The Portland daily press., 1883-04-09

Partisan stations, some little Parises outside
of Paris, Batign0lle more bourgeois aud
Montmartre more popular. The true PROV
inces of Paris, the narrow, wretched and
dull ones, are In Paris.
After all hundred articles might be writ
ten to define what is Partisan and what is
not, and at the hundred and first article the
reader would be no farther advanced than he
would be after reading the four hundredth
work on Parls, lis life and its customs; he
would know less than he could learn by
simply loafing about the streets, the theatres
and the clubs.
IL is this same Paris which in the Sale
Lewis condemns to death the people who
displease an orator charged with oratorical
dynamite, and which goes to the Eden The
atre to see the hattalions of dancers skip and
hop. 1t is Paris which hustles about on the
boulevard on Mardi Gras to see the maskers
and washerw omen and which will 90 to-
morrow with flowers to Victor Hugo to con-
graduate him on his eighty-first birthday.
IL Is this same Paris of which Voltalre said
People so to the Opera Comioue on the
day that the Chevalier de La Barre is burned
and Lally decapitated. All, Parisians, you
only know how to dance around the bodies
Oh yonr Drothers!' And yet, the Partisan is
not wicked; he is generous, amusing and
amusaole, easy to dupe, jolly fellow, and
.>-~"NH5 hN' w AiC bAdNCtN WnCu ~ Is utC-
essary. Yes, sceptical and artless, cruel
and charming, getting enthusiastic over trifes
and kissing masterpieces, coutent TO pay for
his plumbers by statues and doing public
penstence for his sentiments; Harlequin as
much as Athenian, but Harlequin by grace,
quickness, pirouette and the coup de ldngue,
more terrible than the coup de bdtte--this is
the Parision.
Dumas fills admirably defined HMM not
DEFINING him ar all--whau ba xxt,ota Il, Same
album:
God has created the Partisan in order
that foreigners may never know what to
think of the Frenchrr
As to what is Partisan. that is TO say, of
purely Partisan essence, it can be compre
hended rather than analysed. 1t is an affair
of sensation. Partisan wit or Partisan mode
is like the reviews at the end OF the year,
which amuse the boulevard but which would
make no one outside the Notifications laugh.
In the little village of Saint-Gervais, near
Blois, they make "a delicious cream which,
tasted while il is fresh, gives to the palate the
| sensation of the most delicious sorbet. Louis
| Nv, gourmet at Versailles and gourmani
| at the Parc-auX-Cerfs, established a relay in
order that the Saint-Gervais cream might ar
rive az his table fresh This cream Is as ex !.
quislte as sonnet without defect, but it
has grave defect, however. 1t cannot be
transported, and at the end of two hours
| good bye to the don't know what which
| gives it its value. Well, the Partisan charm.
the Partisan seduction, at the theatre or in
| the newspaper, is little the Saint Gervais
| cream Of the mind. Swallowed on the spot
1t is exquisite; transported elsewhere, or
tasted too late and 1t is a little rancid That
| does not at all diminish the price of this rare
| thing, but 1t makes dessert entirely special
| and one that does not admit of expectation.
| Ii is useless for the telegraph, like Louis
| Nv, to invent means of transport. Pa
| risian wit, the cream OF Paris, cannot stand
| the voyage. This is what gives Paris its
| power and its special attraction. People
come here TO taste its froth, its melting sub
stances aud its cream. The misfortune is
| that in coming here each one brings from al
most everywhere a lot of exotic meats which
are spiced and adulterated and which burn
| the palate-caviar or kari, coarse wines from
| America or Australia, red pepper, thrown
by the handful upon our pinch of attic sals,
and the Partisan taste becomes lost, the
| cream of Paris takes, little bv little vague
| perfume OF pale ale, gin or kummel. Rms
sian on one side, American on the other,
half English. half Valague, the pure Paris
ain will finish by becoming myth. People
| will ask what has become of the Partisan.
noun and adjective, the same as they now
seek to know what has become of the carline
or how such and such a maslodon has brok-
/ en- up.
| 1t is still Daniel Dare who warns us of
this dismal eRentful future by heart-rend-
| ing definition of the word Yankee:
Yankee: the Partisan of the future
/ shall not say Amen, concludes NJ. Clare
lie aud have great fear of being compelled
| to add "alasr'