I have seen in Paris. Within it men are relaying the pavement. On the outside of the church, on one side, up above, is a figure that I do not understand,—a figure of an irregular shape, somewhat like a quadrant, with lines branching through it and numbers affixed, and a few Latin words, beginning with Sol and ending with Nicholas les Champs, so I surmise it to be possibly a diagram of lands belonging to the church. One of the workmen, however, says that it was to show the hours of the day, before clocks were invented. It bears date 1666, and the carving on the Porte St. Martin about Ludovico Magno bears date somewhere about 1680. So this may not be very old Paris after all. Living in a handsome quarter, and seeing Paris so renewed and embellished, I had been reminded of the boy's knife, which had first a new blade and then a new handle. However, the narrowness of the Rue Chapon gives me some idea of what Paris may have been in the time of him who revoked the Edict of Nantes.* Inside the door of the old church just mentioned a man is sitting with his little brush ready to let me moisten my fingers with its contents, but I pass in and make no sign. In a chapel at the farther end of the church is the worst figure of Mary and the infant Jesus that I have seen; not ugly, but more like a modern fine lady, and the infant like a pretty boy, and both with the gold hearts hanging around their necks, such as I suppose have lately come into fashion. Here in this chapel are little marble tablets on the wall: about a dozen of them,-all, I think, later than 1870,-with inscriptions such as "Oh, Marie! I have confided her to thee; guard her!" Women are kneeling in this chapel,

* Of all the houses of Paris in 1870, less than one-third had been built prior to 1852.-Appletons' "Cyclopædia," article " Paris.”

and in the body of the church a man with his face turned towards it, and, at a greater distance, an ecclesiastic with an ecstatic countenance. I walk around the church, hearing the voices of young people chanting somewhere. I am carrying a little box, my parasol, and so on, and as I come out of the chapel just spoken of a man says, "Go out of the way." He is carrying something, I think for the repairs, but I had not observed him. Again a feeling of fear comes over me, such as I experienced before leaving for the provinces. However, after going out of the church I desire. to discover whether the chapel just spoken of is to the Virgin of Lourdes, so I re-enter, and find my man with the brush—the aspersoir—asleep in his dark place near the door. I step on, and ask an elderly man to whom that chapel is dedicated. "To the Virgin," he answers. "What virgin do you call her?" "The Virgin Mary; there is only one." "But to her whom you call the Virgin of Lourdes?" "No." So I am relieved.

After coming out of this old church, how satirical seem the words on the outside of the building, "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity"! If that little man who was called Louis the Great were still resting where his remains were put at St. Denis, might he not be supposed to turn in his coffin at the thought?

On the Rue St. Martin I notice one of that infinite number of women who wear caps instead of bonnets, seated behind the little box on which she plies her trade of cleaning shoes. She has fallen asleep, and her knitting and folded newspaper lie upon the box before her. I do not think that such working-women in the time of Louis, fourteenth of the name, had newspapers to read. I remember that about the time his descendant, the sixteenth Louis, was beheaded, women are said to have sat with their

knitting where they could see the guillotine perform its bloody work.

Upon another street, near one of the fine boulevards, I observe a family scene: a porter is seated upon his crochet (the little wooden affair that he puts upon his back to hold burdens), and a woman is handing him the baby to kiss. "Encore!" he says as he kisses the little one,-"encore!" and then the mother kisses it and takes it to its little carriage. As she lifts it I see its slender brown legs. It is neat, and so is she. The porter sees me looking, and seems pleased that they are noticed.

Thursday, July 25th.-I go to the opening meeting of the International Congress of Women, which is held in the hall of the Grantorians, a Freemasons' hall. Here I meet Julia Ward Howe, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, and others from my own country. As we are waiting for the exercises to begin, my friend Madame Latour, with one of our acquaintances, and myself,—we remark a young lady whose dress does not seem to be perfectly modest, and Madame Latour says, "I do not love to see women who maintain serious opinions concerning the equality of women and men, with the appearance of women of light manners; that injures the cause of women." She adds, "In general, women of advanced ideas have a horror of all household labors; as for myself, I do not perform them with pleasure: I should prefer more agreeable employment; but as I do not wish to neglect duties that I ought to perform, I attend to them with all my heart." The speaker, Madame Latour, is she with whom I breakfasted and dined, who has the little

set of rooms upon a public square and keeps no servant, and is "crazy on the subject of order."

The manner of holding this congress is very different from ours in similar conventions. After this opening meeting they will adjourn for several days, and it may be twelve or more before the sessions close. Also there will be a banquet. Paris seems to be very fond of banquets. There was one at the centenary of Voltaire; there will be one of the societies for the protection of animals.

The permanent presidents chosen for the congress are Julia Ward Howe and Antide Martin, a member of the municipal council. Of him Victor Leblanc afterwards tells me that he lived at St. Étienne, a city not far from Lyons, at the time of Napoleon's coup d'état; and that he exerted himself to rouse his fellow-citizens against Napoleon, who had broken his oath to sustain the republic. For this Martin was banished to New Caledonia.

There were present at the congress two Italian ladies whom I especially observed. One was Miss Mazzoni, a young and delicate-looking woman, who brought a letter from the society of the democracy of Rome. Upon the platform at one end were a number of reporters, and I observed much smiling there, as if two or three were inclined to ridicule a thing so new here as an international congress of women; but when Miss Mazzoni read her address their manner changed: no speaker appeared to make a more profound impression. The other Italian lady was older; she was Madame Aurelia Cimino Folliero, who told me that she is editor of The Cornelia, a serious journal, not for the fashions, but for the education of women. Madame Folliero seemed to think it an important fact that this journal is patronized by the queen. Madame F. is the mother of a large family, having had ten children. She

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tells me that she is a delegate from the Italian government to study the French agricultural schools for women. these she says that there are six or more in which women carry on all agricultural labors.

Before the close of this session of the convention comes up the question of the banquet, and produces the most animated debate. Fifteen francs had before been suggested as the price of admission; but one of my friends, who was making a silk dress which she expected to wear upon the occasion, told me that she did not think she should go if the price was so high. The majority of the congress agree with her, for the price is settled much lower,-I think at six francs. And while speaking on this subject, I will add that a young lady dined with us one evening at Leblanc's, whose brother was a member of the French educational commission to our Exposition. While she is there, mention is made of a ball for teachers of the public schools; and Victor afterwards tells me that there was a supper at the ball, of which you could partake for five francs; and those who did not partake did not have to pay. "But," I ask, "who, then, pays for the music?" "That is comprised with the supper," is the reply.

One morning as I was going to Mr. Carpentier's I saw a woman driving in an open carriage. She was dressed in pink muslin, and her servant was behind her. I spoke to Mr. Carpentier about her, and he said that ladies sometimes drive, and it has become more common within a few years; but they do not drive in conspicuous toilets. He adds that kept women drive a good deal; and says that five or six thousand francs a month are sometimes expended on such women. Dr. P., my German acquaintance, said