- The Perron of the Palais-Royal
The Perron of the Palais-Royal - In the Gallery of the Palais-Royal
- The Delights of the Malmaison
The Delights of the Malmaison A saunter through the park in 1804 - Crossbowmen
The centre figure is winding up his windlass crossbow behind the shelter of a shield. From Manuscript, Froissarts ' Chronicles.' The larger shields, which were carried before the knights (by their pages) when on the march, and which were propped up in front of them as a protection from arrows in a battle or a siege, were known as pavises or mantlets. - A gathering in the Luxembourg Gardens
A gathering in the Luxembourg Gardens 1800 - Steel Corset worn in Catherine's time.
The most extensive and extreme use of the corset occurred in the 16th century, during the reign of Catherine de Medici of France and Queen Elizabeth of England. With Catherine de Medici a thirteen-inch waist measurement was considered the standard of fashion, while a thick waist was an abomination. No lady could consider her figure of proper shape unless she could span her waist with her two hands. To produce this result a strong rigid corset was worn night and day until the waist was laced down to the required size. Then over this corset was placed the steel apparatus shown in the illustration on next page. This corset-cover reached from the hip to the throat, and produced a rigid figure over which the dress would fit with perfect smoothness. - The Boulevard 'Des Petits Spectacles'
The Boulevard 'Des Petits Spectacles' 1808 - Louis XVI on the leads of the temple
After an engraving of the period. - View of the two panoramas and of the passage between them
View of the two panoramas and of the passage between them 1810 - The first Switchback
The first Switchback 1799 - A Public Room at Frascatis
A Public Room at Frascatis - Preparing for conquest
- Paris Scene
- Femme-de-la-cour and foundling
Femme-de-la-cour (Lady of the Court) and foundling - Vigier's Baths
- Lady
- Francis I
Charles realized that his great empire was in very serious danger both from the west and from the east. On the west of him was his spirited rival, Francis I; to the east was the Turk in Hungary, in alliance with Francis and clamouring for certain arrears of tribute from the Austrian dominions. - A Lady at Play
The court of France was, at this period, the most depraved in morals, the grossest and most unpolished in manners, of any in Europe. The women of the bourgeoisie, envious of the great ladies, called them dames à gorge nue; and the latter retaliated by designating the women of the people as grisettes, because of their gray (grises) stockings,—a name retained almost down to the present day. In the sittings of the États Généraux, the President, Miron, complained bitterly of the excesses of the nobility, the contempt for justice, the open violences, the gambling, the extravagance, the constant duels, the "execrable oaths with which they thought it proper to ornament their usual discourse." - Lady with Umbrella
- Cossack Encampment on the Champs-Élysées
- Napoleon as Emperor
He was scheming to make himself a real emperor, with a crown upon his head and all his rivals and school-fellows and friends at his feet. This could give him no fresh power that he did not already exercise, but it would be more splendid—it would astonish his mother. What response was there in a head of that sort for the splendid creative challenge of the time? But first France must be prosperous. France hungry would certainly not endure an emperor. - At the Races on the Champ de Mars
- 1798
- French Lady
- Passengers changing cars
- 1798
- Remains of roman amphitheatre
Remains of roman amphitheatre, Rue Monge, discovered in 1869. - Seated Lady
- Fragment of roman aqueduct
Fragment of roman aqueduct - A Drive in a Whiskey
- On the Terrace of the Tuileries
- The Lords and Barons prove their Nobility by hanging their Banners and exposing their Coats-of-arms at the Windows of the Lodge of the Heralds
The Lords and Barons prove their Nobility by hanging their Banners and exposing their Coats-of-arms at the Windows of the Lodge of the Heralds After a Miniature of the "Tournaments of King Réné" (Fifteenth Century), MSS. of the National Library of Paris. - Marie Antoinette on the way to the Guillotine
- Le Ballet De La Reine
A French Court Ballet In The Early Seventeenth Century - Armed Parisians meeting the king
Armed Parisians meeting the king, 1383 From an illuminated manuscript in the National Library, Paris. - Crossbowmen
The soldiers carry windlass crossbows. One man is winding up his weapon ; the other is shooting, with his windlass laid on the ground at his feet. - M. Clemenceau
Georges Benjamin Clemenceau was an old journalist politician, a great denouncer of abuses, a great upsetter of governments, a doctor who had, while a municipal councillor, kept a free clinic, and a fierce, experienced duellist. None of his duels ended fatally, but he faced them with great intrepidity. He had passed from the medical school to republican journalism in the days of the Empire. In those days he was an extremist of the left. - Château-Gaillard, Plan
