[Footnote: From "Walks in Paris." By arrangement with the publisher, David McKay. Copyright, 1880.]
Englishmen are often specially imprest with Paris as a city of contrasts, because one side of the principal line of hotels frequented by our countrymen looks down upon the broad, luxurious Rue de Rivoli, all modern gaiety and radiance, while the other side of their courtyards open upon the busy working Rue St. Honoré, lined by the tall, many-windowed houses which have witnessed so many revolutions. They have all the picturesqueness of innumerable balconies, high, slated roofs, with dormer windows, window-boxes full of carnations and bright with crimson flowers through the summer, and they overlook an ever-changing crowd, in great part composed of men in blouses and women in white aprons and caps.
Ever since the fourteenth century the Rue St. Honoré has been one of the busiest streets in Paris. It was the gate leading into this street which was attacked by Jeanne d'Arc in 1429. It was the fact that the Cardinal de Bourbon and the Due de Guise had been seen walking together at the Porte St. Honoré that was said to have turned half the moustache of Henri of Navarre suddenly white, from a presentiment of the crime which has become known as the Massacre of St. Bartholomew. Here, in 1648, the barricade was raised which gave the signal for all the troubles of the Fronde. It was at No 3--then called L'Auberge des Trois Pigeons--that Ravaillac was lodging when he was waiting to murder Henry IV.; here the first gun was fired in the Revolution of July, 1830, which overturned Charles X.; and here, in the Revolution of 1848, a bloody combat took place between the insurgents and the military. Throughout this street, as Marie Antoinette was first entering Paris, the poissardes brought her bouquets, singing:
"La rose est la reine des fleurs.Antoinette est la reine des coeurs."
("The rose is the queen of flowers, Antoinette is the queen of hearts") and here, as she was being taken to the scaffold, they crowded round her execution-cart and shouted:
"Madame Veto avait promisDe faire égorger tout Paris,Mais son coup a manquéGrâce à nos canonniers;Dansons la carmagnoleAu bruit du sonDu canon!"
("Madame Veto had promised to have the throat cut of all Paris, but her attempt failed, thanks to our gunners. Let us dance the carmagnole to the music of the cannon's roar!")
Turning east toward Old Paris, we pass, on the right of the Rue St. Honoré, the Church of St. Roch, of which Louis XIV. laid the foundation- stone in 1633, replacing a chapel built on the site of the Hôtel Gaillon. The church was only finished, from designs of Robert de Cotte, in 1740. The flight of steps which leads to the entrance has many associations.
"Before St. Roch," says De Goncourt, "the tumbrel in which was Marie Antoinette, stopt in the midst of howling and hooting. A thousand insults were hurled from the steps of the church as it were with one voice, saluting with filth their queen about to die. She, however, serene and majestic, pardoned the insults by disregarding them." It was from these steps, in front of which an open space then extended to the Tuileries gardens, that Bonaparte ordered the first cannon to be fired upon the royalists who rose against the National Convention, and thus prevented a counter-revolution. Traces of this cannonade of 13 Vendémiaire are still to be seen at the angle of the church and the Rue Neuve St. Roch.
[Footnote: From "The Paris Sketch Book."]
You pass from the railroad station through a long, lonely suburb, with dusty rows of stunted trees on either side, and some few miserable beggars, idle boys, and ragged old women under them. Behind the trees are gaunt, moldy houses; palaces once, where (in the days of the unbought grace of life) the cheap defense of nations gambled, ogled, swindled, intrigued; whence high-born duchesses used to issue, in old times, to act as chambermaids to lovely Du Barri; and mighty princes rolled away, in gilt caroches, hot for the honor of lighting his Majesty to bed, or of presenting his stockings when he rose, or of holding his napkin when he dined.
Tailors, chandlers, tinmen, wretched hucksters, and greengrocers, are now established in the mansions of the old peers; small children are yelling at the doors, with mouths besmeared with bread and treacle; damp rags are hanging out of every one of the windows, steaming in the sun; oyster- shells, cabbage-stalks, broken crockery, old papers, lie basking in the same cheerful light. A solitary water-cart goes jingling down the wide pavement, and spirts a feeble refreshment over the dusty, thirty stones.
After pacing for some time through such dismal streets, we déboucher on the grande place; and before us lies the palace dedicated to all the glories of France. In the midst of the great lonely plain this famous residence of King Louis looks low and mean--Honored pile! Time was when tall musketeers and gilded body-guards allowed none to pass the gate. Fifty years ago, ten thousand drunken women from Paris broke through the charm; and now a tattered commissioner will conduct you through it for a penny, and lead you up to the sacred entrance of the palace.
We will not examine all the glories of France, as here they are portrayed in pictures and marble; catalogs are written about these miles of canvas, representing all the revolutionary battles, from Valmy to Waterloo--all the triumphs of Louis XIV.--all the mistresses of his successor--and all the great men who have flourished since the French empire began. Military heroes are most of these--fierce constables in shining steel, marshals in voluminous wigs, and brave grenadiers in bearskin caps; some dozens of whom gained crowns, principalities, dukedoms; some hundreds, plunder and epaulets; some millions, death in African sands, or in icy Russian plains, under the guidance, and for the good, of that arch-hero, Napoleon.
