er, was born. We continue past the
ill-omened Rue de la Ferronnerie and soon reach the Square and
Fontaine des Innocents. This charming renaissance fountain was
transferred here in 1786 from the corner of the old Rues aux Fers (now
the widened Rue Berger) and St. Denis, where it had been designed and
decorated by Lescot and Goujon to celebrate the solemn entry of Henry
II. in 1549. The beautiful old fountain has been considerably modified
and somewhat debased. The longer side has been divided to make a
third, and a new fourth side has been added by Pajou. The whole has
been elevated much too high by the addition of the terrace steps, and
an unsightly dome has been added. Five of the exquisite reliefs of the
Naiads by Goujon still remain, and three have been added by Pajou.
These latter may be distinguished by their higher relief and lack of
refinement.

The site of the immense Necropolis of Les Innocents,[234] which for
six centuries swallowed up half the dead of Paris, roughly corresponds
to the parallelogram formed by the modern Rues Berger, St. Denis,
Ferronnerie and de la Lingerie, and one of the old vaulted
charnel-houses may still be seen at the ground floor of No. 7 Rue des
Innocents. The huge piles of human remains and skulls that grinned
from under the gable roof of the gallery painted with the Dance of
Death were, in 1786, carted away to the catacombs under Paris, formed
by the old Gallo-Roman quarrymen as they quarried the stone used to
rebuild Lutetia. For centuries this enclosure was the refuge of
vagabonds and scamps of all kinds, a receptacle for garbage, the haunt
of stray cats and dogs, whose howlings by night made sleep impossible
to nervous folk; and the lugubrious _clocheteur_, or crier of the
dead, with lantern and bell, his tunic figured with skull and
cross-bones, bleating forth:--

"Reveillez-vous gens qui dormez,
Priez Dieu pour les trepassez."

was no soothing lullaby.

[Footnote 234: According to Sir Thomas Browne, bodies soon consumed
there. "Tis all one to lie in St. Innocents' churchyard as in the
sands of Egypt, ready to be anything in the ecstasy of being ever, and
as content with six feet as the _moles_ of Adrianus."

"_Tabesne cadavera solvat
An rogas haud refert._"--LUCAN.]

A curious early fifteenth-century rhyme is associated with this
charnel-house. One morning, two _bourgeoises_ of Paris, the wife of
Adam de la Gonesse and her niece, went abroad to have a littl