Some Curiosities of Paris Law.

Te Aroha News, Volume V, Issue 208, 25 June 1887, Page 7

Some Curiosities of Paris Law.

A little book has been published recently which gives the public some insight into the functions and power of the Prefect of Paris. No one is allowed to stick a note on. door or window asking for an employe, or post a bill on a hoarding unless it be stamped and taxed. Advertisers may adopft any colour they please, except white, which signifies purity, and is exclusively reserved for official announcements. Special permission is required to give an assault at arms, but nothing is said about permission to fighfr a duel. If anyone goes to Paris with the idea that he can start business right off as a ragpicker, he is mistaken. He will be run in if found gathering rags without a licenseNo reunion or meeting for political or religious objects can meet without the consent of the prefect, and under whatever conditions ho pleases. In order to hold a, meeting on a non-political subject, seven persons connected with it must make a declaration at the prefecture three clear djiys before the day of meeting. Special permission is required to give balls and concerts, and to perform feats of agility in music halls. Owing to the exigencies of the octroi, cattle and live stock are onlyallowed to enter Paris at certain hours of the day, and by certain routes. Merchants of bric-a-brac must be supplied with brass medals and licensed. Dogs are mado the subject of a series of regulations. Frenchmen seem to have a terror of the bulldog, for it is decreed tlUat " no dog of the race boule dogue or a crossed boulo dogue must be allowed to go at large in the street, in warehouses 1 , workshops, or other public places. Inside houses these dogs must always be kept in a string or muzzled." Commissionaires must make a declaration and get a medal and livret before starting business. Commissionaries are shoeblacks. No organgrinder, street musician, or itinerant merchant can exercise his profession without permission from the prefect. No permission is granted unless the applicant haa resided at least a year within the jurisdiction of the prefect and is French. The street musicians, however, sometimes play without permission. Should a concierge be in a particularly amicable turn, he will allow an Italian to play within his gatc3, where he is as absolute as the prefect. The prefect supplies workmen with livrets, without which they are not worth anything. Porters at the public markets must have a certificate of good conduct from the police. Any one who saves a drowning person in the river, either by calling attention to or rescuing: him, gets 25f ; whoever discovers a corpse, or part of a corpse, in the river, receives 15f ; for rescuing a horse 6f are allowed. Republican guards employed at theatres or balls are paid If per night, if on horseback l^f, For tt private soiree they get sf.