By far the greater part of "all the glories" of France (as of most other countries) is made up of these military men: and a fine satire it is on the cowardice of mankind, that they pay such an extraordinary homage to the virtue called courage; filling their history-books with tales about it, and nothing but it.
Let them disguise the place, however, as they will, and plaster the walls with bad pictures as they please, it will be hard to think of any family but one, as one traverses this vast gloomy edifice. It has been humbled to the ground, as a certain palace of Babel was of yore; but it is a monument of fallen pride, not less awful, and would afford matter for a whole library of sermons.
The cheap defense of nations expended a thousand millions in the erection of this magnificent dwelling-place. Armies were employed, in the intervals of their warlike labors, to level hills, or pile them up; to turn rivers, and to build aqueducts, and transplant woods, and construct smooth terraces, and long canals. A vast garden grew up in a wilderness, and a stupendous palace in the garden, and a stately city round the palace: the city was peopled with parasites, who daily came to do worship before the creator of these wonders--the Great King.
"Only God is great," said courtly Massillon; but next to him, as the prelate thought, was certainly Louis, his vicegerent here upon earth-- God's lieutenant-governor of the world--before whom courtiers used to fall on their knees, and shade their eyes, as if the light of his countenance, like the sun, which shone supreme in heaven, the type of him, was too dazzling to bear.
Did ever the sun shine upon such a king before, in such a palace?--or, rather, did such a king ever shine upon the sun? When Majesty came out of his chamber, in the midst of his super-human splendors, viz., in his cinnamon-colored coat, embroidered with diamonds; his pyramon of a wig; his red-heeled shoes, that lifted him four inches from the ground, "that he scarcely seemed to touch;" when he came out, blazing upon the dukes and duchesses that waited his rising--what could the latter do but cover their eyes, and wink, and tremble? And did he not himself believe, as he stood there, on his high heels, under his ambrosial periwig, that there was something in him more than man--something above Fate?
This, doubtless, was he fain to believe; and if, on very fine days, from his terrace before his gloomy palace of St. Germains, he could catch a glimpse, in the distance, of a certain white spire of St. Denis, where his race lay buried, he would say to his courtiers, with a sublime condescension, "Gentlemen, you must remember that I, too, am mortal."
Surely the lords in waiting could hardly think him serious, and vowed that his Majesty always loved a joke. However, mortal or not, the sight of that sharp spire wounded his Majesty's eyes; and is said, by the legend, to have caused the building of the palace of Babel-Versailles.
In the year 1681, then, the great king, with bag and baggage--with guards, cooks, chamberlains, mistresses, Jesuits, gentlemen, lackeys, Fénelons, Molières, Lauzuns, Bossuets, Villars, Villeroys, Louvois, Colberts-- transported himself to his new palace: the old one being left for James of England and Jaquette his wife, when their time should come. And when the time did come, and James sought his brother's kingdom, it is on record that Louis hastened to receive and console him, and promised to restore, incontinently, those islands from which the canaille had turned him.
Between brothers such a gift was a trifle; and the courtiers said to one another reverently, "The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool." There was no blasphemy in the speech; on the contrary, it was gravely said, by a faithful believing man, who thought it no shame to the latter to compare his Majesty with God Almighty.
Indeed, the books of the time will give one a strong idea how general was this Louis-worship. I have just been looking at one which was written by an honest Jesuit and protégé of Père la Chaise, who dedicates it to the august Infants of France, which does, indeed, go almost as far in print. He calls our famous monarch "Louis le Grand: 1, l'invincible; 2, le sage; 3, le conquérant; 4, la merveille de son siècle; 5, la terreur de ses ennemis; 6, l'amour de ses peuples; 7, l'arbitre de la paix et de la guerre; 8, l'admiration de l'univers; 9, et digne d'en être le maître; 10, le modèle d'un héros achevè; 11, digne de l'immortalité, et de la vénération de tous les siècles!"
A pretty Jesuit declaration, truly, and a good, honest judgment upon the great king! In 30 years more: 1. The invincible had been beaten a vast number of times. 2. The sage was the puppet of an artful old woman, who was the puppet of more artful priests. 3. The conqueror had quite forgotten his early knack of conquering. 5. The terror of his enemies (for 4, the marvel of his age, we pretermit, it being a loose term, that may apply to any person or thing) was now terrified by his enemies in turn. 6. The love of his people was as heartily detested by them as scarcely any other monarch, not even his great-grandson, has been, before or since. 7. The arbiter of peace and war was fain to send superb ambassadors to kick their heels in Dutch shopkeepers' antechambers. 8. Is again a general term. 9. The man fit to be master of the universe was scarcely master of his own kingdom. 10. The finished hero was all but finished, in a very commonplace and vulgar way. And, 11, the man worthy of immortality was just at the point of death, without a friend to soothe or deplore him; only withered old Maintenon to utter prayers at his bedside, and croaking Jesuit to prepare him, with heavens knows what wretched tricks and mummeries, for his appearance in that Great Republic that lies on the other side of the grave. In the course of his fourscore splendid miserable years, he never had but one friend, and he ruined and left her. Poor La Vallière, what a sad tale is yours!...
