GAEDEXS OE THE LOEYKE AND THE TUILERIES. 9 



Fig. 4. 



best attempts in our so very mucli larger and "busier 

 London. 



The Gardens of the Louvre and the Tuileries. 



The Place du Carrousel, stretching between the Palaces of 

 the Louyre and the Tuileries, is a large open payed square 

 by no means attractiye, but at its eastern end it merges into 

 the narroTver Place Xapoleon III., to which I wish more par- 

 ticularly to direct attention. The Place is inclosed on three 

 sides by the splendid buildings of the new Louyre, and is 

 embellished with two little gardens surrounded by railings 

 with gilt spears. The Place du Carrousel^ surrounded by 

 Palaces, is perfectly bare and without ornament, except the 

 triumphal arch that stands at 

 the main entrance of the court 

 of the Tuileries, but looking to- 

 wards the LomTe the eye is in- 

 stantly refreshed by these little 

 gardens, yeritable oases in a wil- 

 derness of paying stone. I know 

 of no spot more capable of teach- 

 ing some of the most yaluable les- 

 sons in city-gardening than this. 

 Yiewed externally from their 

 immediate surroundings, or from 

 the more distant Tuileries square, 

 the gardens haye a yery pretty 

 effect, and show at once the 

 utility of such, not only for their own sakes, but also as an 

 aid to architecture. On the one hand you haye a space 

 as deyoid of yegetation as the desert — on the other, by 

 the creation of the simplest types of garden, you relieye 

 the sculptor^s work in stone and the changeless lines of the 

 great buildings by the liying grace of yegetation, so as to 

 make the scene of the most refreshing kind, and all by 

 merely encroaching a little on the space that would other- 

 wise be monopolized by paying stones. The gardens are 

 yery small and most simple in plan, a circle of grass, a 

 walk,, and a belt of hardy trees and shrubs around the 



L'Arc de Tiiompbe du Carrousel. 



