er the tribune, upon
the centre of the floor, is the altar of the country, upon which, in
marble, is represented the book of the laws, resting upon branches of
olive. Behind it, upon semicircular seats, the legislators sit, at the
back of whom are the boxes of the embassadors, and officers of state,
and immediately above them, within a colonnade of corinthian pillars,
the public are admitted. Round the upper part of the cornice, a
beautiful festoon of lilac coloured cloth, looped up with rich tassels,
is suspended, for the purpose of correcting the vibration of the voice.
The whole is very superb, and has cost the nation an immense sum of
money. The principal housekeeper asked me "whether our speakers had such
a place to declaim in," I told him, "that we had very _great_ orators in
England, but that they were content to speak in very little places." He
laughed, and observed, "that frenchmen never talked to so much advantage
as when their eye was pleased."

This man I found had been formerly one of the door keepers of the
national assembly, and was present when, after having been impeached by
Billaud, Panis, and their colleagues, Tallien discharged the pistol at
Robespierre, whom he helped to support, until the monster was finally
dispatched by the guillotine, on the memorable 9th of Thermidor.

The french are amazingly fond of finery and stage effect. The solicitude
which always first manifested itself after any political change in the
course of the revolution, was the external decoration of each new puppet
who, arrayed in the brief authority of the fleeting moment, was
permitted to "play his fantastic tricks before high Heaven."

The poor battered ark of government was left overturned, under the
protection of an escort of assassins, in the ensanguined mud, upon the
reeking bodies of its former, headless, bearers, until its new
supporters had adjusted the rival pretensions of silk and satin, and had
consulted the pattern book of the laceman in the choice of their
embroidery. On one side of the arch which leads into the antiroom of the
legislative assembly, are suspended patterns and designs for tickets of
admission to the sitting, elegantly framed, and near the same place, in
a long gallery which leads to the dressing-rooms of the legislators, are
boxes which contain the senatorial robes of the members. The meetings of
our house of commons would inspire more awe, and veneration, if more
attention was paid to decorum,