ics and workmen of every description. In this laudable object are employed fifteen professors of practical geometry and mechanics, natural philosophy, manufactural economy, agriculture, manufactural mechanics, descriptive geometry, manufactural legislation, practical chemistry, and the ceramic art. On entering the great gate of this college for the industrial classes, gratuitously open to the public on Sundays and Thursdays, from ten to four, and before which I found pacing two sentinels, I passed through, in succession, a series of splendid exhibition rooms, of which I can only attempt to give a very faint outline. In the lower halls I found, admirably arranged and beautifully lighted, models of cranes and of machines of various descriptions, of powder-mills, and of the apparatus employed for elevating the obelisk of Luxor to its present site on the Place de Concorde. At the latter a mechanic, dressed in a blouse, was very clearly explaining to three or four workmen, similarly attired, the power and application of the ten sets of double blocks that had principally performed this mechanical feat. Adjoining, two soldiers in green worsted epaulets were pointing out to each other the operative powers of a spinning-machine; a little farther on, groups of people were looking in silence at models of silk-mills under glass, of various powerful processes, furnaces, gasometers, &c. In a large arched hall, lighted at both sides, I found in two divisions a variety of ploughs, spades, shovels, and tools of all possible and impossible forms of application; waggons, carts, harrows; model of a horse skinned, showing the position and mechanical bearing of all the great muscles; models of windmills, threshing machines, farm-buildings, farm harness, &c., &c. After ascending a very handsome double stone staircase, I entered on its summit a fine hall, close to the door of which was appended the following notice: "Avis-Conformément aux ordres de M. le Ministre de l'Agriculture et du Commerce, et de l'Avis du Conseil de Perfectionnement:-‘La belle collection d'instruments de physique que possède le Conservatoire des Arts et Métiers sera ouverte à l'avenir, "Aux physiciens, aux artistes, aux ouvriers en instruments de physique, etc., les Jeudis et les Dimanches, à partir du Jeudi, 24 Janvier. "L'Administrateur du Conservatoire, "Paris, 22 Janvier, 1850." "A. MORIN.'* In a room headed "Physique et Mécanique," besides chemical and physical instruments of various sorts, were collected models of railroads, locomotive engines, tenders, carriages, furnaces, air-pumps, galvanic batteries, also a powerful electrifying machine, which apparently possessed the faculty of attracting to itself every human being within sight of it. On approaching it I perceived a circle of faces, all convulsed with laughter at the sudden loud, healthy squall of a finelooking young woman who, from possessing in her composition a very little of Eve's curiosity, had just received a smart shock. "Tout-partout !" she exclaimed, as soon as she recovered herself, to the inquiry of her little sister, who, with an uplifted face of fearful anxiety, affectionately asked her "Where it had struck her?" In a department headed "Verrerie" I found on one side models of glass houses of various constructions, and on the other an omnium-gatherum of locks, padlocks, mechanical instruments, and models of various descriptions. In this room I passed, carrying an infant, a maid-servant dressed in a conical cap like a sugar-loaf, more than a yard high. In a hall headed "Géométrie" were models of breakwaters, bridges, arches, staircases, cast-iron roofs, of all descriptions; also, a model of a temple. In a splendid gallery 136 yards long, and headed" Céramique," were various specimens of glass, porcelain, &c. In a room headed "Chauffages, Eclairages" were patterns of lamps, stoves, and furnaces. *NOTICE.-By order of the Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, and by the advice of the Council, The beautiful collection of instruments, &c., for the improvement of arts and trades, shall be opened in future,— To men of science, artists, and workmen, on Thursdays and Sundays, from the 24th January. A. MORIN, Paris, 22nd Jan., 1850. Chief of the Museum. + All over me! In one, not very correctly named " Acoustique, Géodésie,” I found almost every visitor within it congregated in the vicinity of some mirrors that so distorted the countenances of every one who looked at them that several ladies, in spite of the most earnest entreaties, positively refused to approach them. The few who did, suddenly screamed, and, putting both hands befere their faces, ran away amidst roars of laughter. On looking into the first I was introduced to my own face flattened in so extraordinary a manner that it resembled John Bull himself, under a free-trade pressure that had made his features twenty times as broad as they were high. On standing before the next I appeared as if I had suddenly had the honour of being created President