Royal Palaces and Parks of France Part 5

The Conciergerie, that inelegant, inconsistent architectural mixture of the ancient and modern, considered apart, though it properly enough is usually considered with the Palais de Justice, was formerly the dwelling or guardhouse of the Concierge of the Palais de la Cite. His post was not merely that of the keeper of the gates; he was a personage at court and was as autocratic as his more plebeian contemporaries of to-day, for the Paris concierge, as we, who have for years lived under their despotism well know, is a very dreadful person.

In addition to being the governor of the royal dwelling this concierge was the guardian of the royal prisoners. In 1348 he was further invested with the official t.i.tle of Bailli and the post was, at times, occupied by the highest and the most n.o.ble in the land, among others Philippe de Savoie, the friend of Charles VI, and Juvenal des Oursins, the historian of this prince. The first to combine the two functions, that of Bailli and Concierge, was Jacques Coictier, the doctor of Louis XI.

As a virtual prison the Conciergerie only came to be transformed when Charles V quitted the residence of the Palais de la Cite, and the Conciergerie, as such, only figures on the Tournelles registers under date of 1391.

The fire of the latter part of the eighteenth century destroyed a large part of the building, but enough remained to patch together the most serviceable of Revolutionary prisons, for at one time it held at least twelve hundred poor souls, of whom two hundred and eighty-eight were killed off at one fell blow.

But one woman among them all actually came to her death within the prison walls. This was La Belle Bouquetiere of the Palais Royal who, in an access of jealous furor, horribly mutilated a royal guardsman, and for this met a most cruel death by being transfixed to a post and submitting to a trial of "_le fer et le feu_." In just what manner the punishment was applied one can best imagine for himself.

The Revolutionary role of the Conciergerie is a thing apart from the purport of this book, hence is not further referred to.

Going back to the time of Francis I, among the famous prisoners of state were Louis de Berquin, the Comte de Mongomere, the regicides Ravaillac and Damiens, the Marechal d'Ancre, Cartouche, Mandrin and others.

To-day, as a prison, the Conciergerie still performs its functions acceptably, safeguarding those up for the a.s.sizes, and those condemned to death before being sent on their long journey.

The three great flanking towers of the Conciergerie are its chief architectural distinction to-day. That of the left, the largest, is the Tour d'Argent, that of the middle, the Tour Bonchet, and the third, the Tour de Cesar or the Tour de l'Horloge. This last is the only one which has preserved its mediaeval crenulated battlements aloft. The great clock has been commonly considered the largest timepiece of its kind extant, but it is doubtful if this now holds good with railways and insurance companies vying with each other to furnish the hour so legibly that he who runs may read.

Across the Pont au Change, from the Palais de la Cite, by the Louvre and out into the Faubourg Saint Antoine, one comes to the Place des Vosges, the old Place Royale, which occupies almost the same area as was covered by the courtyard of the Palais des Tournelles, so called from its many towers.

All around the Palais des Tournelles was located a series of splendid _hotels prives_ of the n.o.bility. In one of these, the Hotel de Saint Pol, the king once lodged twenty-two visiting princes of the quality of Dauphin (the eldest son of a ruling monarch), their suites and domestics.

Charles V in his time amalgamated with his royal palace three of these magnificent private dwellings, the Hotel du Pet.i.t Musc, the Hotel de l'Abbe de Saint Maur and the Hotel du Comte d'etampes.

The palace proper really faced on what is now the Rue Saint Antoine, opposite the Hotel Saint Pol. Its historic and romantic memories of the sword and cloak period of gallantry were many, but the edifice was demolished by the order of Catherine de Medici.

In the palace Charles VI was confined, during the period of his insanity, by order of the cruel Isabeau de Baviere. The Duke of Bedford, when regent for the minor Henry VI, lodged here, and upon the expulsion of the English it became the residence of Charles VII. Louis XI and Louis XII each inhabited it, and the latter died within its walls.

The Palais des Tournelles will go down to history chiefly because of that celebrated jousting bout held in its courtyard on the marriage day of the two princesses, Elizabeth and Marguerite.

Henri II and the elder princes, his sons, were to ride forth in tournament and break lances, if possible, with all comers. The court, including Catherine de Medici and the princess Elizabeth, wife of Philippe II, the late husband of Mary Tudor, the two Marguerites and other high personages were seated on a dais upholstered in damascened silk and ornamented with many-coloured streamers.

