Old Paris remained, with its dirty, crowded, ill-smelling, narrow, winding streets, the hotbeds of vice and crime. Napoleon Bonaparte was quick to see that while the Paris of the future might indeed grow in attractiveness and convenience, the Paris of the present demanded his attention. Napoleon was disturbed over the condition of his capital. He realized that the city, then numbering some seven hundred thousand people, was destined to become the home of two, three, or even four millions; and he proposed to give it a splendor never before realized by any city in the world. He began to open the Rue de Rivoli, north of the Tuileries gardens; he created the Rue Napoleon (now the Rue de la Paix) in the axis of the Place Vendôme; from the mediæval bridges he swept the superstructures, adding three superb new crossings of the Seine; he built the first sidewalks in Paris, and lighted the streets at night; and he transformed the banks of the river by the construction of three thousand meters of new quays. He also gave to Paris her great commemorative monuments, the Arc de Triomphe de l’Etoile, which was finished by Louis Philippe, the Arc du Carrousel, and the Column Vendôme, all of which were foreshadowed in the designs of Louis XIV. [Illustration: XVII. THE TRANSFORMATION OF PARIS UNDER HAUSSMANN: PLAN SHOWING THE PORTION EXECUTED FROM 1854 TO 1889. The new boulevards and streets are shown in yellow outlined with red.] [Illustration: XVIII. PARIS. PLAN PROPOSED BY M. EUGENE HÉNARD FOR ADDITIONAL RADIAL ARTERIES AND AN INNER CIRCUIT BOULEVARD ON WHICH WOULD FRONT THE PRINCIPAL EXISTING ADMINISTRATIVE BUILDINGS AND MANY PUBLIC MONUMENTS. The system, involving radical cuts through the blocks and widening of existing arteries, is shown by hatched lines.] It remained for the third Napoleon, however, to accomplish the great work of breaking through the old city, of opening it to light and air, and of making it fit to sustain the army of merchants and manufacturers which makes Paris to-day the center of a commerce as wide as civilization itself. In 1853, Georges Eugène Haussmann became prefect of the Seine, the appointment being in the nature of a promotion due to the successful administration of the office of prefect in other French cities. Immediately Haussmann began a career which has established for all time his place among the city-builders of the world. As if by intuition he grasped the entire problem. Taking counsel neither of expediency nor of compromise, he ever sought the true and proper solution. To him Paris appeared as a highly organized unit, and he strove to create ideal conditions throughout the entire city. The world gives him credit for the highest success. The people of Paris have always supported those who aimed to make their city grand and beautiful. Proud, ambitious, endowed with good taste and an artistic sense, the Parisians have ever been zealous to make their city the capital not only of the state, but also of civilization.