Accompanied by an English gentleman, like myself a married man, we visited every part of this Temple of Sin, and we agreed in opinion that as long as it existed it will be vain to look in Paris for any sincere demonstrations of either moral probity, decency in private or honesty in public life. The Government appears sensible of the evil, though they have taken no steps to prevent it. It is believed, and from what I have seen I do not entertain the least doubt upon the subject, that they _protect_ these scenes of voluptuousness for the purpose of enervating the minds and diverting the attentions of the Parisians from the consideration of public affairs. If this is not the case why should the legislators and the Government be continually preaching up the advantage of morality, and the necessity of establishing a national education system for the encouragement of virtue and the suppression of vice, when they receive at the same time a considerable revenue from the wages of harlots and the profits of gambling-houses? Why is a soldier stationed at the door of every one of these dens of impurity but to demonstrate that they are tolerated? There is another circumstance which is noticeable in the Palais Royale, this is the domineering aspect and conduct of the military, the airs and consequence assumed by the soldiers, and the manifest superiority they affect and maintain over their fellow citizens. Every one makes room for them to pass, the officers strut or saunter along arm in arm, the clinking of their sabres along the pavement announcing their approach warns the servile citizen to make way. The very prostitute, leaning on the arm of the large whiskered regimental pantaloon, feels an importance far above her sisters. She laughs and talks loud, and as she moves exacts from the spectators the ecstatic apostrophe: “_Eh! regardez-là, comme elle est belle!_” These things are better ordered in our country, which is at once a land of liberty and of paramount laws. The soldier, with us, comprehends the obligation he owes the laws, and while he displays the utmost loyalty to his sovereign he associates under the idea of duty a regard for his fellow subjects. I cannot conclude this subject without noticing a remark made to me by one of the founders of the French Revolution, an ex-Bishop and now a member of the Senate. The thing [said he] which gives me most pleasure in your English institutions is the general appearance of moral conduct that everywhere prevails, the astonishing observance of Sunday and holy days, the respect for religion, and the orderly and unaffected manners of your soldiers, who are neither insolent nor consequential, but who seem to feel they are neither masters nor slaves. XIV EXCURSION TO VERSAILLES