Letters from France: containing many new anecdotes relative to the French revolution, and the present state of French manners. By Helen Maria Williams. Vol.II.

LETTER III.

THE rejoicings at Paris did not ter|minate with the ceremony of the Federa|tion. A succession of entertainments, which lasted several days, were prepared for the deputies from the provinces, who were all quartered in the houses of the bourgeois, where they were received with the most cordial hospitality.

The night of the 14th of July the whole city of Paris was illuminated; and the next day le ci-devant Duc, now Mons. d'Orleans, gave a public dinner to the national guard in the hall of the Palais Royal. We walked in the evening round the gallery, from which we saw part of the crowd below amusing themselves by dancing, while others were singing in chorus the favourite national songs.

On the following Sunday the national guards were reviewed by Mons. de la Fayette in the Champ de Mars, which was again filled with spectators, and the people appeared more enthusiastic than ever in their applauses of their general. The Champ de Mars resounded with re|peated cries of * 1.1

Vive Mons. de la Fayette!

On this day carriages were again forbidden, and the evening displayed a scene of general rejoicing. The whole city was illuminated, and crowds of com|pany filled the gardens of the Tuilleries, from which we saw the beautiful façade of the Louvre lighted in the most splendid manner. In the Champs Elysées, where a fête was given to the Deputies, innu|merable lamps were hung from one row of trees to another, and shed the most agreeable brilliance on those enchanting walks; where the exhilarated crowd danced

and sung, and filled the air with the sound of rejoicing. Several parties of the na|tional guard came from the Champs Ely|sées, dancing along the walks of the Tuil|leries with a woman between every two men; and all the priests whom they met in their way, they obliged to join in the dance, treating them as women, by placing them between two soldiers, and sometimes sportively dressing them in grenadiers caps. Fire-works of great variety and beauty were exhibited on the Pont Neuf; and the statue of Henry the Fourth was decorated with the ornament of all others the most dear in the eyes of the people, a scarf of national ribbon. Transpa|rencies of Mons. de la Fayette and Mons. Bailly were placed, as the highest mark of public favour, on each side of this revered statue.

But the spectacle of all others the most interesting to my feelings, was the re|joicings at the Bastille. The ruins of that

execrable fortress were suddenly trans|formed, as if with the wand of necro|mancy, into a scene of beauty and of plea|sure. The ground was covered with fresh clods of grass, upon which young trees were placed in rows, and illuminated with a blaze of light. Here the minds of the people took a higher tone of exultation than in the other scenes of festivity. Their mutual congratulations, their reflections on the horror of the past, their sense of present felicity, their cries of * 1.2

Vive la Nation,

still ring in my ear! I too, though but a sojourner in their land, re|joiced in their happiness, joined the uni|versal voice, and repeated with all my heart and soul, "Vive la nation!"

Notes

• * 1.1

  Long live Mons. de la Fayette.
• * 1.2

  Long live the Nation.