equal ours, eight in a compartment,
sitting omnibus fashion, face to face. We rolled on to the Capital,
passing many fine villas, the product of French architecture.
Everywhere one is impressed with the national peculiarities--the houses,
the streets, modes of conveyance and transportation. Compactness,
neatness, order and precision pervades their every undertaking; but for
celerity and despatch of business they were painful to encounter or
behold, for it ill accords with the American mode. A ride of four hours
and we reach Paris. At the depot the baggage is placed on long tables
awaiting examination by custom-house officers. Mine was passed without.
Took cab for "Hotel de Binda," exquisitely furnished and centrally
located, having easy access to places of note.

This being the most disagreeable time of year, a fire in the rooms was
necessary, for outside everywhere was a damp, penetrating air, remaining
here 15 days with the sight of the sun but once.

The next day after my arrival I called on the American Ambassador, Mr.
Porter, in relation to my exequator, to be issued by the French
Government. It is a recognition of status, and a formal permit from one
nation to another to allow their respective Consuls to exercise the
duties appertaining thereto and a guarantee of protection in their
performance. Had a very cordial reception from Mr. J. R. Gowdy, our
Consul at Paris. Visited the Paris office of the New York Herald, where
many files of American and European papers can be perused. A visit to
the "Louvre" is a joy for the layman, as for the connoisseur, galleries
a mile or more in length hung with paintings grand in imagery and beauty
of old masters, French and Italian, centuries old. Many showed the
silent, slow and impressive steps of age. But "you may break, you may
scatter the vase if you will, the scent of the roses will linger there
still," for on shrunken canvas or from luster dimmed was imperial tone
of materialized conception "not born to die."

Among the guests of the hotel were two gentlemen, one an American
capitalist, the other a German merchant from Berlin, the latter speaking
French like a native. We became pleasant companions, and concluded on
Sunday evening to go to the "Follies Bergere"--in American parlance a
variety theater.

Ten minutes' drive brought us to a very large building, lighted as if by
sunlight, where a hundred finely-dressed men and women crowded for
entrance. Outside of what we t