The New Orleans bulletin. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1874-1876, 1875-09-01
Fer the New Orleans Bulletin
LIFE IN PARIS.

tout ensemble Of Paris, as does the belle of til
Champs Elysees by the perfection of he
toilet upon the ialers of all nations VIII,
frequent that fashionable promenade. Bot
are got up with nice regard for admiration
Both are equally successful in their effort
We admire the lady as one does a coquettish
ly arranged bouquet, too content with its gen
eral beauty to think Of criticising its details
SO with the public edifces and grounds; W
pay them at once and involuntarily tn,
homage of our admiration, receiving at each
glance the lntuitive satisfaction that arts e
from the presence of the beautiful, whethe
made by man or born of God. am not sure
that an inv,iious com psrison does not fore,
itself at once upon Americans at the too per
ceptible contrast between the noble avenues
spacious palaces, beautiful places and taste
full gardens; in short, between the treasures
of their rich and venerable and the m eagre-
ness OF our juvenile and practical civilization
the advantages in respect to architecture
the ornamental arts, and even the scale an
elegance of the more humble requirements Of
the necessities Of the age, in the shape Of
bridges, railroad stations, and public edifices
generally, are greatly on their side. If the
comparison stopped here we should be filled
with envy. With too many it does not 60
further, and they dishonor their native land
by condemning in her the want of a taste for
the mere lust of the eye, which, if cultivated,
would go far to develop with us those social
contrasts which here mark the extremes of
society.
One instance will suffice to illustrate the
ruling passion Of the various governments of
France The most conspicuous, but by no
means the most costly of TIE embellishments
OF Paris, is the Arch of Triumph at the bar
rire de TEoile. A nobler and more COM
handing monument at the entrance Of a
capital mo other city can boast. From its
elsHated position it towers far above all that
portion Of Paris, conspicuous to a great dis
lance in the country, like colossal gateway
to city of giants. 1t is simply an architec-
tural ornament, useful only as affording from
its top the best coup-d'Ga of Paris. The
glory of exhibiting this arch has cost French
men two millions of dollars additional taxes
Even they, while boasting its possession, con-
slider it an apt illustration of their proverbial
expression in regard to prodig .lity, ''to throw
money out of the windows"
Were American citizens called upon to de-
eide between the appropriation of two mil
lions of dollars to a similar construction or
for ofn %ha ~ 4
get it. Not so in France The gold goes for
ornament, the copper for instruction. This
one fact explains, in great MEASURE the wide
distinction of ruling principles between the
two nations. We have less elegance but more
comfort. Our wealth is diffused and society
equalized. Democracy, like water, constantly
seeks level, and with us, imperfect as it is,
it is still the most comfortable assurance for
future progress in all that makes humanity at
large wise and happy that the world has yet
seen. France, on the contrary, fuctuating
between the extremes of aristocratic concerva-
tism and democratic destructiveness, though
slowly winning her way toward the goal of
human rights, still exhibits contrasts in the
social scale which painfully mark the poverty
and ignorance of her masses. Out of the two
million souls that people Paris, fifteen hun
dred thousand are in q state of either uncer-
tainty as to their future, or absolute want.
No civilization which produces such results
can be rightly based. The citizens of the
United States may well spare France the
pride Of her monuments, if tneir cost is the
indulgence of her people.
The better to picture the straits of subsist-
ence to which the luxurious civivilization Of
European aristocracy compels the masses, I
shall draw upon the streets for specimens of
the honest modes of livelihood of this capital.
Without glance at both sides of the social
panorama, the American is very differently
qualified to judge Of the comparative merits
of the institutions of his own and other coun-
tive land is to gather for it, be it in ever SO
humble measure, the wisdom, whether of
example or warning of those he visits. By
thus doing his expatriation may not be with
out benefit to his fellow.citizsns.
It is with the female sex that the compari-
son OF occupations anords the greatest va
riety of strange examples to American eyes, |
Accustomed as we are to invest woman with |
The associations of "home," it is with re-
pugnance at first that we see her SO isolated |
rom her natural protector, leading life |
equally as dist net and Independent in the
,trife,of existence as his. Marriage has not
he same neutrality-suspicious. as with us. 1t
IS union OF interests, seldom of affections.
4 business arrangement for mutual convent
,nce, leaving to the man the same latitude of
bachelor instincts as before, and bestowing
upon the woman a liberty to be purchased in
40 other way. But the aspect of feminine
ISOLATION from domestic relations is most
strongly marked in the extensive class of
hop. girls and all those compelled to gain
subsistence by their individual ex-
,rtions. They live alone, or in couples, al
ured by every species Of dissipation of this
ensuous city, and without other restraint
y surveillance than their own dubious stand
nd of propriety or morals. Their religious
when they have any, in confined
-. $40 ~ .rv of Catholic urorob;p Wbilo |