Château-Gaillard, the “Saucy Castle” of Cœur-de-Lion, the work of one year of his brief reign, and the enduring monument of his skill as a military engineer, is in its position and details one of the most remarkable, and in its history one of the most interesting of the castles of Normandy. Although a ruin, enough remains to enable the antiquary to recover all its leading particulars. These particulars, both in plan and elevation, are so peculiar that experience derived from other buildings throws but an uncertain light upon their age; but of this guide, usually so important, they are independent, from the somewhat uncommon fact that the fortress is wholly of one date, and that date is on record. Moreover, within a few years of its construction, whilst its defences were new and perfect, with a numerous garrison and a castellan, one of the best soldiers of the Anglo-Norman baronage, it was besieged by the whole disposable force of the most powerful monarch of his day; and the particulars of the siege have been recorded by a contemporary historian with a minuteness which leaves little for the imagination to supply, and which, by the help of the place and works, but little changed, enables us to obtain a very clear comprehension of the manner in which great fortresses were attacked and defended at the commencement of the thirteenth century. - Statuette of a Gaul
Greek Statuette of a Gaul - The Bastille
- Map of France, corrected by order of the king
Map of France, corrected by order of the king Desborough Cooley in his "History of Voyages," says, "They deprived her (France) of several degrees of longitude in the length of her western coast, from Brittany to the Bay of Biscay. And in the same way retrenched about half a degree from Languedoc and La Provence." These alterations gave rise to a "bon-mot." Louis the XIV., in complimenting the Academicians upon their return, remarked, "I am sorry to see, gentlemen, that your journey has cost me a good part of my kingdom!" - Bonaparte and the grenadier
Bonaparte and the grenadier - Louis XIII, King of France
- The Curule Chair
The Curule Chair called the “Fauteuil de Dagobert,” in gilt bronze, now in the Musée des Souverains. The chair ascribed to St. Eloi, and known as the Fauteuil de Dagobert, is an antique consular chair, which originally was only a folding one; the Abbé Suger, in the twelfth century, added to it the back and arms. - Charlemagne crowned
Charlemagne Crowned, a with the nimbus Painting on glass from the Cathedral of Strousbeg, XII and XIV centuries - Madam Campan
Lady-In-waiting to Marie Antoinette - Louis XVI
- Besnier's flying apparatus
Reproduction by heliogravure of the figure from the Journal des sçavans (1678). Extract from a letter written to Mr. Toynard on a Machine of a new invention to fly in the air. A, right front aisle. — B, left rear aisle. — C, left front aisle. — D, right rear aisle. — E, fissure of the left foot which lowers the D aisle, when the left hand lowers the Aisle C. — F, fissure of the right foot which lowers the D-pin when the left hand lowers the C-pin. - Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI
- King Louis leaped fully armed into the sea
But after some delay from contrary winds, and a long wait at Cyprus, the French army landed in Egypt, where the first attack was to be made; King Louis leaped, fully armed, from his galley into the sea in his eagerness to reach the shore. The Saracens fled at first before the invading army, and the city of Damietta was taken almost without a blow. There the Queen, who had followed her husband, as our good Queen Eleanor did a few years later, was left with a sufficient garrison while the army moved onwards up the Nile. - Electric flying machine depicted in Le Philosophe sans pretension (1775)
We reproduce as a curiosity this charming vignette, where we see the inventor Scintilla driving his machine. - Birthplace of Lamarck
Birthplace of Lamarck - Napoleon’s Empire, 1810
Napoleon’s Empire, 1810 - Anne of Austria
engraved by W. Greatbach from a Print by Masson, after P. Mignard - Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis
Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis We must now speak of two important expeditions, which ought to have settled the animated discussion as to the shape of the earth. The Academy of Sciences had despatched a mission to America, to compute the arc of the meridian at the Equator. It was composed of Godin, Bouguer, and La Condamine. It was decided to entrust a similar expedition to the North to Maupertuis. - Nouvelle-Calédonie
- Marshall Bassompierre
Engraved by Gouttière from the Original by Alaux. - Tourelle de la Rue de L’Ecole.-de-Médecine b
- Marshall Schomberg
Engraved by Rouargue from the Original by Rouillard. - Cardinal De Richelieu
Engraved by Bourgeois.