ich are served from Tortoni's, long celebrated
for the supply of that cooling refreshment. It is by night that the
_Boulevards_ are seen to the greatest advantage, the innumerable lights
blazing from the different theatres, the lamps placed before the
coffee-houses, the brilliant shops, the trees, the equipages, the sound
of music and singing, the houses, which resemble palaces, the gilded
cafes all united has the air of a fairy scene to any one brought
suddenly upon them.

Some of the handsomest shops and coffee-houses are to be found on the
_Boulevards_, and dwellings where many of the most respectable persons
reside. There is always an humble traffic going on from an immense
number of stalls, in which various commodities are sold, and although
the assortment consists of a hundred different descriptions of articles,
yet all are at one price, consisting of everything that can well be
imagined, from a comb to a pair of bellows, the vender singing out the
price with stentorian lungs, perhaps twenty-five sous, more or less, and
as there is a great deal of opposition with these itinerant merchants,
they often try who can cry out the loudest, and succeed in raising a
terrific din, which amuses the mob, who consider that all is life and
spirit as long as there is noise and fun going forward; these
_Boulevards_, therefore, are just such as suit the Parisian lower
classes. Those on the south side of the Seine are an exact contrast,
most of them being so deserted, that in viewing the long lines of tall
arched elms, with scarcely an individual moving beneath them, one could
imagine that they were a hundred miles from any capital; but there is
something pleasing in retiring to these lone green shades, when fatigued
with the bustle and rattling noises of the city. The only individuals
usually to be met with in these quiet _Boulevards_ are now and then a
nursery-maid with a child, an old lady of the gone-by school, and her
female servant of the same era, who jog on at a slow and solemn pace as
they moan over the good old times that are passed, and sympathise in
expressions of horror at the vices of the present day; a tall thin
battered looking beau, whose youth was passed in the last century, meets
the antiquated pair, mutual salutations take place, the gentleman doffs
his hat, and with a graceful sort of turn and wave of the hand, at the
same time bows his body full half way to the ground, which, although
rather stiffened with age