with eagle glance
and abrupt gesture he marked out the future limits of the continental
kingdoms, creating and erasing monarchies, fashioning nations and
people, in all the proud wilfulness of Omnipotence! And now, while
thinking of the Emperor, let me bring to mind another local association.

In the handsomest part of the Chaussee d'Antin, surrounded on every
side by the splendid palaces and gorgeous mansions of the wealthiest
inhabitants of Paris, stands a small, isolated, modest edifice, more
like a Roman villa than the house of some northern capital, in the midst
of a park; one of those pleasure-grounds which the French--Heaven knows
why--designate as "Jardin Anglais." The outer gate opens on the Rue
Chantereine, and here to this hour you may trace, among the time-worn
and dilapidated ornaments, some remnants of the strange figures which
once decorated the pediment: weapons of various ages and countries,
grouped together with sphinxes and Egyptian emblems; the faint outlines
of pyramids, the peaceful-looking ibis, are there, among the helmets and
cuirasses, the massive swords and the death-dealing arms of our modern
warfare. In the midst of all, the number 52 stands encircled with a
little garland of leaves; but even they are scarce distinguishable now,
and the number itself requires the aid of faith to detect it.

Within, the place speaks of neglect and decay; the shrubs are broken and
uncared-for; the parterres are weed-grown; a few marble pedestals rise
amid the rank grass, to mark where statues once stood, but no other
trace of them remains: the very fountain itself is fissured and broken,
and the water has worn its channel along the herbage, and ripples on its
wayward course unrestrained. The villa is almost a ruin, the sashes have
fallen in in many places; the roof, too, has given way, and fragments
of the mirrors which once decorated the walls lie strewn upon the floor
with pieces of rare marble. Wherever the eye turns, some emblem of the
taste of its former occupant meets you. Some fresco, Stained with damp,
and green with mildew; some rustic bench, beneath a spreading tree,
where the view opens more boldly; but all are decayed. The inlaid floors
are rotting; the stuccoed ceilings, the richly-carved architraves, fall
in fragments as your footsteps move; and the doomed walls themselves
seem scarce able to resist the rude blast whose wailing cadence steals
along them.

Oh, how tenfold more powerfully are th