PARIS BY GASLIGHT.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 211, 23 August 1862, Page 5

PARIS BY GASLIGHT.

(From the Saturday Revieio.) Every one who remembers the Paris of Louis Thilipe and the Paris of the Republic will have remarked many changes in the city besides those produced by new streets, boulevards, and buildings. The one that strikes an Englishman as much as, or perhaps more than any other is the change in the hours which Paris keeps. Fifteen or even ten years ago, Paris, like other Continental cities, went to bed early. In those days, after 11 o'clock p.m you might walk for miles along some of the leading thoroughfares without meetin" anybody except the chiffoanier slouching*alo^r with his cane-hook and lantern swinnn"- close to the pavement, or the distressed ouvrur with his cap well drawn over his eves—a «entleman who especially affected the quays and was reputed to be the principal contributor of objects of interest to the Morgue. About the Boulevards, in the neighbourhood of the cafes it » true, the signs of life lingered a little longer; and, in the quarter of the hotels frequented by the English, gentlemen of that nation, who always do at Rome as London does, might be seen on their way home from the quarters of their compatriot;, or heard making night hideous by their performance oa the bell and their call* upon the sleepy porter at Meuriceß or the Hotel Windsor Hut, with these exaction--, Paris, as a city was in bed long before midnight. With ! Imperialism came new lines of streets i and boulevards, new shops, and fresh floods of! gaslight—always a powerful attraction for the ! flaneur, who has a great deal of the moth in his composition. With Imperialism there! came, too, an increased activity in the upp«r strata of society. Halls, parties, and soirees multiplied, and when th-y multiply, some j mast perforce be late. As Img as there was a S stir m the streets, and currhge-s to be seen, the ' loungers would not retire to rest, and as ion" I as the loungers were about, the shops and ! cafes kept open ; so that Paris gradually crept I into a habit of not going home till morning, | and now bids fair to become as Hvdv and j wide-awake in the small hour* as Loadon :tsch. It is to this aspect of Paris that the earlier portions of M. Julien Lemer's book relate, the latter half being made up of a i couple of taies of the ordinary feuilicton type I which calls for no special remark, and have nothing to d> with Paris either by gaslight or by daylight. ° } With the lighting of the lamps during I three-q:nrters of the ye.tr, there comes to j thousands of Parisians a moment of intense * anxiety. It is then that, as the author puts it. i "cc probleme terrible, comment dinerai-je?) yient se poser comrue uu fun tome fnmilier." It j is a mistake to fancy that it is only the obvi- j ously poor and needy who are agitated by 1 cares of this sort. The most irreproachable waistcoat in the world may cover a heart uneasy as to the solution of the ahove question, especially in a city where dining at home is the exception, and the restaurants, taught by experience, are slow to give credit; aii(f in the crowd on the asphalt of the Boulevard there is many an object of compission to be seen pacing along tightly gloved and neatly booted, but umncrk-ss. There are, however, many receipts for a dinner under these circum- | stances. There is, of course, the commonplace contrivance of going_ to the Mont-dc-Piete with <-ome more easily spared article of dress or jewellery; and M. Lerner states as a fact that, at the higher class of these establishments there is more busineis done between five and six in the afternoon than at any other time of the- day. But he clearly looks on it as a device unworthy of a man of genius or imagination, and as arguing a deplorable poverty of invention. A much nobler and simpler plan is to dress for dinner carefully, take a cab and drive to some well-to-do friend's, and explain to him that you are goin<' to dine with some grandee" in his nei^h" bourhood, but that you have fust discovered that you have left your purse at home, and consequently are unable to pay the cab. Or, another way, as the cookery books say—pick out a friend (young and affluent ones are best), and invite him to dine with you, en tete-a-tete at Very's—Philippe's will do as well; then nicely tear out the lining of your pocket, order dinner—the more sumptuously the better—nnd when the time for settling the bill comes, discover that you have boen robbed, and serve up and season your despair according to taste. A cheap and substantial dinner for four persons may be procured by a device which the author recommends as having been tried with success on one occasion. Certain actors, being in the predicament just mentioned, went to the pro-perty-room of the theatre they belonged to, and, selecting four liveries of sufficient magnificence, proceeded to the nearest restaurateur, and ordered an admirable dinner for four in the name of their master, the Marquis de Rostocoff. When the dinner was ready they called for it, and when it had been despatched they brought back the dishes and plate, and even, M. Lemer says, were considerate enough to ask for the bill, that the Marquis might settle it the next day. The dinner-hunter is succeeded by the flaneur, who, though occasionally appearing in the day time, is properly a nocturnal j animal. According to our author, the geo- j graphical distribution of the flaneur proper is by no means so wide as a superficial view of Paris might lead one to imagine. For instance, he is rarely to be met with in the Rue St. Ilonore—" On ny flane guere, nun's on y passe beaucoup"—or in the Rue de Rivoli. The " sad" aspect imparted to the latter street by the English, who " come here to seek a remedy for the spleen," has had such a depressing effect on the poor fellow's spirits, that, even in the time of rain, he can hardly bear to take advantage of its arcades. M. Lemer is naturally severe upon that habituai dejection of ours which has made the Rue de Rivoli so intolerable to the French mind, but if he knew how his compatriots have avenged themselves in the Quadrant, and along the sunny side of the Regent Street, and what a combined flavonr of the Palais Royal Jmd the Rue Breda they have given to those eminent London thoroughfares, perhaps his soul would be satisfied. The Rue de la Paix is a sort of neutral ground, on account of its proximity to the Boulevard. "On y flane, dans le haut surtout, mais l'Anglais y domine." Even the Palais Royal, we suspect, baa become tainted. At present, however the flaneur is supreme on the Boulevards from the Madeleine even to the Place de la Bastile. There the saddening influence of the Englishman is not yet felt, and little hata with curly brims, and glazed boots, and tooth-picks, and eau sucree, and other things which make existence endurable, may be enjoyed without any drawback. Even