of the United States, for my face, which was a couple of feet long, was as sharp and narrow as the edge of a hatchet, and yet every feature was distinctly perceptible. On coming out of this admirable institution I inquired of a very intelligent young man dressed in a blouse the way to the General Post Office, at the "Bureau Restante" of which I had been informed there were lying some letters to my address; and although it was raining, he insisted on accompanying me through three crooked streets, in which he said he was afraid I should otherwise lose my way. แ As we were walking he told me he was a mécanicien," and that he had just returned to Paris from the Great Exhibition in London, where he had been employed to unpack and arrange the machinery he had taken over. I asked him how he had fared. He replied, "Parfaitement bien!"* but after praising the intelligence of the English people, he said, "Il y a trop de sévérité dans leurs mœurs ;" and he then theoretically explained to me what apparently unconsciously he was in person practically demonstrating, namely, the advantages to a country of politeness. In reply to these remarks I repeated to him the observation of an American who, in preaching on the same text, very cleverly and truly said "I guess, my friends, you can catch more flies with molasses than with vinegar!" PANTHEON. ON getting out at the office of the Omnibus, I saw immediately before me, in the middle of a great square, a magnificent building, composed apparently of an ancient temple and a church. The former-which forms, in fact, the portico of the latter, and which stands above a flight of eleven steps, extending for its whole length, and overlooking the iron railing that divides it from the square-is composed of a triangular pediment 129 feet long by 22 feet high, supported by eighteen very handsome Corinthian columns 6 feet in diameter and 60 feet high. The church-looking building contains three domes-a very large one, a smaller one, and a lantern surrounded by a gallery and balustrade-one above another. The object of this splendid pile-for it is not a church-is sufficiently explained by a series of figures in relief by David, representing on the triangular pediment of the portico, France, a figure 15 feet high, attended by Liberty and History, surrounded by, and dispensing honour to, Voltaire, Lafayette, Fénélon. Rousseau, Mirabeau, Manuel, Carnot, David, and, of course, Napoleon and the principal heroes of the republican and imperial armies. Beneath, in letters of gold, is the following inscription:- "Aux Grands Hommes la Patrie Reconnaissante."* On entering this splendid edifice, the interior of which, 80 feet high, is a cruciform, 302 feet long by 255 broad, enlightened from above by the beautiful dome and cupola, surmounted by the lantern I have described, and by six semi-circular windows in the massive walls of the building, I was much surprised to find that, comparatively speaking, it was as empty as an empty barn! From the lofty cupola there slowly vibrated a pendulum, the lower extremity of which, slightly touching some To great men by a grateful country. loose sand on the pavement, was very beautifully demonstrating the earth's movement round the sun. Within the immense almost vacant space I observed three statues, namely, of Clemency, of Justice, and, lastly, of Immortality, who, in June, 1848, while she was standing with a pen in one hand to record the "deeds" of Frenchmen, and with a crown of glory in the other to reward them, was suddenly almost shivered to pieces by a cannon-shot, which for the moment threatened, so far as she was concerned, for ever to destroy the immortality she was so generously dispensing to others. After, however, having been very cleverly stuck together again, she returned to her everlasting occupation and, so far as I could judge from looking at her, is not a bit the worse for the accident. On the four pilasters that support the great dome there is inscribed Their names were, however, in letters so small that I could not read them, and I was beginning to think I had come a long way to see a very little, when I observed a handsomelooking priest, three or four soldiers, and two persons dressed en bourgeois following an official very finely attired, who had a lantern in one hand with a few tallow candles dangling in the other; and I had scarcely joined the party when we were conducted by our magnificent guide to a door or opening, where we descended some steps into a series of vaults containing, in various descriptions of tombs, the bones of great men, whose names the guide repeated so monotonously, so glibly, and so fast that it was with difficulty I could only occasionally comprehend him. At the tomb of Voltaire, whose splendid talents had been so grievously misapplied, I had but just time very hastily, by the light of one little thin tallow candle, to copy the following inscription: "Aux manes de Voltaire, *Names of Citizens who died in the defence of the Laws and of Liberty, |