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PARIS—MIDNIGHT TO 1 A.M. · Around the Clock in Europe : A Travel Sequence

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  Section twelve of Around the Clock in Europe a Travel Sequence. This is a
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  LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information
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  or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org. Around the Clock in Europe
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  a Travel Sequence by Charles fish Howell. Paris midnight to one a m Like
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  a practiced coquette. Paris, the world's enchanteresse reserves for the supreme moments of
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  midnight, her rarest resources of gaiety and charm. Her last laughs are her
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  best and decidedly. She is dangerous when laughing, beyond question. Her glowing
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  eyes at midnight are wonderfully sweet and beguiling. And hers is the skill to
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  touch the bright hours with the most delectable couleur de rose. There is satisfaction
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  for each desire. Woodmosieur sup the most amazing cuisine in the world, awaits
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  your pleasure. A woodmosieur stroll the sparkling lights and rustling trees of the fairest
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  of boulevards, fairly drag you their way? Would he drive you? Raise
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  your hand? A fiacre dashes up, and soon the bois and a chance
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  elize cool scented dewy receive you gladly to their enchanting retreats. Or would he
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  join a revel just a little one cabaret, cafe, chantan bal publique were
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  designed for no other purpose. Would we look on at life garrison vite and
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  demitas in sour la terase, and heart could not ask for a matter merrier,
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  more absorbing spectacle than that which will whirl and surge by the very edge
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  of your little round table. A monsieur has a fancy for nature and solitude,
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  mon dieu, and said to Na regennand sailui la may, and you
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  will find nowhere gardens lovelier than those of the Tuillieri, elegant with statues and
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  carpeted with flowers. Thus, at every point the charmer winds what is left
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  but surrender. She seems the very queen of heart's desire. Of course,
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  the night side of Paris is her most trivial side, But then visitors have
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  always refused to take her seriously at any time, no matter how many wonderful
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  achievements have been crying out to them all day, that this is one of
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  the most extraordinary and advanced communities to be found. Anywhere on the face of
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  the earth. Still they stubbornly cling to the conviction that all is frivolity here,
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  and that night is Paris's supreme period and pleasure. Seeking her most conspicuous
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  and characteristic role. Accustomed to the droll ideas of foreigners and bothering little about
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  them except to find occasional amusement, Paris shrugs her shoulders in indifference and turns
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  on more lights. Brilliant, charming, and ingenius. She creates what she
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  prefers, an atmosphere of gaiety and beauty, and the visiting world purrs about
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  her in joy of a fascination it cannot find elsewhere, and solves its own
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  patriotism with the conclusion that this is her principle reisond'etre. As a matter of
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  fact, the Parisians are masters of the art of living. As their kitchen
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  is the best, so is there drawing room and study. All the affairs
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  of every day are handled with ease and grace, with imagination and a kind
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  of poetic skill that adorns even the ugly and commonplace and invests them with attractiveness
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  and charm. The cheery, lightheartedness that is a fundamental trait of Parisians converts
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  the life of their straits and parks into scenes delightful, either to contemplate or
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  share. Indeed, they often seem to be only grown up children, so
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  gracefully have they retained the fresh and stimulating enthusiasm of youth, so rueful and
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  pouting over a rainy day, so exuberant over a bright one, and the
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  best of it is, And that there is an infection to their high spirits
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  that passes into the observer and clears his perception of the folly of worry and
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  depression, and shows him the value and availableness of optimism and good cheer.
