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them. As I had, however, explored them before, I can here furnish some little memento of them. The descent into these receptacles of the bones of the dead is by a staircase, descending more than seventy feet into these subterranean quarries, whence has been dug the stone for the mansions of Paris; thus, the bones of the dead fill up the empty space made by digging out the stone which housed those very bodies when living! Two millions of corpses were the estimated numbers deposited here, according to a calculation taken some years since. These bones are arranged in various modes, and regular forms: they are also divided into classes; for instance, some heaps are of those who perished in the horrors of the Revolution, indicated by the simple inscription of "Septembre, 1792;" others are the collections of ages from various monasteries; and some there are, the decaying, sickening, relics of distortions, maims, and foul diseases. Thus we walk through rows and long arcades of grinning death, and through passages so numerous, and intricate, that a black line is marked upon the whitened ceiling as a clue to retrace one's steps. This simple precaution was not taken till after the horrid death of some wretched visitors, here below, who lost their way.

There are various altars interspersed where mass is performed on certain occasions, and there are abundance of inscriptions, Heathen, Philosophical,

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and Scriptural. Over the entrance into these Cimmerian regions is this first address:

Has ultra metas requiescunt, beatam spem expectantes.*for Philosophy there are these:

and

Neant; silence, etres mortels,†

Quæris quo jaceas post obitum loco ?

Quo non nata jacent.-Seneca.

for Scripture this:

Qui dormiunt in terræ pulvere evigilabunt:alii in vitam æternam, et alii in opprobrium, §

and for Heathen this, from Virgil : ·

Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas,
Atque metus omnes, et inexorabile fatum,

Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari! ||

2d Georgics, v. 490.

The contemplation of death may lead to the better appropriation of life; the sight of death may make the yet more solemn impression; but to play with our poor remains,-to make an exhibition of our mouldered bones, all packed in quaint de

* Reposing far hence, awaiting their blessed hope. + Silence; mere mortals, nothingness!

Would'st thou know where thou shalt lie after death? Where the yet unborn lie.

§ And they who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake; and some shall go into life eternal, and some into condemnation.

Happy is the man who can develope causes, who knows no fears, nor dreads his coming fate, or doom hereafter.

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vices, and to surmount them with our grinning, chapless skulls!-this, this, is horrible. Those limbs, the only property, the little all that man can call his own, when lost to him-what cannot be another's-let the dark grave shroud, as his! How much more bitter, if here, perchance, there be exhibited the bones of those whom in life we loved, and those limbs which we may have clasped with our own!

46

Streets of Paris.

CHAPTER IV.

STREETS OF PARIS-SHOP SIGNS-FOUNTAINS-FRENCH CHARACTER, AND WOMEN-INTRIGUE-ADVERTISING FOR HUSBANDS-LIVING-CAFES-THEATRES, AND TRAGEDY—TIVOLI-PALAIS ROYAL-GAMING-CEMETERY OF PERE LA BIBLIOTHEQUE DU ROI FRENCH MANNERS

CHAISE
DRESS.

THE greatest disagreeable of Paris, at least to a pedestrian, is the want of pavement. No distinction here prevails for horse, or man: foot passengers kicking their ancles at every step, and slipping onward through mud, and mire, have no other protection from carts, and coaches, than the occasional holloa of "Gare"-" Gare ;"-they are splashed in filthy weather without mercy; and are of necessity driven against a dirty wall, or find refuge from immediate crushing by a post. Hardly any walking disagreeable can be greater than this to an Englishman, or woman—and the many stone posts which line the street, as some sort of security against carriages, are made receptacles for all sorts of filth, rotten vegetables, &c.

Yet in the Palais Royal, the Passage des Panorames, and some other few places, one may always walk with comfort, and clean shoes. At night, the streets are infinitely worse, from the very genteel practice of ejecting from the windows the contents

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of dirty basins, &c. by which one's new hat, or coat, may obtain, unasked for, a very complete, and agreeable, christening! Nevertheless, barring these, and some other, inconveniencies, I know of nothing more amusing than a walk in Paris streets. Some of the shops, particularly those for clocks and china, make a superb display, while all have a very diversified, and numerous, collection of articles; but it is the Signs that so amuse, and absolutely arrest, a stranger. This is a practice that has grown into a mania at Paris, and is even a subject for the ridicule of the stage, since many a shop-keeper considers his Sign as a primary matter, and spends a little capital in this one outfit. Many of them exhibit figures as large as life, painted in no humble, or shabby, style; while history, sacred, and classical, religion, the stage, &c. furnish subjects. You may see the Horatii and Curiatii-a scene from the Fourberies de Scapin of Moliere-a group of French soldiers with the inscription" A la valeur des soldats François," or a group of children inscribed—“ A la reunion des bons enfans: "—or, “ à la Baigneuse," depicting a beautiful nymph just issuing from the bath :-or, "à la Somnambule," a pretty girl walking in her sleep, and night dress, and followed by her gallant.

In ludicrous things a barber will write under his sign

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