While La Vallière's heart is breaking, the model of a finished hero is yawning; as, on such paltry occasions, a finished hero should. Let her heart break: a plague upon her tears and repentance; what right has she to repent? Away with her to her convent! She goes, and the finished hero never sheds a tear. What a noble pitch of stoicism to have reached! Our Louis was so great, that the little woes of mean people were beyond him; his friends died, his mistresses left him; his children, one by one, were cut off before his eyes, and great Louis is not moved in the slightest degree! As how, indeed, should a god be moved?...
Out of the window the king's august head was one day thrust, when old Condé was painfully toiling up the steps of the court below. "Don't hurry yourself, my cousin," cries Magnanimity; "one who has to carry so many laurels can not walk fast." At which all the courtiers, lackeys, mistresses, chamberlains, Jesuits, and scullions, clasp their hands and burst into tears. Men are affected by the tale to this very day. For a century and three-quarters have not all the books that speak of Versailles, or Louis Quatorze, told the story?
"Don't hurry yourself, my cousin!" O admirable king and Christian! what a pitch of condescension is here, that the greatest king of all the world should go for to say anything so kind, and really tell a tottering old gentleman, worn out with gout, age, and wounds, not to walk too fast!
What a proper fund of slavishness is there in the composition of mankind, that histories like these, should be found to interest and awe them. Till the world's end, most likely, this story will have its place in the history-books, and unborn generations will read it, and tenderly be moved by it.
I am sure that Magnanimity went to bed that night, pleased and happy, intimately convinced that he had done an action of sublime virtue, and had easy slumbers and sweet dreams--especially if he had taken a light supper, and not too vehemently attacked his "en cas de nuit." ...
The king his successor has not left, at Versailles, half so much occasion for moralizing; perhaps the neigbhboring Parc aux Cerfs would afford better illustrations of his reign. The life of his great grandsire, the Grand Llama of France, seems to have frightened Louis the well-beloved; who understood that loneliness is one of the necessary conditions of divinity, and, being of a jovial, companionable turn, aspired not beyond manhood.
Only in the matter of ladies did he surpass his predecessor, as Solomon did David. War he eschewed, as his grandfather bade him; and his simple taste found little in this world to enjoy beyond the mulling of chocolate and the frying of pancakes. Look, here is the room called Laboratoire du Roi, where, with his own hands, he made his mistress's breakfast; here is the little door through which, from her apartments in the upper story, the chaste Du Barri came stealing down to the arms of the weary, feeble, gloomy old man.
But of women he was tired long since, and even pancake-frying had palled upon him. What had he to do, after forty years of reign; after having exhausted everything? Every pleasure that Dubois could invent for his hot youth, or cunning Lebel could minister to his old age, was flat and stale; used up to the very dregs; every shilling in the national purse had been squeezed out, by Pompadour and Du Barri and such brilliant ministers of state. He had found out the vanity of pleasure, as his ancestor had discovered the vanity of glory: indeed, it was high time that he should die. And die he did; and round his tomb, as round that of his grandfather before him, the starving people sang a dreadful chorus of curses, which were the only epitaphs for good or for evil that were raised to his memory....
On the 10th of May, 1774, the whole court had assembled at the château; the Oeil de Boeuf was full. The Dauphin had determined to depart as soon as the king had breathed his last. And it was agreed by the people of the stables, with those who watched in the king's room, that a lighted candle should be placed in a window, and should be extinguished as soon as he had ceased to live.
The candle was put out. At that signal, guards, pages, and squires, mounted on horseback, and everything was made ready for departure. The Dauphin was with the Dauphiness, waiting together for the news of the king's demise. An immense noise, as of thunder, was heard in the next room; it was the crowd of courtiers, who were deserting the dead king's apartment, in order to pay their court to the new power of Louis XVI.
Madame de Noailles entered, and was the first to salute the queen by her title of Queen of France, and begged their Majesties to quit their apartments, to receive the princes and great lords of the court desirous to pay their homage to the new sovereigns. Leaning on her husband's arm, a handkerchief to her eyes, in the most touching attitude, Marie Antoinette received these first visits.
On quitting the chamber where the dead king lay, the Due de Villequier bade Mr. Anderville, first surgeon of the king, to open and embalm the body: it would have been certain death to the surgeon.
"I am ready, sir," says he; "but while I am operating, you must hold the head of the corpse; your charge demands it."
The Duke went away without a word, and the body was neither opened nor embalmed. A few humble domestics and poor workmen watched by the remains, and performed the last offices to their master. The surgeons ordered spirits of wine to be poured into the coffin.
They huddled the king's body into a postchaise; and in this deplorable equipage, with an escort of about forty men, Louis, the Well-beloved, was carried, in the dead of night, from Versailles to Saint-Denis, and then thrown into the tombs of the kings of France!