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  Such is the glorious influence of a people whose attitude toward life is essentially one
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  of hope and zest. And no one is going to deny that the Parisian
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  is vain. Indeed, his attitude toward the rest of the earth, while
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  patient and polite, is at bottom patronizing and even a little supercilious. And
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  sometimes it must be confessed this gets on the visitor's nerves. One cannot give
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  out admiration forever and rest content with getting none back. It is easy to
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  understand the mood of bitter derision, into which even so enthusiastic an admirer as
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  Edmondo de Amichi's fell when he wrathfully wrote, three hundred citizens hang over the
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  side of a bridge to see a dog washed. If a drum passes,
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  a crowd collects, and a thousand people in one railway station make a tremendous
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  uproar by lapping their hands, shouting and laughing because one of the guards of
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  the train has lost his hat. And yet de Amicis came shortly to see
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  that this is only the Parisian temperament, which he admired in so many other
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  of its manifestations, and that under it lies solid qualities of the highest and
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  rarest order. So he forgave Paris as everyone does, and took her again
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  to his heart, albeit i mistrust, with reservation, and a lingering grain
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  of suspicion, and perhaps something of the foreign conviction that she is not always
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  to be taken quite seriously. Paris on the boulevard. To the vast majority
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  of visitors, Paris by night means the boulevards, the beauty of these famed
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  thoroughfaars, the cosmopolitan and fascinating sea of humanity, that flows through them,
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  The means of amusement that abound, and the many little refinements of comfort and
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  elegance to be seen on every hand, placed them in a class by themselves
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  among the city streets of the world. In the manner of virility. The
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  life of the boulevards is amazing. Every One seems to be at his keenest
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  when he walks there. Anticipation is fairly skipping on tiptoe. The old boulevardiear,
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  the traditional flaneur, has not been disappointed of his evenings diverting on look
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  these forty years or more, and he can, therefore, clothed and gloved
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  and caned a la mode, proceed with his stroll in unhasting dignity, confident
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  that the usual amusing spectacle will unfold itself in good time. But the new
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  arrivals and the visitors of a few weeks show in their eager faces that nothing
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  is going to escape them, and that a thorough, deep vouch of pleasure
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  is the least they propose to make out of all the bewildering light and life
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  about them. From the place de la Concorde to the Place de la Republique,
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  a laughing brilliant, light hearted multitude powers along all night with infinite bustle
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  and chatter. Between twelve and one o'clock it is at its gayest, and
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  the theaters and cafe concerts have emptied their audiences into the stream, which is
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  swollen to the very curb, and the driveways are whirling with an enormous outpouring
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  of buses, motors and cabs. The size of the loads the hired victorious,
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  and theatres will accommodate is determined solely by the inclination and interest of the
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  impertinent fat cochet in the varnish plug hat. And it is nothing to see
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  a conveyance that ordinarily carries but two people trundling merrily along behind a sprung kneed
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  nag with a man and several girls piled inside, and all waving hands to
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  the crowd, with the vastest camaraderie imaginable. This is of a piece with
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  the universal high spirits and good humor that prevail along the boulevards. It is
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  all fun and frolic, and everybody is in it. The rows of chairs
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  and tables on the sidewalks before the cafes really make the spectators a part of
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  the show, and the groups before, the artistic little newspaper kiosks and the
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  comfortable sitters on the green benches along the curb are, in spite of themselves,
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  part and parcel of the big family, with something of the intimacy and
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  allied interest of a village street at fair time, and it always seems fair
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  time in Paris by night the profusion of lights that have won it the title
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  of La Ville Lumiere and gives it an appearance of being perpetually unfed, and
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  the ebulliant crowds complete the illusion. But the grand boulevards have no monopoly of
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  the night attractiveness of the city. All over town stretch broad, clean streets
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  with shade trees and double lines of lights, and rows of stone and stucco
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  houses. In the main these houses resemble each other rather closely, slate colored,
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  mansard roofed, and with shallow iron balconies running full length of the second,
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  fourth and fifth stories. By night, they fairly exhale an atmosphere of
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  tranquility and peace. There are besides hundreds of beautiful roomy squares flooded with light
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  and set with comfortable benches that are seldom without contented occupants. Such a notable
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  one as the place de la Concorde, is without its equal in any city.
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  It costs the three and a quarter millions of people who live in and
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  about Paris more than seventy million dollars a year to maintain their cities and reputation
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  for beauty, and not a sou of it is begrudged, for Paris is
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  the whole world to most of them, and many a Parisian politician had rather
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  be Prefect of the Seine and rule this town than president of the whole republic.
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  And with what reason? It is a world city, said Gothe,
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  where the crossing of every bridge or every square recalls a great past, and
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  where at every street corner a piece of history has been unfolded. Whoever turns
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  from the boulevards for a space will learn of other kinds of life that are
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  in full cry at midnight. What of the studial revelries of the Quartier Latin,
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  There abound in jollity and earnestness, and strong friendships, with few of
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  the gilded accessories of the reeve dat. The brightest of these scenes are often
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  the most meager in setting a group of jovial smoking, singing companions, and
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  about them an easel and sketching board, a dingy divan, a few battered
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  chairs, a stove in the corner with the remains of the last meal,
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  a huddle of draperies and hangings, fragments of casts and uncompleted sketches on the
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  walls, and a co corner table piled with a dusty letter of squeezed out
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  paint tubes, broken brushes, a magazine illustrations, a dog eared book or
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  two, and a generous strewing of cigarette butts. The cleanest things in sight
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  are a freshly scraped palette and a sheaf of brushes stuck in a half filled
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  jar of water. And with so much of equipment, your merry, care
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  free artist squeezes the orange of life into its smallest drop and cares not a
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  sou how the whole world wags provided all is well between the place de lapsur
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  Vatoire and the Seine. And then again, were you to pass some pleasant
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  house on a quiet avenue where an evening party is ending, you could not
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  help but linger under the windows in delight to hear some tender song of massinettes,
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  some soothing vercos of Ropace's, a haunting plaint of a saint sayin,
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  or a vitalizing torrent of shaman nads. And perhaps where you might most expect
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  just such a scene as this, behind the closely drawn window draperies of some
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  handsome apartment, there is gathered around a broad green table, a group of
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  flushed, excited men, to whom a hard eyed croupier is singing the abominable
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  siren song of fete voussieu alessieux son fet rihenna the pluse. It seems quiet
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  and peaceful enough you could scarcely believe that there hangs above it the shadows of
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  the little gray morgue down behind Notre Dame, Before returning to the giddy boulevards
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  for a final petit there and an exchange of pleasantries with cafe acquaintances. One
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  likes to finish a cigar in an aimless ramble through such placid scenes as these.
