Royal Palaces and Parks of France

. It has not, however, always been a tilting ground for lawyers and criminals, though, no doubt,

mark the Palais de Justice down in the books of most folk as one of the chief Pa

ice of some considerable importance, existed from the earliest days of the Frankish invasi

he throne he abandoned the kingly residence formerly occupied by the Frankish rulers, the Palais des Thermes, and installed h

dence of the French monarchs, regardless of the grander, m

ace that he married Denmark's daughter. His successors, Saint Louis, Philippe-le-Hardi, and Philippe-le-Bel did their part in

ssisted at an official massacre, differing little from that

where Charles V received the Emperor Charles IV and the "Roi des Romains." The three monarchs, accompanied by their families, here supped together around a g

ven over wholly to the disciples of Saint Yves, the judges, advocates and notaries. It became also the definite seat of the Parliament and took the nomenclature of Palais de Justice, though still inhabited at intermitten

eant-were invaded by the stalls of small shopkeepers, some of which actually took root in wood and s

s and minor court officials danced on the famous marble table and "played farces" with the judicial bench serving as a stage. It was said that, on account of the immor

onflagration broke out leaving only the round towers of the Conciergerie, the tower and the church, and that part of the main struc

e fut un

Paris Da

r mangé t

Palais tou

us, crowded with the shuffling coming and going crowd of men and women whose business, or no business at all, brings them to this central point

tes are practically the same as they were in 1622. The structure, take it as a whole, may be said to date only from the seventeenth century, but certain it is that the old Pa

Justice, was formerly the dwelling or guardhouse of the Concierge of the Palais de la Cité. His post was not merely that of the keeper of the gates; he was a personage at court and

itle of Bailli and the post was, at times, occupied by the highest and the most noble in the land, among others Philippe de Savoie, the friend of Charles VI, and J

rles V quitted the residence of the Palais de la Cité, and the Concierger

h remained to patch together the most serviceable of Revolutionary prisons, for at one time it held at

o, in an access of jealous furor, horribly mutilated a royal guardsman, and for this met a most cruel death by being transfixed to a

e is a thing apart from the purport of th

s Ravaillac and Damiens, the Maréchal d'Ancre, Cartouche, Mandrin and others. To-day, as a prison, the Conciergerie still performs i

the third, the Tour de César or the Tour de l'Horloge. This last is the only one which has preserved its medi?val crenulated battlements aloft. The great clock has been commonly considered the la

nt Antoine, one comes to the Place des Vosges, the old Place Royale, which occupies almost the sam

ility. In one of these, the Hotel de Saint Pol, the king once lodged twenty-two visiting princ

these magnificent private dwellings, the Hotel du Petit Musc, t

el Saint Pol. Its historic and romantic memories of the sword and cloak period of gal

. The Duke of Bedford, when regent for the minor Henry VI, lodged here, and upon the expulsion of the English it b

se of that celebrated jousting bout held in its courtyard on th

urt, including Catherine de Médici and the princess Elizabeth, wife of Philippe II, the late husband of Mary Tudor, the two Margu

. At a signal from Catherine musi

e set with jewels, and, in spite of the presence of his wife, his lance flying black and white stre

de Nemours, and was just about disarming when a masked knight approached from the Faubourg Saint Antoine and challenged the king, who

nd's present Earl of Eglinton. The captain of the Scotch Guards, Montgomeri, was not immediately pursued (he meantime had fled the court), but Catherine de Médici harboured for him a most bitter rancour. Pro and con

as her only means of showing her contempt for the woman who had played her royal spouse to his death as the Romans played th

ectacle of the time more imposing than this sky-line silhouette of a Paris palace; not at Chambord nor Chenonc

the ink-black, frowning donjon of the Bastille, its severity in strong contrast

r of Paris's breathing spaces. Well may it be called a royal garden-a park virtually o

n this enclosure were the usual garden or park attributes, more or less artificially disposed, but making an ideal open-air playground for t

elebrating the alliance between France and Spain. Under Richelieu the square became known as the Place des Vosges, and, in spite of the law against duelli

eft a bloody souvenir, which was only forgotten by the historians when they had to recount ano

ount between our illustrious houses," and with that he drew his sword and

the most elegant residential quarters of the capital, preferred

d'état, in the house first made famous as the ha

be recalled Corneille, Condé, Saint Vincent de Paul, Molière, Turenne, Madame de Longueville, De Thou,

wner of one of the houses which borders upon it to change the disposition of the fa?ade brought about a law-s

lans still preserved in the national archives. This is a demonstration of

E VIEW OF

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des Vosges must be kept intact as originally planned-gave joy