If any man is curious, and can get permission, he may mount to the roof of the palace, and see where Louis XVI. used royally to amuse himself by gazing upon the doings of all the towns-people below with a telescope. Behold that balcony, where, one morning, he, his queen, and the little Dauphin stood, with Cromwell Grandison Lafayette by their side, who kissed her Majesty's hand, and protected her; and then, lovingly surrounded by his people, the king got into a coach and came to Paris: nor did his Majesty ride much in coaches after that....
He is said to have been such a smart journeyman blacksmith that he might, if Fate had not perversely placed a crown on his head, have earned a couple of louis every week by the making of locks and keys. Those who will may see the workshop where he employed many useful hours: Madame Elizabeth was at prayers meanwhile; the queen was making pleasant parties with her ladies; Monsieur the Count d'Artois was learning to dance on the tightrope; and Monsieur de Provence was cultivating l'éloquence du billet and studying his favorite Horace.
It is said that each member of the august family succeeded remarkably well in his or her pursuits; big Monsieur's little notes are still cited. At a minuet or sillabub, poor Antoinette was unrivaled; and Charles, on the tightrope, was so graceful and so gentil that Madame Saqui might envy him. The time only was out of joint. Oh, curst spite, that ever such harmless creatures as these were bidden to right it!
A walk to the little Trianon is both pleasing and moral; no doubt the reader has seen the pretty, fantastical gardens which environ it; the groves and temples; the streams and caverns (whither, as the guide tells you, during the heat of summer, it was the custom of Marie Antoinette to retire with her favorite, Madame de Lamballe): the lake and Swiss village are pretty little toys, moreover; and the cicerone of the place does not fail to point out the different cottages which surround the piece of water, and tell the names of the royal masqueraders who inhabited each.
In the long cottage, close upon the lake, dwelt the Seigneur du Village, no less a personage than Louis XV.; Louis XVI., the Dauphin, was the Pailli; near his cottage is that of Monseigneur the Count d'Artois, who was the Miller; opposite lived the Prince de Condé, who enacted the part of Gamekeeper (or, indeed, any other role, for it does not signify much); near him was the Prince de Rohan, who was the Aumonier; and yonder is the pretty little dairy, which was under the charge of the fair Marie Antoinette herself.
I forget whether Monsieur the fat Count of Provence took any share of this royal masquerading; but look at the names of the other six actors of the comedy, and it will be hard to find any person for whom Fate had such dreadful visitations in store. Fancy the party, in the days of their prosperity, here gathered at Trianon, and seated under the tall poplars by the lake, discoursing familiarly together: suppose, of a sudden, some conjuring Cagliostro of the time is introduced among them, and foretells to them the woes that are about to come.
"You, Monsieur l'Aumonier, the descendant of a long line of princes, the passionate admirer of that fair queen who sits by your side, shall be the cause of her ruin and your own, [Footnote: In the diamond-necklace affair.] and shall die in disgrace and exile. You, son of the Condés, shall live long enough to see your royal race overthrown, and shall die by the hands of a hangman. [Footnote: He was found hanging in his own bed- room.] You, oldest son of St. Louis, shall perish by the executioner's ax; that beautiful head, O Antoinette, the same ruthless blade shall sever."
"They shall kill me first," says Lamballe, at the queen's side.
"Yes, truly," says the soothsayer, "for Fate prescribes ruin for your mistress and all who love her."
[Footnote: Among the many lovers that rumor gave to the Queen, poor Fersen is the most remarkable. He seems to have entertained for her a high and perfectly pure devotion. He was the chief agent in the luckless escape to Varennes; was lurking in Paris during the time of her captivity; and was concerned in the many fruitless plots that were made for her rescue. Fersen lived to be an old man, but died a dreadful and violent death. He was dragged from his carriage by the mob. In Stockholm, and murdered by them.--Author's note.]
"And," cries Monsieur d'Artois, "do I not love my sister, too? I pray you not to omit me in your prophecies."
To whom Monsieur Cagliostro says, scornfully, "You may look forward to fifty years of life, after most of these are laid in the grave. You shall be a king, but not die one; and shall leave the crown only; not the worthless head that shall wear it. Thrice shall you go into exile; you shall fly from the people, first, who would have no more of you and your race; and you shall return home over half a million of human corpses, that have been made for the sake of you, and of a tyrant as great as the greatest of your family. Again driven away, your bitterest enemy shall bring you back. But the strong limbs of France are not to be chained by such a paltry yoke as you can put on her: you shall be a tyrant, but in will only; and shall have a scepter, but to see it robbed from your hand."
"And pray, Sir Conjurer, who shall be the robber?" asked Monsieur the Count d'Artois.
This I can not say, for here my dream ended. The fact is, I had fallen asleep on one of the stone benches in the Avenue de Paris, and at this instant was awakened by a whirling of carriages and a great clattering of national guards, lancers, and outriders, in red. His Majesty, Louis Philippe, was going to pay a visit to the palace; which contains several pictures of his own glorious actions, and which has been dedicated, by him, to all the glories of France.
[Footnote: From a letter to his friend West.]
