Interior of the Mont de Piété, Rue Capron....._facing_ 321 The General Post Office.....321 The Poste Restante.....321 The Public Hall, General Post Office.....323 The Telephone Room at the General Post Office.....324 Place des Victoires.....325 Rue de la Vrillière.....328 In Père-Lachaise.....333 Parc des Buttes Chaumont.....336 Montmartre.....340 The Synagogue in the Rue de la Victoire.....341 St. Peter's Church, Montmartre.....343 The Bells of St. Peter's.....343 The New Municipal Reservoir and the Church of the Sacred Heart, Montmartre.....344 The Caulaincourt Bridge, Montmartre.....344 In the Parc Monceau.....345 Diana of Poitiers.....348 Marshal Ney.....352 The Race-course, Longchamps....._facing_ 353 Camille Desmoulins.....356 The Polytechnic School.....357 Notre Dame from the Pont Saint-Louis.....360 A Rag-picker.....361 A Rag-picker.....364 The Boulevard Poissonière.....368 Selling Goats.....369 The Bird Market.....373 Madame de Maintenon.....375 [Illustration: PLACE DE LA CONCORDE.] PARIS, OLD AND NEW. CHAPTER I. PARIS: A GENERAL GLANCE. "Paris," said Heinrich Heine, "is not simply the capital of France, but of the whole civilised world, and the rendezvous of its most brilliant intellects." The art and literature of Europe were at that time represented in Paris by such men as Ary Scheffer, the Dutch painter, Rossini, the Italian composer, the cosmopolitan Meyerbeer, and Heine himself. Towards the close of the eighteenth century most of the European Courts, with those of Catherine II. and Frederick the Great prominent among them, were regularly supplied with letters on Parisian affairs by Grimm, Diderot, and other writers of the first distinction, who, in their serious moments, contributed articles to the _Encyclopédie_. At a much remoter period Paris was already one of the most famous literary capitals of Europe; nor was it renowned for its literature alone. Its art, pictorial and sculptural, was also celebrated, and still more so its art manufactures; while of recent years the country of Auber and Gounod, of Bizet, Massenet and Saint-Saëns, has played a leading part in the world of music. Paris, too, has from the earliest times been a centre of science and philosophy. Here Abélard lectured, and here the first hospitals were established. Then, again, Paris has a military history of singular interest and variety. It has been oftener torn within its walls by civic conflicts, and attacked from without by the invader, than any other European city; while none has undergone so many regular sieges as the capital of the country of which Frederick the Great used to say that, if he ruled it, not a shot should be fired in Europe without his permission.