Palace of Tuileries

“ Meanwhile, the Tuileries palace showed no signs of ruin—quite the reverse. Catherine’s son, Charles IX, had a bastion erected in the garden on the Seine side; a small dwelling-house, a pond, an aviary, a theatre, an echo, a labyrinth, an orangery, a shrubbery were soon added. Henri IV began a gallery to join the new palace to the Louvre, a work accomplished only under Louis XIV. Under Henri’s son, Louis XIII, the Tuileries was the centre of the smart life of the day; visitors of distinction, but not of royal rank, were often entertained in royal style in the pavilion in the garden. ”

“ A sorry dowry, this, for an inheritor of a palace at once so noble and admirable in spite of its unluckiness.
With the court followers and the nobility of the last days of the monarchy it was the same thing; the Tuileries was but a temporary shelter. The scaffold accounted for many and banishment engulfed others to forgetfulness.
It was a commonplace at the time to repeat the warning: "O! Tuileries! O! Tuileries! [Pg 108] Mad indeed are those who enter thy walls, for like Louis XVI, Napoleon, Charles X and Louis Philippe you shall make your exit by another door." ”

“ Greek, Egyptian, Assyrian, Chaldean and Persian antiquities (including the unique and magnificent frieze of the archers from the palace of Darius I.) , all are crowded with objects of interest and beauty, even to the inexpert visitor.
Of the gorgeous palace of the Tuileries, with its inharmonious but picturesque façade, stretching across the western limit of the Louvre from the Pavilion de Flore to the Pavilion de Marsan, not one stone is left on another. ”

“ It is not probable that the Tuileries will ever again be inhabited by royalty. There are too many mournful associations connected with the place ever to render it agreeable as a residence. When Louis Philippe was driven from the Tuileries, the mob again sacked it, and its vast saloons are unfurnished and empty. Four years ago, the Provisional Government passed a decree that this palace should be converted into a hospital for invalid workmen. ”

“ But it has never been a favorite residence of the kings of France, and no effort of the imagination, and no concomitants of regal splendor can make it an agreeable home. It has probably witnessed more scenes of woe, and more intensity of unutterable anguish, than any other palace upon the surface of the globe. Its rooms are of spacious, lofty, cheerless grandeur. Though millions have been expended upon this structure, it has had but occasional occupants. A few evenings ago I was honored with an invitation to a party given by Prince Louis Napoleon in the palace of the Tuileries. ”

“ At twelve o'clock the rumor sped with lightning rapidity through the streets of Paris that the troops, who had ostensibly been ordered to their quarters, were, in fact, concentrated around the palace. Instantly rose the shout, "To the Tuileries! To the Tuileries!" and a hundred thousand men from all [Pg 284] sections of the city marched toward the Palais Bourbon and the Tuileries! ”

“ As I have fancied I could read the French character in the national palace of the Tuileries, so I have pictured to myself some of the traits of John Bull in his royal abode of Windsor Castle. The Tuileries, outwardly a peaceful palace, is in effect a swaggering military hold; while the old castle, on the contrary, in spite of its bullying look, is completely under petticoat government. Every corner and nook is built up into some snug, cozy nestling place, some "procreant cradle," not tenanted by meager expectants or whiskered warriors, but by sleek placemen ”

“ It is nearly four o'clock in the afternoon. The invasion of the Tuileries is beginning. Let us glance at the palace and get a notion of the apartments through which the crowd are about to rush. On approaching it by way of the Carrousel, one comes first to three courtyards: that of the Princes, in front of the Pavilion of Flora; the Royal Court, before the Pavilion of the Horloge; and the Swiss Court, before the Pavilion of Marsan. The assailants enter by the Royal Court, pass into the palace through the vestibule of the Horloge Pavilion, and climb the great staircase. ”

