew was passed by almost in silence. It is observable, that whenever a Frenchmen speaks of the Emperor, he means our old enemy Buonaparte—when he alludes to his present governor, he has to describe him as Napoleon the Third; but it struck us, wherever we went, that the little Corsican has a more abiding presence among the present generation than the living individual who has inherited his power and name. His statues and monuments are everywhere—songs are sung about him—plays are perpetually acted in which he is introduced; and altogether it needs a very slight effort of the imagination to suppose that he is still inhabiting the Tuileries, and ready to launch his thunderbolts all over the world. But the fact of his nephew occupying the throne of France is the most wonderful proof of his still existing ascendancy over the French mind. It seems as much in accordance with the “eternal fitness of things,” that a Napoleon should rule in France, as it was in ancient days that a Cæsar should reign at Rome. No matter whether he was an Augustus or a Nero, he was of the true master’s blood; and Julius was honoured in the vilest of his successors. When this stream of hereditary adulation in France will be dried up, it is impossible to say. It is just possible the fame of the great founder may go on increasing in a greater ratio than the deterioration of his descendants, so that what is lost at one end may be supplied at the other. But surely cockhats and little grey greatcoats can’t last for ever—some glimpses of fact will steal in upon the most benighted of his admirers, and awaken them to a knowledge that, even in military affairs, he was oftener repulsed and defeated than any great conqueror who ever lived, and that in politics, foreign and domestic, he was the most cruel and unprincipled tyrant “whereof the world holds record.” Those merry, lively, vain French people have entirely forgotten all his reverses. His Moscows, Leipsics, and fifty other defeats, have all disappeared. Even Waterloo is looked on as a miraculous incident, against which it is impossible to reason, but which tells nothing against his fame; and he stands on the top of the column in the Place Vendôme surrounded by a halo of victories, unclouded by a single check. This is the most honourable feature in the French character in its connection with Buonaparte, and finding no counterpart, we are afraid, in our own. If Nelson had been defeated at Trafalgar—if Wellington had been defeated at Waterloo—their previous glories would have been effaced; the Nile and Copenhagen never would have been heard of, and the History of the Peninsular War would never have been read. Byng would be shot again, if the same circumstances occurred to-morrow.

Nôtre Dame is grand and massive, but it is under repair; the Sainte Chapelle is most rich and beautiful, but it is under repair; the Palais de Justice vast and imposing, but it is under repair. So are half the churches, so is the Palace of the Luxembourg; and almost all the public buildings are finding the effects of the new Emperor’s rage for improvement. But this very vehement desire he has to leave a city of marble which he found of bricks, has considerable disadvantages for the historical student. The scenes of great events will soon become doubtful or forgotten. The Temple and Bastille have long disappeared; the Place de Grève is now an open space, soon to be surrounded by buildings of the most modern character; the bridges have lost their identity; and, in short, if this system of substitution goes on for twenty years, there will be no monuments of Parisian history remaining. The reign, at all events, of Louis Philippe will be entirely blotted out. The Orleanist statues are all withdrawn; the names they gave to streets and places rigorously changed; and the most recent of his predecessors whom Louis Napoleon condescends to recognise is Louis XIV. That crowned Brummel still bestrides his steeds in marketplaces and esplanades; but the series of the Louis after him is completely expunged. The Grand Monarque is still popular in France; for the people are still fond of the drama, and are persuaded he was an admirable actor. There is something elevating, too, in the superbness of the tyranny under which their ancestors were trodden down. There never was a man, not even Napoleon, who was so entirely the central figure in the kingdom he ruled; and certainly there never was a man, except that most selfish and magnificent of despots, who would not have sunk into insignificance by the gigantic scale on which everything round him was carried on. Who, except himself, would not have become ridiculous amid the enormous spaces of Versailles? Even he must have felt like an ant in a barn, when he wandered through the interminable galleries and innumerable rooms which he vainly thought he inhabited. The size of that palace must have unkinged him, and occasionally he must have sighed for some more moderate mansion to enable him to recover his self-respect. At the same time, it is the most imperial residence we ever saw; and nothing shows so much the illogical tendency of the French mind, as the attempt they have several times made to establish a republic in Paris, with Versailles within an hour’s drive. That stately pile is a standing protest against equality and plainness. While such piles as Versailles and the Tuileries stand, there will be some person supreme in France. Even a constitutional king would be overhoused in those enormous residences. They must be inhabited by the whole nation distilled into one man.

