MENDICITY IN PARIS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 783, 20 April 1877, Page 3

MENDICITY IN PARIS.

Mendicity in Paris flourishes largely during.tho Carnival weeks, when the Parisians bout on enjoying themsolvesjbefore .Lent, are more charitable and openhanded than at other times. In Parisian slang this is the harvest season of the arcasinews, or impostors who visit the various houses under suitable disguises. There is the “Alsaciem;e,” an elderly lady, well dressed and accompanied by a servant in full nationa costume, who attempts to address the mistress of the house and melts into tears. Iho bonne then relates in bad French how her mistress belongs to Strassburg, lost her husband in the war, and could not remain in Alsace funder the hated Prussians. She speaks no French hand is utterly destitute—a sad tale which invariably extracts a handsome donation. The “ Americaine ” frequents the large hotels patronised by Transatlantic millionaires, and, whilst.qtelling a similar story of ruin by the American war, represents herself to Northerners as the widow of a Bostonhnerchant and. to Southerners as the relict of a Virginian planter, the “ Politique,” makes friends with the eungierge of a large house, aud furtively reads ; the names of the inhabitants on the bands of the,newspapers—a sure _ index of the readers’ opinions. Dressed in suitable character, the “ Politique ” piresents himself to the subscribers of Ultramontane papers as a proscribed Carlist, to Republicans he is an ex-Commuuist, and to Bonapartists a warm sympathiser with Napoleon IV. The most [Curious] type, however, is the “ Deterre,”>a wretched,man occupying a miserable,attic, [where] he lies apparently in the) last) agonies. Charitable neighbors hear hisjgroaus, tend’him, give him a few sous, and j talk of him in the neighborhood.’^Hisj.diitressjhgets. known, and rich people send thejjsufferer a handsome present ofpnoney, with which he decamps to another quarter to play] out the same comedy. g/Fliis character, though profitable, is not a favorite Jone, as the actor is obliged to live sparingly to keep up his ghastly, and haggard appearance, and’ can only indulge in absinthe, which thins him aud/givesja,leaden huo,to his complexion.