Royal Palaces and Parks of France Part 12

A recent discovery has been made in the lumber room of this old Palais Bourbon, where deputies howl and shout and make laws as noisily as in any other of the world's parliaments.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The THRONE of the PALAIS-BOURBON]

This particular "find" was the throne constructed in 1816 for Louis XVIII, with its upholstering of velvet embroidered with the golden fleur-de-lis. The records tell that this throne also served Louis Philippe under the Second Empire, and also was used under the Monarchy of July. It was after the momentous "Quatre Setembre" that it was finally relegated to the garret, but now, as a historical souvenir of the first rank, it has been placed prominently where all who visit the Palais Bourbon may see it.

The history of the Palais de l'Elysee has not been particularly vivid, though for two centuries it has played a most important part in the life of the capital. In later years it has served well enough the presidential dignity of the chief magistrate of the French Republic and is thus cla.s.sed as a national property. Actually, since its construction, it has changed its name as often as it has changed its occupants. Its first occupant was its builder, Louis d'Auvergne, Comte d'Evreux, who built himself this great town house on a plot of land which had been given him by Louis XV. Apparently the young man had no means of his own for the construction of his luxurious city dwelling, for he refilled his coffers by marriage with the rich daughter of the financier Crozat.

The new-made countess's mother-in-law apparently never had much respect for her son's choice as she forever referred to her as "the little gold ingot."

"The ingot" served to construct the palace, however, though at the death of its builder, soon after, it came into the proprietors.h.i.+p of La Pompadour, who spent the sum of six hundred and fifty thousand _livres_ in aggrandizing it. It became her town house, whither she removed when she grew tired of Versailles or Bagatelle.

History tells of an incident in connection with a fete given at the Palais de l'Elysee by La Pompadour. It was at the epoch of the "_bergeries a la Watteau_." The blond Pompadour had the idea of introducing into the salons a troop of living, sad-eyed sheep, combed and curled like the poodles in the carriages of the fas.h.i.+onables in the Bois to-day. The quadrupeds, greatly frightened by the flood of light, fell into a panic, and the largest ram among them, seeing his duplicate in a mirror, made for it in the traditional ram-like manner. He raged for an hour or more from one apartment to another, followed by the whole flock, which committed incalculable damage before it could be turned into the gardens. Such was one of the costly caprices of La Pompadour.

She had many.

La Pompadour's brother, the Marquis de Menars et de Marigny, continued the work of embellishment of the property up to the day when Louis XV bought it as a dwelling for the amba.s.sadors to his court. Its somewhat restricted park, ornamented with a grotto and a cascade, was at this time one of the curiosities of the capital.

In 1773, the financier Beaujon bought the property from the king and added considerably to it under the direction of the architect Boullee, who also re-designed the gardens. Thanks to Beaujon, the wonderful Gobelins of to-day were hung upon the walls, and many paintings by Rubens, Poissin, Van Loo, Von Ostade, Murillo, Paul Potter and Joseph Vernet were added.

The death of the financier brought the property into the hands of the d.u.c.h.esse de Bourbon, the sister of Louis Philippe, and the mother of the Duc d' Enghien, who died so tragically at Vincennes a short time after.

The d.u.c.h.ess renamed her new possession Elysee-Bourbon and there led a very retired and sad life among surroundings so splendid that they merited a more gay existence.

At the Revolution the palace became a national property, and, under the Consulate, was the scene of many popular fetes, it having been rented to a concern which arranged b.a.l.l.s and other entertainments for the pleasure of all who could afford to pay. Its name was now the Hameau de Chantilly, and, considering that the entrance tickets cost but fifteen sous--including a drink--it must have proved a cheap, satisfying and splendid amus.e.m.e.nt for the people.

This state of affairs lasted until 1805, when Murat bought it and here held his little court up to his departure for Naples, when, in gratefulness for past favours, he gave it to Napoleon. The emperor greatly loved this new abode, which he rechristened the Elysee-Napoleon.

After his defeat at Waterloo Napoleon, limping lamely Parisward, down through the Forests of Compiegne and Villers-Cotterets, sought in the Elysee-Napoleon the repose and rest which he so much needed, the throng meanwhile promenading before the palace windows, shouting at the tops of their voices "Vive l'Empereur!" though, as the world well knew, his power had waned forever; the eagle's wings were broken. The throng still crowded the precincts of the palace, but the emperor fled secretly by the garden gate.

On the return of the d.u.c.h.esse de Bourbon from Spain the magnificent structure became again the Elysee-Bourbon. The d.u.c.h.ess ceded the palace to the Duc and d.u.c.h.esse de Berry but, at the duke's death, in 1820, his widow abandoned it.

Some time after it was occupied by the Duc de Bordeaux, and, in 1830, it became one of the long list of establishments whose maintenance devolved upon the Civil List, though it remained practically uninhabited all through the reign of Louis Philippe.