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  Not only may he so indulge the pleasing diversion of speculating over the kinds
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  of home life that go on within these houses, but incidentally he escapes the
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  tumult of the maelstrom for a few calm moments and eventually sees for himself what
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  pity it is that so many night fascinations should abound in Paris and be enjoyed
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  by so few. He may like to draw moral conclusions from the peace loving
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  pigeons nesting in the war glorifying relics of the gigantic and towering Arc de Trient,
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  or take satisfied note of the monuments of the victories of peace that dot
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  the broad avenues that radiate from it. One such monument is always under the
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  eyes of the boulevardiers, in the form of that most glorious of all temples
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  to music, the Paris Opera House. It is especially impressive by night,
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  with the shadows blending columns and statues in being beauty, and high lights from
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  the street lamps glinting on sculptured balustrades and cornices, chalking the edges of half
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  hidden arches, and penciling the delicate detail of medallions and reliefs. Nor it
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  must be allowed, are devotees often wanting for that fair Greek temple of La
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  Madeleine, so chaste and of such imposing dignity, rimmed with giant columns and
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  embowered in verdure. After like fashion does night enhance the beauty of the great
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  rambling Louver. Though this may only be Diana's way of paying tribute to the
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  arts and of venerating the sacred shrine of a sister divinity, that serenest and
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  sublimest of goddesses, the Venus de Milo. There is certainly something of almost
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  ethereal comeliness by night, to those long vistas of columns and arcades, to
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  the shadowy sculptures of the pavilions, the lines of graceful caryatids, and the
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  blustering, triumphal groups of the pediments. One might fancy the Louver wearing a
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  look of grave disapproval over the hubbub that drifts in from the boulevards, were
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  he not aware how carefully it treasures so many pictorial skeletons in its own closets.
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  Bouchet and Watteau are on record with infinitely worse scenes than these. But
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  now it has the appearance of some palace capital of shadowland, and before it,
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  in perfect sympathy, lies its beautiful dream kingdom, the hushed and fragrant
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  gardens of the Tuileries, fair as the golden hesperides, fresh with fountains,
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  silvered in patches, with little shining lakes, marketride in flowers, and peopled
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  with shadowy forms of pallid marble. From a sane bridge, one notes the
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  wizard liberties the reckless moon takes with the colonnaded dome of the sombre Pantheon,
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  and more astonishing still, the magic tricks it plays with the adorned and enormous
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  bulk of Notre Dame, now veiling, now revealing massive buttress and delicate rose
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  window, some recessed arch tucked full of sculptured saints, all snugly foot to
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  head, or a goblin band of hideous gargoyles that leer ghoulishly down from out
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  the purple haze of the towers. One could well wish, however, for
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  a closer view of that exquisite survivor of the Valois Kings, the peerless tour
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  Saint Jacques, at the first sight of which the most indifferent exclaim with delight
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  over so rare a vision of grace and lacelike beauty, over long slender windows,
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  delicately foliated over traceries of stone like petrified festoons, and an ensemble so
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  suggestive of some dainty ivory carving a million times enlarged. With a glimpse of
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  the round pointed towers of the dread Conciergerie, comes something of the horror of
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  the days of the Terror, and one fancies ghastly forms beckoning him at the
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  windows, with white frightened faces and hanging hair, and eyes with hideous rings,
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  and delicate praying hands upheld to passers by, and iron bars clutched by
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  the little white fingers of Marie Antoinette and her court. From such a gruesome
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  fancy, it is a relief to turn and look down on the dark,
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  rippling scene and watch the wavy ribbons of light swim quiveringly out from the bridge
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  lamps. And there, in the cool of their stone wharfs, still panting
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  and perspiring from the violent exertions of the earlier evening, lie the fat,
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  little open deck steamers that haul the lover's home. For many a happy pair
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  this day has been dining deliciously adieu under the gay terrace awnings of one or
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  another of the romantic flower embowered inns that overlook the river all the way from
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  Charenton to gray Old Argentil, where Eloise in her nunnery, fought her losing