The present unit prefers St Cloud, and we don’t wonder at the preference. There are many of the old hereditary mansions of our nobility of greater extent, but probably not excelling it in elegance and comfort. A man could keep it up on an income of twenty thousand a-year; and perhaps Louis Napoleon feels the comparative security of a house which might be defended by the domestics, and does not need to be garrisoned by a regiment or two of soldiers.

The grey old mustaches of the French army have disappeared. In their stead you see thousands upon thousands of lightly-made active young fellows, from nineteen to twenty-three, with their clothes excellently made, their surtouts neatly drawn in at the waist—their height as uniform as possible, at about five feet one—a lively, vigorous, contented-looking set, with none of the martial precision and combined motion which gives to our army such an appearance of military power. Those little French heroes never think of keeping the step, or holding their muskets all at one elevation—they crowd and roll and hustle—but they get on. Their pace is very rapid, and instantly on the word of command they form line, and are as regular and formal as ourselves.

We determined to go to the camp at Satory, where notice was given of an intended review. A line of two or three thousand tents stretched along the farther end of the immense plain which forms the western boundary of Versailles. The hour designated for the review was two in the afternoon, but on arriving at about half-past twelve we found no signs of any preparation; on the contrary, the soldiers were all lounging about, or sunning themselves before their tents. In front of each of the external lines, which stretched like an interminable street towards the north, the national ingenuity was wonderfully displayed. The space between the canvass of the tent and the line of felt was probably not more than four feet—but what an amazing use of those four feet of ground the gallant occupiers had made! In each of those little divisions there was a portion perfectly smooth and covered with sand; in the midst of this sand were inscribed a vast variety of mottoes, the letters being composed of parsley-leaves or furze prickles. Of these mottoes the greater part had reference to the Emperor, but whether the allusion in the military mind was to the present or the first, we could not guess. The statues of both, either in common plaster, or occasionally in mud, from the artistic hand of one of the soldiers, were the unfailing ornaments of the remaining ground unoccupied by inscriptions. There were also some models admirably executed of the Arc de Triomphe, and the Emperor’s tomb in the Invalides. There were also slabs of excellent imitation-marble, surmounted by the common cast of Napoleon with the cocked-hat and riding-coat, and on the slab a verse or a quotation. On one we saw—

“On lira dans l’histoire

De Cæsar, Alexandre, Hannibal,—

Mais nous préférons la gloire

Du petit caporal.”

On another we saw, under a bust of the present Emperor,

“Il a protégé la société et est le sauveur de la patrie.”

On a third, under well-executed military trophies, we read,

“Si vis pacem, bellum para.”

In others the ingenuity was more mechanical than artistic or literary. There were small fountains sending up tiny columns of water through a crow-quill to the height of eight or nine inches. The labour of procuring even this quantity must have been considerable, for we observed no water near; and as the fountain seemed perpetual, the barrel which gave it supply must have required frequent replenishment.