The time was July and the morning. At a signal from Catherine music burst forth and the bouts began.

The king rode forth at the head of his chevaliers, wearing a suit of golden armour, his sword handle set with jewels, and, in spite of the presence of his wife, his lance flying black and white streamers, the colours of Diane de Poitiers, who had lately turned her affections from father unto son.

A herald proclaimed the opening of the combat, and before night the king had broken the lances of the Ducs de Ferrare, de Guise, and de Nemours, and was just about disarming when a masked knight approached from the Faubourg Saint Antoine and challenged the king, who, in spite of being implored to desist by his queen, entered the lists again and was ultimately wounded unto death by the sable knight.

Henri II expired the same night in a bedchamber of the Palais des Tournelles, whither he had been carried, at the age of forty-one, the victim of chance, or the wile of the Sieur de Montgomeri, the ancestor of England's present Earl of Eglinton. The captain of the Scotch Guards, Montgomeri, was not immediately pursued (he meantime had fled the court), but Catherine de Medici harboured for him a most bitter rancour.

Pro and con ran his cause, for he had his partisans, but the Marechal de Matignon finally caught up with him in Normandy and he was tortured and condemned to death for the crime of _lese majeste_--beating the king at his own game.

The widowed queen angrily ordered Diane de Poitiers from the court, and caused the Palais des Tournelles to be razed. This was her only means of showing her contempt for the woman who had played her royal spouse to his death as the Romans played the gladiators of old; and Tournelles, as a palatial monument of its time, blotted out the rest when it disappeared from view.

A forest of spirelets soared aloft from the gables and rooftrees of the Palais des Tournelles. There was no spectacle of the time more imposing than this sky-line silhouette of a Paris palace; not at Chambord nor Chenonceaux was the spectacle more fine. It was like a fairy castle, albeit that it was in the heart of a great city.

To the right of the Palais des Tournelles, beyond the Porte Saint Antoine, was the ink-black, frowning donjon of the Bastille, its severity in strong contrast with the more luxurious palaces of the princes which surrounded it not far away.

The charming Place des Vosges, which occupies the site of Tournelles to-day, is another of Paris's breathing s.p.a.ces. Well may it be called a royal garden--a park virtually on a diminutive scale--since it was originally known as the Place Royale, under Henri IV.

With the advent of the gascon Henri de Bearn this delightful little unspoiled corner of old Paris took on the aspect which it now has.

Within this enclosure were the usual garden or park attributes, more or less artificially disposed, but making an ideal open-air playground for the court, shut in from outside surroundings by the outlines of the old palace walls, and not too far away from the royal palace of the Louvre.

The first and greatest historic souvenir of this garden was a Carrousel given in 1612, by Marie de Medici, two years after the tragic death of Henri IV, celebrating the alliance between France and Spain. Under Richelieu the square became known as the Place des Vosges, and, in spite of the law against duelling, which had by this time come into force, it became a celebrated meeting place for duellists like Ivry, the "Grand'

Roue" or the "Vel' Hiver" of to-day.

It was on May 12, 1627, that the Comte des Chappell killed Bussy d'Amboise on this spot, and left a b.l.o.o.d.y souvenir, which was only forgotten by the historians when they had to recount another meeting, this time between the Catholic Duc de Guise and the Protestant Coligny d'Andelot.

"Monsieur," said the duke, "we will now proceed to settle that little account between our ill.u.s.trious houses," and with that he drew his sword and killed Coligny, as if he were but stamping the life out of a caterpillar.

Now, with all this b.l.o.o.d.y memory behind, the Place became one of the most elegant residential quarters of the capital, preferred above all by the n.o.bility, the Rohans, the Alegres and Rotroux.

At No. 21 lived Victor Hugo, just before the Coup d'etat, in the house first made famous as the habitation of the somewhat infamous Marion Delorme.

Among other ill.u.s.trious names who have given a brilliance to these alleyed walks and corridors are to be recalled Corneille, Conde, Saint Vincent de Paul, Moliere, Turenne, Madame de Longueville, De Thou, Cinq-Mars, Richelieu, D'Ormesson, the Prince de Talmon, the Marquis de Tesse and the Comte de Chabanne.