“ Until the outbreak of the Revolution, the noblesse or their privileged associates alone had the right to pace its alleys. Soldiers were never permitted to walk there. Once a year only, a great occasion, its gates were thrown open to the peuple.
A period of neglect followed upon the fine work done under Louis XIV. His successor cared nothing for the Tuileries palace and grounds. They fell into a most lamentable state; and, when in the troublous days of the year 1789, Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette and their little son took up their abode at the Tuileries, the Dauphin looked round in disgust. ”

“ It must be remembered, too, that under the reign of Louis XIV. Gothic architecture was proscribed, as recalling “the age of barbarism.” Every new edifice was constructed in the Italian or Italo-Byzantine style. The finest, if not the most ancient, dome that Paris could ever boast was the one which crowned the central pavilion of the Tuileries Palace. The cupola of St. Peter’s was the model adopted in the early part of the sixteenth century by all French architects who had studied in Italy, or Italian architects who had settled in France ”

“ When the palace of Versailles was erected, the Tuileries ceased to some extent to be used by the French kings. In the Revolution it was stormed and sacked by the frenzied Parisian mob (1792) , and for a time became the seat of the national convention which governed France after abolishing monarchy. The Tuileries were also attacked and taken in the insurrections of 1830 and 1848, and during the Commune (1871) the buildings were burned, the ruins not being removed till 12 years later. ”

“ His most important work was the palace of the Tuileries, begun in 1564. Of this gigantic scheme only a small part, the central part on the garden side, was completed by De l’Orme, and this was much altered by successive architects before the building was [201] destroyed in 1871. The plan, as given by Du Cerceau (Fig. 119) , is symmetrical, but it is broken by projecting bays and angle pavilions more pronounced than those of the Louvre. ”

“ France contains no spot more rich in touching associations.
4. The Tuileries.—"Will Prince Louis Napoleon," inquired a gentleman, of a French lady, "take up his residence in the Tuileries?" "He had better not," was the laconic reply. "It is an unlucky place." It requires not a little effort of imagination to invest this enormous pile of blackened buildings with an aspect of beauty. Three hundred years ago the palace was commenced by Catherine de Medici. ”

“ The name of fortress would be more appropriate than any other, for the Old Palace; it is a great mass of stone, without columns, without frontal, without order of architecture. Time has gilded the walls with beautiful vermilion tints which the pure blue of the sky sets off marvelously, and the whole structure has that haughty and romantic aspect which accords well with the idea that one forms for oneself of that old Palace of the Seigneurie, the witness, since the date of its erection in the thirteenth century, of so many intrigues, tumults, violent acts, and crimes. ”

“ Here is everything to make such a paradise delightful. In the garden I saw a rose grafted on an orange-tree. There was much topiary-work, and columns in architecture about the hedges. The Duke has added an ample laboratory, over against which stands a fort on a hill, where they told us his treasure is kept. In this palace the Duke ordinarily resides, living with his Swiss guards, after the frugal Italian way, and even selling what he can spare of his wines, at the cellar under his very house, wicker bottles dangling over even the chief entrance into the Palace, serving for a vintner’s bush. ”

“ Nevertheless, the remarkably pointed and lofty roof of the modern palace, bristling with carved eaves, covered with sheets of lead, where coiled a thousand fantastic arabesques of sparkling incrustations of gilded bronze, that roof, so curiously damascened, darted upwards gracefully from the midst of the brown ruins of the ancient edifice; whose huge and ancient towers, rounded by age like casks, sinking together with old age, and rending themselves from top to bottom, resembled great bellies unbuttoned. Behind rose the forest of spires of the Palais des Tournelles. ”

“ The Tuileries and Windsor Castle I have sometimes fancied I could discover national characteristics in national edifices. In the Chateau of the Tuileries, for instance, I perceive the same jumble of contrarieties that marks the French character; the same whimsical mixture of the great and the little; the splendid and the paltry, the sublime and the grotesque. On visiting this famous pile, the first thing that strikes both eye and ear is military display. The courts glitter with steel-clad soldiery, and resound with the tramp of horse, the roll of drum, and the bray of trumpet. ”

