The increase of the royal power brought about by Richelieu, and the consequent stability and internal peace of the kingdom, combined with the complete change in methods of defence which culminated in Vauban, enabled Louis XIV to =pull down the walls= of Paris altogether, and to lay out the space covered by his predecessor’s fortifications in that series of broad curved avenues which still bears from this circumstance the name of Boulevards (“bulwarks” or ramparts). The original line so named, from the Bastille to the Madeleine, is ordinarily spoken of to this day simply as “the Boulevard.” All the others called by the same have borrowed the title, mostly at a very recent date, from this older girdle. Gradually, the =Faubourgs= which gathered beyond the line of the inner city, as well as beyond the artificial southern prolongation of the Boulevards by which Louis continued his circle, with true French thoroughness of system, on the southern bank, have entirely coalesced with the central town, and at last enormously outgrown it. Nevertheless, to the end, the Paris of Louis XIV continues to enclose almost all that is vital in the existing city. Especially is =Paris within the Great Boulevards= to this day the Paris of =business and finance=: it includes the Bourse, the Banque de France, the Bourse de Commerce, the chief markets, the Post Office, the Ministries of Finance, Marine, and Justice, the Hôtel de Ville, numerous Government Offices, the principal wholesale warehouses, financial firms, and agencies, and almost all the best shops, hotels, banks, and business houses. Even the inner circle itself, again, _within_ the Boulevards, has been largely transformed by modern alterations, especially in that extensive reorganisation of the city inaugurated under Napoleon III by Baron Haussmann. In the brief itinerary which follows, and in which I have endeavoured to give the reader in two short walks or drives some general idea of the development of the Right Bank, with its chief points of interest, I shall indicate roughly the various ages of the great thoroughfares, and note with needful conciseness the causes which at various times led to their construction.] A. THE CORE OF THE RIGHT BANK