What a huge heap of littleness! It is composed, as it were, of three courts, all open to the eye at once, and gradually diminishing till you come to the royal apartments, which on this side present but half a dozen windows and a balcony. This last is all that can be called a front, for the rest is only great wings. The hue of all this mass is black, dirty red, and yellow; the first proceeding from stone changed by age; the second, from a mixture of brick; and the last, from a profusion of tarnished gilding. You can not see a more disagreeable tout ensemble; and, to finish the matter, it is all stuck over in many places with small busts of a tawny hue between every two windows.
We pass through this to go into the garden, and here the case is indeed altered; nothing can be vaster and more magnificent than the back front; before it a very spacious terrace spreads itself, adorned with two large basons; these are bordered and lined (as most of the others) with white marble, with handsome statues of bronze reclined on their edges. From hence you descend a huge flight of steps into a semi-circle formed by woods, that are cut all around into niches, which are filled with beautiful copies of all the famous antique statues in white marble. Just in the midst is the bason of Latona; she and her children are standing on the top of a rock in the middle, on the sides of which are the peasants, some half, some totally changed into frogs, all which throw out water at her in great plenty.
From this place runs on the great alley, which brings you into a complete round, where is the bason of Apollo, the biggest in the gardens. He is rising in his car out of the water, surrounded by nymphs and tritons, all in bronze, and finely executed, and these, as they play, raise a perfect storm about him; beyond this is the great canal, a prodigious long piece of water, that terminates the whole. All this you have at one coup d'oeil in entering the garden, which is truly great.
I can not say as much of the general taste of the place: everything you behold savors too much of art; all is forced, all is constrained about you; statues and vases sowed everywhere without distinction; sugar loaves and minced pies of yew; scrawl work of box, and little squirting jets- d'eau, besides a great sameness in the walks, can not help striking one at first sight, not to mention the silliest of labyrinths, and all Aesop's fables in water; since these were designed "in usum Delphini" only.
Here, then, we walk by moonlight, and hear the ladies and the nightingales sing. Next morning, being Whitsunday, make ready to go to the installation of nine Knights du Saint Esprit. Cambis is one: high mass celebrated with music, great crowd, much incense, King, Queen, Dauphin, Mesdames, Cardinals, and Court: Knights arrayed by his Majesty; reverences before the altar, not bows, but curtsies; stiff hams; much tittering among the ladies; trumpets, kettledrums, and fifes.
[Footnote: From "Days Near Paris."]
The golden age of Fontainebleau came with the Renaissance and Francis I., who wished to make Fontainebleau the most glorious palace in the world. "The Escurial!" says Brantôme, "what of that? See how long it was of building? Good workmen like to be quick finished. With our king it was otherwise. Take Fontainebleau and Chambord. When they were projected, when once the plumb-line, and the compass, and the square, and the hammer were on the spot, then in a few years we saw the Court in residence there."
Il Rosso was first (1531) employed to carry out the ideas of François I. as to painting, and then Sebastian Serlio was summoned from Bologna in 1541 to fill the place of "surintendant des bastiments et architecte de Fontainebleau." Il Rosso-Giovambattista had been a Florentine pupil of Michelangelo, but refused to follow any master, having, as Vasari says, "a certain inkling of his own." François I. was delighted with him at first, and made him head of all the Italian colony at Fontainebleau, where he was known as "Maitre Roux." But in two years the king was longing to patronize some other genius, and implored Giulio Romano, then engaged on the Palazzo del Té at Mantua, to come to him. The great master refused to come himself, but in his place sent the Bolognese Primaticcio, who became known in France as Le Primatice.
The new-comer excited the furious jealousy of Il Rosso, whom he supplanted in favor and popularity, and who, after growing daily more morose, took poison in 1541. Then Primaticcio, who, to humor his rival had been sent into honorable exile (on plea of collecting antiquities at Rome), was summoned back, and destroyed most of Il Rosso's frescoes, replacing them by his own. Those that remain are now painted over, and no works of Il Rosso are still in existence (unless in engravings) except some of his frescoes at Florence.
With the Italian style of buildings and decorations, the Italian system of a Court adorned by ladies was first introduced here under François I., and soon became a necessity.... Under François I., his beautiful mistress, the Duchesse d'Étampes--"la plus belle des savantes, et la plus savante des belles," directed all the fêtes. In this she was succeeded, under Henry II., by Diane de Poitiers, whose monogram, interwoven with that of the king, appears in all the buildings of this time, and who is represented as a goddess (Diana) in the paintings of Primaticcio.
Under François II., in 1560, by the advice of the queen-mother, an assembly of notables was summoned at Fontainebleau; and here, accompanied by her 150 beautiful maids of honor, Catherine de Medici received the embassy of the Catholic sovereigns sent to demand the execution of the articles of the Council of Trent, and calling for fresh persecution of the reformers.
Much as his predecessors had accomplished, Henri IV. did more for the embellishment of Fontainebleau, where the monogram of his mistress, Gabrielle d'Estrées, is frequently seen mingled with that of his wife, Marie de Medici. All the Bourbon kings had a passion for hunting, for which Fontainebleau afforded especial facilities.
