therefore, allowed to store them, under the
supervision of the octroi, and pay as they are sold. When the ancient
corporation of the _crieurs jures_ announced throughout the city the
arrival of a shipment of wine, the purchasers would throng to the banks
of the Seine; when Louis XIV granted the first authorization to
establish a _halle aux vins_, on condition that the profits should be
divided with the Hopital General, the site selected was the Quai
Saint-Bernard, the entrepot of Bercy being then a market outside the
city walls. The latter, on the site of the ancient Halle des Hopitaux of
the seventeenth century, developed greatly after its incorporation
within the city limits; it is at present divided into two sections, _Le
Grand Bercy_ and _Le Petit Chateau_. The city is the proprietor, and
rents spaces to applicants, generally for a year at a time. The octroi
is stationed at every gate of exit, and at numerous posts within the
enclosure. Not only is the wine stored here, but it is blended and
assorted in great tuns, and there is also storage for alcohol, liquors
of all kinds, and oil. The huge enclosure is very carefully policed, not
only for the detection of thieves, but also of fraudulent practices; at
night there are four rounds, of which the second and third are made by
guardians armed with revolvers (a recent innovation), and accompanied by
eight shaggy watch-dogs.

* * * * *

Among the scientific establishments of the city may be mentioned the
observatory established on the top of the Tour Saint-Jacques, the
beautiful fragment remaining of the old church of Saint-Jacques de la
Boucherie, demolished in 1789. In the vaulted open chamber of the base
of the tower stands a statue of Pascal, who, from the top of it,
repeated his experiments on the weight of the air; and on this top--only
fifty three metres from the pavement--there has been in operation for
the last seven or eight years a meteorological observatory. The varying
conditions of the atmosphere, the winds, and the smoke which pollutes
it, are closely investigated, weather predictions are hazarded, and the
observers even descend into the sewer at their feet, under the Rue de
Rivoli, to investigate and analyze the subterranean air. About 1885, M.
Joubert, the director, established here a gigantic pendulum, to repeat
the experiments made by Foucault at the Pantheon in 1851, and afterward
a water-barometer, the only one in exis