PARIS AND LONDON.
EVERY visitor of Paris is struck with the extent, variety, and im- portance of that which Louis Napoleon is doing for the French capital; not only in finding employment for large numbers of the working classes, but in improving and adorning the capital so that the work itself shall stand after he shall have passed away. Whatever the motive, whatever the sacrifice or cost, certain ad- vantages will remain, which the French especially can prize, and which might be prized indeed by the people of any .capital in Europe. The chief improvements are these. The opening of two great streets ; one from the Hotel de Ville to the Strasbourg Rail- way station,—a broad street to be planted with trees ; the other, front the Place de la Concorde, past the Tuileries and the Louvre, to the Hotel de Ville, a mile and a half in length,—a street of palaces with two grand squares in it : an immense barrack behind the Hotel de Ville,—a palace of stone, to contain 3600 soldiers, and to constitute a fort commanding the Hotel de Ville and the streets around: the completion of the Tuileries according to the original design,—adding a wing, and forming the most extensive palace in the world : the restoration and decoration of the Louvre : the improvement and completion of the quays : the restoration and decoration of several churches,—NOtre Dame, the Sainte Chapelle, St, Eustaee, St. Etienne du Mont, St. Genevieve, the chapel of the Invalides, and the tomb of the first Napoleon: the great Exhibi- tion building of 1855,—a palace of solid stone, 800 or 900 feet long, 400 feet broad, whose walls are already springing from the ground, exhibiting a long row of marble arches, rising above one another, and forming already a conspicuous object in an avenue of the Chaiiips Elysees. It is not only the material, the design, and the extentof these improvements and new buildings which strike the Visitor, but also the grouping, so arranged, at commanding points of view, as to present a striking scene, solacing to the pride of the Parisian in its effect on the mind of the stranger. Even the off-lying Bois de Boulogne is undergoing such improvements as to make it a great pleasure-ground for the Parisians. Successive Governments of Paris have kept their river, so inferior to ours in size and utility, at least pure ; it is now to be made navigable to the sea. With far less enterprise resident in the body of the people Paris, will be supplied very shortly with a circular railway surroulding it and uniting all the lines of the kingdom. The Englishman is not only struck by this immense improve- ment for the Parisian, but also by the contrast which the capital of France presents with his own. The ever-recurring question in Paris is, where does the money come from ? But we, who have so mach more means for the purpose, are still without the corn- roentement of improvements on such a scale or in such a style. The game•of,Lonis Napoleon is pretty well understood, and it is 040,4100.'haAard. The devotion of so much industry to the Pnocess-,of ,colaversion; and not of production' necessarily "locks
Orimpital, which Trance is likely to need; and
hence the speoulation in which the prinoipal manager of France is now engaged involves a great chance that'bankruptcy may come before success. Nevertheless, it is tolerably certain that these speculations will pay. Paris will gain by being attractive. The improvement of the river will give facilities to its commerce ; the circular railway w ill probably be worked at a profit. And it is possible that the Government which bestows these advantages on the French capital may become so far stable as by that means to possess the credit fur increasing its resources at the next stage of its financial difficulties. his by no means certain, therefore, that the speculation is a false one.
But if France can do these things, how much more should we be able ? If she can find capital by hook or by crook, we can find it at the banker's by the ordinary means. One difficulty which we have felt in our increasing trade has been the want of labour ; one form of labour is transit, which always adds indeed to the value of other labour ; hence we want railway transit snore than France. But, with all our means, we have not the concentration of purpose which has effected results in Paris. We leave our railways to be managed by companies who devote an immense proportion of their capital to branches and other enterprises, designed not on their own merits, or for public convenience, but to circumvent other companies. We leave the improvement of the Metropolis to specu- lative builders, who try to "run up" "new towns " for the attrac- tion of tenants, without investing too much money for materials, or in those unseen arrangements which render habitations really habitable. We leave our river to be at once a commercial canal and a common sewer ; the vilest approach into any city of Europe. We are, however, it is said, on the point of great improve- ments ; and our object should be to catch from the example of our ingenious rival some conception of what may be done where there is unity of purpose and a proper earnestness in the work. If the Seine can be made navigable, and is a fine promenade, the Thames, which is navigable, can be made the most magnificent water high- way in Europe. We are disencumbering our town of the burden of burial-grounds, and the City has taken steps to tv.mence the formation of a cemetery on the best plan which modern science and art can suggest,—an improvement to be imitated, no doubt, by the rest of the Metropolis, as well as of the country. We have begun a small arc of the circular railway underground, experi- mentally, and if it succeed we may carry it throughout ; we have opened Victoria Street ; we are making a new cattle-market in Copenhagen Fields, in lieu of Smithfield ; we are by degrees im- proving the drainage. But as yet there is no plan before the public for combining these improvements in one design, or even for grouping parts of them into separate designs. On the contrary, we tinker our capi- tal as if it were not worth treating thoroughly. It is become a joke to ourselves. We have no sooner laid down some under- ground apparatus for water-supply, lighting, or drainage, but we pull up our streets to tinker another apparatus ; instead of regu- larly constructing a passage always accessible for such purposes, as the ancient Romans did with so much sounder an economy, though it would not be necessary for us to waste the space which was wanted for their ideas of drainage. The treat thing we want is unity; and whether the promised Municipality can supply it, we doubt. It may give the machinery, but we want the mind. Louis Napoleon has found a Visconti to direct the restoration of Paris : we have no Visconti—at least in office, or announced to the public.
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