“Since the auctioning of Cagliostro’s effects the gloomy house of the Rue St. Claude has had no history. Ah, but I am mistaken. In 1855 some repairs were made. The old carriage door was removed, and the one that took its place was taken from the ruins of the Temple. There it stands today with its great bolts and immense locks. The door of the prison of Louis XVI. closes the house of Cagliostro.” M. de Ricaudy verifies this statement about the door of the mansion. The student of Parisian archæology will do well to consult M. de Ricaudy, as well as M. Labreton, 93 Boulevard Beaumarchais, who possesses forty volumes relating to the history of the Marais Quarter. Last but not least is the indefatigable student of ancient landmarks of Paris, M. G. Lenôtre, author of _Paris révolutionnaire, vieilles maisons, vieux papiers, 1re série_. My friend, M. Félicien Trewey, who visited the place in the summer of 1901, at my request, reported to me that it had been converted into a commercial establishment. The salons were cut up into small apartments. The laboratories and the _chambre égyptienne_ where the great sorcerer held his séances were no more. A grocer, a feather curler, and a manufacturer of cardboard boxes occupied the building, oblivious of the fact that the world-renowned Cagliostro once lived there, plying his trade of sorcerer, mesmerist, physician, and mason, like a true _chevalier d’industrie_. Alas! the history of these old mansions! They {83} have their days of splendid prosperity, followed by shabby gentility and finally by sordid decay,—battered, blear-eyed, and repulsive looking. According to Henri d’Almeras (_Cagliostro, et la franc-maconnerie et l’occultisme au XVIIIe siècle_), Cagliostro’s apartment on the second floor of the house was occupied in the year 1904 by a watchmaker. Two famous watchmakers became conjurers, one after having read an old book on natural magic, the other after having seen a performance of the Davenport Brothers. I allude to Robert-Houdin and Jno. Nevil Maskelyne. Watchmaking leads naturally to the construction of automata and magical illusions. The young horologist of the Rue Saint Claude has every excuse to become a prestidigitateur. He works in an atmosphere of necromancy in that old house haunted by its memories of the past. If this does not influence him to enter the magic circle, nothing else will.