CHAPTER LI

THE QUAYS The quays of the Seine in its course through Paris are picturesque in the extreme and show at almost every step points of historic interest. That interest is strongest, the aspect of the quays most quaint and entrancing, where they pass through the heart of the city. Let us start from the Point-du-Jour, the “Dawn of Day,” at the point where the boundary-line of Paris touches the _banlieue_ to the south-east. The name refers to a famous duel fought here at the break of day on a memorable morning in 1743. Taking the Rive Droite, the right bank, we follow the Quai d’Auteuil which, till the closing years of the nineteenth century, was a mere roadway along which the river boats were loaded and unloaded. The fine viaduct across the river was built in 1864-65. It was fiercely bombarded in the war of 1870. On Sundays and fête-days this quaint quay is gay with holiday-makers who crowd its popular cafés, drinking-booths and shows. Quai de Passy was made in 1842 along that part of the old high road to Versailles. Some quaint old houses still stand there. At No. 26 we see a pavilion Louis XVI. No 32 is surrounded by a fine park wherein we find vestiges of the home of the abbé Ragois, Madame de Maintenon’s confessor, and ferruginous springs. Rue Berton, leading up from the Quai, is one of the most picturesque old streets of Paris. At No. 17 we find an extensive property and a Louis XV _hôtel_, once the home of successive families of the _noblesse_ and of the unhappy princesse de Lamballe, now a Maison de Santé--a private asylum. The _borne_ at No. 24 has been there since 1731, a boundary mark between the manors of Passy and Auteuil. Quai de la Conférence, arrondissement VIII, dates from the latter years of the eighteenth century, its name referring to the middle of the previous century, when Spanish statesmen entered Paris by a great gate in its vicinity to confer concerning the marriage of Louis XIV and Marie-Thérèse. Cours-la-Reine, bordering the Seine along this quay, was first planted by Marie de’ Medici in 1618, on market-garden ground. It was a favourite and fashionable promenade in the time of the Fronde; a moat surrounded it and iron gates closed it in. At No. 16 of Rue Bayard leading out of it, we see the Maison de François I, its sculptures the work of Jean Goujon, brought here, bit by bit, in 1826 from the quaint old village of Moret near Fontainebleau where it was first built. On its frontage we read an inscription in Latin. Quai des Tuileries was formed under Louis XIV along the line of Charles V’s boundary wall razed in 1670. The walls of the Louvre bordering this quay, dating originally from the time of Henri IV, who wished to join the Louvre to the Tuileries, then without the city bounds, by a gallery, were rebuilt by Napoléon III (1863-68). Place du Carrousel behind this frontage, so named from a _carrousel_ given there by Louis XIV, in the garden known then as the parterre de Mademoiselle, dates from 1662. At the Revolution it became for the time the _soi-disant_ Place de la Fraternité. On this fraternal (?) _place_ political prisoners were beheaded, while the _conventionels_ looked on from the Tuileries windows. And it was the scene of the historic days June 20th and August 10th, 1792, later of the 24th July, 1830. L’Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel dates from 1806, set up to commemorate the campaign of 1805. The large square, in the centre of which stands the colossal statue of Gambetta, known in the time of the Second Empire as the Cour Napoléon III, was covered in previous days by a number of short, narrow streets, interlacing. Several mansions, one or two chapels, a small burial-ground, and a theatre, were there among these streets and on beyond, and the grounds of the great hospital for the blind, the “Quinze-Vingts,” stretched along the banks of the Seine at this point, extending from the hospital, in Rue St-Honoré, its site from its foundation till its removal to Rue de Charenton in 1779 (_see_ p. 250). Alongside the Quai we see the terrace “Bord de l’Eau,” of the Tuileries gardens. The Orangerie reconstructed in 1853 was in the seventeenth century a garden wherein was the famous Cabaret Regnard, forerunner of the modern Casino. From this terrace to the Tuileries Palace ran the subterranean passage made by Napoléon I for Marie Louise, and here was the Pont-tournant, built by a monk in 1716, across which Louis XVI was led back on his return from the flight to Varennes. The Quai de Louvre is a union of several stretches of quay known of old by different names, the most ancient stretch, that between the Pont-Neuf and Rue du Louvre, dating from the thirteenth century. In the jardin de l’Infante, bordering the palace, here the old palace of the time of Catherine de’ Medici, we see statues of Velasquez, Raffet, Meissonnier, Boucher. Reaching the houses along the quay we see at No. 10 the ancient Café de Parnasse, now the Bouillon du Pont-Neuf, where Danton was wont to pass many hours of the day and ended by wedding Gabrielle Charpentier, its landlord’s daughter. At No. 8, built by Louis XVI’s dentist, we see a fine wrought-iron balcony. And now we come to the ancient Quai de la Mégisserie, dating from the time of Charles V, first as Quai de la Sannierie, “tools for saltmaking” quay, then as Quai de la Ferraille, “iron-instrument” quay. Its