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  fight against love and the memory of Abbe Loave. Some of these steamers appear
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  alarmingly apoplectic, so that one wonders how they have managed to wheeze safely under
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  all those low arches, with the garlanded ends, and past so many formidable
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  buttresses, all sculptured cap a pee. If now you turn and look upward
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  and about you lo the heaped and cluttered roofs of Paris, the most fantastic
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  and romantic of spectacles. It is singular, almost startling to see how they
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  stare down as though to study you, and with apparently as much curious intentness
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  and dark suspicion as you do them. There must be whole volumes of stories
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  to each of them. Out of the ponderous mansard roofs, impudent little dormer
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  windows wink down and squint up, each with his rakish peaked roof like a
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  jockey cap. Over one ear and up above even them are whole groves of
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  blackened chimney stacks, leaning all askew like barricades for sansculottes. You look expectantly
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  to see miserable white Piero come forth, guitar in hand, and sing sadly
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  of Columbine to the pallid moon. Suddenly, to the right, the lift
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  of a cloud unveils the bronze dome of the solemn hotel dis invalid, and
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  your heart beats high with thoughts of the marvelous man who lies under it,
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  among his tattered battle flags on a pavement inscribed with his victories. It is
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  a sobering reflection that now, in the darkness and stillness of that chamber,
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  the only eyes that are looking down on his porphyry sarcophagus are those of the
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  bronze Christ that hangs on the cross in the little side chapel of the Tomb
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  to Paris, as smart Society calls itself, spends the early summer at Trouville.
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  All the most exclusive names of the two volume bought in are then inscribed
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  in the hotel registers of this recherchet resort. Nor are their owners to be
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  looked for in town again until long after the derbies have reappeared in the hatter's
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  windows. But while fashion is flirting on the beaches and bedding on the little
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  wooden horses of the Trouville Casino. What is left at home after all Paris
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  has gone is quite sufficient to keep the boulevards lively. What walking space remains
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  is eagerly employed by the tens of thousands of visitors. O One may not
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  therefore see the fashionable show of winter, but he finds an acceptable substitute in
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  the vivacious summer throngs, with their perpetual atmosphere of Mardi gross. As midnight
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  wanes and the multitude waxes, it is amusing to speculate upon the scattered sources
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  of the innumerable tiny streams that come gradually trickling in the outlying attractions hold firmly
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  enough up to this hour, but the magnet of the boulevards is strongest.
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  In the end. Montmart you may be sure, has been up to her
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  old tricks. What a labout has to learn about promiscuous entertaining may be classed
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  among the negligible quantities Somewhere in that honeycomb of Moulain cabarets, penny shows,
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  spectaclear revues, tiny theaters with sensational rococo facades, and cafes with fantastic names
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  dedicated to the riotous and the riscue. Diversion is bound to be forthcoming for
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  any amusement hunter. Blassee with the usual all the way down from the quaint
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  little shops and crooked cobblestone streets of the rustic upper region above the Moulin de
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  la Galette, to the blazing pure lieu of Thelas de Cliche and the Place
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  Pigal. There is always something on hand at midnight to amaze the neophyte.
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  You may indulge or not, as inclination dictates, but you are pretty apt
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  to be astonished when you look at your watch to see how long you have
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  lingered. French ingenuity has lavished itself on every form of attraction, from vaudeville
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  and ball publique to papier mache establishments devoted to parodies of heaven and hell.
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  The Boulevard de Clichy is the heart of La Boute, but the life it
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  pumps along its arteries flows principally from one show to another. You may settle
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  down on a bench under the trees if you like, and resolve to view
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  life only in the open, in defiance of all the devils rampant in the
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  neighborhood. But presently a flashing electric sign shrieks out an overlooked novelty, and
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  you find yourself saying, oh, well, since I am in Paris,
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  et cetera, et cetera, and off you go. The excuse of being
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  in Paris covers a multitude of sins. To do as the Parisians do serves
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  purposes rarely indulged by Parisians themselves. It must be because everything is different here.
