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Old chroniclers have recorded many fanciful legends of the origin of the city, but the earliest authentic history we have is of a hunted tribe fleeing from some unknown locality, and treating with the Senones, a tribe of the Gallic Confederation, for a strip of land on which to settle. The fugitives were known as the Parisii-that is, borderers. On seven small islands of the Seine, that have now become two, these rude hunters and fishers built their village of thatched mud huts, and called it Lutetia-" dwelling of the waters." As skilfully as they knew how they fenced in their primitive citadel, and connected it with the mainland by two bridges. On both sides of the river were marshes and forests, abounding with wild boars and other game. Here they sought their prey, and on the high places now known as Mont St. Geneviève, Montmartre, and elsewhere, they reared their rough-hewn altars, and celebrated the mystic rites of their religion.

Such was the state of things when the eagles of Rome appeared upon the scene. It was on the banks of the Seine that, in B.C. 53, the tribes of the Gallic Confederation gathered in a vain effort to stem the tide of Roman conquest. To prevent its falling into the hands of the foe, the Gauls burnt Lutetia, and subsequently fled in disastrous rout before the legions of Caesar's lieutenant, Labienus. Then for 400 years the island stronghold disappears from the page of history. It is certain, however, that Lutetia was speedily rebuilt, and in an improved fashion-probably by Julius Cæsar himself. For Paris, like every other place with a history, has given up its secrets to scientific excavators, and we know that Roman towers and temples and other edifices were reared on this island, and that Roman laws and institutions were adopted. It was a Roman provincial town when Julian, surnamed the Apostate, dwelt in it, about A.D. 355. He appears to have had a special fondness for the place, which he calls his "dear Lutetia." He raised the town to the rank of a Roman city, changed its name from Lutetia to Parisia, built temples, and also a palace, a theatre, and an aqueduct, and placed the city under the government of a Roman prefect.

While Paris was under Roman rule, it was visited by Constantine and Valentinian, and several other Emperors. Its commerce was in the hands of a powerful trading guild, the Nauta Parisiaci, whose symbol still figures in the city arms. Christianity, if monkish legends err not, was introduced in A.D. 250 by St. Denis, who died for the faith on the hill henceforth known as Montmartre. Paris was in the enjoyment of Roman civilisation Fierce and luxury when, in the fifth century, the Empire was crumbling into ruins. tribes from beyond the Rhine swept over Gaul, and Paris was seized by Clovis and his Franks. Under the influence of his pious wife, the Burgundian princess Clotilde, and her friend St. Geneviève, this monarch, first of the Merovingian line, renounced his He also built a wall with gates and towers round the paganism and built churches. island. For two centuries and a half the Merovingian dynasty lasted, and for Paris it was a time of stagnation and decay. In 752, Pepin, Mayor of the Palace, seized King Childeric, shaved his head, and threw him into prison, and became the first monarch of the Carlovingian line. But the Kings of this race seldom dwelt at Paris, and did little for it, and when the puny successors of Charlemagne were ruling the remnant of his Empire, Paris under its Counts had often to fight fiercely for its very existence. Again and again the Northmen ravaged and burnt the outlying suburbs; once, in 857, they sacked the

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city; at a later date they besieged it for two years. Paris found its own Counts more efficient and powerful than the nominal Kings, and in 987 Hugh Capet was elected to the throne, on which his descendants sat for 800 years.

Up to this time Paris had been one of the smallest cities in Gaul, but under the protection of the religious houses outside, villages had sprung up, which were ultimately included in the city. Under its new race of powerful and vigorous monarchs, Paris grew apace and flourished. In the reign of Louis le Gros 3,000 students were attending the lectures in her schools, and walls were built to include La Ville on the northern bank of the Seine, and L'Université on the southern bank, as well as La Cité on the island. Philippe Auguste, who embellished Paris with many new buildings, commenced the paving of the streets, and erected new walls with 500 towers and 130 gates. Whilst John the Good was a prisoner in London, Stephen Marcel, Provost of Paris, was the real ruler of the city, and considerably extended the fortifications. The churches rang with Te Deums when Paris came into the power of the English Henry VI., when it was governed by the Duke of Bedford, and again in 1436 when Charles VII. came back to his throne. But under this monarch Paris had a very bad time of it. War and faction had depopulated the city, and now successive years of famine and the plague still further wasted it, till wolves were prowling in the very streets. Louis XI. found the city so drained of inhabitants that in 1466 he actually invited the malefactors and refugees of all countries to come and settle in Paris. But these were not the only classes that were attracted to Paris; the King encouraged art, literature, and commerce; the merchants flourished; the University was crowded; the famous schools of medicine were founded, and the first printing-press was set up in the Sorbonne. It is said that when Louis XI. died, the population of the city had risen to 300,000. Francis I. (1515—1547), the intolerant persecutor of the Protestants, promoted literature and art, and completely changed the aspect of the city; sixty new streets were added, and King and nobles vied with each other in raising magnificent edifices, and in rebuilding the parts of the city which had been laid waste in the wars. Henry II., who lit up Paris with the incessant flames that consumed his Protestant subjects, was frightened at the growth of the city, and issued an order that no more houses should be built in the suburbs; but the edict was, of course, just as successful as similar edicts were in London and other great cities about the same time.