present name, too, denotes a Paris industry, the preparation of sheepskins. The cross-roads where it meets Quai du Louvre and the Pont-Neuf went in olden days by the name Carrefour des Trois-Maries, also by that of Place du Four. The “Belle Jardinière” covers the site of the Forum Episcopi, the episcopal prison of the Middle Ages, later a royal prison rebuilt in 1656 by de Gondi, the first archbishop of Paris. Its prisoners were for the most part actors and actresses. Interesting old streets open on this ancient quay. At No. 12, we turn into Rue Bertin-Poirée, a thoroughfare in the earlier years of the thirteenth century, where at No. 5 we see a quaint, time-worn sign of the Tour d’Argent, and several black-walled houses. The thirteenth-century Rue Jean-Lantier, memorizing a Parisian of that long-gone age, lies, in its upper part, across what was the Place du Chevalier du Guet, from the _hôtel_ built there for a Knight of the Guet (the Watch) of Louis IX’s time. Rue des Lavandières, of the same period, recalls the days when lavender growers and lavender dealers lived and plied their thriving trade here. At No. 13 we see a fine heraldic shield devoid of signs; at No. 6, old bas-reliefs. Rue des Deux-Boules dates under other names from the twelfth century. At No. 2 of this quay the great painter David was born in 1748. Quai des Gesvres was built by the Marquis de Gesvres in 1641. The ancient arcades upon which it rests, hidden away with their vaulted roofing, still support this old quay. The shops they once sheltered were knocked to pieces in 1789. The Café at No. 10, built in 1855, was named “A la Pompe Notre-Dame,” to record the existence till then on the bridge, Pont Notre-Dame, of the twin pumps from which the inhabitants of the neighbourhood drew their water. Rue de la Tâcherie (_tâche_, task, work) was known in thirteenth-century days as Rue de la Juiverie. This is still the Jews’ quarter of the city. Quai de l’Hôtel de Ville was formed in its present aspect in the nineteenth century, of three ancient thoroughfares along the banks of the Seine. Corn and hay were in old days landed here. On the walls of the house No. 34 we see the date 1548, and find within an interesting old staircase. At No. 90 opens the old Rue de Brosse, named in memory of the architect of the fine portal of St-Gervais, before us here (_see_ p. 103), and of the Luxembourg palace, close by the ancient _impasse_ at the south end of the church; and at the junction of Quai des Célestins, opens the twelfth-century Rue des Nonnains d’Hyères, where the nuns d’Yerres had of old a convent. Almost every house is ancient. In the court at No. 21 we see the interesting façade of the hôtel d’Aumont, now the Pharmacie Centrale des Hôpitaux. [Illustration: HÔTEL DE FIEUBET, QUAI DES CÉLESTINS] Quai des Célestins, in the district of the vanished convent (_see_ p. 303) has many interesting vestiges of the past. No. 32 is on the site of the Tour Barbeau, where the wall of Philippe-Auguste ended, and of the tennis-court which served at one time as a theatre for Molière and his company (1645). The walls of No. 22 are one side of the fine old hôtel de Vieuville (_see_ p. 114). At No. 16 we find a curious old court. No. 14, once hôtel Beaumarchais, then petit hôtel Vieuville, at one time used as a Jewish temple, has a splendid frescoed ceiling. We see remains of old _hôtels_ at No. 6 and 4. No. 2, l’École Massillon, built as a private mansion, l’hôtel Fieubet, the work of Mansart (seventeenth century), was restored in 1850, enlarged by the Oratoriens in 1877. Quai Henri IV stretches along the ancient line of the Île Louviers joined to the Rive Droite in 1843, the property of different families of the _noblesse_ till 1790. At No. 30 the Archives de la Seine. Quai de la Rapée, named from the country house of a statesman of the days of Louis XV., is bordered along its whole course by old, but generally sordid, structures, in olden days drinking booths. Passage des Mousquetaires at No. 18 records the vicinity of the Caserne des Mousquetaires, now l’Hôpital des Quinze-Vingts. Quai de Bercy, records by its name the _bergerie_, in old French _bercil_, here in long-gone days. Here, too, there was a castle built by Le Vau and extensive gardens laid out by the great seventeenth-century gardener Le Nôtre. Their site was given up in the latter half of the nineteenth century for the Entrepôts de Bercy. Picturesque old quays surround the islands on the Seine. Quai de l’Horloge, overlooked by the venerable clock-tower of the Palais de Justice (_see_ p. 50), went in past days by the name Quai des Morfondus, the quay of people chilled by cold river mists and blasting winds. When opticians made that river-bank their special quarter, it became Quai des Lunettes. Lesage, author of _Gil Blas_, lived here in 1715, at the Soleil d’Or. No. 41, where dwelt the engraver Philipon, Mme Roland’s father, is known as the house of Madame Roland, for it was the home of her girlhood. No. 17 dates from Louis XIII. Quai des Orfèvres, the goldsmith’s quay, dating from the end of the sixteenth and first years of the seventeenth centuries, lost its most ancient, most picturesque structures by the enlarging of the Palais de Justice in recent years. In ancient days a Roman wall passed here. At No. 20 of the Rue de Harlay, opening out of it, we see part of an ancient archway. At No. 