THE STYLE OF THE EMPIRE. 



481 



451. PARIS: WING OF LOUVRE ON NORTH SIDE OF PLACE DU CARROUSEL, BY 

 PERCIER AND FONTAINE, IN IMITATION OF HENRY IV. 's RIVER FRONT 

 (1806-13). 



Their work may be seen in the external and sculptured decoration in 

 several places, in the eastern entrance, the staircase of the Egyptian 

 Museum, the Hall of the Caryatids, &c. Innumerable schemes were 

 once more put forward by various architects for uniting the two palaces 

 into a single one. That of Percier and Fontaine effected this by means 

 of several courts disguising the defect in parallelism, and comprised a 

 public library and an opera-house. The only portions actually carried 

 out were the triumphal arch, and a few bays at each end of a wing 

 running along the Rue de Rivoli. In this part of the palace the archi- 

 tects showed an appreciation of the work of early predecessors, which 

 was the best feature of the archaeological tendencies of the day. They 

 contented themselves with reproducing the elevations of Henry IWs 

 Galerie du Bord de 1'Eau on the opposite side of the court (Fig. 451), 

 a very fortunate circumstance at the present day, when the original has 

 disappeared. 



PUBLIC MONUMENTS : ARC DU CARROUSEL. The triumphal arch, 

 on the other hand, shows their more usual bent towards classical 

 archaeology. The so-called "Arc du Carrousel" (Fig. 453) is a pleasant 

 variant on the arch of Septimius Severus, differing from it first by the 

 greater importance given to the treatment of the ends, which are 

 pierced by arches equal to the lesser ones in the face, with whose 

 vaults they intersect, and secondly by the introduction of colour in the 

 form of pink marble panels, friezes, and columns. These columns were 



