44° LETTERS FROM PARIS- 



lands comprehended within the city. In the quartet 

 of the military academy and the hofpital of the inva- 

 lids, from the rue du Vaugirard to the more of the 

 Seine, and along from thence to the Chaillot, la ville 

 l'eveque, fauxbourg Montmartre, St. Denis, St. Mar- 

 tin, du Temple, St. Antoine, &c. lie difperfed thou- 

 fands of fquare toifes, where there is neither ftreet nor 

 houfe, but only gardens and fields : traces, which, if 

 they were built upon ? would fwell the number of 

 houfes, ftreets, and inhabitants to at leaf! a third 

 more. The nearer round about the walls, the more 

 airy is the town, the ftreets are longer and broader, and 

 the cpncpurfe of people lefs, the inhabitants are more 

 induftrjous, quiet, and contented, the houfes more 

 modern but lower. All Paris, built and inhabited in. 

 this manner, could not contain above four hundred 

 ftreets, and three hundred thoufand inhabitants ; but 

 as it is at prefent, particularly about the centre, where 

 the houfes and ftreets are preffed clofe together, the 

 ftreets are reckoned at above nine hundred, and the 

 inhabitants, exclufive of foreigners, at upwards of nine 

 hundred thoufand, 



In Du Laure's description of Paris, the laft edition, 

 of 1 787. the number of ftreets is fet down at about a 

 thoufand *, and the amount of the inhabitants at a mil- 

 lion, one hundred and thirty thoufand, four hundred 

 and fiftyvtwo. Of thefe, feven .hundred and eighty 

 thoufand, four hundred and fifty -two pay the poll-tax, 

 two hundred thoufand are excepted as paupers, and 

 the foreigners, one time with another, are eftimated 

 at one hundred and fifty thoufand perfons. M. Du 

 * The newel! phn. of Fans gives 943 by name, 



Laure 



