of Casimir Perrier the householders had complained of the inconvenient mode of cleansing the streets by large heavy carts drawn by three horses, which, during their slow progress throughout the day, obstruct the public thoroughfares and occasion great inconveniences, especially in the narrow streets. In the beginning of the year 1834, when the cholera broke out, the attention of the authorities was directed to sanitary measures, and the municipality decided that the cleansing of the streets should be done by contract, by a quick relay of carts of a smaller and more convenient shape, drawn by single horses; and in order to diminish the inconvenience of the presence of these improved vehicles, the contractor was allowed to collect one load for each of his carts on the overnight, which would have led to a practice similar to that of London, where the dust-carts take the refuse direct from the house without any deposit in the streets. But in this arrangement an important interest had been overlooked; the chiffonniers, who were said to have been aided and directed by the owners and men belonging to the superseded vehicles, rose in revolt, attacked and drove away the conductors, broke to pieces the new carts, threw the fragments into the river, or made bonfires with them. Unfortunately at that time the cholera had broken out at Paris. The mobs of chiffonniers which collected on the following day were swollen by other crowds of ignorant, terrified, and savage people, who were persuaded that the deaths from the strange plague were occasioned by poison. “My agents,” says the then prefet of police, in an account of this revolt, “could not be at all points at once, to oppose the fury of those crowds of men with naked arms and haggard figures, and sinister looks, who are never seen in ordinary times, and who seemed on this day to have arisen out of the earth. Wishing to judge myself of the foundation for the alarming reports that were brought to me, I went out alone and on foot. I had great difficulty in getting through these dense masses, scarcely covered with filthy rags; no description could convey their hideous aspect, or the sensation of terror which the hoarse and ferocious cries created. Although I am not easily moved, I at one time feared for the safety of Paris—of honest people and their property.” In fact the riot was one of the most dangerous that had been witnessed in that city, and it was not suppressed without great exertions and some loss of life. The anxieties which it occasioned to the minister, Casimir Perrier, and his disgust at the political use made of it, were considered to have contributed to his death. He was himself attacked with the cholera, and died a few days after. Shortly before his death, when expressing his disgust, he said to the prefet, “My friend, we are harnessed to a vile carriage.” “Truly so,” replied the prefet, “and the ways are dreadfully dirty.” The material ways of the city continued as