ent height, and the breadth is immense,
still the effect is dignified and imposing.

The Chamber itself is a semi-circular hall with 24 white marble ionic
columns and bronze capitals gilt. The president's chair and the tribune
form the centre of the axis of the semi-circle, from whence the seats
rise of the 459 deputies, in the shape of an amphitheatre. A spacious
double gallery capable of containing 700 persons surrounds the
semi-circular part of the Chamber, arranged with tribunes for the royal
family, the corps diplomatique, officers of state and the public. There
are a number of very fine statues, as well as some extremely clever
pictures by the first French artists, and there, is a library of 50,000
volumes. Anyone with a passport may visit the Chamber, but for the
debates a letter post-paid must be addressed to M. le Questeur de la
Chambre des Deputes, who will send a ticket of admission. A short
distance to the east is the Palace of the Legion of Honour, erected in
1786 after designs by Rousseau for the Prince de Salm, after whom it was
called. The entrance is by a triumphal arch, and a colonnade of the
ionic order with two pavillions. At the end of a court yard is the
principal front consisting of a fine portico, adorned with large
corinthian pillars. The side which fronts the Seine is particularly
light and graceful, having a circular projection adorned with columns
supporting a balustrade with six statues. When the Prince de Salm was
beheaded in 1793, the hotel was put up to lottery, and won by a journey
man hairdresser, and in 1803 it was appropriated to its present object;
strangers are admitted without any difficulty.

The Palais du Quai D'Orsay is almost adjoining, and although one of the
most magnificent, yet one of the most chaste edifices in Paris; it has
never received any decided name. It was begun under Napoleon, and then
remained dormant until 1830, and in the present reign has been finished
in the most perfect style. The grand front which faces the river
presents a long series of windows formed by arches beneath a tuscan
colonnade on the ground-floor; the one above is similar, except being of
the ionic order, surmounted by a sort of corinthian attic; the court is
surrounded by a double series of Italian arcades, there are four
staircases, placed at each corner, one styled the escalier d'honneur, is
absolutely splendid, both as regards the construction and the richness
of its ornaments. The chief e