s sold cheaper than at the bakers
in Paris. At the south end of the street at No. 3, is the site of the
house where Moliere was born, which was held by his father who was an
upholsterer and valet de chambre to Louis XII; against the house is a
bust of the author, with an inscription specifying the event.

Following the Rue de la Tonnellerie brings us opposite St. Eustache,
which after Notre-Dame is the largest church in Paris, built on the site
of a chapel of St. Agnes. The present edifice was begun in 1532, but not
supposed to have been finished until 1642. The portico is more recent,
being after a design by Mansart de Jouy, and erected in 1754: combining
altogether a most incongruous mixture of styles and orders of
architecture, originally commenced with the design that it should be a
sort of mixed gothic, of which the southern door and front bear
evidence, whilst the western portico has doric and ionic columns, and
at the northern end are corinthian pillars, notwithstanding it is a bold
imposing structure, and the interior has the appearance of a fine abbey,
and is a monument which every stranger ought to visit. It is a pity that
a number of little square knobs have been suffered to remain sticking
out from different parts of the shafts of the columns of this church; it
is strange that the French could not be made to understand that the
beauty of a pillar in a great degree consists in a bold broad mass,
which should never be cut up into littlenesses, by rings or any
obtruding projections. In this church lie buried several celebrated
persons, amongst the rest the great Colbert, which is indicated by a
very handsome sarcophagus, sculptured by Coysevose. The sacred music
here is sometimes most exquisitely delightful, the organ being
particularly fine. Facing the southern front is the Marche des
Prouvaires, a sort of appendage to the Marche des Innocents, and
opposite the east side of the church, is the Fontaine de Tantale, at the
point formed by the two streets, Montmartre and Montorgueil, which will
repay the observer for a few minutes devoted to its examination. The
west front of the church faces the Rue Oblin, which we will take, as it
leads to the Halle au Ble, a fine extensive circular building, with a
noble dome, it is built on the site of the Hotel de Soissons, erected
for Catherine de Medicis, in 1572, which in 1748 was demolished, and the
present Halle constructed in 1763; the roof has a round skylight, 31
feet