Paris, From the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 2Walton, William
History
Paris, From the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 2
Walton, William
Paris (France) -- Description and travel; Paris (France) -- History
Before 1826, the entrance to the Conciergerie was from the grand
court-yard, the Cour du Mai, to the right and at the foot of the grand
stairway. This entrance, with its iron railings, still exists, it now
gives access to the Tribunal de Simple Police, and through it the
multitude of victims, illustrious and obscure, of the Revolution and the
Terror, issued to take their places in the cart for the guillotine. This
doorway was walled up in 1826, and the entrance to the prison is now
on the Quai de l'Horloge, near the tower of Cæsar. It was at this latter
date that the Conciergerie was transformed into a modern prison, with
the _régime cellulaire_. In the course of this transformation, the
ancient dungeons in which had been confined so many eminent historical
personages disappeared; to-day there can be seen only the cell of
Marie-Antoinette, which now communicates with that of Robespierre, and
the latter with the Salle des Girondins. The apartment of the unhappy
queen was transformed into a chapel in 1816. Of the original furniture
of her cell, there now remains, it is said, the little lamp hanging from
the ceiling, and the ivory crucifix which she kissed before mounting the
scaffold. As to the arm-chair in which she sat, it was prudently removed
some years ago to his office by one of the directors of the
Conciergerie, to protect it from the ravages of the tourists of all
nations who were gradually carrying it away piecemeal. This apartment of
the prison can be visited on Thursdays by securing a permit from the
Préfecture de Police. The grande salle which was the prison of the
priests and royalists during the Terror, and in which the Girondins
passed their last night, is now the chapel of the Conciergerie. Through
the little door at the left the latter passed on their way to the
scaffold, and in this court-yard took place the massacres of September.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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