THE BASTILLE.

Waikato Times, Volume 2537, Issue XXXI, 13 October 1888, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE BASTILLE.

Among the peculiar items with which the French are to remind their visitors next year of their great Revolution of 17S!) is a reproduction of the Bastille. This famous prison lias been re-erected, and in stone, by the architect Golibert, upon the Champs de Mars. Not only the prison itself, but also a part of the Rue Antoine that led up to it, with 30 onestoried houses with the oil lamps luuia across the streets a3 in former days, have been reproduced The hotel Moyenne is there, with a cafe on the ground H>or, where the hostess sits in a costume of Louis XVL, and all the other little shops are peopled with goldsmiths and silvern is, m>Ui!3<. h letter writers, bakers. &c. In the streets are seen, all in costume, soldiers and flower girls, rope dancers and tumblers. In the refreshment houses an 1 e fes are giili with white periwigs, broad tulle collars and head dresses in the style of Marie Antoinette. Against the walls of the Bistille are little stalls with old books atid curio3itii)3. Only within the building is there a falling away of the realism. Instead of the great courtyard is a salon with a stage, upon which, at the opening of the building, an operetta of Grety's, of the year 1769, was performed. The whole arrangement picturesquely recalls the past.—Yorkshise Post.