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  The rolicsome party in pink stockings who dropped her heel playfully on my bashful
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  friend's shoulder in an aside of the quadrille at the Moulin Rouge, was merely
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  turning one of the tricks that passes kh on Montmartre. She was of the
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  assured and robust type that supports the pyramid in acrobatic feats, and the effect
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  this had of dazing my friend arose rather from astonishment at its unconventionality and then
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  delight at its skill. This much I gathered when he seized my arm and
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  hurried me away and eventually choked out. Do you know I have to keep
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  saying to myself, a mone can this be you? I think it was
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  quite as hard on him at the Javain de Paris on the chams Elise,
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  or when he saw beautifully gowned Paris girls step out of the crowd and go
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  down the chutes on their shoulders, screaming with laughter in a whirl of skirts
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  and flat bush of lancherie in Paris. What American would dream of trying the
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  tricks at home that he accomplishes with the ease of an expert on and under
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  the tables of the rat Maud or the Cathae Tabarin. It is a pretty
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  problem as to whether he is saved up a special surplus of buoyancy for this
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  city alone, or whether he has become infected with the natural high spirits of
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  the Parisians and discovers too late that he is unable to control them as they
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  do. The men who want one more fling before settling down head straight for
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  Paris. It is probable that if they could not get here, that they
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  would dispense with the fling altogether. Nor is the reef Gauche without its votaries
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  at midnight, If the Latin quarter stands for anything, it is unconventionality and
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  comfortable enjoyment. If it is Thursday night, the famous bal Boulie is in
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  full blast, and visitors are gazing down from the encircling boxes upon a jolly
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  whirl of students in velvet coats and black slouch hats, cutting fantastic capers in
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  the quadrille with their latest bond and pretty models. Mimi and Muset are on
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  the arms of Throudolphe and Marcel, contented with little, happy with more.
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  Those so disposed need not long remain uncompanioned if they take a turn among the
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  tables under the trees of the enclosed garden, where from any cozy corner a
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  soft voice at any moment may ask you for a cigarette with so auspicious a
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  start. There is no reason, if you are that sort, why you
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  should not be swearing eternal devotion before you have finished one citron glasse. And
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  no matter what night it is, there is the old bull mish, as
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  always the resort and delight of artists and students from time immemorial, or when
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  you sup. There are cafes, tavernes, brasseries and restaurants of every price
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  and description. A you can have a plat de jour, a venerable beef,
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  and a quantity of VENs or denaire for the modest outlay of one franc
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  fifty, and your payment is received with many a cheery mercy monsieur, and
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  silverpley and hardy bon soir, and all the rest of that captivating civility that
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  prevails to the last corner of the city. It is perhaps more agreeable to
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  join the few remaining ayri mercer types among the crowds on the terraces of the
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  Tavern de Pantheon or the Cafe Soufflot, and listen to the vigorous talk that
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  goes on over the little glasses of Anniscente and Vermouth. It always seems to
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  be that hour of the apparitiff pronounced by Baudelaire leurs Saint the Lapsinthe, when
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  the flower women and peddlers become too numerous before the cafe, and you are
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  weary with declining nuts and nuggets and ten olives for two sous, you may
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  have a look into lay noct'mboul or some other smoke layden cabaret. The old
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  timers will grin behind their cigars at your stung again expression when the polite garson
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  adds to the price of your first refreshment a franc or so for the consee
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  mascion of what was advertised as a free show. But shortly you get the
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  run of things and settle down to attend the chansonnier, who is the ox
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  eyed gentleman in the long beard, who strides up to the consumptive piano and
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  pours forth an original and impassioned rhapsody to our old friend, parfait amour.
• 40:20
  A little of this goes a long ways. When you have politely heard him
• 40:25
  through, you are apt to think better of the boulevards, and to start
• 40:32
  bowing your way into the street. How still and deserted the familiar places appear,
• 40:42
  where by day is so much life and stir, and such bustling about
• 40:47
  of stout market women in aprons, such racing of delivery boys in white blouses,
• 40:57
  shouldering trays and backs, such a concourse of the little fruit wagons they
• 41:05
  push, and the two wheeled carts they haul. In the little wine shops
• 41:10
  that dot the side streets. One sees the portly proprietors in shirt sleeves behind
• 41:19
  the shining zinc bars, polishing glasses and chatting with their patrons, who are
• 41:25
  workmen in jerseys and corridor trousers, and cabmen inglazed hats and whips in hand.
