8a The Public Gardens and Parks of Paris. 



are near and radiate from it, and with a terrible history. Fountains 

 and statues embellish it ; there is no sign of its fearful associations 

 to be seen ; it is a place to make one ashamed of Trafalgar-square, 

 which has been ridiculously called the finest site in Europe. By 

 looking to the east the Palace of the Tuileries may be seen through 

 the division made in the wood of chestnuts by the central walk, 

 and to the west the Avenue des Champs Elysees. If the reader 

 who has not visited Paris will suppose the lower part of Regent- 

 street to be flanked with a large and wjde pleasure ground, with a 

 grand tree-bordered avenue passing through its centre straight away 

 to the highest point of the broad walk in the Regent's Park, and 

 there crested by an immense triumphal arch — the largest in the 

 world, i6i feet high and 145 wide — he will be able to form some 

 idea of what the scene here is. It was only in 1 860 that the garden 

 part was laid out as such, and yet it looks an ancient affair, has 

 many respectable specimens of conifers. Magnolias, &c., numerous 

 large and well made banks and beds of Rhododendrons, Azaleas, 

 hoUies, and the best shrubs generally, with abundant room for 

 planting summer flowers, chiefly however as margins to the clumps 

 of fine shrubs. It is a large space, large enough for the aUied 

 armies to encamp here in 1813, and perhaps the most remarkably 

 diversified scene of the kind in the world. In the centre is the 

 avenue itself, usually covered in fine weather with carriages ; then 

 wide asphalte footways and gravel walks, with about five rows of 

 trees on each side, and then the ground begins to assume the gar- 

 denesque aspect, and to become in short a first-rate pleasure garden. 

 Here and there among the trees may be seen neat and showy- 

 looking buildings surrounded by a close planting of rhododendrons 

 or other shrubs, and with a rather large gravelled space surrounding 

 each ; these are cafes, where singing, music, &c., are to be heard in 

 the summer — the summer residences of the music halls, in fact. 

 Other "places of amusement," from Punch and Judy shows to re- 

 volving circuses, abound. On Sundays and fine days tlie wide tree- 

 shaded walks are crowded with pedestrians ; all the little games are 

 in full swing, and though it may seem a queer jumble to some 



