474 
PAR 
The monuments are difiributed in different apartments; 
and, by their arrangement, exhibit the Rate of flatuary in 
France from the earlieft periods to the prefent time. They 
are arranged according to their refpeftive antiquity, each 
containing fpecimens of a fingle century, which is num¬ 
bered at the entrance; and receiving light through win¬ 
dows of painted'glafs, executed during the fame period. 
The eye of a ftrangeris firfi arrefted by the mouldering 
altars of the ancient Gauls,—altars probably Rained with 
human blood. Palling over many of the rude veftiges of 
early times, he dwells with enthufiafm on the tomb of 
Clovis: he beholds that prince humbling himfelf, and 
fuppiicating pardon for the atrocities which he had com¬ 
mitted. He paufes on the remains of the cruel Chilperic ; 
his attention is rivetted on the monument of the raur- 
derefs Fredegonde, till he is roufed by the martial air and 
menacing attitude of the illuRrious Charlemagne, who, 
with brandilhed fword, appears to be dictating laws to the 
world. On thefe relics of remote ages time has com¬ 
mitted many ravages ; but, with all their mutilations, 
they are intereRing to the hiflorian and the artiR. 
An anachronifm, not pleafing to the eye of taRe, is ad¬ 
mitted here, on account of its fuppofed effeft. The beau¬ 
tiful maufoieums of Francis I. and Diana of Poiftiers, 
equally verfed in the myReries of politics and love, form 
a Rriking contraR with the rude efforts of earlier ages. 
The Ratue of Corneille likewife occupies a place in this 
hail, with many other exquilite pieces of fculpture. 
The apartment dedicated to the thirteenth century 
contains not much worthy of attention. We obferve the 
tombs of Louis IX. his fon Philip, his wife Ifabella of 
Arragon, and his brothers Charles 5 but the art of fculp¬ 
ture has made little progrefs. 
With the apartment containing the relics of the four¬ 
teenth century are found the efligies of Philip the Fair, 
and of John. The middle of the hall is enriched by the 
Ratue of Charles V. furnamed the Wife, the noble Du 
Guefclin, and his friend Sancere. 
In the hall of the fifteenth century we perceive the 
daum of that light and elegant architecture which dif- 
tinguiflies modern times. The monuments, which are 
there preferved, interefi by their number, and by the 
names with which they are connected. The connoifleur 
firfi paufes at the tombs of Louis d’Orleans, and his bro¬ 
ther Charles the Poet. After which appear Renee d’Or¬ 
leans, grandfon of the intrepid Dunois, and Philip de 
Comines, the father of modern hifiory. The Ratue of 
Louis XI. is placed near that of his fon Charles VII. 
and, not far diRant, the heroic and unfortunate Joan of 
Arc Rands by the fide of Ifabel of Bavaria. In the centre 
of this group the fuperb tomb of Louis XII. in the form 
of a Gothic chapel, is one of the noblefi fpecimens of the 
improved taRe of the 15th century. His recumbent 
figure, charafterifiic of death, reminds the fpeCiator of 
that melancholy hour, when thoufands of his weeping 
fubjeCts, following his remains to St. Denis, exclaimed, 
51 Our good monarch Louis XII. is dead. In him we 
have loll our father and our friend.” 
The Hall of the Sixteenth Century contains the flatues 
of Francis I. and Claude his queen, the good Henry, the 
brave Coligny, the witty but immoral Rabelais, the fage 
1 ’Hopital, the unprincipled Catharine of Medicis, and 
xnany others. Some painted glafs, refpefting the hifiory 
of Pfyche, although beautifully executed, does not quite 
accord with the folemnity of the place. 
Entering the hall appropriated to the feventeenth cen¬ 
tury, the ltranger is bewildered amid the crowd of philo- 
fophers and heroes which prefent themfelves to his view. 
Fie contemplates the form of Richelieu refiing in the 
arms of Wifdom, Turenne repofing in thofe of Immor¬ 
tality, and Mazarine fuppliant at the throne of Heaven. 