• 41:37
  The loveliness of the Luxembourg gardens fairly shouts for appreciation. One could scarcely
• 41:45
  linger too long under the chestnuts and sycamores, among the puffing fountains, the
• 41:51
  bronzes and marbles, the beds of dahlias and geraniums, the oleanders of the
• 41:59
  towns, and the great stone urns that drip petunias and purple clematis. As
• 42:07
  you cross the Seine by the old Ponteneuf and lean a moment on its broad
• 42:14
  balestrade, kindly thoughts go out to the garrets that may now be sheltering those
• 42:21
  pathetic, stooping figures that bend all day above the long lines of bookshelves along
• 42:30
  the keys, and never buy. And you wish good luck to the good
• 42:36
  natured booksellers who never annoy them with importunities, but sit indulgently oblivious on the
• 42:45
  benches opposite, and smoke their pipes and read their papers. So great a
• 42:52
  love of books will at least ensure the old habitue from ever being included in
• 42:59
  that dread tall up to a day that the same regularly pays into the morgue.
• 43:07
  It is like getting home to be back on the boulevards, gay gleaming,
• 43:14
  brimming and confused, the air hums with the incessant shuffle of feet on
• 43:22
  the asphalt sidewalks and the pounding of hoofs on the wood paved streets. The
• 43:30
  eyes ache with trying to miss none of the faces that flash past, or
• 43:37
  any of the good fellowship that abounds. The bubbling current drifts one along by
• 43:45
  little kiosks, all a flutter, with magazines and newspapers, by advertising pillars
• 43:52
  flaming in playbills of many colors, by crowded curb benches, go blowing shop
• 44:00
  windows and table lined cafe fronts. The wives drop out where the red lights
• 44:08
  mark tobacco bureau and replenish their cigar supply from government boxes with the prices stamped
• 44:16
  on them, rather than pay double for the same article in a restaurant.
• 44:22
  Later on, as you proceed to your favorite cafe, it is immensely diverting
• 44:29
  to catch the glimpses of good cheer from those you pass. It is the
• 44:35
  same sort of thing in each case, and yet somehow always different. On
• 44:42
  the red divans that extend around the rooms with mirrors at their backs and petit.
• 44:50
  There on marble topped tables. Before them, one beholds formidable arrays of
• 44:57
  bon vivant, all taking their ease with as hardy a will as the very
• 45:04
  kings of ive to military men with red noses and white imperials, politicians with
• 45:13
  pervasive smiles, letterati bearded like the Assyrian kings and wearing rosettes of the Legion
• 45:23
  of Honor, fat merchants in fat diamonds, and pot headed elegants who advertise
• 45:32
  smart tailors with as much exuberant grace as Roland himself. Happily for Paris,
• 45:43
  champagne is never out of season, and popping corks are held by many to
• 45:50
  make sweeter music than some of the orchestras in restaurant corners. The tide of
• 45:57
  life appears at flood La Belle Ninette of the Follies tree fete e treys Admiree
• 46:07
  fares daintily on out of seasoned delicacies thanks to the enduring ardor of the distinguiet
• 46:16
  marquis opposite and drops candied fruits with the prettiest air imaginable into the nervous mouth
• 46:25
  of her favorite poodle, who is himself rejoicing in a new silver collar set
• 46:32
  with garnets. Licaide visante. Gabrielle at an adjoining table, having once been
• 46:42
  a blanchiseeuse herself appropriately excels in a toilette of cloud like gossamer. Anne is
• 46:52
  quite the adored of the rheumatic old party beside her, who has probably been
• 46:58
  doting on the Valais for two generations. The talk is largely of la belle
• 47:07
  this and la Belle that, of the latest display of extravagance, the most
• 47:15
  recent spectacle, the most promising plays for the fall, or the drollest freaks
• 47:22
  of the new fashions. On one sees foreign faces from all quarters of the
• 47:30
  earth, as though it were some kind of international congress, with both hemispheres
• 47:37
  fully represented. Long accustomed to seeing the world without leaving home, nothing surprises
• 47:45
  Paris. A Chinese admiral, a Bedwin Chikh, a Spitsberg and Esquimaux,
• 47:54
  a lotus lover of Tahiti, a Russian grand duke, or a millionaire hemp
• 48:00
  grower of Yucatan pass practically unremarked. It would be a matter of no comment
• 48:10
  if the owl and the pussy cat went to sea in a beautiful pea green
• 48:16
  boat La mour is the point of common contact, and even so one has
• 48:24
  little chance against a rich old rouet in the eyes of a premiere dancers,
• 48:32
  or a far vision chanteuse of the Marigni. Business flourishes in the cafes.
