Preface
Reading edition
"A thousand years ago, by the rim of a tiny spring, a monk who had avowed himself to the cult of Saint Saturnin, robed, cowled and sandalled, knelt down to say a prayer to his beloved patron saint. Again he came, this time followed by more of his kind, and a wooden cross was planted by the side of the "Fontaine Belle Eau," by this time become a place of pious pilgrimage. After the monk came a king, the latter to hunt in the neighbouring forest."
It was this old account of fact, or legend, that led the author and illustrator of this book to a full realization of the wealth of historic and romantic incidents connected with the French royal parks and palaces, incidents which the makers of guidebooks have passed over in favour of the, presumably, more important, well authenticated facts of history which are often the bare recitals of political rises and falls and dull chronologies of building up and tearing down.
Much of the history of France was made in the great national forests and the royal country-houses of the kingdom, but usually it has been only the events of the capital which have been passed in review. To a great extent this history was of the gallant, daring kind, often written in blood, the sword replacing the pen.
At times gayety reigned supreme, and at times it was sadness; but always the pageant was imposing.
The day of pageants has passed, the day when lords and ladies moved through stately halls, when royal equipages hunted deer or boar on royal preserves, when gay cavalcades of solemn cortèges thronged the great French highways to the uttermost frontiers and ofttimes beyond. Those days have passed; but, to one who knows the real France, a ready-made setting is ever at hand if he would depart a little from the beaten paths worn smooth by railway and automobile tourists who follow only the lines of conventional travel.
France, even to-day, the city and the country alike, is the paradise of European monarchs on a holiday. One may be met at Biarritz on the shores of the Gascon gulf; another may be taking the waters at Aix or Vichy, shooting pigeons under the shadow of the Tete de Chien, or hunting at Rambouillet. This is modern France, the most cosmopolitan meeting place and playground of royalty in the world.
French royal parks and palaces, those of the kings and queens of mediæval, as well as later, times, differ greatly from those of other lands. This is perhaps not so much in their degree of splendour and luxury as in the sentiment which attaches itself to them. In France there has ever been a spirit of gayety and spontaneity unknown elsewhere. It was this which inspired the construction and maintenance of such magnificent royal residences as the palaces of Saint Germain-en-Laye, Fontainebleau, Versailles, Compiègne, Rambouillet, etc., quite different from the motives which caused the erection of the Louvre, the Tuileries or the Palais Cardinal at Paris.
Nowhere else does there exist the equal of these inspired royal country-houses of France, and, when it comes to a consideration of their surrounding parks and gardens, or those royal hunting preserves in the vicinity of the Ile de France, or of those still further afield, at Rambouillet or in the Loire country, their superiority to similar domains beyond the frontiers is even more marked.
In plan this book is a series of itineraries, at least the chapters are arranged, to a great extent in a topographical sequence; and, if the scope is not as wide as all France, it is because of the prominence already given to the parks and palaces of Touraine and elsewhere in the old French provinces in other works in which the artist and author have collaborated. It is for this reason that so little consideration has been given to Chambord, Amboise or Chenonceaux, which were as truly royal as any of that magnificent group of suburban Paris palaces which begins with Conflans and ends with Marly and Versailles.
Going still further afield, there is in the Pyrenees that chateau, royal from all points of view, in which was born the gallant Henri of France and Navarre, but a consideration of that, too, has already been included in another volume.
The present survey includes the royal dwellings of the capital, those of the faubourgs and the outlying districts far enough from town to be recognized as in the country, and still others as remote as Rambouillet, Chantilly and Compiègne. All, however, were intimately connected with the life of the capital in the mediæval and Renaissance days, and together form a class distinct from any other monumental edifices which exist, or ever have existed, in France.
Mere historic fact has been subordinated as far as possible to a recital of such picturesque incidents of the life of contemporary times as the old writers have handed down to us, and a complete chronological review has in no manner been attempted.
CHAPTERPAGE
I.Introductory13
II.The Evolution of French Gardens14
III.The Royal Hunt in France43
IV.The Palais de la Cité and Tournelles61
V.The Old Louvre and Its History75
VI.The Louvre of Francis I and Its Successors85
VII.The Tuileries and Its Gardens106
VIII.The Palais Cardinal and the Palais Royal131
IX.The Luxembourg, the Elysée and the Palais Bourbon151
X.Vincennes and Conflans168
XI.Fontainebleau and Its Forest180
XII.By the Banks of the Seine203
XIII.Malmaison and Marly215
XIV.Saint Cloud and Its Park229
XV.Versailles: The Glory of France244
XVI.The Gardens of Versailles and the Trianons260
XVII.Saint Germain-en-Laye279
XVIII.Maintenon296
XIX.Rambouillet and Its Forest309
XX.Chantilly324
XXI.Compiègne and Its Forest342
Index363
Terrace of Henri IV, Saint GermainFrontispiece
The Louvre, the Tuileries and the Palais Royal of To-day12
"Jardin Français—Jardin Anglais"15
Henri IV in an Old French Garden20
Parterre de Diane, Chenonceaux27
Plan of Sunken Garden (Jardin Creux)30
A Parterre32
Bassin de la Couronne, Vaux-le-Vicomte42
A "Curée aux Flambeaux"46
An Imperial Hunt at Fontainebleau52
Rendezvous de Chasse, Rambouillet56
Bird's Eye View of Old Paris (Map)74
The XIV Century Louvre82
The Louvre90
Original Plan of the Tuileries (Diagram)106
Salle des Marechaux, Tuileries116
The Galleries of the Palais Royal146
Bourbon-Orleans Descendants of Louis Philippe (Diagram)146
Palais du Luxembourg154
Door in Throne Room, Luxembourg156
The Petit Luxembourg156
The Luxembourg Gardens158
The Throne of the Palais Bourbon161
Vincennes Under Charles V168
Chateau de Vincennes172
A Hunt under the Walls of Vincennes174
Conflans176
Original Plan of Fontainebleau180
From Paris to Fontainebleau (Map)180
Palais de Fontainebleau186
Salle du Throne, Fontainebleau190
Fragments from Fontainebleau192
Cheminée de la Reine, Fontainebleau194
Monument to Rousseau and Millet at Barbison200
Chateau de Bagatelle204
Chateau de Malmaison218
The Gardens of Saint Cloud236
The Cascades at Saint Cloud240
Cour de Marbre, Versailles264
The Potager du Roy, Versailles270
The Bassin de Latone, Versailles272
The Fountain of Neptune, Versailles274
Petit Trianon276
Laiterie de la Reine, Petit Trianon277
Saint Germain (Diagram)280
The Valley of the Seine, from the Terrace at Saint Germain288
Fauteuil of Mme. de Maintenon297
Chateau de Maintenon300
Aqueduct of Louis XIV at Maintenon306
Chateau de Rambouillet (Diagram)309
Laiterie de la Reine, Rambouillet312
Chateau de Rambouillet316
Chantilly (Diagram)325
Statue of Le Notre, Chantilly326
Chateau de Chantilly336
Compiègne (Diagram)343
Napoleon's Bedchamber, Compiègne352
Cours de Compiègne356