Morning journal and courier., 1884-10-25

I SlTeet SceneS-AOW to Save Money EnterPrise-Much Gas Burned-The Seine.
 l PARIS, Sept. 30. 1 To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER: 1t IS rather an inverted order of things to explore the Orient, the land of holy writ and
 the eastern countries of Europe, and finally
 drop in upon the gay French capital. Yet even Paris is measurably fresh to the west bound round -the-world tourist from Ameri- ca. Perhaps the reader can forgive Der
 sonal account of experiences and impressions
 thus enjoyed for the sake of comparing it with his own experience; if he has taken the reverse route
 Landing in Paris after an all-day railway ride from Switzerland, I stampeded for the
 hrst hotel at hand and went to bed; rather commonplace beginning, but was too tired for sightseeing. Bright and early the fol lowing morning found me on foot, without guide-book, knowledge of any English-speak- ing person in the city, or the least idea where
 was relatively. It was very, very early in ! the morning; seven o'clock ante-meridian is earlier in Paris than in any other place I, ! have yet swooped down upon My first bus Ao cities-was to provide myself with a good
 lndexed map of the entire city. It was so ! early that had some difficulty in finding
 store open, but by drifting hither and thith- CT at random I at length found that which I sought. It was now my purpose to master the general topography of Paris, and found ! special tramps' settee (they are commenda- ply numerous in Paris upon which to prose cute my studies. I had fancied that this ! would be Herculean task. In Vienna, Mu- ! nleh, and in fact all except the large Orient | al cities with their narrow, crazy streets I have found it a simple matter to find my way 1 anywhere after the first day with the aid of ! only pocket-map. In the course of two weeks of hard work learned Vienna so that used to go everywhere without the map | even rom St. Marx to the Donau Baden ! and from Mussdorf and Wahring to Pensing | and Hutzing.
 Of course 1t IS the customary thing to hire 1 cabs and guides When was a very help
 less young tourist began that way, but I l have outgrown it. I never could be satisfied l to subordinate myself to a dragoman, and I this feeling of independence has developed | into positive though somewhat arbitrary l contempt for the species. When one of the book guides stood last week before a Thes- plan statue that held aloft the tragic mask. ! and deliberately pronounced it a statue of Herod with the head of John the Baptist in I his hand, the incident failed to even interest me, so often have I seen substantially the same thing done elsewhere. I prefer to l launch forth in a city, earn what learn, and know that have arrived at fact This way l takes longer, of course, but it leaves a much more vivid picture in the mind In this way | have learned to revel in the very intricacies of city, and to love to plunge into it in a ! hit and miss way, with only my friendly map as an ally.
 But when looked at the map of Paris I confess that I was aghast for moment. Could ever learn to navigate such a Iaby- r1nth of c1rcu1tous rues, avenues and boule- wards? 1 would try. After half an hours hard study of the relative localities of points ] of interest, coupled with memorization of the boulevard nomenclature in general, the light began to break in upon me, and felt equal to the task of ''tackling' even Paris I providing was content not to stray off into ! the byways. Experience is something in sneh an undertaking, and perhaps good ! bump of locality is more; but common horse sense" is most of all, and it does not ! argue any exceptional shrewdness to get along successfully in this way. Thanks to the width of these magnificent Ps1risian bouleyards, ss,d the first-eiass method of bull tletining the names of the various stTeets I found 1t no dIfncuIt task to get along nfEElet my own tutorship ssase I Many of the street sights which impress
 
 ! catch my attention, because I have seen them duplicated elsewhere. But there were plenty that were novel, and at the risk of repetition l will jot a' few of them down. ] The street sweepers were at work cleaning each thoroughfare and fitting it up for the business of the day. They do their work well, so that the real Parisians wake up each ! morning tor noon) to find their metropolis wearing "spick and span" aspect. The heavy revolving brooms, drawn by horses, are very effective; and what they do not ac- complish is performed by the men and wo- l men who follow with brush brooms The I refuse is gathered up in wooden boxes or tubs bearing the name of the street to which l they belong. All these street cleaning uten- I sils are kept in tall round ''sentry boxes" ! three or four feet in diameter, that line the streets on either side. A surprisingly large l number of the streets are paved with the wooden block payements which have come l into such disfayor in the States on account of their wearing-out capacity; but here-I know not by what magic infuence-they are I made to be as sound gold dollar, a good ly sight every morning after they have been freshly cleaned. I wonder how this extraor- dinary condition is maintained. There seems to be no repairing in progress In fact the only cause of complaint that can find against these Paris Nieholsons is that they are quite slippery during rain or after they have been watered. l have seen several horses thrown to the ground on th1S account.
 The principal vehicles astir at this ''early' hour were the heavy two-wheeled vegetable l carts going to market, some drays and the public carTyalls. The drays that were en- gagged in carrying stone were drawn by five, seven and even more horses harnessed single ! file in a long procession. The public carry alls were a study. The omnibuses were all street cars, and the street cars were omnibus l es. In other words, those that went on tracks looked no more like street cars than did the nominal omnibuses, if as much There are but few street car lines in the city, the omni- bus lines doing the bulk of the business. Both vehicles have two stories and accommo- date about fifty persons with seats. Several l of the steam railway lines have two-story I Carriages, with the second class below and the third-class above. The early vendors of newspapers were abroad with long poles. to | the upper extremity of which their wares were attached, and by reaching these up to 1 the lofty second story omnibus patrons, they l effected sales where otherwise they could not | go.
 l I was surprised at the large number of news pavilions on either side of the streets. One would think that the sale of papers in | this way must be enormous in order to justi- I fly such frequent establishments.
 | was amused at the loaves of bread, three I or four feet long, which women were bearing | on their shoulders bound together in bundles | ten or twelve feet long.
 | As the day advanced the broad streets proved none too broad for the traffic imposed upon them. The blare of the fish horns car | ried by the omnibus drivers deafening at I times The vehicles seem to be driven at. a pretty smart pace and the precaution is quite necessary. They are much larger than the t'tram omnibuses' of Alexandria, Basic or
 any other city that have visited. Without the aid of that fpony" of tourist students
 a guide-I readily found my way down the Boulevard de Strasbourg to the Boulevard de l St. Denis, which, with it's extensions under different names, forms perhaps the most ire l duented street here. Past spacious hotels, imposing theatres and great business blocks, I threaded my way to the famous church 1 Madeleine, catching a glimpse en route of I that magnificent opera house which seems still to hold it's position unrivaled as the 1 most sumptuous one in the world. I have heard it said that five thousand houses were I torn down to permit the erection of this mar
 yelous edifce, but can hardly credit so ex- l travagant Q statement.
 l On the left I passed the American Ex-
 change, with it's cosy conversation rooms and 1 it's fine collection of newspapers from all parts of the United States, including all the | representatiYe journals