• 48:42
  The harried waiters are kept bowing right and left, and hurry off crying toot
• 48:50
  sweet. Each open door sends out its vision of fluttering hands and shrugging shoulders,
• 48:59
  and one here an incessant, rapid fire of bier di donc ecute,
• 49:08
  magnan, pre sisment alon, oh la la, and so on. At
• 49:16
  Maxim's and the Olympia, you would think there was a riot. Ice pails
• 49:23
  are as numerous as pulse beats. When you reach your cafe at last,
• 49:30
  on the corner by the opera house, perhaps the ponderous a maitre d'hotel assigns
• 49:37
  you a garson whose name is doubtless Francois Gustave or Adolphe, and who is
• 49:45
  very business like in short jacket and white apron To him goes your order for
• 49:53
  a fellet de beauf or perhaps a fricando, or better still, a soul
• 50:02
  with shrimp sauce, and as you await its preparation, You think with satisfaction
• 50:09
  of the self appreciative observation of brillat Savarin, one eats everywhere, one dines
• 50:20
  only in Paris. The life you then see about you is the usual thing
• 50:25
  here to a stranger, novel and amusing to a Parisian, all together important
• 50:34
  and absorbing an indispensable part of his existence. The setting is of soft carpets,
• 50:43
  palms, red velvet divans, chandeliers, and a crush of small marble
• 50:51
  topped tables. The place is crowded to the point of discomfort. A thin
• 50:58
  veil of smoke hangs over all. There are people in all kinds of street
• 51:05
  clothes and evening dress, ladies in opera cloaks, and gentlemen in immaculate white
• 51:12
  waistcoats. There are ordinary individuals and fantastic types. Ruddy portly bourgeois who shout
• 51:22
  montvieux at each other and make a prodigious racket generally, and nervous old beau
• 51:30
  intwo pays who fancy themselves in drafts occupations. Vary ladies are dining on champagne
• 51:40
  and truffles. The man at your elbow is writing a letter. Another is
• 51:46
  looking through the illustrated papers, and another has called for ink and paper and
• 51:53
  is casting up the day's expenditures. Rubbers of dominoes and ecarte are being played
• 52:01
  out. There is a continual running to the telephone booths, and you hear
• 52:08
  the muffled calls of at all in all the time, an orchestra is holding
• 52:16
  forth in the corner. The clatter of chairs and dishes, and the confused
• 52:23
  rattle of conversation is amazing. Wit, wets on wit. Everybody has an
• 52:30
  opinion and is anxious to back it. Politicians bang their fists on the tables
• 52:38
  and address one another as citoyenne. Philosophers have it out Cartesian against Hegelian.
• 52:50
  Poets quote from their latest lyrics and are tremendously applauded. Novelists dispose of rival
• 52:59
  books with a scornful shrug and a withering mow, and the playwright, by
• 53:06
  universal concession, is supreme cock of the walk. Presently, you move a
• 53:14
  little out of all of this, and have a seat near the outer edge
• 53:17
  of the terrace, and begin to accumulate a pile of cups and saucers,
• 53:22
  each with the price of the order burned in the bottom. So far as
• 53:28
  out of doors goes a. You are now the audience and the passing crowd
• 53:32
  the show. The number has dwindled, but in characteristics it remains the same,
• 53:40
  sociable, good humored, easy in manner, and quick in intelligence.
• 53:49
  It will be seen to differ from the night throngs of other cities, not
• 53:54
  only in variety and exuberance, but in dramatic qualities as well. Camelo rush
• 54:05
  up to you, crying the latest editions of the evening papers, and suddenly,
• 54:12
  with furtive glances over their shoulders, thrust some questionable commodity under your nose
• 54:21
  and protest it is a bargain. Jolly parties sweep along arm in arm in
• 54:29
  lines that cross the sidewalk from house to curb. Lady visitors, with eyes
• 54:37
  full of excited delight, pause for a wistful glance down Rue de la Pey,
• 54:45
  where the establishments of famed milliners and modestes stand in gloom, little dreaming
• 54:53
  that they may be touching elbows this minute with the very chef de jou,
• 55:01
  cor Sainger and Guarniseeuz that they are to visit in the morning. Chic grisets
• 55:13
  trips smiling by, who have dined frugally at duvals on chocolate and bread to
• 55:20
  have another rose to their corsages. There are blase clubmen from the exclusive circle
• 55:30
  of Place de la Concorde and the Champs Elise, and supercilious representatives of the
• 55:38
  American colony of the boulevard houseman. Here comes Dartagnon, himself, capable and
• 55:49
  alert, arm in arm with blustering porthos. Ragged vour years with shifty looks
• 55:59
  run to open the carriage doors. From time to time, their saunters by
• 56:06
