With this view, I directed my steps towards the _Tuileries_, which, in spite of the immense crowd, I reached without the smallest inconvenience. The appearance of carriages of every kind had been strictly prohibited, with the exception of those belonging to the British ambassador; a compliment well intended, no doubt, and very gratifying when the streets were so extremely dirty. For some time I amused myself with surveying the different countenances of the groups within immediate reach of my observation, and which to me was by no means the least diverting part of the scene; but on few of them could I discover any other impression than that of curiosity: I then took my station in the garden of the _Tuileries_, on the terrace next the river. Hence was a view of the _Temple of Commerce_ rising above the water, on that part of the Seine comprised between the _Pont National_ and the _Pont Neuf_. The quays on each side were full of people; and the windows, as well as the roofs of all the neighbouring houses, were crowded beyond conception. In the newspapers, the sum of 500 francs, or £20 sterling, was asked for the hire of a single window of a house in that quarter. Previously to my arrival, a flotilla of boats, decked with streamers and flags of different colours, had ascended the river from _Chaillot_ to this temple, and were executing divers evolutions around it, for the entertainment of the Parisians, who quite drowned the music by their more noisy acclamations. About half after three, the First Consul appeared at one of the windows of the apartments of the Third Consul, LEBRUN, which, being situated in the _Pavillon de Flore_, as it is called, at the south end of the palace of the _Tuileries_, command a complete view of the river. He and LEBRUN were both dressed in their consular uniform. In a few minutes, a balloon, previously prepared at this floating _Temple of Commerce_, and adorned with the flags of different nations, ascended thence with majestic slowness, and presently took an almost horizontal direction to the south-west. In the car attached to it were Garnerin, the celebrated aëronaut, his wife, and two other persons, who kept waving their tricoloured flags, but were soon under the necessity of putting them away for a moment, and getting rid of some of their ballast, in order to clear the steeples and other lofty objects which appeared to lie in their route. The balloon, thus lightened, rose above the grosser part of the atmosphere, but with such little velocity as to afford the most gratifying spectacle to an immense number of spectators.