In 1848, the National a.s.sembly designated the palace as the official residence for the presidents of the French Republic. Three years after, on the night of the first of December, as the last preparations were being made by Louis Bonaparte for the Coup d' etat and the final strangling of the young republic, the residence of the president was transferred to the Tuileries, and the palace of the Faubourg Saint Honore was again left without a tenant, and served only to give hospitality from time to time to pa.s.sing notables.

After the burning of the Tuileries, and the coming of the Third Republic, the Elysee Palace again became the presidential residence, and so it remains to-day.

One of the most notable of modern events connected with the Elysee Palace was the _diner de ceremonie_ offered by the president of the Republic and Madame Fallieres to Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt in April, 1910.

The dinner was served in the "Grand Salle des Fetes" and the music which accompanied the repast was furnished by the band of the _Garde Republicain_, beginning with the national anthem of America and finis.h.i.+ng with that of France. Never had a private citizen, a foreigner, been so received by the first magistrate of France. The toast of President Fallieres was as follows: "Before this repast terminates I wish to profit by the occasion offered to drink the health of Monsieur Theodore Roosevelt, an ill.u.s.trious man, a great citizen and a good friend of France and the cause of peace. I raise my gla.s.s to Madame Roosevelt who may be a.s.sured of our respectful and sympathetic homage, and I am very glad to be able to say to our guests that we count ourselves very fortunate in being allowed to meet them in person and show them this mark of respect."

CHAPTER X

VINCENNES AND CONFLANS

[Ill.u.s.tration: VINCENNES UNDER CHARLES V]

Vincennes is to-day little more than a dull, dirty Paris suburb; if anything its complexion is a deeper drab than that of Saint Denis, and to call the Bois de Vincennes a park "somewhat resembling the Bois de Boulogne," as do the guidebooks, is ridiculous.

In reality Vincennes is nothing at all except a memory. There is to-day little suggestion of royal origin about the smug and murky surroundings of the Chateau de Vincennes; but nevertheless, it once was a royal residence, and the drama which unrolled itself within its walls was most vividly presented. A book might be written upon it, with the following as the chapter headings: "The Royal Residence," "The Minimes of the Bois de Vincennes," "Mazarin at Vincennes," "The Prisoners of the Donjon," "The Fetes of the Revolution," "The Death of the Duc d'Enghien," "The Transformation of the Chateau and the Bois."

Its plots are ready-made, but one has to take them on hearsay, for the old chateau does not open its doors readily to the stranger for the reason that it to-day ranks only as a military fortress, and an artillery camp is laid out in the quadrangle, intended, if need be, to aid in the defence of Paris. This is one of the things one hears about, but of which one may not have any personal knowledge.

The first reference to the name of Vincennes is in a ninth century charter, where it appears as _Vilcenna_. The foundation of the original chateau-fort on the present site is attributed to Louis VII, who, in 1164, having alienated a part of the neighbouring forest in favour of a body of monks, built himself a suburban rest-house under shelter of the pious walls of their convent.

Philippe Auguste, too, has been credited with being the founder of Vincennes; but, at all events, the chateau took on no royal importance until the reign of Saint Louis, who acquired the habit of dispensing justice to all comers seated beneath an oak in the near-by Forest of Joinville.

The erection of the later chateau was begun by Charles, Comte de Valois, brother of Philippe-le-Bel; and it was completed by Philippe VI of Valois, and his successor, Jean-le-Bon, between the years 1337 and 1370, when it became an entirely new manner of edifice from what it had been before. It was in this chateau that was born Charles V, to whom indeed it owes its completion in the form best known.

To-day, the outlines of the ma.s.s of the Chateau de Vincennes are considerably abbreviated from their former state. Originally it was quite regular in outline, its walls forming a rectangle flanked by nine towers, the great donjon which one sees to-day occupying the centre of one side. The chapel was begun in the reign of Francois I and terminated in that of Henri II. Its coloured gla.s.s, painted by Jean Cousin from the designs of Raphael, is notable.

The chapel at Vincennes, with the Saint Chapelle of the Palais de Justice at Paris, ranks as one of the most exquisite examples extant of French Gothic architecture. It was begun in 1379, but chiefly it is of the sixteenth century, since it was only completed in 1552. This chapel of the sixteenth century, and the two side wings flanking the tower of the reign of Louis XIV, make the Chateau de Vincennes a most precious specimen of mediaeval ecclesiastical and military architecture. If Napoleon had not cut down the height of the surrounding walls the comparison would be still more favourable. In the reproduction of the miniature from the Book of Hours of the Duc de Berry given herein one sees the perfect outlines of the fourteenth century edifice.

