EASTERN PACIFIC EXPEDITION 445 



in the winter. So we came and are in our old quarters, 

 somewhat in a mess, as the manager is taking advantage 

 of the boycott against Paris by strangers to revamp the 

 whole house. I have seen a few of my Paris friends ; 

 those at the Jardin des Plantes fared badly, and the 

 menagerie worse than its keepers. They lost but one 

 beast, one old lady giraffe who had seen her best days. 

 The basement of the buildings where the duplicates are 

 kept fared badly, and I fancy those collections suffered 

 greatly. The great wine-sheds along the Seine were 

 swept clear of thousands of hogsheads of wine that 



have gone down the Seine to ? It is even now 



quite a sight to see the Seine rush against the arches 

 of the bridges ; a few only of them are fully opened. 

 They must have been well built to stand the enormous 

 pressure thrown against them — not one was carried 

 away. But the damage done to Paris, and especially to 

 the suburbs, is stupendous. It is a catastrophe. All the 

 small workmen who owned their houses in the banlieux, 

 who came to Paris every day to work, are cleaned out, 

 their houses and all cleared away, ruined from one day 

 to the next, nothing left after having provided a home 

 and for the future of their families. It is amazing how 

 the people have recovered their bearings. Everything 

 goes on as usual ; all the theatres, cafes, etc., are opened 

 in full blast as usual. The recuperative capacity of the 

 French is amazing, — the Franco-German war forty 

 years ago, and then such a calamity as this flood on 

 the top. They ought to be crushed, but they rise to the 

 occasion and get ready for the daily work, which, after 

 all, has carried many a man over calamities which seemed 

 unbearable. 



We had an excellent passage to Naples, stopped there 



