The Stones of Paris in History and Letters (Vol. 1&2). Benjamin Ellis Martin
street lanterns, that came into use in 1745, served for directions to the neighboring houses, as did the private lanterns hung outside the better dwellings. Toward the middle of that century the city almanacs began a casual numbering of the houses in their lists, and soon this was found to be such a convenience that the householders painted numbers on or beside their doors. Not before 1789 was there any organized or official numbering, and this was speedily brought to naught during the Revolution, either because it was too simple or because it was already established. To this day, the first symptom of a local or national upheaval, and the latest sign of its ending, are the ladder and paint-pot in the streets of Paris. Names that recall to the popular eye recently discredited celebrities or humiliating events, are brushed out, and the newest favorites of the populace are painted in.
The forty-eight sections into which the Revolution divided the city changed many street names, of section, and renumbered all the houses. Each lunatic section, quite sure of its sanity, made this new numbering of its own dwellings with a cheerful and aggressive disregard of the adjoining sections; beginning arbitrarily at a point within its boundary, going straight along through its streets, and ending at the farthest house on the edge of its limits. So, a house might be No. 1187 of its section, and its next-door neighbor might be No. 1 of the section alongside. In a street that ran through several sections there would be more than one house of the same number, each belonging to a different section. "Encore un Tableau de Paris" was published in 1800 by one Henrion, who complains that he passed three numbers 42 in Rue Saint-Denis before he came to the 42 that he wanted. The decree of February 7, 1805, gave back to the streets many of their former names, and ordered the numbering, admirably uniform and intelligible, still in use—even numbers on one side of the street, odd numbers on the other side, both beginning at the eastern end of the streets that run parallel with the Seine, and at the river end of the streets going north and south. For the topographer all these changes have brought incoherence to the records, have paralyzed research, and crippled accuracy. In addition, during the latter half of the nineteenth century, many old streets have been curtailed or lengthened, carried along into new streets, or entirely suppressed and built over. Indeed, it is substantially the nineteenth century that has given us the Paris that we best know; begun by the great Emperor, it was continued by the crown on top of the cotton night-cap of Louis-Philippe, and admirably elaborated, albeit to the tune of the cynical fiddling of the Second Empire. The Republic of our day still wields the pick-axe, and demolition and reconstruction have been going on ruthlessly. Such of these changes as are useful and guiltless are now intelligently watched; such of them as are needlessly destructive may be stopped in part by the admirable Commission du Vieux Paris. The members of this significant body, which was organized in December, 1897, are picked men from the Municipal Council, from the official committees of Parisian Inscriptions, and of Historic Works, from private associations and private citizens, all earnest and enthusiastic for the preservation of their city's monuments that are memorable for architectural worth or historic suggestion. Where they are unable to save to the sight what is ancient and picturesque, they save to the memory by records, drawings, and photographs. The "Procès Verbal" of this Commission, issued monthly, contains its illustrated reports, discussions, and correspondence, and promises to become an historic document of inestimable value.
The words rue and place, as well as their attendant names, have been retained in the French, as the only escape from the confusion of a double translation, first here, and then back to the original by the sight-seer. The definite article, that usually precedes these words, has been suppressed, in all cases, because it seems an awkward and needless reiteration. Nor are French men and French women disguised under translated titles. If Macaulay had been consistent in his misguided Briticism that turned Louis into Lewis, and had carried out that scheme to its logical end in every case, he would have given us a ludicrous nomenclature. "Bottin" is used in these pages as it is used in Paris, to designate the city directory: which was issued, first, in a tiny volume, in 1796, by the publisher Bottin, and has kept his name with its enormous growth through the century.
The word hôtel has here solely its original significance of a town house of the noble or the wealthy. In the sense of our modern usage of the word it had no place in old Paris. Already in the seventeenth century there were auberges for common wayfarers, and here and there an hôtellerie for the traveller of better class. During the absences of the owners of grand city mansions, their maîtres-d'hôtel were allowed to let them to accredited visitors to the capital, who brought their own retinue and demanded only shelter. When they came with no train, so that service had to be supplied, it was "charged in the bill," and that objectionable item, thus instituted, has been handed down to shock us in the hôtel-garni of our time. With the emigration of the nobility, their stewards and chefs lost place and pay, and found both once more in the public hotels they then started. No hôtels-garnis can be found in Paris of earlier date than the Revolution.
In their explorations into the libraries, bureaus, museums, and streets of Paris, the authors have met with countless kindnesses. The unlettered concierge who guards an historic house is proud of its traditions, or, if ignorant of them, as may chance, will listen to the tale with a courtesy that simulates sympathy. The exceptions to this general amenity have been few and ludicrous, and mostly the outcome of exasperation caused by the ceaseless questioning of foreigners. The concierge of Châteaubriand's last home, in Rue du Bac, considers a flourish of the wet broom, with which he is washing his court, a fitting rejoinder to the inquiring visitor. That visitor will find Balzac's Passy residence as impossible of entrance now as it was to his creditors. The unique inner court of the Hôtel de Beauvais must be seen from the outer vestibule, admission being refused by a surly concierge under orders from an ungenerous owner. The urbanity of the noble tenant of the mansion built over the grave of Adrienne Lecouvreur is unequal to the task of answering civil inquiries sent in stamped envelopes. All these are but shadows in the pervading sunshine of Parisian good-breeding. In making this acknowledgment to the many who must necessarily remain unnamed, the authors wish to record their recognition of the sympathetic counsel of Mlle. Blanche Taylor, of Paris, and of George H. Birch, Esq., Curator of the Soane Museum, London. Cordial thanks are especially given to the officials of the Hôtel de Ville, in the bureau of the Conservation du Plan de Paris, to M. Charles Sellier of the Musée Carnavalet, to M. Monval, Librarian of the Comédie Française, to M. G. Lenôtre, and to M. Victorien Sardou, for unmeasured aid of all sorts, prompted by a disinterestedness that welcomes the importunate fellow-worker, and makes him forget that he is a stranger and a foreigner.
THREE TIME-WORN STAIRCASES
We are to see a Paris unknown to the every-day dweller there, who is content to tread, in wearied idleness, his swarming yet empty boulevards; a Paris unseen by the hurried visitor, anxious to go his round of dutiful sight-seeing. This Paris is far away from the crowd, bustling in pursuit of pleasure, and hustling in pursuit of leisure; out of sound of the teasing clatter of cab-wheels, and the tormenting toot of tram-horns, and the petulant snapping of whips; out of sight of to-day's pretentious structures and pompous monuments. To find this Paris we must explore remote quarters, lose ourselves in untrodden streets, coast along the alluring curves of the quays, cruise for sequestered islands behind the multitudinous streams of traffic. We shall not push ahead just to get somewhere, nor restlessly "rush in to peer and praise." We shall learn to flâner, not without object, but with art and conscience; to saunter, in the sense of that word, humorously derived by Thoreau from Sainte-Terre, and so transform ourselves into pilgrims to the spots sacred in history and legend, in art and literature. In a word, if you go with us, you are to become Sentimental Prowlers.
In this guise, we shall not know the taste of Parisine, a delectable poison, more subtle than nicotine or strychnine, in the belief of Nestor Roqueplan, that modern Voltaire of the boulevards. And we shall not share "the unwholesome passion" for his Paris, to which François Coppée owns himself a victim. Nor, on the other hand, shall we find "an insipid pleasure" in this adventure, as did Voltaire. Yet even he confesses, elsewhere, that one would "rather have details about Racine and Despréaux, Bossuet and Descartes, than about the battle of