2 a Louis XIII house. Nos. 52-54 on the _quai_ date from 1603, the latter once the firm of jewellers implicated in the _affaire du collier_. At No. 58 lived Strass, the inventor of the simili-diamonds. Quai de la Cité was built in 1785, on the site of the ancient _port-aux-œufs_, remains of which were unearthed in making the metropolitan railway, a few years ago. Along these banks we see the Paris bird shops; the Marché-aux-Oiseaux is held here. And close by is the Marché-aux-Fleurs. Merovingian remains were found beneath the surface on this part of the quay in 1906. Thick, strong walls believed to have been built by Dagobert, inscriptions, capitals, tombstones--the remains of oldest Paris. Quai de l’Archevêché records the existence there of the archbishop’s palace built in 1697 by Cardinal de Noailles, pillaged and razed to the ground in 1831. The sacristy and presbytery we see there now are modern. This is the quay of the Paris Morgue, the Dead-house, brought here in 1864 from the Marché-Neuf, which had been its site since 1804, when it was removed from le Grand Châtelet. For years past we have been told it is “soon” to be again removed, taken to a remoter corner of the city. The Square de l’Archevêché, laid out in 1837, was in olden days a stretch of waste land known as the “Motte aux Papelards,” the playground of the Cathedral Staff. Boileau’s Paris home was here in a street long swept away. His country-house, as we know, was at Auteuil (_see_ p. 275). In 1870 the square was turned for the time into an artillery ground. Quai de Bourbon on the Île St. Louis dates from 1614. Every house along its line is interesting, of seventeenth-century date for the most part. At No. 3, we see a shop of the days and style Louis XV. Nos. 13-15, hôtel de Charron, where in modern times Meissonnier had his studio. We see fine doors and doorways, courts, staircases, balustrades, at every house. No. 29 was the home of Roualle de Boisgelon. Philippe de Champaigne lived for a time at No. 45. Quai d’Orléans was named after Gaston, the brother of Louis XIII. No. 18 is the hôtel Roland. No. 6 is a Polish museum and library. Quai de Béthune, once Quai du Dauphin, named by the Revolutionists Quai de la Liberté, shows us seventeenth-century houses along its entire course. No. 32 was the home of the statesman Turgot in his youth--his father’s house. Subterranean passages ran to the Seine from No. 30, and some other riverine houses. At No. 24, built by Le Vau, we find an interesting court, with fountain, etc. Quai d’Anjou is another Orleans quay, for Gaston was duc d’Anjou. No. 1 is the splendid hôtel Lambert de Thorigny (_see_ p. 93). No. 5, the “petit hôtel Poisson de Marigny,” brother of Mme de Pompadour. No. 7, began as part of the hôtel Lambert, and is now headquarters of the municipal bakery directors. Nos. 11, 13, hôtel of Louis Lambert de Thorigny. No. 17, hôtel Lauzun, husband of “La Grande Mademoiselle,” in later times the habitation of several distinguished men of letters: Baudelaire, Théophile Gautier, etc. The society of the “Parisiens de Paris” bought it in 1904, a magnificent mansion, classed as “Monument historique,” under State protection, therefore, in regard to its upkeep. Nos. 23 and 25 are built on staves over four old walls. No. 35 was built by Louis XIV’s coachman. RIVE GAUCHE (LEFT BANK). We will start again from the south-western corner. Here in 1777, in the little riverside hamlet beyond Paris, a big factory was built, where was first made the disinfectant, of so universal use in France, known as _eau de Javel_. The Quai de Javel was constructed some fifty years later. Quai de Grenelle, a rough road from the eighteenth century, was built at the same period. The Allée des Cygnes owes its name to the ancient Île des Cygnes, known in the sixteenth century and onwards as Île Maquerelle, or _mal querelle_, for the secluded islet on the Seine, joined later to the river-bank, offered a fine spot in those days for fights and quarrels. In the time of Louis XIV the islet was a public promenade, and the King had swans put there, hence its name. Quai d’Orsay memorizing a famous parliamentary man of his day, Prévôt des Marchands, first constructed in the early years of the eighteenth century, was known from 1802 to 1815 as Quai Buonaparte. It extends far along the 7th arrondissement. There we see along its borders the bright gardens of the recently laid out park of the Champ de Mars, and numerous smart modern streets and avenues opening out of it. No. 105 is the State Garde-Meuble, its walls sheltering magnificent tapestries, and historic relics of the days of kings and emperors. At No. 99 were the imperial stables. No 97, Ministère du Travail. The Ministère des Affaires Étrangères (Foreign Office), at No. 37, is a modern structure. The Palais de la Présidence, at No. 35, dates from 1722. The Palais-Bourbon from the same date (_see_ p. 200). The busy Gare d’Orléans, so prominent a modern structure along the quay, covers the site of the old Palais d’Orsay, and an ancient barracks burnt to the ground in 1871. In an inner courtyard at No. 1 we find the remains of the ancient hôtel de Robert de Cotte, royal architect-in-chief, in the early years of the eighteenth century. Quai Voltaire was known in part of its course in eighteenth-century days as Quai des Théatins. It was constructed under Mazarin, restored in