Francis II., husband of Mary Queen of Scots, stayed the persecution of the Protestants that had raged for thirty-seven years, and was succeeded by Charles IX. Then the haughty Catherine de Medici appeared upon the scene, bidding new palaces arise at her command, and deluging Paris with blood in the terrible Massacre of St. Bartholomew. In the wars of religion Paris suffered frightfully. In 1588 it was held for six months by a Commune which revelled in bloodshed, and prefigured Communes of a later date; from October, 1589, to 1590, it was besieged by Henry of Navarre; the most loathsome animals were consumed for food, and 13,000 of the wretched inhabitants perished before the siege was raised. Peace and order were at length restored, and many additions were made by Henry IV. to his conquered capital. Although for political reasons he became a convert to Romanism, he, by the Edict of Nantes, gave peace and security

to the Protestants, a peace which continued until the Revocation of the Edict in the next reign, when the best blood of the nation was sent into exile, and a severe blow was dealt to the commercial resources and manufacturing industries of France.

Through all these troubles Paris increased in size and grandeur, and stately buildings multiplied. In 1610 Henry IV. died by the hand of Ravaillac, and Paris came under the sway of Louis XIII. and the great Cardinal Richelieu. New palaces, houses, quays, and

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bridges rose on every hand, and fortifications were constructed to include the Tuileries, hitherto without the city. The new wall crossed what was afterwards to be the Place de la Concorde to the Madeleine; its course from that point to the Seine was to have a worldwide fame in future years under the name of the Boulevards. Under the fostering care of Louis XIV. and the Queen-mother, Anne of Austria, with the great ministers Mazarin and Colbert, Paris developed marvellously; thirty-three churches and numerous other edifices were erected; eighty new streets were built, and many old ones improved and renewed; palaces were enlarged and gardens planted; elegant squares and public places were created, and the streets for the first time were lit with lamps suspended from cords stretched across the way. These cords were doomed to be put to terrible À la lanterne !" uses when "

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1, Pavilion of Rohan; 2, Triumphal Arch, Place du Carrousel; 3, Pavilion of the Library; 4, The Apollo Gallery; 5, Pavilion of Richelieu; 6, Façade of the Old Louvre; 7. Pavilion Turgot.

should become a shout of dread. After the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle no more foreign invasion was feared; the ramparts were levelled, and the famous Boulevards created. In 1652 Paris echoed with the shouts of battle as Turenne and the Royalists closed in deadly fray with Condé and the Frondeurs. The King, disgusted with civic turbulence and uproar, retired to the splendour and pageantry of his new palace at Versailles, and Paris ceased practically to be a royal city until that fearful day in 1789, when the people went forth en masse to bring Louis XVI. back to the bosom of his people. Still, under Louis XV. and the Regent, the Duke of Orleans, many sumptuous houses rose in the faubourgs of St. Germain and St. Honoré; the Panthéon and other new churches were built, and the southern Boulevards laid out, while the octroi wall and barriers were erected by the farmersgeneral of the taxes. Then came the Great Revolution, stamping Paris with the ineffaceable impress of events that will be more particularly alluded to in our description of the city and its existing monuments.

The "Reign of Terror," the Directory, the Empire, the puppet Kings of the Restoration, the July Monarchy, the "Men of Forty-eight," the Second Empire, the Prussian invasion, and the Commune-of what these did to Paris, or for Paris, we shall find abundant evidence in our survey of the fair city that seems now, under happier auspices, to have entered on a new career of prosperity and peace.

No less than sixty acres in the very heart of Paris were covered by the magnificent group of palaces known as the Louvre and the Tuileries. The latter is now a mass of ruins, but destined no doubt to rise from its ashes in renewed splendour. The Louvre, with its grand façades, pavilions, and colonnades, and its splendid halls, saloons, and galleries, still stands as the proudest monument of the ancient royalty of France, as well as of her imperial splendour in modern days. Down to the water's edge in ancient times stretched a dense forest, in which King Dagobert built himself a hunting-seat, afterwards transformed by Philip Augustus into a citadel and a group of towers. This stronghold was used by succeeding monarchs as a State prison. It became dilapidated, and although restored and furbished up for the reception of the Emperor Charles V., the result was so unsatisfactory that Francis I. determined to rear a stately modern palace in lieu of the old feudal castle. Pierre Lescot, one of the greatest architects of the Renaissance, aided by the noted sculptor Jean Goujon, commenced the work which has from time to time afforded occupation for French monarchs and architects ever since. Three Queens-Catherine de Medici, Marie de Medici, and Anne of Austria-successively lavished sumptuous decorations on the interior; Louis XIV. and Colbert built the eastern and southern façades. But the King relinquished his project of completing the work in favour of his new caprice at Versailles, and a considerable part of the building was roofless till finished by Napoleon I. His nephew, Napoleon III., at a cost of 25,000,000 francs, made vast additions, building elaborately-sculptured pavilions, and porticoes, and colonnades, until the Louvre and Tuileries formed one immense and stately pile completely surrounding the Place du Carrousel.

The historic memories of the Louvre sweep by like a stately pageant, as for more than a hundred years it remained the abode of "the gay Court of Bourbon.”

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