there, however, there are certain ominous signs ---certain small clouds on the horizon that haply may indicate a coming deluge of spleen. Le pale ale and le soda-water (as yet, it is true, under the name of soldatde Voltaire) have established themselves on the innocent light-hearted marble tables of the cafeX and when these British beverages make their appearance there is no saying how near dulness may be

Another class of street wanderer is represented by the " noctambule." The noctambule must be carefully distinguished from the " noctivague." The latter is a person who, in London slang, is said to have "the key of the street"—in other words, one who does not go home because he has no home to go to, and no money to hire one with. The nocttvague's highest idea of human happiness is to have a room where he can turn-in at nine, and sleep till the next morning; and if lie succeeds in getting possession of one, he generally becomes a person of remarkably regular habits and hours.. The noctambule, on the other hand, is characterized by a reluctance to go to bed at the time which mankind generally considers proper for that purpose. To him, going to bed at night is a mere conventionality. He sees no necessary connection between night and sleep. Sleep is simply intended to repair the wear and tear caused by bodily and mental activity, and night happens to be his period of activity.^ " L'atmosphcre exteriear de la nuit lvi parait plus en harmonic avec ses gouts, son intelligence, ses sens meme," as M. Lemer says. Some noctambulists have pushed this principle so far that during the winter months the}' never see daylight unless when the dawn overtakes them on their way home. Respectability may denounce the taste, but it cannot condemn it as utterly irrational. It would be idle to deny that noctambulisra has charms and enjoyments of a high order. Who, for instance, but the noctambuli*t has ever thoroughly and honestly enjoyed a sunrise ? There is a great deal of loose sentiment and poetry abroad touching the glories of the rising sun, but can any one who has done a respectable sunrise, as- it is done on the Ri<n for example, lay his band on his heart and say he enjoyed the spectacle . In the first place, he had to get up for it, and began with the bitter sense of having sacrificed a certain happiness for a prospective pleasure. In the next place, there was a premeditation about the afTur utterly destructive to enjoyment— not to speak of the minor discomforts of being physically chilly and having to give vent toVarm raptures, or else be set down as a commonplace person, and dead to the beautiful. With the noctambulist it is very different. Sunrise finds him in the full possession of all his facultiesno remnant of a hastily snatched sleep lies heavy on his eyelids like an ill-digested morsel. It steals upon him gently, courting, but not demanding, his admiration, and he sinks to rest with a mind filled with impressions of beauty which crystallize into golden dreams. After Mr. Dickens's paper on •'llouselessness," in the Uncommercial Traveller, there is no need to expatiate on the humors and necessities of nocturnal travel; but there is still something to be said in its favour from the purely severe and esthetic point of view. No one but the noctambulist is competent to give an opinion of any value on the architecture of a great city. No one can be said to have seen St. Paul's until he has seen it through the smokeless air of the early summer morning, when all its lines come out clear and sharp, and the cross above glitters in the first rays of the rising sun. Those Ruskmisms about its being ignoble, and debased, and a heathen temple, have reference only to the blurred mass that looms through the smoke at the top of Ludgate Hill at noonday. There is one trait in the character of the noctambulist to which M. Lemer refers, and I which is too creditable to noctambulism to be ' passed over in silence. Such is the sociability of the noctambulists and their disinclination to I part company, that they frequently keep seein«one another home the whole night. He men- ! tions a fraternity who used to meet chiefly for this purpose "On s'etait reconduit reciproquement les uns les autres; puis, on en etait venu a si bien se reconduire, qne ce3 promenades duraientjusqu'aquatre heuresdu matin." M. Lemer was quite right in calling attention to a race so kindly and simple. We cannot leave him, however, without taking the liberty of putting one of his stories of noctambulism into its proper form. Two noctambulists were deep in a game of ecarte when the time for taking to the streets arrived. Unable to forego their accustomed pastime, and unwilling to leave off play at an interesting point, they took the cards with them to the Boulevard, and.continued the game on one of the benches. The watch came round and proposed to take tbem into custody for gambling publicly, but agreed to let them finish the game first. By degrees they too got excited. The corporal placed himself behind one player, one of his men behind the other, nnd began to bet and give advice. After a little, the corporal was induced to take >lhe hand himself, and his example was soon followed by his subordinate. On which the two original culprits slipped quietly away, leaving the guardians of the city to be found by the patrol carrying on the 1 game, to the great scandal of the National : Guard.

