Travellers' Stories, By Eliza Lee Follen
















































































































 -  Look, north from the
Obelisk, up the Rue de la Concorde, and the splendid church of the
Madeleine bounds your - Page 21
Travellers' Stories, By Eliza Lee Follen - Page 21 of 24 - First - Home

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Look, North From The Obelisk, Up The Rue De La Concorde, And The Splendid Church Of The Madeleine Bounds Your Sight.

On your right are the Gardens of the Tuilleries; on your left are the Champs Elysees; behind you is the Chamber of Deputies.

Both before and behind you, in the Place itself, you have a splendid fountain, each being a round basin, fifty feet in diameter, in which stands a smaller basin, with a still smaller above it, supported and surrounded by bronze figures of rivers, seas, genii of fruits, flowers, and fisheries, and all manner of gods of commerce and navigation, all spouting water like mad.

See the famous marble horses from Marly. How impatient they look to break away from the athletic arm which holds them! what life and spirit they show! how beautiful they are! Take one look now at the Arc de Triomphe; it is nearly two miles off, but looks very near. Now turn; and directly opposite, at some distance, you see what James Lowell calls the "Front door of the Tuilleries."

The gardens are full of beautiful children. Their mothers or nurses are sitting under the trees, while the children run about at will. There are thousands playing at ball, driving hoops, jumping ropes, shouting, laughing, merry as children will be and ought to be.

Let us take a stroll in the Champs Elysees. You have never seen any thing so beautiful, so captivating, as the scene. It seems like enchantment. All the world is here - young and old, poor and rich, fashionable and unfashionable. All for their amusement. Let us see what this group are looking at so earnestly. A number of wooden ponies are wheeled round and round, and each has a rosy-cheeked boy upon it. Here is another in which they go in boats; another in chairs. This amusement costs only two or three sous apiece to the children. The parents or the nurses stand around enjoying it almost as much as the children. Let us walk on. See that little fountain gleaming through the tender green of the young leaves as you see them in the pretty wood that forms a background to the picture. All along in the road you observe fine equipages of all sorts standing in waiting, while the gay world, or the poor invalids whom they brought to this place of enchantment, are walking about or sitting in chairs, courting health and amusement. Here is something still prettier than any thing you have seen - a beautiful little carriage that can hold four children and a driver, drawn by four white goats, with black horns and beards.

The French are peculiarly kind to animals. No law is necessary in France for the protection of animals from the cruelty of their masters. You meet men and women, very respectably dressed, leading dogs with the greatest care; and in the fashionable drives, every tenth carriage (it seemed to me) had a dog lying on the seat, or standing on his hind legs, looking out of the window.

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