The inauguration of this last built portion of the palace was held on August 14, 1857, the occasion being celebrated by a banquet given by Napoleon III to all the architects, artists and labourers who had been engaged upon the work. In the same Salle, two years later, which took the name of Salle des Etats, the emperor gave a _diner de gala_ to the generals returning from the Italian campaign. Still further resume of fact with regard to the main body of the Louvre, as well as with respect to its individual components, will open never-ending vistas and pageants. It is not possible in a chapter, a book or a five-foot shelf to limn all that is even of cursory interest. The well-known, the little-known and the comparatively unknown mingle in varying proportions, according to the individual mood or attitude. To some the appeal will lie in the vastness of the fabric, to others in the varied casts of characters which have played upon its stage, still others will be impressed with the dramatic incidents, and many more will retain only present-day memories of what they have themselves seen. The Louvre is a study of a lifetime. To resume a none too complete chronology, it is easy to recall the following important events which have taken place in the Louvre since the days of Henri III, the period at which only the barest beginnings of the present structure had been projected. In 1591 a ghastly procedure took place when four members of the Conseil des Seize were hung in the Salle des Caryatides by orders of the Duc de Mayenne. Like the horoscope which foretold the death of Henri III, another royal prophecy was cast in 1610 that reminds one of that which perhaps had not a little to do with the making away with the last of the Valois princes. The Duc de Vendome, the son of Henri IV by Gabrielle d'Estrees, handed the king a documentary horoscope signed by an astrologer calling himself La Brosse, which warned the king that he would run a great danger on May 14 in case he went abroad. "La Brosse is an ass," cried the king, and crumpled the paper beneath his feet. On the day in question the king started out to visit his minister, Sully, at the Arsenal. It was then in turning from the Rue Saint Honore into the Rue de la Ferroniere that the royal coach, frequently blocked by crowds, offered the opportunity to the assassin Ravaillac, who, jumping upon the footboard, stabbed the king twice in the breast.