ttooed
himself somewhat as the painter here paints him, it is probable that
there was far less of the picturesque and presentable about him, of
grace of attitude and whiteness of skin in his women-folk, than in any
artist's presentation on a self-respecting canvas.

The habitations of the early Parisian were equally unlike those familiar
to the Cook's tourist. On the pedestal of an antique statue of Melpomene
of heroic size in the Louvre is a relief representing the head of a
supposed Gaul defending his house against a Roman soldier, and this
sculpture, confirmed by others on the column of Antoninus at Rome of
those of the German barbarians, gives this dwelling as a species of
circular, upright hut, covered with a conical-shaped roof constructed of
branches and reeds, or thatch, or perhaps of a half-spherical piece of
wood.

In the soil of the tertiary, or quaternary, basin in which Paris lies
are found traces of marine plants, oyster-shells, skeletons of fish,
etc., which indicate that it has risen from the bottom of the sea. As
every one knows, the Seine, flowing in a general direction from east to
west, curves toward the north to traverse the heart of the city, the
former Palais de l'Industrie, but just demolished, having occupied
nearly the centre of the upward curve of this bow. On the south, the
river receives the waters of the Bievre, a feeble stream which flows
through a narrow valley, and, farther eastward, those of the river
Marne. Under the Roman domination and that of the first Merovingian
kings, that part of the city lying immediately south of the river seems
to have become the most populous and important almost as soon as the
narrow limits of the original islands became too confining. The pride of
the Faubourg Saint-Germain may date itself back for some fifteen
centuries. A central, principal street traversed the city from south to
north, entering it in the general direction of the Rue Saint-Jacques,
passing on the east side of the imperial palace whose ruins may still be
seen in the Musee des Thermes, at the corner of the Boulevard
Saint-Germain and Boulevard Saint-Michel. Under the Rue Saint-Jacques
remains of the ancient pavement have been found at a great depth, and a
fragment of it is preserved in the Musee de Cluny. The Roman street
crossed the small arm of the Seine on a wooden bridge, near where is now
the Petit-Pont, traversed the Ile de la Cite, at the western end of
what is to-day the Place du