  in cap and cape. That model policeman, the affable and accommodating Sir Jean
• 56:13
  de Ville. And if you look around for a camelot, then you will
• 56:19
  find him attending very strictly to business. And so the fascinating procession troops merrily
• 56:28
  by roaring students from the bulmiche, black eyed soldiers in shackles and baggy red
• 56:37
  trousers, members of the Institute, pretty working girls who handle their skirts with
• 56:44
  the captivating grace of comedienne. The shapely dress models they nickname coils, conceited
• 56:52
  figurants from the cafe concerts, famous models, cocottes, frail daughters of Lutatia
• 57:01
  with complexions like Italian sunsets, impudent gamins, chattering in unintelligible arcle de letnti,
• 57:12
  possure, and the usual concomitants of beggars and thieves. What a jumble
• 57:21
  of happiness and misery. What an amazing spectacle, with the shimmer of silks
• 57:30
  and the glint of pearl ranged beside the mendicant in his rags. What a
• 57:37
  wealth of material too for the capable one sees how Balzac found the best types
• 57:45
  of his human comedy on the boulevards. Why Victor Hugo tramped them day and
• 57:52
  night and read shop signs by the hour in search for characters and the names
• 58:00
  to fit them. Where Zola got the misery, then he put between covers
• 58:07
  a where Moliere secured impressions that he transplanted so effectually to the stage. How
• 58:15
  Dumas must have known these streets, and Flaubert and de Maupassant. Nor are
• 58:23
  they exhausted yet or ever will be Where the entire gallot of the emotions is
• 58:31
  so incessantly run as here, Vital human material can never be lacking. As
• 58:40
  one o'clock wheer shround, it is easy to distinguish a change in the appearance
• 58:49
  of the crowd, the tumult and the shouting dies the captains and the king's
• 58:57
  depart Something of that juan and forlorn look is beginning to appear that makes even
• 59:06
  these buildings themselves seem dejected and remorseful. By the time the street cleaner's advance
• 59:15
  to flood the boulevards and the sky beyond Pere la chise is paling to dawn.
• 59:22
  The heart says, let's keep it up. The body says, too
• 59:28
  bad, and now too the crasser comedies of the fag End of the Night
• 59:37
  receive their premieres. Amreillis has lost her column and laments loudly with florian se
• 59:47
  mon ami. Re Rene de la mois g sonamour il a ma fois Mademoiselle
• 59:58
  v I demands her carriage and bundles out into it, with the red faced
• 1:00:05
  Barren hurrying after carrying her amazing hat, and off they go toward the chance
• 1:00:14
  Elisee. A stag party of revelers hails at Victoria and sinks limply onto its
• 1:00:22
  cushions, and they too, head for the chance Elisee, with one hanging
• 1:00:29
  on to the cauchet and reciting dramatically all Claire de la lune, monte ami
• 1:00:37
  pierrot. Everyone smiles, for they know whither they are bound. Four pray
• 1:00:45
  catalog, of course, in the Bois de Boulogne, where they will chase
• 1:00:51
  the ducks and chickens around the little farmyard, and make speeches to the mild
• 1:00:59
  eyed cows, and recover themselves gradually on mugs of cold milk. Clearly it
• 1:01:07
  is time to depart. A one does not want the leaves of this sparkling
• 1:01:15
  cup. A man is a fool to abuse his pleasures. Though this may
• 1:01:22
  sound naive at one o'clock in the morning, go while everything is still charming
• 1:01:30
  and delightful. The seasoned boulevardiere can do it, for he has a viewpoint
• 1:01:38
  that is all his own. It is by no means that of France,
• 1:01:45
  nor yet that of Paris by day, but of Paris by night, his
• 1:01:53
  Paris. It is opportunism applied to society, not the mad reckless a pre
• 1:02:05
  mois le deluge folly wrote of the late Louis's, but rather a conception of
• 1:02:14
  the importance of few things and the inconsequence of many. He sings with Villon,
• 1:02:23
  where are the snows of yesteryear. He searches the classics and has carpe
• 1:02:31
  Dium framed. He skims holy writ and puts his finger on sufficient. Unto
• 1:02:40
  the day is the evil. Thereof life is poetry, quoth he, In
• 1:02:49
  spite of a limping line here and there, Why fuss over Waterloo, or
• 1:02:57
  the place de Greve, or the guilty or the tumbrels that rattled up the
• 1:03:04
  Rue Royal. The present alone is ours. Enjoy it to the uttermost life
• 1:03:13
  is beautiful, And of the moment lights are sparkling, fountains are splashing.
• 1:03:22
  The night is delicious with fragrance and enchanting, with music and laughter. Join
• 1:03:31
  me, he cries, I raise my glass to the lilies of France and
• 1:03:37
  the bright eyes of the daughters of Paris. The end end of section twelve.
• 1:03:50
  End of Around the Clock in Europe, a travel sequence by Charles fish Howel