re is
an old house, restored no doubt under Francis I., and built of bricks
held together by a few courses of masonry. That it is substantial seems
proved by the shape of its front wall, not uncommonly seen in some
parts of Paris. It bellies, so to speak, in a manner caused by the
protuberance of its first floor, crushed under the weight of the second
and third, but upheld by the strong wall of the ground floor. At first
sight it would seem as though the piers between the windows, though
strengthened by the stone mullions, must give way, but the observer
presently perceives that, as in the tower at Bologna, the old bricks and
old time-eaten stones of this house persistently preserve their centre
of gravity.

At every season of the year the solid piers of the ground floor have the
yellow tone and the imperceptible sweating surface that moisture gives
to stone. The passer-by feels chilled as he walks close to this wall,
where worn corner-stones ineffectually shelter him from the wheels of
vehicles. As is always the case in houses built before carriages were
in use, the vault of the doorway forms a very low archway not unlike
the barbican of a prison. To the right of this entrance there are three
windows, protected outside by iron gratings of so close a pattern, that
the curious cannot possibly see the use made of the dark, damp rooms
within, and the panes too are dirty and dusty; to the left are two
similar windows, one of which is sometimes open, exposing to view the
porter, his wife, and his children; swarming, working, cooking, eating,
and screaming, in a floored and wainscoted room where everything is
dropping to pieces, and into which you descend two steps--a depth which
seems to suggest the gradual elevation of the soil of Paris.

If on a rainy day some foot-passenger takes refuge under the long vault,
with projecting lime-washed beams, which leads from the door to
the staircase, he will hardly fail to pause and look at the picture
presented by the interior of this house. To the left is a square
garden-plot, allowing of not more than four long steps in each
direction, a garden of black soil, with trellises bereft of vines, and
where, in default of vegetation under the shade of two trees, papers
collect, old rags, potsherds, bits of mortar fallen from the roof; a
barren ground, where time has shed on the walls, and on the trunks and
branches of the trees, a powdery deposit like cold soot. The two parts
of the house