How to Enjoy Paris in 1842. Francis Hervé

and killing many foes with his own hand at the battle of Pavia, was taken prisoner and conveyed to Madrid. On returning to France he was received with the utmost joy by his subjects; in this reign the principles of protestantism were first promulgated and several persons were burnt for subscribing to the tenets of Luther. Francis was occupied constantly with war, from the commencement of his reign until the year of his death. He had many virtues but they were sullied by infidelity to his engagements, and his persecution of the protestants whom he sacrificed as heretics. Notwithstanding that his time was so much occupied by his enemies that a very short period of his reign was passed at Paris, he found means to embellish that city; the Church of St-Merri in the Rue St-Martin was built by his orders, precisely as it now stands, in the year 1520. The style is Sarrasenzic, much richness of sculpture is displayed, particularly over and around the middle door, well meriting the close attention of an amateur. At the same period were many of the churches now standing extensively repaired and nearly rebuilt, amongst which St. Eustache, St. Gervais, St. Jacques-la-Boucherie, of which the tower only remains, St. Germain-l'Auxerrois, etc., several colleges and hospitals were instituted, fountains and hotels erected, but scarcely any of them are now to be seen, or at any rate very few as constructed in their original form. He was succeeded by his son Henry II in 1547, who like his predecessors was constantly occupied with war, but gained one point, that of taking the last place which the English retained in France, being Calais, which surrendered to the Duke de Guise; after a reign of thirteen years Henry was killed at a tournament held in the Rue St-Antoine, by Montgomery, the captain of his guard. The cruelties of which he was guilty towards the protestants entirely eclipse whatever good qualities he possessed, which principally consisted in desperate courage with extraordinary prowess; he was also zealous in his friendships. According to Dulaure, that part of the Louvre which is the oldest, was built by Henry II from the design of Pierre Lescot. I have found other authors attribute the erection of a portion of the Louvre to Francis, but it appears that his son had all pulled down which was then standing, and had it built as it now remains, except the wing in which the pictures are exhibited, which is of a more recent date, and was not terminated until the time of Louis XIV. The augmentation of some few colleges and hospitals were the only acts of this reign from which any advantages to Paris were derived.

      In 1559, at the age of sixteen, Francis II ascended the throne; his name is familiar to us as the first husband of the unfortunate Mary, Queen of Scots; his mother, Catherine de Medici, of infamous memory, took the reigns of government in her hands and wreaked all her fury upon the protestants. Francis, too young to have displayed any decided tone of character, expired in 1560; the persecution of the huguenots, as the followers of the Reformed Church were styled, seems to have exclusively occupied the whole time during this short reign, therefore no attention was devoted to the improving of Paris, which was next brought under the dominion of the young monster, Charles IX, or rather the continued reign of his sanguinary mother, Catherine, he being but ten years of age. The massacre of the night of St. Bartholomew is known to all. Charles certainly had some revulsive feelings on the subject, and several times would have given orders to stop it, but Catherine bade him assert the claims of heaven, and be the noble instrument of its vengeance, "Go on, then," exclaimed the King, "and let none remain to reproach me with the deed," and after all, when daylight appeared, he placed himself at a window of the Louvre, which overlooks the Seine, and with a carbine he fired at the unfortunate fugitives who tried to save themselves by swimming across the river. In his reign was built the Tuileries, he himself laying the first stone; it was intended for the Queen Mother, but Catherine did not inhabit it long, her conscience not permitting her to enjoy repose anywhere. Charles died a few months after the dreadful massacre of the protestants, a prey to all the pangs of remorse, and was succeeded in 1574 by his brother Henry III. Brought up in the same pernicious school, under the same infamous mother as his predecessor, little could be hoped from such a being; he was inclined, however, to be somewhat more tolerant than his brother, but was frightened into persecuting the protestants; his mother died at the age of seventy, goaded by the consciousness of the crimes she had committed; civil war raged during the reign of Henry, and he was obliged to quit his capital and join the protestants, whom he soon, however, betrayed; without energy to adopt any certain line of conduct, he balanced between the two parties of catholics and protestants, until both sects despised him, and at length he was stabbed by a fanatic friar, named Jacques Clement. Several convents and religious establishments were founded in his reign, amongst the rest the Feuillans, which was extensive and had a church attached, but in 1804 the whole was demolished, and on its site, and that of the monastery of the Capucins, were built the Rue Rivoli, Castiglione, and Monthabor, and a terrace of the gardens of the Tuileries is still called the Feuillans. The Pont Neuf was also built in this reign. In 1589, Henry IV, surnamed the Great, succeeded to the throne; he was of the house of Bourbon, and descended from Robert, the second son of Louis the Ninth. He was compelled to begin his reign by laying siege to his own capital, which was in the hands of his enemies, who defended it with 58,000 troops, and 1,500 armed priests, scholars and monks, and after three years' vain endeavours he was obliged to renounce the protestant religion, and conform to the catholic ceremonies, which produced a truce, and Henry at last entered Paris. By his mild and judicious conduct he regenerated the prosperity of France, and published the famous edict of Nantes in favour of the protestants, and acted with considerable wisdom under the difficult circumstances in which he was placed, by the intemperate zeal of the catholics and huguenots. At last, after many unsuccessful attempts upon his life, he was stabbed in his own carriage by Ravaillac, a religious fanatic, who conceived that the King was not sufficiently zealous in the cause of catholicism; he was regretted by every worthy character throughout his realms, for, although he had many of the faults common to men, yet he had such redeeming qualities that he well merited the title of Great. During his reign Paris was considerably embellished, the improvement of the city being with him a favourite object. The Hospital of Saint Louis was built by his orders, himself laying the first stone; it is still standing, and is generally filled with patients, who receive the most humane treatment. It is situated in the Rue Carême Prenant, near the Barrière du Combat. He established a manufactory of Persian carpets, on the Quai de Billy, No. 30.

      The Rue and Place Dauphine, the Place Royale, which still exhibits a square of houses unaltered in style since the day they were built, owed their construction to his mania for building and passion for augmenting and improving his capital. Several other streets were extended and in part rebuilt under his reign, besides which he founded different institutions, had divers fountains and gates erected, as well as bridges, and some other public edifices, which having since disappeared or become the houses of individuals, workshops, warehouses, etc., it is not worthwhile to recapitulate them, as they cease to be objects of interest. Several theatres were established at this period for the first time, the performers having merely given representations in large rooms belonging to public buildings where they could get accommodation, particularly in the Hôtel de Bourgoyne, in the Rue Mauconseil, which at last acquired the name of a theatre; but a company of Italians received such encouragement from Henry IV, that they were enabled, in a situation assigned them regularly, to establish a theatre in the Hôtel d'Argent, Rue de la Poterie, corner of the Rue de la Verrerie. He was equally the patron of literature, and of the arts and sciences; the Tuileries and Louvre, under his directions, received the material and superintendence which was requisite for their completion, as far as the design extended at that epoch.