At first, one who is accustomed to the forms and movements of a sea-port feels a little disappointment at seeing a river that bears nothing but dingy barges loaded with charcoal and wine-casks. The magnificence of the quays seems disproportioned to the trifling character of the commerce they are destined to receive. But familiarity with the town soon changes all these notions, and while we admit that Paris is altogether secondary, so far as trade is concerned, we come to feel the magnificence of her public works, and to find something that is pleasing and picturesque, even in her huge and unwieldy wood and coal barges. Trade is a good thing in its way, but its agents rarely contribute to the taste, learning, manners, or morals of a nation. The sight of the different interesting objects that encircle Paris stimulated our curiosity to nearer views, and we proceeded immediately to visit the environs. These little excursions occupied more than a month, and they not only made us familiar with the adjacent country, but, by compelling us to pass out at nearly every one of the twenty or thirty different gates or barriers, as they are called, with a large portion of the town also. This capital has been too often described to render any further account of the principal objects necessary, and in speaking of it, I shall endeavour to confine my remarks to things that I think may still interest you by their novelty. The royal residences in Paris at this time are, strictly speaking, but two,--the Tuileries and the Palais Royal. The Louvre is connected with the first, and it has no finished apartments that are occupied by any of princely rank, most of its better rooms being unfinished, and are occupied as cabinets or museums. A small palace, called the Elysee Bourbon, is fitted up as a residence for the heir presumptive, the Duc de Bordeaux; but, though it contains his princely toys, such as miniature batteries of artillery, etc., he is much too young to maintain a separate establishment. This little scion of royalty only completed his seventh year not long after our arrival in France; on which occasion one of those silly ceremonies, which some of the present age appear to think inseparable from sound principles, was observed. The child was solemnly and formally transferred from the care of the women to that of the men. Up to this period, Madame la Vicomtesse de Gontaut-Biron had been his governess, and she now resigned her charge into the hands of the Baron de Damas, who had lately been Minister of Foreign Affairs. Madame de Gontaut was raised to the rank of Duchess on the occasion. The boy himself is said to have passed from the hands of the one party to those of the other, in presence of the whole court, _absolutely naked_. Some such absurdity was observed at the reception of Marie Antoinette, it being a part of regal etiquette that a royal bride, on entering France, should leave her old wardrobe, even to the last garment, behind her.