France in eighteen hundred and two

Strangers in Paris are always recommended to visit the theatres and places of public amusements. Arts, manufactures, courts of justice, useful institutions and distinguished characters in the literary and political worlds rarely trouble. We arrived in good time to see the Easter Promenade de Longchamps in the Bois de Boulogne. This ceremony is for the time uppermost in the heads of the Parisians, it was the only subject of conversation; and every one quitted his house and shop to take a share in the spectacle. The uninitiated might therefore conclude that this favourite diversion of the public was a grand and splendid scene, rivalling the marriage of the Adriatic or the Carnival at Rome.

It is on the contrary an insipid and contemptible show, consisting merely in the procession of a long string of coaches, cabriolets, carts and horsemen; with a few boobies mounted on asses, making wry faces, and a number of Merry Andrews playing fantastic antics for the diversion of the populace. There was much noise but no real mirth.

The Bois de Boulogne has been extolled, but it presents no object or coup d’œil either agreeable or attractive. The roads are miserable tracks of sand, and the Wood (?) contains no lofty trees, it consists of an extensive copse, composed of shrubs, none of which exceed eight feet in height. There is a sheet of water laden with boats, which plain calculating English Islanders would call a duckpond.

On our return from this excursion we drove round the Boulevards of Paris. They are by far the most pleasant, neat and lively parts of the capital. Indeed, the expressions I have employed do not convey an adequate idea of their beauty and elegance. They extend around the city 12,100 yards in length, and are at least eighty feet wide, bordered by four rows of trees, which form three alleys, the middle for the use of carriages and horsemen and the two collateral ones for passengers on foot.

On the Northern Boulevards the fashionable and idle resort to while away their time in theatres and puppet shows—at Tivoli, Frascati, public baths and eating-houses; but especially at an exhibition of waxwork, so horrible and disgusting that its mere description would make the hair of the most abandoned English libertine stand on end.

I feel no hesitation in saying that I would rather a child of mine should inhabit hell itself than be a spectator of what I have seen there.

The Southern Boulevard is more agreeable and serene; it has more moral views, and though no meretricious forms render it the haunt of fashionable votaries, there is an air of tranquillity about it, which denotes the absence of guilt and the resort of innocence. This is the part frequented by the industrious tradesman and his family. There are two public gardens on the Northern Boulevard, which from the decorum observed there are justly deserving of encomium, especially when contrasted with other public places in Paris. I mean Tivoli and Frascati.

Tivoli is celebrated for its mineral waters and baths as well as its garden. The French compare its walks to those of our Vauxhall, but the comparison is ridiculous, as well compare the sun to a farthing rushlight. In the first place there are no variegated lamps. The gardens are not lighted at all except the platform appropriated to dancing.

The sheet of water is about sixty yards long and three yards broad. Upon this the gay Parisians perform their nautical exploits or promenade sur l’eau. The illuminations and fireworks are on such an inferior scale that the price of admission, three livres (or half a crown), is absolutely exorbitant. Frascati, at the corner of the rue de la Loi, on the boulevard, is the most elegant lounge in Paris. The garden is small but well lighted—along each walk are busts of the French and English poets, and at the extremity of the principal one is a pretty little hermitage, arranged with great taste. Nothing is paid for admission, the proprietors are amply compensated by the prices the fashionable company of Paris pay for the exquisite ices in the form of peaches and other refreshments supplied at no very immoderate price. There is no place of public amusement here which unites so much elegance with decency, and I was never satisfied with the fascinations of Frascati below stairs. Above the apartments are reserved for gamblers.

Chantilly, in the Champs Elysées, is a lower kind of Tivoli, a franc is the price of admission, which includes refreshments. The inferior orders in France conduct themselves with more propriety and are less riotous than the Londoners who assemble at Bagnigge Wells and the so-called tea gardens of our Metropolis.

On the other side of the water, near the residence of the British Minister, in the Faubourg S. Germain, is a fashionable walk in the Garden of Biron. But that which gave me most pleasure was the solitary and unfrequented garden of the Luxembourg. To this solitude I fled when I wished to avoid the noise of Paris. It was also a place of conversation with my friends. Here I learnt the true history of the French Revolution from personages who had distinguished themselves in that wonderful event, here I was instructed in the characters of those who now govern France; this was the rendezvous of concealed Royalists and avowed Republicans. I shall never forget the walks in the Gardens of the Luxembourg. We were too remote from the office of Fouché for our whispers to reach it, and we were too well guarded to become objects of suspicion.

The Government are now repairing the Palace, and the new Senate is to hold its sittings there. The garden will then be cleared and beautified.

There are three or four other public walks in Paris. The Gardens of the Arsenal, the Soubise and the Temple, but they are totally deserted. The garden of the Tuileries, attached to the residence of the First Consul, the Garden of the Palais Royal and the Jardin des Plantes I have not yet described. Each of these gardens has been the scene of extraordinary events and deserve a detailed account and description.