In later years, Louis XIII added considerably to the existing structure, but little is now to be seen of that edifice save the great tower and the chapel.

Charles IX, whose royal edict brought forth the b.l.o.o.d.y night of Saint Bartholomew in 1572, fell sick two years later in the Chateau de Vincennes. Calling his surgeon, Ambroise Pare, to his side he exclaimed: "My body burns with fever; I see the mangled Huguenots all about me; Holy Virgin, how they mock me; I wish, Pare, I had spared them." And thus he died, abhorring the mother who had counselled him to commit this horrible deed.

The donjon of Vincennes was carried to its comparatively great height that it might serve as a tower of observation as well as a place of last retreat if in an attack the outer walls of the fortress should give way.

Here at Vincennes a certain ma.s.siveness is noted in connection with the donjon, though the actual ground area which it covers is not very great; it was not like many donjons of the time, which were virtually smaller chateaux or fortresses enclosed within a greater.

Vincennes, in comparison with many other contemporary edifices, possessed a certain regularity of outline which was made possible by its favourable situation. When others were of fantastic form, they were usually so built because of the configuration of the land, or the nature of the soil. But here the land was flat, and, though the edifice and its dependencies covered no very extended area, they followed rectangular lines with absolute precision.

As its walls were of a thickness of three metres, it was a work easy of accomplishment for Louis XI to turn the chateau into a Prison of State, a use to which the first chateau had actually been put by the shutting up in it of Enguerrand de Marigny. Henri IV, in 1574, pa.s.sed some solitary hours and days within its walls, and Mirabeau did the same in 1777. The Duc d'Enghien, under the First Empire, before his actual death by shooting, suffered sorely herein, while resting under an unjust suspicion.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Chateau de Vincennes_]

In 1814-1815 the chateau became a great a.r.s.enal and general storehouse for the army. It was attacked by the Allies and besieged twice, but in vain. It was defended against the armies of Blucher by the Baron Daumesnil. Summoned to surrender his charge, "Jambe de Bois" (so called because he had lost a leg the year before) replied: "I will surrender when you surrender to me my leg." A statue to this brave warrior is within the chateau, and commemorates further the fact that he capitulated only on terms laid down by himself out of his humane regard for the lives of friends and foes.

The ministers of Charles X, in 1830, had cause to regret the strength of the chateau walls; and Barbes, Blanqui and Raspail, in 1848, and various Republicans, who had been seized as dangerous elements of society after the Coup d'etat of 1851, also here found an enforced hospitality. The Chateau de Vincennes had become a second Bastille.

The incident of the arrest and death of the Duc d'Enghien is one of the most dramatic in Napoleonic history. The scene was Vincennes. Louis Antoine Henri de Bourbon, son of the Prince de Conde, born at Chantilly in 1772, became, without just reason, suspected in connection with the Cadoudal-Pichegreu plot, and was seized by a squadron of cavalry at the Schloss Ettenheim in the Duchy of Baden and conducted to Vincennes.

Here, after a summary judgment, he was shot at night in the moat behind the guardhouse. The obscurity of the night was so great that a lighted lantern was hung around the neck of the unfortunate man that the soldiers might the better see the mark at which they were to shoot.

Napoleon confided to Josephine, who repeated the secret to Madame de Remusat, that his political future demanded a _coup d'etat_. On the morning of the execution, the emperor, awakening at five o'clock, said to Josephine: "By this time the Duc d'Enghien has pa.s.sed from this life."

The rest is history--of that apologetic kind which is not often recorded.

In the chapel at Vincennes a commemorative tablet was placed, by the orders of Louis XVIII, in 1816, to mark the death of the young duke.

The Bois de Vincennes is not the fas.h.i.+onable parade ground of the Bois de Boulogne. On the whole it is a sad sort of a public park, and not at all fas.h.i.+onable, and not particularly attractive, though of a vast extent and possessed of a profoundly historic past of far more significance than that of its sweet sister by the opposite gates of Paris.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _A Hunt under the Walls of Vincennes_

_From a Fourteenth Century Print_]

It contains ten hundred and sixty-nine hectares and was due originally to Louis XV, who sought to have a sylvan gateway to the city from the east. Under the Second Empire the park was considerably transformed, new roads and alleys traced, and an effort made to have it equal more nearly the beauty of the more popular Bois de Boulogne. It occupies the plateau lying between the Seine and the bend in the Marne, just above the junction of the two rivers.

There are some forty kilometres of roadway within the limits of the Bois de Vincennes, and a dozen kilometres or more of footpaths; but, since the military authorities have taken a portion for their own uses as a training ground, a shooting range and for the Batteries of La Faisanderie and Gravelle, it has been bereft of no small part of its former charm. There are three lakes in the Bois, the Lac de Sainte Mande, the Lac Daumesnil and the Lac de Gravelle.