“ It is full of memories of the masterful Tudors, and the pleasure-loving Stuarts, a period stored with great and stirring happenings, just when the New World was being discovered, the New Learning flooding over Europe, and the Reformation stirring the hearts of men. Yet of all its vast size, only a tiny fragment is left—the banqueting hall of the magnificent palace designed by Inigo Jones—and not a brick or stone remains of the palace where Wolsey reigned in his episcopal glory, and Henry VIII. held his gorgeous Court. ”

“ We also saw the duke's private pier extending towards the open sea, and from this point we had a fine view of Dunrobin Castle, the duke's residence, which was the finest building we had seen, and not at all like the other gloomy-looking castles, being more like a palace. It is a happy blending of the German Schloss, the French château, and Scottish baronial architecture, with a fine display of oriel windows, battlements, turrets, and steeples, the great tower rising to a height of 135 feet above the garden terrace below. ”

“ Inside, the rooms are large and lofty, and the stairs of greyish marble or even wood; but neither in doors or out are there any fine statues or sculptures.
The Palace of the governor is as I before said, a magnificent building—one that would be an ornament to the finest city in the world. It is built in the form of a horse-shoe, with a handsome cupola in the centre: the portico, as well as both the wings, is supported upon columns. The internal arrangements are as bad as can possibly be imagined; the supper-room being, for instance, a story higher than the ball-room. ”

“ Many of the old noblesse have been describing the splendour of the Hôtel d'Orsay to me since I have been at Paris, and the Duc de Talleyrand said it almost realised the notion of a fairy palace. Could the owner who expended such vast sums on its decoration, behold it in its present ruin, he could never recognise it; but such would be the case with many a one whose stately palaces became the prey of a furious rabble, let loose to pillage by a revolution—that most fearful of all calamities, pestilence only excepted, that can befall a country. ”

“ In every structure, the base is commonly broad; the monument diminishes in thickness as it encroaches on the sky. The Ducal Palace is the exact opposite of that natural scheme of architecture: the base, pierced by light porticoes surmounted by a gallery of arabesques indented with four-leaved open trefoils, supports an almost bare square mass: one would say it was a fortress built upon pillars, or rather an inverted building planted on its light coping with its thick root in the air. ”

“ I wish my apartments to be very near those of the Empress, and on the same floor. Finally, I wish a palace that would be comfortable for a convalescent, or for a man as age approaches. I wish a small theater, a small chapel, etc.; and above all great care should be taken that there be no stagnant water around the palace."
The Emperor carried his passion for building to excess, and seemed more active, more eager in the execution of his plans, and more tenacious of his ideas, than any architect I have ever known. ”

“ What a world in miniature, (and not on a very small scale either,) is this Palais Royal! A palace that would cover two or three of our squares, in the heart of the city, was converted by its proprietor, the late Duke of Orleans, into an immense bazaar; the entrance from every part being from the interior court, which is a long promenade of itself, adorned with rows of trees, fountains, and gardens. The lower floor of the palace is divided into stores, in the arcade fashion, in which are displayed every article, almost, which can be imagined or desired, for use or ornament. ”

“ Outside the city, a few miles to the north, lies the Summer Palace, another locality on which the Celestial architects and landscape artists have exhausted their genius in devising scenes of beauty and charm, and which is similarly walled in from the common herd. Beyond the Great Wall, on the borders of Tartary, exists another palatial enclosure, the hunting and pleasure grounds of the emperor, in the midst of an immense forest abundantly stocked with game. ”

“ At this time, which is devoted to Mirth, there is a Ball at Court, and on the Flesh-days there is commonly a great Masquerade representing a Country-Wedding. In the Palace there is a very magnificent Theatre, which indeed is almost the only thing there that is worth seeing, for the Imperial Palace is so wretched a Mansion that few Monarchs are lodged worse than the Emperor. ”