Our aim, I repeat, is therefore simply to continue in a few walks, which we will try to render as attractive as possible, the search for documents which, alas! are disappearing more and more every day. We will divide Paris into three great sections--the old City and the Isle of St. Louis; the left bank of the Seine; the right bank of the same river. After the document written or pencilled, the living document, or at least what remains of it. This volume "Nooks and Corners of Paris" is, in great part, the re-edition of a work entitled, "Sketches of Old Paris," printed only in a very small number of copies and published in 1904 with equal elegance and taste by Conard. Since then, the volume has been not only revised and added to, but new illustrations were chosen. An artist of great talent, Monsieur Tony Beltrand--too soon, alas! taken away from us by death--had adorned the "Sketches of Old Paris" with a number of admirable compositions, of which, moreover, he had been the clever engraver. We have been compelled to replace these illustrations by a series of reproductions of pictures, designs, etchings, and lithographs borrowed from private collections, museums, libraries--and our very pleasant duty is to remark on the exceeding good grace with which every one has helped us. May our gratitude be allowed to mention the names of Messieurs Sardou, Claretie, Detaille, Lavedan, Lenôtre, Bouchot, H. Martin, Funck-Brentano, A. Meignan, Massenet, Pigoreau, Ch. Drouet, de Rochegude, Beaurepaire, Ch. Sellier, J. Robiquet, our masters or our friends, not forgetting many, besides, who have lent us most precious aid. Indeed, when Paris is in question, all doors open and all hearts beat. Our task was an easy one, and, if we have not been able to discharge it better, the fault is ours alone. A suitable termination, therefore, to this introduction will be the old formula--more than ever apropos--"Excuse the faults of the author." [Illustration: THE PONT-ROYAL, THE TUILERIES, AND THE LOUVRE (18th CENTURY) (View taken from the Pont-Neuf.) _Noël, pinxit._] [Illustration: _Etching by Martial_] THE OLD CITY Paris was born in the Isle of the Seine, whose shape is that of a cradle, and of which Sauval speaks so picturesquely: "The isle of the City is fashioned like a great ship sunk in the slime and stranded at the surface of the water, in the middle of the Seine." This particularity must certainly have struck the heraldists of every age, and from it comes the vessel that is blazoned on the old escutcheon of Paris. So the City presents itself with its prow to the west and its poop to the east. [Illustration: VIEW OF THE PONT-NEUF, TAKEN FROM AN OVAL WINDOW IN THE COLONNADE OF THE LOUVRE _Water-colour by Nicolle_ (Carnavalet Museum)]