Certainly Paris thrived under Charles. The population increased to a hundred and fifty thousand, many people coming in to the town during the troublous times with Navarre and the English to secure the protection of its wall. Charles carried on Marcel’s plans of fortification. The chief point was the Bastille--at first merely two heavy towers protecting one of the city gates, but, by the time of Charles’s death, strengthened by the addition of six others so that it became a formidable fortress and dungeon. Its walls were fifteen feet thick and over sixty feet high. A deep ditch surrounded it. Its destruction by the mob on July 14, 1789, was one of the opening events of the Revolution, and so profoundly did its grim walls symbolize oppression that the anniversary of its destruction is the French national holiday. Where the huge building stood is now an open square adorned by a shaft called the “July Column” raised in honor of the heroes of the Revolution of July, 1830. Of examples of domestic architecture of this time there is still in existence part of the Hôtel de Clisson. It is now the entrance of the Archives, and, like the Hôtel de Sens, shows the lingering style of the feudal _château_. Charles was ably seconded in his civic improvements by Hugh Aubriot, the provost of Paris, who established a mallet-armed militia devoted to the king’s interests. The provost of Paris represented the king, and Charles added to his responsibilities many of those formerly attaching to the provostship of the Merchants before the king had experienced their extent in the hands of Marcel. Aubriot laid the corner stone of the enlarged Bastille. He never was on good terms with the clergy, unlike Charles, whose studiousness and piety endeared him to the ecclesiastics. On the very day of Charles’s funeral, even while the _cortège_ was making its way to Saint Denis, the provost quarreled with the rector of the University, was ordered before the bishop of Paris to answer for his misdeed, and was condemned to life imprisonment. How he escaped is a later story. As provost of Paris Aubriot lived in the Grand Châtelet on the right bank. This fortress, afterwards a prison, is now represented only by a square of the name. In the course of his improvements Charles strengthened its mate, the Petit Châtelet, on the left bank. He also installed the first large clock in Paris, that on the square tower of the Conciergerie. As a symbol of the royal power the king ordered that there be added to the seal of the city of Paris, which bore the ship of the ancient guild of Nautae, a field sown with the fleur-de-lis. [Illustration: ARMS OF CITY OF PARIS UNDER CHARLES V.] CHAPTER X PARIS OF THE HUNDRED YEARS’ WAR