But the civility of our military friends was greater, if possible, than their skill in gardening or hydraulics. When we saw a countenance more intelligent and good-natured than the rest, we made bold to enter into conversation, and make inquiries about the forthcoming review. The witnesses were unanimous in answering, that it was to commence at half-past two, and that the Emperor and Empress would appear at three. The French army, we conclude, is recruited, like our own, from all parts of the country, and the mixture of dialects is accordingly very great. There were the most convulsive efforts made by several of the men we spoke to, first, to understand what we said, and, secondly, to make us understand their reply. Some were from Alsace, and we detected the German element in the sibilants and gutturals with which they in vain endeavoured to simplify their discourse; but, whether Parisians or Alsacians, they were unanimous about the show, and we accordingly considered ourselves in luck, and moved slowly towards the Champ de Manœuvre, a plain on the other side of the road, where, they told us, the display was to take place. Suddenly we heard bugles and drums at the line of camps which we had left, and, on looking back, we saw blue coats and red trousers congregating in front, issuing from their tents like a thousand hives of bees swarming; and after a few rat-tat-tats! and a few notes of the horn, we saw a long line of soldiers stretching from one end of the encampment to the other. Motion was communicated to this immense body, and we waited to see them pass. First, a regiment, in battle array, with bayonets blazing in the sun, marched solidly and firmly past, crossed the highway, and were lost to our eyes in the level ground beyond. Behind them, at a moderate interval, walking, not marching, fifteen abreast, came a prodigious column of men and officers, but they had no arms, and apparently very little discipline; laughing, talking, dropping out of line, but still tripping lightly on, at about four miles an hour, and they also disappeared in the plateau to the south. Where could they all be going to? Without muskets, how could they manage at a review? The artillerymen also were in full force, but they were dismounted and unarmed, and the whole army, “pioneers and all,” disappeared, in some marvellous manner, the moment they crossed the road. We crossed the road too, and found ourselves behind a close line of armed soldiers, who were drawn up along a narrow pathway. Another line of soldiers guarded its other side, and the space so kept clear was occupied by field-officers and aides-de-camp, and occasionally by an orderly or two, trotting at full speed, and busy in the delivery of orders and despatches. About fifty yards from where we stood, an immense curtain was suspended across the whole width of the footpath, and entirely blocked up the view beyond. This enormous curtain stretched from side to side of lofty banks, which looked like the entrance to a deep cutting in a railway; and it was only when either the wind blew the canvass aside, or the sides of it were partly opened to admit fresh arrivals from the camp, that we caught momentary views of the most curious spectacle it ever was our fortune to see. An amphitheatre of more than Roman size had been hollowed out of the sandy elevation at the end of the pathway. Row upon row, to an enormous height, were stretched the seats all round; and placed on them, grim, silent, and expectant, sat upwards of twenty thousand of the young soldiers of France, all in uniform, all under military discipline—for their officers maintained perfect order—and all radiant, as far as we could see, with health and satisfaction. The curtain again closed, and we were left to the line of soldiers and the narrow pathway. There were crowds where we stood, but by the disbursement of some halfpence we got our party comfortably provided with chairs, and on these miserable rush-bottomed and rickety articles we stood in the hot sun, till fatigue almost compelled us to give up all prospect of the review, and wend our way to Versailles. But the plot began to thicken. A bewhiskered civilian made his appearance at the end of a little alley, which was exactly opposite to where we stood, and at his command there emerged from some canvass tents, which we had not observed under some trees, a group of strangely dressed characters, which was “a sight to behold” at that time of day, with the sunshine all round. First, on piebald steeds, with long tails and broken knees, appeared two or three painted ladies, dressed in red jackets and spangled velvet petticoats. They spurred and whipped their chargers to get a little life into them, and took short gallops from the tents towards the opposite line of soldiers, pulling suddenly up when they came within an inch or two of the bayonets, and voltiging round with great elegance and skill. Next came some men, also mounted, dressed like emirs of the desert, trundling tremendous hoops, of such circumference that they rose several feet above the horses’ heads. The hoops the horsemen kept at full speed, twisting and turning them, galloping after or overtaking them; and all these preliminary rehearsals were carried on exactly in front of our position, and sufficed to make our time pass pleasantly enough. The bewhiskered civilian made some signal which we did not notice, and instantly, dashing through the line of soldiers, the bespangled ladies burst into the pathway full speed, the curtains were for a moment withdrawn, and clapping of hands and hearty cheers from the twenty thousand spectators hailed the commencement of the fêtes of Satory. This was a field-day, not of the French army, but of Franconi’s troop, all at the Emperor’s expense.

