f
the frame. In one room there is a singular collection of skulls of men
from all countries, of all ages, and conditions. Celebrated murderers
here are side by side with men of ancient renown.

The gallery of zoology is three hundred and ninety feet in length, and
fronts the east end of the garden. The other galleries are all equally
spacious and well arranged.

The library is composed of works on natural history, and it is an
unrivaled collection. It contains six thousand drawings, thirty thousand
volumes, and fifteen thousand plants. This fine library is free on
certain days to the world.

The good which results from such _free_ exhibitions as that of the
_Jardin des Plantes_ is incalculable. The _people_ become educated,
enlightened to a degree they can never attain, upon the subjects
illustrated, without them. This is one reason why Parisians are
universally intelligent, even to the artisans. The poorer classes can
scarcely help understanding botany, anatomy, zoology, and geology, with
such a garden free of access. This is but a specimen of many like places
in Paris. Lectures upon the sciences and arts are free to all who will
hear, and whoever will may learn.

THE LUXEMBOURG PALACE AND GARDENS.

When France was governed by Louis Phillippe, the Palace Luxembourg was
occupied by the Chamber of Peers, and it is now occupied by the Senate.
It is a fine old building, and the impression it makes upon the stranger
is an agreeable one. There is nothing in its history of particular
interest, though its architecture is ancient.

I was better pleased with the Luxembourg gardens than with the palace.
They are more beautiful than the Tuileries gardens and are much more
democratic. Trees, plants, and flowers seemed to me to abound in them to
a greater extent than in any other garden in Paris. On beautiful days
they are full of women and children. Troops of the latter, beautiful as
the sky which covers them, come to this place and play the long hours of
a summer afternoon away, with their mothers and nurses following them
about or sitting quietly under the shade of the trees, engaged in the
double employment of knitting and watching the frolicsome humors of
their children. I was very fond of going to these gardens in the
afternoon, just to look at the array of mothers and children, and it was
as pretty a sight as can be seen in all Paris. It is a sight which New
York--be it spoken to her shame--does not furnish.