Till the appearance of Mr. Loftie's History of London (2 vols. 1883), we had not a single scholarly history of our great city. But for more than two centuries there have been produced a long series of works on the topography and monuments of Paris. And we have now a splendid series of treatises issued by the Municipal Council, the Histoire Gfnirale de Paris, begun in 1865. When I was on the London County Council, I endeavoured to induce the Council to undertake a similar work for London; but I found that, with an annual expenditure of some two millions, the Municipality of London had no power to expend a penny on such an object.
With all this prodigious wealth of historic record beneath our feet as we tread over old Paris, how little do we think of any part of it, as we stroll about new Paris of to-day. We lounge along the boulevards, the quays and 'places,' with thoughts intent on galleries and gardens, theatres and shops, thinking as little of the past history of the ground we tread as a fly crawling over a picture by Raphael thinks of high art. Haussmann, and the galleries, the Boulevards, and the opera smother up the story of Paris, much as a fair with its booth, scaffoldings, and advertisements masks the old buildings round some mediaeval market-place. Ceci tuera cela, said Victor Hugo of the book and the Cathedral.
No ! it is not the book which has killed old Paris. It is Haussmann and his imitators, the architectural destroyers, restorers, and aesthetic Huns and Vandals. Not that we deny to Haussmannised Paris some delightful visions, many brilliant, some even beautiful effects. But to most foreign visitors, and perhaps to most modern Parisians, Haussmann has buried old Paris both actually and morally — hiding it behind a screen private guide turkey, disguising it with new imitation work, or dazzling the eye till it loses all sense of beauty in the old work.
Paris certainly imposes a strain on the imagination
The effort to recall old Paris when we stand in new Paris certainly imposes a strain on the imagination. When we stand on some bright morning in early summer in the Place de la Concorde whilst all is gaiety and life, children playing in the gardens, the fountains sparkling in the sun, and long vistas of white stone glistening in the light, with towers, spires, terraces, and bridges in long perspective, and the golden cross high over the dome of the Invalides, it is not easy to recall the aspect of the spot we stand on when it was soaked with the blood of the victims of the guillotine from King and Queen to Madame Roland and Charlotte Corday; we forget that every tower and terrace we look on has resounded to the roar of cannon and the shouts of battle, with fire and smoke, with all the forces of destruction and all the passions of hell — not once or twice but repeatedly for a century; nay, how the same scenes of carnage and of battle have raged through Revolution and Fronde, League and St. Bartholomew, and English wars and feudal faction fights back to the days of Counts of Paris, and Franks, Huns, Gauls, and Romans. And after all these storms, the city still smiles on us as a miracle of gaiety, brightness, industry, and culture, keeping some scar, or remnant, or sign of every tempest it has witnessed.
It has happened to us at times to stand on some beautiful coast on one of those lovely days which succeed a storm, when ripples dance along the blue and waveless sea, whilst the glassy water gently laps the pebbled beach, and yet but a few hours before we have seen that same coast lashed into foam, whilst wild billows swept into the abyss precious things and priceless lives of men. So I often think Paris looks in its brightness and calm a few short years after one of her convulsions; fulfilling her ancient motto —Jluctuat nec mergitur. Her bark rides upon every billow and does not sink. Fresh triumphs of industry and art and knowledge follow upon her wildest storm.
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