I cannot better depict society in 1789 and 1790 than by comparing it with the architecture of the time of Louis XII. and François I., when the Greek orders began to be grafted upon the Gothic style, or rather by likening it to the collection of ruins and tombs of all ages heaped pell-mell, after the Terror, in the cloisters of the Petits-Augustins: only, the ruins of which I speak were alive and constantly changing. In every corner of Paris were literary sets, political societies, and spectacles; future celebrities wandered unrecognized in the crowd, like the souls on the shore of Lethe, before enjoying the light. I saw Marshal Gouvion-Saint-Cyr[375], play a part in Beaumarchais' _Mère Coupable_[376] at the Théâtre du Marais. One went from the Club des Feuillants to the Club des Jacobins, from the public ball-rooms and gaming-houses to the meetings in the Palais-Royal, from the gallery of the National Assembly to the gallery in the open air. The streets were filled with popular deputations, cavalry pickets, infantry patrols passing to and fro. Behind a man in a French coat, with powdered hair, a sword, a hat carried under his arm, pumps and silk stockings, walked a man wearing his hair short and without powder, an English frock and an American neck-cloth. At the theatres the actors gave out the news; the pit shouted patriotic ditties. Topical pieces drew crowds: an Abbé appeared upon the stage; the audience cried, "Jack-priest! Jack-priest!" and the Abbé answered: "Gentlemen, long live the nation!" People trooped to hear Mandini and his wife, Viganoni and Rovedino[377], sing at the _Opera Buffa_ after hearing _Ça ira_ roared in the streets; they went to admire Madame Dugazon[378], Madame Saint-Aubin[379], Carline[380], little Olivier[381], Mademoiselle Contat, Molé, Fleury, Talma at the commencement of his career, after seeing Favras hanged. The walks on the Boulevard du Temple and the Boulevard des Italiens, or de Coblentz, the paths of the Tuileries Gardens were inundated with smartly dressed women: three young daughters of Grétry's[382] shone there, white and pink as their costumes; they soon died, all three. "She fell asleep for ever," said Grétry, speaking of his eldest daughter, "seated on my knees, as beautiful as in life." A multitude of carriages ploughed across the muddy spaces in which the sans-culottes plodded on foot, and one saw the beautiful Madame de Buffon[383] sitting alone in a phaeton belonging to the Duc d'Orléans, waiting at the door of some club.