New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1870-01-28
FOREIGN CORRESPONDENCE.
FRANCE.

your readers some of them, ut least might be little
incredulous il to attempt 10 convince them that
the Holiday aspect of the street differs in hardly an
appreeiable degree from their everyday aspect
Take away the booths that placed along the side
walk Of the Boulevards at Christmas time and let
out 70 petty dealers for fifteen days term, and do
not know what there was in the streets during the
Holiday season very different from what one sees
every day. The arrangement of shop-windows has
been brought to such perfection. here in Paris that
there was really not much left to do for the
special occasion, and as / have become tOcrably
familiar with the shop-wIndOws in all the principal
quarters and with a good many in the low quarter
venture to assert with the modest assurance of
eonnosseur that except, perhaps, in the toy-shopS
and candy-shopS there was great lack OF novelties
In the windows. Indeed | dare say should not
want for hackers if were to that the look of
the streets little dull. for man who loves his
kind and who has opecial dislike to shOp-keepcrs
must I think have his heart touched little at
ing crowds Of people in the streets staring in at the
windows and nobody all inside but the shopkeeper
with his hands in his pockets, or dame-au-comptoir
busy in making MP imaginary accounts. That bust
ness was uncOmmonly dull. rybody admits. and
how could il he expected to be otherwise consider
ing the uncertainty of the political situation and the
strikes that are still in force in many of the most i'm
portant trades There must always DO an immense
deal of buying and selling in Paris, for somebody
must support tins wilderness of shops but it must
always be a Of wonder how, in their apparent
state of chronic emptiness, many of them do con-
trve TO keep open, and TO wear even semblance OF
life I suppose it is because Broadway is compare
lively small a street. and becanse all the fine shops
in our city are confined to its modest limits, that it
has always IN the holiday season animated an
aspect but be the reason what il may, remember
Broadway as much cheerfuler, brighter place dur
the week between Christmas and NewYears, than
the sunuieSt of the BOulevards The BoulevardS are
DO doubt infinitely finer streets than any American
city has 10 show, and the Paris shop-windows
most skilfuy arranged for the display of the most
beautiful products of modern ingenuity, taste and
skill but this display is very little varied and as II
is seen every day IN the year it is not very surprising
that they should not be much gayer at one time than
another. Then, too the weather had something to
Go with the dullness 1t was for the most of the
time drilling fog with CLEANS of treacherous
light luring people out without umbrellas and
lrencLing them most unexpectedly, most uncom-
Portable habit the Paris weather has got confirmed
in For all can see the umbrella is as necessary an
institution in Paris in London 1t rains here, more
or less, almost every day.
The shops Of Paris present several noticeable fca-
lures and are interesting beside for what they
tain as pictures of the manners of large por-
ton Of the population. They are by no means
arranged after the unvarying pattern though
there are certain resembances TO be traced be-
tween them ALL There are immense establish
meuts like the /" Bon March6," the petit ST.
Thomas the "Grande Macazins du Louvre" &c,
&c. establishments to which nothing but Stewards
can be compared. aud though Stewards shop is much
larger than any single one of the great establish
mens of Paris there 20 of these, where we have
only one like his And some OF them, La Mena-
gore" for instance the great place where everything
needed in housekeeping, from toothpick up to
cookinGrange for the largest family, can be bought,
are vastly extensive than anything we have to
show. Indeed, the Menagere gives one an over
whelming sense of the infnity Of human artificial
wants and Of the incalcuable labor time. and inge-
uuity that are called into play to crafty those
wants Some day, viii get the details Of this vast
caravanseIai and make a selection from them to
astonish your readers with; it is not subject TO be
introduced at full length in an ordinary letter.
will leave out OF the count to-day. these great mag
ozines which constitute sort of exception to Paris
shops although in reality they only On applica-
ton large scale of the principle of speciat6s"
the principle, and very good one, that runs through
all French society. You don't buy cake at
your bakers. unless. which Is not often, he
calls himself Baker and Pastry-cook" you
don't expect TO find fish at your butchers, SC, &c,
though the rule is not carried out absolutely Sill
there is enough of the principle put into practice TO
make the impression on the mind that every shop
devoted to special article of merchandise. and that
if yOu want collars you must not look to find them
in the same shop with shirts. On the other hand,
where this eZcclleut rule is broken through, Inc
shop-keeping mind seems TO become the sporting
ground of the most incOngruOus IDEAS OF relation,
and its owner is as lost French architect de
pTived of his idea of symmetry. floriS says that
when he was a little boy and lived IN Boston, he
used To be greatly puzzle with the problem Why
they always sold umbrellas IN muslc-shOps. Similar
pRZzes await his solution in Paris, and doubt If
they will be more easily resolved. Another notice
able feature of the shops here Is the domestic ar so
many of them have. They are, in nine cases out of
ten, the places where the prOprletOrs family seems
TO spend the greater part Of ITS time And OF course
il is very pleasant place to spend ones time IN, ana
10 receive ones friends think this feature Is more
likely to be observed in quarters of the great BOue-
ward though there is enough of II even there aud IT
explains perhaps why so many people continue 10
keep up a business that, Judging by the customers
ing. The life of The shOpkeepcr here is IN his shop
and his business and all his family, especially all
the female portion of II, is selfcOnStuted part OF
the firm. lOu Oitenest more nt the women, the
wife and the daughters. than of the man. In humid
reds of there Is no man at all, 80 lar as
the public Is concerned. The shop IS generally
And il is often the best furnished, best lighted, and
waInest, of all the rooms. Probably the instances
very few where the shopkeeper lVes III sep
arate building from that his shop ~ IN. ana, so, III
nav not uusedOm happen that on entering the shop,
you may be greeted with the Odor OF the dinner or
with the shut-Up smell that betrays an hl-yenated
Nyng-rOom. There are, of course, shops fTequented
by the high nobility and by rich Americans, OF
which have not the face TO say such things speak
now only of The ordinary run, the average reSpccta
Die shops, and, barring the occasional III OdgrS,
very much like the domestic air these places have
like very much TO pass them in the evening ana
steal a glance at the buXOm mother aunt, or IT may
be- the salaTied dame-au-conptolr' sitting at her
desk dressed in her best, WITH perhaps, little GIRL
a pretty young woman at her sue engaged III