"The storm which wrecks the wintry sky, No more disturbs their deep repose, Than summer evening's gentlest sigh, Which shuts the rose."
Upon a part of the ruins of this old palace of the Cæsars, there has been reared, by more _modern ancients_, still another palace, where mirth and revelry have resounded, where pride has elevated her haughty head, and vanity displayed her costly robes--but over all those scenes of splendor, death has rolled its oblivious waves. About four hundred years ago, upon a portion of the crumbling walls of this old Roman mansion, the Palace of Cluny was reared. For three centuries, this palace was one of the abodes of the kings of France. The tide of regal life ebbed and flowed through those saloons, and along those corridors. There is the chamber where Mary of England, sister of Henry VIII., and widow of Louis XII., passed the weary years of her widowhood. It is still called the chamber of the "white queen," from the custom of the queens of France to wear white mourning. Three hundred years ago, these Gothic turrets, and gorgeously ornamented lucarne windows, gleamed with illuminations, as the young King of Scotland, James V., led Madeleine, the blooming daughter of Francis I., to the bridal altar. Here the haughty family of the Guises ostentatiously displayed their regal retinue--vying with the kings of France in splendor, and outvying them in power. These two palaces, now blended by the nuptials of decay into one, are converted into a museum of antiquities--silent depositories of memorials of the dead. Sadly one loiters through their deserted halls. They present one of the most interesting sights of Paris. In the reflective mind they awaken emotions which the pen can not describe.
2. _The Louvre._--When Paris consisted only of the little island in the Seine, and kings and feudal lords, with wine and wassail were reveling in the saloons of Cluny, a hunting-seat was reared in the dense forest which spread itself along the banks of the river. As the city extended, and the forest disappeared, the hunting-seat was enlarged, strengthened, and became a fortress and a state-prison. Thus it continued for three hundred years. In its gloomy dungeons prisoners of state, and the victims of crime, groaned and died; and countless tragedies of despotic power there transpired, which the Day of Judgment alone can reveal. Three hundred years ago, Francis I. tore down the dilapidated walls of this old castle, and commenced the magnificent Palace of the Louvre upon their foundations. But its construction has required the labor of ages, and upon it has been expended millions, which despotic power has extorted from the hard hands of penury. This gorgeous palace contains a wilderness of saloons and corridors, and flights of stairs; and seems rather adapted to accommodate the population of a city, than to be merely one of the residences of a royal family. The visitor wanders bewildered through its boundless magnificence. The spirits of the dead rise again, and people these halls. Here the pure and the noble Jeanne d'Albret was received in courtly grandeur, by the impure and the ignoble Catherine de Medici. Here Henry IV. led his profligate and shameless bride to the altar. From this window Charles IX. shot down the Protestants as they fled, amidst the horrors of the perfidious massacre of St. Bartholomew. In this gilded chamber, with its lofty ceiling and its tapestried walls, Catherine de Medici died in the glooms of remorse and despair. Her bed of down, her despotic power could present no refuge against the King of Terrors; and the mind is appalled with the thought, that from this very room, now so silent and deserted, her guilty spirit took its flight to the tribunal of the King of kings, and the Lord of lords. Successive generations of haughty sovereigns have here risen and died. And if there be any truth in history, they have been, almost without exception, proud, merciless, licentious oppressors. The orgies of sin have filled this palace. Defiance to God and man has here held its high carnival.
