Evening star., 1898-06-04
Yet the Paris Morgue Has Many
Charms for Tourists.
WHERE UNKNOWN DEAD ARE TAKEN
Hundreds of the Unfortunates
Are Never Identified.
S q 1CIDE AND MURDER

| Spetidi Correspondence OF 1he Evening Star
| PARIS. May 25. 1895.
| Feet-fcremost, thou shalt 20 thy way!
This was a famous song at the Chat
| Noir, which mixed grave things ard gay
in fearful and wonderful manner Some
| of the French dead stay feet-foremost for
many days-behind the glass windows of
the morgue. They are the poor devils fished
out Of the Seine river, or found lifeiess in
| some back street in the late night, without
| anything to tell who or what they are.
Altogether. this gay city of Paris counts
| an average Of two suicides and two muir
| ders every day of the year. All these are
| regularly brought TO the morgue for the
| medical examination and autopsy. The
autopsy is in connection with department
| OF the faculty of medicine, SO that suicide
ana murder benefit some one If not the
] victims But few bodies are exposed to the
! public The occupants of the places be-
hlnd the windows which present SO in
| vincible an attraction to tourists and Par
| isians alike, are those who bear about
| thein no sign OF identity. They are ex-
| posed here in the hope that some one NAV
come to recognize them. The clothing
| ICund on them is arranged near as this is
| often the only means of Identification And
| all day long the crowd defiles before the
siass screen, from which falls on them the
deathly chill Of the refrigerating room be-
mind, in which the corpses are preserved
| 1t Is gruesome sight thrown into the
! frivolous brightness of Paris.
Her Morbid Curiosity.
Il will never, never go there again. SAYS
the young woman after her first visit. But
when her final sightseeing comes she drives
| ostensibly to the stately cathedral church
OF Notre Dame, towering above the river
and then slips round to the low building on
| the rivers bank and in at
| doors TO look once more at those who lie
| feet-foremost.
| behind the ornate apse of the great
Gothic church, with its flying buttresses of
stone, there is first green square where
| cl ldren play beneath the trees Then
| there is the highway, and then-with the
| eVeropen doors at the curb-the long low
| bulidlnS CT the mcrgue. The balls of the
| children at play may roll into It. and tn,
| urchins, before hurrying back to their
| sport, take a calculating look at the body
| winch the night has added to the familiar
| cCilectlon. The building is like a Grecian
| toInb-or place where lost objects are
| Kept until claimed. Perhaps that would
pe the best description of the relics of hu-
nanity found here at ali seasons. but es-
| pecidliy now in the Springtime.
When Suicides Abound
1t is curious fact that, while a ma
| Jorlty OF the dead are taken from the river
where they have drowned themselves or
| cSSiA SiOWiie4, II Is III the months when the
water is warm that suicides abound. Strong
| argument for the insanity of all these poor
| victims, for If they were really tired of
| lifes history, glad of deaths mystery,
would they hesitate from the fatal plunge
| Just because the water is cold?
This is just what Rousseau says happened
| TO himself once, and as a result of his
| antipathy to cold water, he lived to a con-
| siderable age, and lies buried in the Pan
| Ineoh as the prophet and precursor of the
! frehch revolution. He is not the only one
| WHO discovered the mortal dread of the
| French race for cold water. When the peo-
| pie gathered, in 1880 or thereabouts to
| make a new revolution, Casmir Perier
! grandfather OF the ex-president of the
| present French republic instead of ordering
| out the troops, had the firemen turn their
noses on the mutinous crowd. The crowd
ran Tor dear life, and there was no reyolu-
lioh-and the great man was known for
ever after as Casimir "Pompier.' But
| misery is great, and in the balmy spring
| time the water grows warm enough to
| think of suicide in it.
Women I'm the Minority.
In one year, out of 695 bodies brought to
| the morgue, 34T had been taken out of the
river. OF these, only eighty were women
| which shows that Tom Hoods Bridge of
| Sighs" was a compliment to the sex, at
| least as far as our French sisters are con-
cerned.
The life which has been led by those who
commit suicide is interesting to know. 1t
Is not what is commonly thought-which
again shows that people do not get rid of
tfeir own lives according to any reasonable
act; Of the men, sixty came from the lib
eral professions, forty-seven We're foremen
IN commercial or industrial establishments
siXty-eight were clerks or employees 2SS
skilled workmen and ninety-nine day labor
ers thlrty-eight domestic servants and
siAty-three without any known or avowed
profession. OF the women, eight were from
liberal professions, six were forewomen
six clerks, seventy-eight skilled and thirty
three unskilled workingwomen, twenty-five
domestic servants and sixty-three of pro-
fession unknown worse.
Another curious item of the statistics of
the place is that the figures run up fear
fully in the years of universal exhibitions.
Is it because SO many foreigners get
stranded here in Paris? 1t will be ques-
tlcn to ask in two years from now, when
SO many will try to do the exhibition Of
1900 on perhaps insufficient funds. Let
their first visit be to the morgue to see
how unwholesome they will look if they
are ever brought to these benches, to be
propped up with their American feet curled
up piteously at the idle, profane. Mortified.
cynical stares of the crowd which will
surely pass before their dead bodies.
Preserving the Bodies.
At the back of the morgue where the
public is not admitted, the building sinks
DOWN two stories to the waters edge. Here
are the demonstrating rooms for the medi-
cad students and the powerful refrigerating
apparatus. This latter produces tempera-
ture of the zero of our thermometers-that
is thirty-two degrees below the freezing
point The bodies brought in are subjected
to this during several hours. They are
placed for the purpose in inches in the
solid wall. Then they are brought into the
exhibition hall Gf they have not been iden-
tlhed) and are kept at freezing tempera-
ture. Sometimes they remain for many
weeks. If no one recognizes them they are
taken away from public view; but they are
still kept for some months before they are
finally buried.
Meanwhile, photographs of all who arrive
in this strange inn of death are placed at
the entrance, where every one can scan
the details of the features; and the clothing
is open to inspection by any one who thinks
he has recognized the face. When persons
are missing 1t is here their friends come to
search. There Is always Official to give
them all Information and aid. With the
sudden mixture Of this dreadful and laugh
able which characterize the civilization of
this city of light, forty-year-old Partisan