It was at Fontainebleau that Louis XIII. was born, and that the Maréchal de Biron was arrested. Louis XIII. only lived here occasionally. In the early reign of Louis XIV., the palace was lent to Christina, of Sweden, who had abdicated her throne.
It was in one of the private apartments, occupying the site of the ancient Galerie des Cerfs, now destroyed, that she ordered the execution of her chief equerry, Monaldeschi, whom she had convicted of treason. She listened patiently to his excuses, but was utterly unmoved by them and his entreaties for mercy. She provided a priest to confess him, after which he was slowly butchered by blows with a sword on the head and face, as he dragged himself along the floor, his body being defended by a coat of mail....
Even after the creation of the palaces of Versailles and Marly, Louis XIV. continued to make an annual "voyage de Fontainebleau." He compelled his whole court to follow him; if any of his family were ill, and unable to travel by road, he made them come by water; for himself, he slept on the way, either at the house of the Duc d'Antin (son of Mme. de Montespan) or of the Maréchal de Villeroy.
It was here that the Grand Dauphin was born, in 1661. Here, also, it was that Mme. de Maintenon first appeared at the councils, and that the king publicly asked her advice as to whether he should accept the throne of Spain for the Duc d' Anjou. Here, also, in 1685, he signed the revocation of the edict of Nantes. The great Condé died in the palace. Louis XV. was married here to Marie Leczinska in 1725; and here the Dauphin, his son, died in 1765. Louis XIV. delighted in Fontainebleau for its hunting facilities.
After the Revolution, Napoleon I. restored the château and prepared it for Pius VII. who came to France to crown him, and was here (January 25, 1813) induced to sign the famous Concordat de Fontainebleau, by which he abjured his temporal sovereignty. The chateau which witnessed the abdication of the Pope, also saw that of Napoleon I., who made his touching farewell to the soldiers of the Vielle-Garde in the Cour du Cheval-Blanc, before setting off for Elba.... The Cour du Cheval-Blanc, the largest of the five courts of the palace, took its name from a plaster copy of the horse of Marcus Aurelius at Rome, destroyed 1626. Recently it has been called the Cour des Adieux, on account of the farewell of Napoleon I. in 1814. It was once surrounded by buildings on all sides; one was removed in 1810, and replaced by a grille.
The principal façade is composed of five pavilions with high roofs, united by buildings two stories high. The beautiful twisted staircase in front of the central pavilion was executed by Lemercier for Louis XIII., and replaces a staircase by Philbert Delorme. Facing this pavilion, the mass of buildings on the right is the Aile Neuve of Louis XV., built on the site of the Galerie d'Ulysse, to the destruction of the precious works of Primaticcio and Niccolo dell' Abbate, with which it was adorned. Below the last pavilion, near the grille, was the Grotte du Jardin-des-pins, where James V. of Scotland, coming over to marry Magdalen of France, daughter of François I., watched her bathing with her ladies, by the aid of a mirror....
To the west of the Cour du Cheval-Blanc, and communicating with it, is the Cour de la Fontaine, the main front of which is formed by the Galerie de François I. This faces the great tank, into which Gaston d' Orleans, at eight years old, caused one of the courtiers to be thrown, whom he considered to have spoken to him disrespectfully. One side of the Cour de la Fontaine, that toward the Jardin Anglais, is terminated by a pavilion of the time of Louis XV.; the other, formerly decorated with statues is attributed to Serlio. The fountain from which the court takes its name has been often changed; a poor work by Petitot now replaces the grand designs of the time of François I. and Henri IV. Beyond this court we find, on the left, the Porte Dorée, which faces the Chaussée de Maintenon, between the Etang and Parterre; it was built under François I., and decorated by Primaticcio with paintings, restored in 1835. It was by this entrance that Charles V. arrived at the palace in 1539....
A staircase now leads to the first floor, and we enter the apartments of Napoleon I., all furnished in the style of the First Empire. The cabinet de l'Abdication is the place where he resigned his power. His bedroom (containing the bed of Napoleon I., the cradle of the King of Rome, and a cabinet of Marie Louise) leads to the Salle du Conseil, which was the Salon de Famille under Louis Philippe. Its decorations are by Boucher, and are the best of the period. It was in leaving this room that the Maréchal de Biron was arrested under Henri IV., in a cabinet which is now thrown into the adjoining Salle du Trône, (previously the bedroom of the Bourbon kings), dating from Charles IV., but decorated under Louis XIII. A fine portrait by Phillipe de Champaigne represents Louis XIII. It is accompanied by his device in allusion to his vehemence in the extermination of heresy.
The adjoining boudoir de Marie Antoinette is a beautiful little room, painted by Barthelemy. The metal work of the windows is said to have been wrought by Louis XVI. himself, who had his workshop here, as at Versailles. The richly decorated Chambre à Coucher de la Reine was inhabited by Marie de Medici, Marie Thérese, Marie Antoinette, Marie Louise, and Marie Amelie. The silk hangings were given by the town of Lyons to Marie Antoinette on her marriage. The Salon de Musique was the Salon du jeu de la Reine, under Marie Antoinette. The ancient Salon de Clorinde, or des Dames d' Honneur, is named from its paintings by Dubois and from the "Gerusalemme Liberata."