It is possible that this charming Paris square will remain as ever it has been, for a recent attempt of the owner of one of the houses which borders upon it to change the disposition of the facade brought about a law-suit which compelled him to respect the procedure which obtained in 1605 when it was ordained the Place Royale.

To prove their rights the civic authorities had recourse to the original plans still preserved in the national archives. This is a demonstration of how carefully European nations preserve the written records of their pasts.

The decision finally arrived at by the courts--that the Place des Vosges must be kept intact as originally planned--gave joy to the hearts of all true Parisians and archeologists alike.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF OLD PARIS]

CHAPTER V

THE OLD LOUVRE AND ITS HISTORY

A stroll by the banks of the Seine will review much of the history of the capital, as much of it as was bound up with Notre Dame, the Louvre and the Palais de la Cite (now the Palais de Justice), and that was a great deal, even in mediaeval and Renaissance times.

The life of the Louvre was Paris; the life of Paris that of the nation; and the life of the nation that of the people. This even the Parisians of to-day will tell you. It is scant acknowledgment of the provinces to be sure, but what would you? The French capital is much more the capital of France than London is of England, or Was.h.i.+ngton of America--leaving politics out of the question.

Paris before the conquest by the Franks was practically only the Seine-surrounded isle known as Lutetia, and later as "La Cite," and the slight overflow which crept up the slopes of the Montagne de la Sainte Genevieve. From the Chatelet to the Louvre was a damp, murky swamp called, even in the moyen-age, Les Champeaux, meaning the Little Fields, but swampy ones, as inferred by studying the evolution of the name still further.

A rapid rivulet descended from Menilmontant and mingled with the Seine somewhere near the Garden of the Tuileries.

Clovis and his Franks attacked the city opposite the isle, and, upon the actual achievement of their conquest, threw up an entrenched camp on the approved Roman plan in what is now the courtyard of the old Louvre, and filled the moat with the waters of this rivulet. The ensemble was, according to certain authorities, baptized the Louvre, or Lower, meaning a fortified camp. This entrenchment was made necessary in order that the Franks might sustain themselves against the Gallo-Roman occupants of Lutetia, and in time enabled them to acquire the whole surrounding region for their own dominion. This the Lower, or Louvre, made possible, and it is well deserved that its name should be thus perpetuated, though actually the origin of the name is in debate, as will be seen by a further explanation which follows.

Little by little this half-barbaric camp--in contradistinction to the more solid works of the Romans--became a _placefort_, then a chateau, then a palace and, finally, as the young lady tourist said, an art museum. Well, at any rate, it was a dignified evolution.

Two Louvres disappeared before the crystallization of the present rather irregularly cut gem. From the Merovingians dates the Louvre des Champs, the hostile, militant Louvre, with its high wood and stone tower, familiar only in old engravings. After this the moyen-age Louvre, attributable to Saint Louis and Charles V, with its great tower, its thick walls of stone and its deep-dug moats, came into being. With Francis I came a more sympathetic, a more subtle era of architectural display, a softening of outlines and an interpolation of flowering gables. It was thus that was born that n.o.ble monument known as the New Louvre, which combined all the arts and graces of a fastidious ambition.

Nothing remains of the old Louverie (to which the name had become corrupted) which Philippe Auguste early in the thirteenth century caused to be turned into an ambitious quadrangular castle from a somewhat more humble establishment which had evolved itself on the site of the Frankish camp, save the white marble outline sunken in the pavement of the courtyard of the palace of to-day. By destiny this palace, set down in the very heart of Paris, was to dominate everything round about.

From the date of its birth, and since that time, it has had no rivals among Paris or suburban palaces. Its very situation compelled the playing of an auspicious part, and the Seine flowing swiftly by its ramparts added no small charm to the fetes and ceremonies of both the Louvre and the Tuileries.

Never was a great river so allied with the life of a royal capital; never a stream so in harmony with other civic beauties as is the Seine with Paris. When Henri II entered Paris after his Sacrament he contemplated a water-festival on the Seine, which was to extend from the walls of the Louvre to the towers of Notre Dame, a festival with such elaborate decorations as had never been known in the French capital.

The kings of France after their Sacrament entered the Louvre by the quay-side entrance, followed by their cortege of gayly caparisoned cavaliers and gilded coaches with personages of all ranks in doublet and robe, cape and doublet. The scintillating of gold lace and burnished coats gave a brilliance which rivalled that of the sun.