The size of the amphitheatre was too vast, the noise of the reception frightened the horses; some accident we saw had taken place, for a horse rushed frantically down the pathway, nearly upsetting a fiery little major, who had been showing off by blowing up some of the too ardent spectators, and in a short time the runaway steed was followed by one of the red-jacketed amazons, very much contused, and leaning for support on the arms of two men: a horse, bleeding and lame, followed. There had been a collision in the ring, and that portion of the sports was dispensed with. Our Arabian hoop-players took their place, were well received, and came off without an accident. It was now three o’clock, and we only wished the founder of the feast would follow the example of our gracious Queen in the great virtue of punctuality; and we were not much disappointed. At a corner of the little wood, beyond the horse-people’s tents, we perceived a stir among the spectators. Suddenly emerging from a green alley in the wood, we saw a first-rate turn-out—an open carriage and four, with two outriders, but no other attempt at show. It came at a foot pace, and was followed by another, also with four horses, but both as plain and unpretending as any gentleman’s could be. Meanwhile the sports grew fast and furious among the equestrians in our front. Five or six ponies now made their appearance bestrode by monkeys, dressed like Abd-el-Kader, and fixed so closely and ingeniously to the saddle that it was difficult to believe their horsemanship was not voluntary, but painful and distressing to the last degree. The ponies carried them at full gallop through the curtain and round the ring. After them, like lightning, rushed an equal number of boys, also on ponies, and dressed like French spahis; and great was the agitation in the military circle, to see the counterfeit presentment of the African war. There were shouts and loud clappings of hands, as they watched the pursuers gradually overtake the vanquished Arabs, and lay their mimic swords lightly on the captives’ shoulders; but this lasted a long time, during which the royal cortège made its slow detour towards the entrance of the guarded pathway; and far down, to our left, we heard the shouting that told the gradual approach of the cavalcade. The shouting was cold and faint; but perhaps soldiers in actual duty, with muskets in hand, thought noisy demonstration a little out of place. The spectators were not numerous enough—that is, condensed enough into one crowd—to encourage each other to any violent hurraing; and therefore in comparative silence, which however was respectful and good-humoured, the carriages passed on through the double line of soldiers and of spectators on the outside. Just opposite to us the carriages stopped, and we had a full view of Louis Napoleon and the Empress Eugenie. His appearance is so well known from bust and portrait, that we will not allude to it farther. We will only say that on this occasion he had shaken off the dull apathetic expression, or rather want of expression, of which he is accused. He sat with his back to the horses, fronting his wife, and his cousin the Princess Mathilde, and seemed very much pleased and interested with all he saw. But the Empress—Has she red hair? Has she absurdly large features, and a ridiculously long nose? Does she look proud and haughty like a parvenu?—bronzed and audacious like a successful adventuress? In short, is she like the descriptions we have read of her from the pens of her enemies and rivals? No, she is not. She is as sweet and gentle a lady as ever it was our fortune to look upon. None of her portraits do her justice—a point greatly in her favour, for we remember hearing Sir Henry Raeburn say, “No woman’s face is worth anything if it can be put upon canvass,”—meaning that variety and transitoriness of expression were the finest parts of female beauty. Even in feature she is statuesque and regular; “but ’twasna her bonny blue e’e was my ruin;” it was the soft, feminine graciousness of look and motion; the retiring and yet self-possessed manner with which she acknowledged the sincere and hearty reception of the spectators,—and to us—

(“Land of my sires! what mortal hand

Shall e’er untie the filial band

That binds me to thy rugged strand?”)

she had an indefinable charm—powerless perhaps on the hearts of French, or even English. She was the exact representative of “the yellow-haired lassie” we read of in Burns’s songs: a refined Scottish expression about her mouth, winning and humorous, completed the effect; and from henceforth our glove is perpetually in the ring against all comers, as champion à l’outrance of the Empress Eugenie—always saving and excepting our sovereign lady the Queen. But in the mean time the monkeys and boys were in mad career round the ring; the royalties dismounted from the carriages, and walked up a steep incline which conducted to the top of the amphitheatre on its outward face; they were received by generals and princes, and distinguished visitors of all nations—except our own; for there was not a red coat or tartan trews to refresh the eye in all that blaze of gold and jewels; and on stepping a little forward to the inner edge, they came in view of the soldiers. But the monkeys were too much for the Emperor. The spahis were in the very act of cutting off the retreat of the Bornouses, and the recognitions of the Sovereign were slight and momentary. However, like a sensible man, he seemed pleased with the applauses they gave, bowed in a very manly manner once or twice, and took his seat with no pride or state, and seemed to enter into free and lively conversation with anybody that chose.

So having commenced our inspection of foreign parts with such elevated personages, we shall proceed in our future communications to a notice of the Sciences and Arts, and any other subject which may appear worthy of Maga’s regard.

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