The Galerie de Diane, built by Napoleon I. and Louis XVIII., replaces the famous frescoed gallery of Henri IV. It is now turned into a library for the use of the town. In the center is a picture of Henri IV. on horseback, by Mauzaise. The Salles des Chasses contain pictures of hunting scenes under Louis XV. We now reach the glorious Galerie d' Henri II. (or Salle des Fêtes), built by François I., and decorated by Henri II. The walnut- wood ceiling and the paneling of the walls are of marvelous richness. Over the chimney is a gigantic H, and the initials of Henri II. are constantly seen interlaced with those of Diane de Poitiers.... The sixty paintings on the walls, including eight large compositions, were executed by Niccolo Dell' Abbate, and are probably the finest decorations of the kind existing in France.
The rooms usually shown last are those formerly inhabited by Catherine de Medici and Anne of Austria, and which, under the First Empire, were used by Pius VII., under Louis Philippe, by the Duke and Duchess of Orleans. The most interesting of these are the Chambre à Coucher, which bears the oft-repeated A L (the chiffre of Louis XIII. and Anne of Austria), and in which Pius VII. daily said mass, and the Salon, with its fine tapestry after Giulio Romano. The Galerie des Assiettes, adorned with Sévres china, only dates from Louis Philippe. Hence, by a gallery in the Aile Neuve, hung with indifferent pictures, we may visit the Salle du Theâtre, retaining its arrangements for the emperor, empress, and court.
The Gardens, as seen now, are mostly as they were rearranged by Lenôtre for Louis XIV. The most frequented garden is the Parterre, entered from the Place du Cheval-Blanc. In the center of the Jardin Anglais (entered through the Cour de la Fontaine) was the Fontaine Bleau, which is supposed by some to have given a name to the palace. The Etang has a pavilion in the center, where the Czar Peter got drunk. The carp in the pool, overfed with bread by visitors, are said to be, some of them, of immense age. John Evelyn mentions the carp of Fontainebleau, "that come familiarly to hand." The Jardin de l' Orangerie, on the north of the palace, called Jardin des Buis under Francois I., contains a good renaissance portal. To the east of the parterre and the town is the park, which has no beauty, but harmonizes well with the château.
Visitors should not fail to drive in the Forest, 80 kilometers in circuit, and, if they return late, may look out for its black huntsman--"le grand veneur." ... The forest was a favorite hunting-ground of the kings of France to a late period. It was here that the Marquis de Tourzel, Grand Provost of France, husband of the governess of the royal children, fractured his skull, his horse bolting against a tree, when hunting with Louis XVI., in November, 1786. The forest is the especial land of French artists, who overrun and possess it in the summer. There are innumerable direction-posts, in which all the red marks--put up by Napoleon III., because so few peasants could read--point to town.
[Footnote: From "Paris."]
About six miles north of the original Paris stands the great Basilica of St. Denis--the only church in Paris, and I think in France, called by that ancient name, which carries us back at once to the days of the Roman Empire, and in itself bears evidence to the antiquity of the spot as a place of worship. Around it, a squalid modern industrial town has slowly grown up; but the nucleus of the whole place, as the name itself shows, is the body and shrine of the martyred bishop, St. Denis. Among the numerous variants of his legend, the most accepted is that in which the apostle of Paris carries his head to this spot from Montmartre. Others say he was beheaded in Paris and walked to Montmartre, his body being afterward translated to the Abbey; while there are some who see in this legend a survival of the Dionysiac festival and sacrifice of the vine-growers round Paris--Denis--Dionysius--Dionysus.
However that may be, a chapel was erected in 275 above the grave of St. Denis, on the spot now occupied by the great Basilica; and later, Ste. Geneviève was instrumental in restoring it. Dagobert I., one of the few Frankish kings who lived much in Paris, built a "basilica" in place of the chapel (630), and instituted by its side a Benedictine Abbey. The church and monastery which possest the actual body of the first bishop and great martyr of Paris formed naturally the holiest site in the neighborhood of the city; and even before Paris became the capital of a kingdom, the abbots were persons of great importance in the Frankish state.
The desire to repose close to the grave of a saint was habitual in early times, and even (with the obvious alteration of words) ante-dated Christianity--every wealthy Egyptian desiring in the same way to "sleep with Osiris." Dagobert himself was buried in the church he founded, beside the holy martyr; and in later times this very sacred spot became for the same reason the recognized burial place of the French kings. Dagobert's fane was actually consecrated by the Redeemer Himself, who descended for the purpose by night, with a great multitude of saints and angels.
The existing Basilica, tho of far later date, is the oldest church of any importance in the neighborhood of Paris. It was begun by Suger, abbot of the monastery, and sagacious minister of Louis VI. and VII., in 1121. As yet, Paris itself had no great church, Notre-Dame having been commenced some 50 years later. The earliest part of Suger's building is in the Romanesque style; it still retains the round Roman arch and many other Roman constructive features. During the course of the 50 years occupied in building the Basilica, however, the Gothic style was developed; the existing church therefore exhibits both Romanesque and Gothic work, with transitional features between the two, which add to its interest. Architecturally, then, bear in mind, it is in part Romanesque, passing into Gothic. The interior is mostly pure Early Gothic.