The names of Corneille, Moliere, La Fontaine, Racine, 
Fenelon, Pafcal, and Boileau, fill him with pleafing vene¬ 
ration. In the centre of the hall is placed the exquifitely- 
fij;i&ed Ratue of Louis XJV, rendered Rill more fublime 
3 
I s. 
by the immortal geniufes which furround him. The 
tombs of Le Brun, the French Apelles; Poufiin, the 
painter of philofophers and poets; Colbert, the profound 
financier ; Defcartes, the antagonifi of Newton ; De Thou, 
the philofophical hiRorian; Bofi'uet, the eloquent preacher; 
Coyfevox, the inimitable Ratuary ; and Le Notre, to whom 
the mofi beautiful gardens of France owe all their ele¬ 
gance, will not be overlooked. 
The eighteenth century prefents us with the illuRrious 
names of Voltaire, Crebilion, Montefquieu, Roufleau, 
Maupertuis, Couflou, Lepautre, Saxe, Helvetius, Fonte- 
nelle, BuR'on, and d’Alembert. The remarkable dif¬ 
ference in the defign and execution of the monuments 
of Maupertius, Cayius, and the Marechal d’Harcourt, 
and thofe wdiich decorate the extremity of the hall, fii-ows 
the rapid progrefs of the art during the lafi century. 
The garden is converted into a kind of Elylium, where, . 
fhaded by the cyprefs and the willow, repofe the afiies of 
Moliere, La Fontaine, Boileau', Defcartes, MalTillon, and 
Montfaucon ; the warrior Du Guefclin, and thee monarch 
Dagobert. In a final 1 fepulchral edifice, conflrufted with 
materials from the very maufoleum which endirined them, 
were depofited the bones of Abelard and Eloifa ; but they 
have been removed to the cemetery of Perela Chaife. 
Catacombs and Cemeteries.— The cemeteries of 
Paris were originally without the walls of the city ; but, as 
its boundaries were gradually extended, they became fur- 
rounded by buildings. Of thefe the cemetery belonging 
to the church of the Holy Innocents was the molt capa¬ 
cious as well as mofi difiinguifiied: for more than feven 
centuries it ferved as a receptacle for the dead for up¬ 
wards of twenty pariflies. Philip AuguRus, as far back 
as 1186, inclofed it with high walls, and the gates were 
clofed at night. About forty years afterwards the bifliop 
of Paris, Pierre de Nemours, enlarged it; but from that 
time no further enlargement of its precinfts was ever 
made. In 144.0, Denis Defmoulins, then bifiiop of Paris, 
raifed the burial-fees; at which the people murmured, 
and refented the impofition, as they deemed it, fo Rrongly, 
that they entered into a combination, and during four 
months no perfon was buried there, and no funeral fer- 
vice performed over thofe who died, a revenge for which 
the bifliop excommunicated them all. This quarrel did 
not continue long; and, as generations after generations 
were piled one upon another within the fame ground, the 
inhabitants of the neighbouring pariflies began to com¬ 
plain of the great inconvenience and danger to which 
they were expofed ; diftafes were reafonably imputed to 
fuch a mafs of colle&ed putridity, tainting the air by ex¬ 
halations, and the waters by filtration; and meafures for 
clearing out the cemetery would have been taken in the 
middle of the fixteenth century, if forne difputes between 
the bifliop and the parliament had not prevented them. 
To fave the credit of the burial-ground, a marvellous 
power of confuming bodies in the fliort fpace of nine days 
was imputed to it, as Hentzner tells us when he defcribes 
the place as fepidchrorum numero et fcelejlis aclmiraudum. 
The mode of interment was of the mofi indecent kind, 
not in fingle graves, but in common pits. “ I am aflo- 
niflied,” fays Philip Thicknefle writing from Paris, “ that, 
where fuch an infinite number of people live in fo fmall a 
compafs, they fhould fuffer the dead to be buried in the 
manner they do, or within the city. There are feveral 
burial-pits in Paris, of a prodigious fize and depth, in 
which the dead bodies are laid fide by fide, without any 
earth being put over them till the ground-tier is full ; 
then, and not till then, a fmall layer of earth covers them, 
and another layer of dead comes on, till, by layer upon 
layer, and dead upon dead, the hole is filled with a mafs 
of human corruption, enough to breed a plague. Thefe 
places are inclofed, it is true, within high walls; but, 
neverthelefs, the air cannot be improved by it. The 
burials in churches too often prove fatal to the priefis 
and people who attend ; but every body and every thing 
in Paris is fo much alive, that not a foul thinks about the 
dead.” 
