At the back of the building is the wood of Vincennes, from which it is separated only by a wall, with a gate for the inmates of the asylum. In front the landscape comprises the immense and fertile plain of Maisons Alfort, Ivry, and Choisy-le-Roi. The panorama is one of the finest offered by the environs of Paris. The capricious meanderings of the Marne, with its green banks and its flower-clad islands, the picturesque hill of Alfort, the interesting domain of Charentonneau; villages sparkling beneath the sun in the midst of fields and meadows: on the horizon the smiling slopes of Saint-Maur, Créteil, Champigny, Chenevières, and Boissy-Saint-Lèger; the forest of Sénart, Villeneuve-St.-Georges--which, deserted by its inhabitants, was occupied, during the last war, in every house and every room by German troops, who left behind them sad proofs of their destructiveness; and, finally, the majestic course of the Seine, and its union with the Marne. The new establishment has been so built that from nearly every room the patients can gladden their eyes and refresh their minds by contemplating the enchanting scenery. The patients are grouped together, not with reference to their social rank, but according to the medical peculiarities of each particular case. In the first division are patients who have reached the convalescent stage, and who are quiet. In the second are the lunatics who know how to behave themselves, but are still subject to fits of insanity. The third class consists of incurable lunatics, who are nevertheless capable of obeying orders. The fourth is reserved for incurable lunatics, difficult to govern; the fifth for paralytic lunatics; the sixth for lunatics who have been attacked by some ordinary malady; the seventh for epileptic patients; and the eighth for violent uncontrolable maniacs. [Illustration: DINNER TIME AT BICÊTRE.] [Illustration: ENTRANCE TO BICÊTRE.] During the last twenty or thirty years a hydropathic establishment has been added to the asylum, together with workshops for the occupation and amusement of the convalescent. On the 2nd of February, 1866, the Empress paid a visit to Charenton, and took the institution under her special patronage. She began by proposing the construction of a department for women on the same system and the same scale as the well-organised department for men; and, adopting the Empress’s idea, the legislative body voted an important sum towards carrying it out.