The neighborhood to Paris, the supremacy of the great saint, and the fact that St. Denis was especially the Royal Abbey, all combined to give it great importance. Under Suger's influence, Louis VI. adopted the oriflamme or standard of St. Denis as the royal banner of France. The Merovingian and Carlovingian kings, to be sure--Germans rather than French--had naturally been buried elsewhere, as at Aix-la-Chapelle, Rheims, and Soissons (tho even of them a few were interred beside the great bishop martyr). But as soon as the Parisian dynasty of the Capets came to the throne, they were almost without exception buried at St. Denis. Hence the abbey came to be regarded at last mainly as the mausoleum of French royalty, and is still too often so regarded by tourists.
But tho the exquisite Renaissance tombs of the House of Valois would well deserve a visit on their own account, they are, at St. Denis, but accessories to the great Basilica. Besides the actual tombs, too, many monuments were erected here, in the 13th century (by St. Louis) and afterward, to earlier kings buried elsewhere, some relic of whom, however, the abbey possest and thus honored. Hence several of the existing tombs are of far later date than the kings they commemorate; those of the Valois almost alone are truly contemporary.
At the Revolution, the Basilica suffered irreparable losses. The very sacred reliquary containing the severed head of St. Denis was destroyed, and the remains of the martyr and his companions desecrated. The royal bones and bodies were also disinterred and flung into trenches indiscriminately. The tombs of the kings were condemned to destruction, and many (chiefly in metal) were destroyed or melted down, but not a few were saved with difficulty by the exertions of antiquaries, and were placed in the Museum of Monuments at Paris (now the École des Beaux-Arts), of which Alexandre Lenoir was curator. Here, they were greatly hacked about and mutilated, in order to fit them to their new situations.
At the Restoration, however, they were sent back to St. Denis, together with many other monuments which had no real place there; but, being housed in the crypt, they were further clipt to suit their fresh surroundings. Finally, when the Basilica was restored under Viollet-le-Duc, the tombs were replaced as nearly as possible in their old positions; but several intruders from elsewhere are still interspersed among them. Louis XVIII. brought back the mingled bones of his ancestors from the common trench and interred them in the crypt. As regards the tombs, again, bear in mind these facts. All the oldest have perished; there are none here that go back much further than the age of St. Louis, tho they often represent personages of earlier periods or dynasties. The best are those of the Renaissance period. These are greatly influenced by the magnificent tomb of Giangaleazzo Visconti at the Certosa di Pavia, near Milan. Especially is this the case with the noble monument of Louis XII., which closely imitates the Italian work. Now, you must remember that Charles VIII. and Louis XII. fought much in Italy, and were masters of Milan; hence this tomb was familiar to them; and their Italian experiences had much to do with the French Renaissance. The Cardinal d'Amboise, Louis's minister, built the Château de Gaillon, and much of the artistic impulse of the time was due to these two. Henceforth recollect that tho François I. is the prince of the Renaissance, Louis XII. and his minister were no mean forerunners....
The interior is most beautiful. The first portion of the church which we enter is a vestibule or Galilee under the side towers and end of the Nave. Compare Durham. It is of the age of Abbot Suger, but already exhibits pointed arches in the upper part. The architecture is solid and massive, but somewhat gloomy.
Descend a few steps into the Nave, which is surrounded by single aisles, whose vaulting should be noticed. The architecture of this part, now pure Early Gothic, is extremely lovely. The triforium is delicate and graceful. The windows in the clerestory above it, representing kings and queens, are almost all modern. Notice the great height of the Nave, and the unusual extent to which the triforium and clerestory project above the noble vaulting of the aisles. Note that the triforium itself opens directly to the air, and is supplied with stained-glass windows, seen through its arches. Sit awhile in this light and lofty Nave, in order to take in the beautiful view up the church toward the choir and chevet. Then walk up to the Barrier near the Transepts, where sit again, in order to observe the Choir and Transepts with the staircase which leads to the raised Ambulatory. Observe that the transepts are simple. The ugly stained glass in the windows of their clerestory contains illustrations of the reign of Louis Philippe, with extremely unpicturesque costumes of the period. The architecture of the Nave and Choir, with its light and airy arches and pillars, is of the later 13th century.
The reason for this is that Suger's building was thoroughly restored from 1230 onward, in the pure pointed style of that best period. The upper part of the Choir, and the whole of the Nave and Transepts was then rebuilt-- which accounts for the gracefulness and airiness of its architecture when contrasted with the dark and heavy vestibule of the age of Suger.
Note from this point the arrangement of the Choir, which, to those who do not know Italy, will be quite unfamiliar. As at San Zeno in Verona, San Miniato in Florence, and many other Romanesque churches, the Choir is raised by some steps above the Nave and Transepts; while the Crypt is slightly deprest beneath them. In the Crypt, in such cases, are the actual bodies of the saints buried there; while the Altar stands directly over their tombs in the Choir above it.