About nine o’clock Barfleur arrived with his program. I was to walk in the Tuileries--which is close at hand--while he got a shave. We were to go for a walk in the Rue de Rivoli as far as a certain bootmaker’s, who was to make me a pair of shoes for the Riviera. Then we were to visit a haberdasher’s or two; and after that go straight about the work of sight-seeing--visiting the old bookstalls on the Seine, the churches of St. Étienne-du-Mont, Notre-Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, stopping at Foyot’s for lunch; and thereafter regulating our conduct by the wishes of several guests who were to appear--Miss N. and Mr. McG., two neo-impressionist artists, and a certain Mme. de B., who would not mind showing me around Paris if I cared for her company. We started off quite briskly, and my first adventure in Paris led me straight to the gardens of the Tuileries, lying west of the Louvre. If any one wanted a proper introduction to Paris, I should recommend this above all others. Such a noble piece of gardening as this is the best testimony France has to offer of its taste, discrimination, and sense of the magnificent. I should say, on mature thought, that we shall never have anything like it in America. We have not the same lightness of fancy. And, besides, the Tuileries represents a classic period. I recall walking in here and being struck at once with the magnificent proportions of it all--the breadth and stately lengths of its walks, the utter wonder and charm of its statuary--snow-white marble nudes standing out on the green grass and marking the circles, squares and paths of its entire length. No such charm and beauty could be attained in America because we would not permit the public use of the nude in this fashion. Only the fancy of a monarch could create a realm such as this; and the Tuileries and the Place du Carrousel and the Place de la Concorde and the whole stretch of lovely tree-lined walks and drives that lead to the Arc de Triomphe and give into the Bois de Boulogne speak loudly of a noble fancy untrammeled by the dictates of an inartistic public opinion. I was astonished to find how much of the heart of Paris is devoted to public usage in this manner. It corresponds, in theory at least, to the space devoted to Central Park in New York--but this is so much more beautiful, or at least it is so much more in accord with the spirit of Paris. These splendid walks, devoted solely to the idling pedestrian, and set with a hundred sculptural fancies in marble, show the gay, pleasure-loving character of the life which created them. The grand monarchs of France knew what beauty was, and they had the courage and the taste to fulfil their desires. I got just an inkling of it all in the fifteen minutes that I walked here in the morning sun, waiting for Barfleur to get his shave.