Getting axd Spending.—Tn order not to be covetous,' steadily adhere to God's laws in the gaining and in the expenditure of property. These are few land simple, but obligatory under peril of eternal diath. Do not gain by any species of robbery. As the price of your skill and labor, you may demand a profit; but that which belongs to other men never can, except by their free act, become yours. Do not gain by neglecting to pay that which you owe; for, whatever we owe, we owe to God as well as man. God adopts as His own every just claim on earth; and if we do not pay just debts we '-rob God." Do not gain by desperate speculation, which is oaly another form o"f gambling. Man is appointed to labor ani gain his living in the sphere of the certain and of the visibly probable, not in the sphere of flic unknown and contingent. In proportion as a man embarks in undertakings in which the visible probability lessens that he will be able to pay every other man his own; he is a gambler. He who trusts in contingents is, in effect, a thief. Do not gain by parsimony, but by economy. Miserly saving eat out the bottom of the bag which holds them llemeinber, that money is given to be used not merely to be saved ; and that money! which is not sayed| for use is !«=t as effectually as if it bore no interest at all. Remember that "gain is not. Rodhness ;" that a man is not "worth" what he has, but what he is. Worth is worth-ship worship ; and no man ought to be worshipped for his I gold, but for his goodness. Do not venerate " successful men, until you know their history and cha- i racter. Remember that your life is a stewardship, '< tliat you must consult the will of God in your expenditure. A person who regards this as degradation of divinity, or as an interference of heaven, lias no religion at all. In nothing is character more shown than in money matters. A man who is right here is usually right everywhere • a man who iails with money matters is probably rotten to the core. We have just as much of the love of God as we have of the desire to let Him rule in our personal affaire; and this, therefore, is a test which excludes multitudes from heaven. They banish God from their expenditure. Their "love of money ' is the sinful love; and it will pierce them through, like a flight of poisoned arrows, with many sorrows, when they are summoned to " cive an account to Him" of the " deeds done in the body.". A I very long list of " guinea subscribers" will be found lon the Devil's roll-call in perdition.— Christian spectator.

Water at Ballarat.—Since the 10th July the water in the Swamp has risen seventeen and a-half inches. In August last year it was twenty inches below the by wash ; but on Wednesday last it w2 thirteen and s-half inches only, thus showing that there are now six and a-half inches more water in the bwamp than there was in the corresponding monta unWh-Ballarat Star, Aug. H.BJ^«2