On  Midsummer  Day,  Saint  John's  fire  flared  up  from  the
Greve,  and  those  whose  name  was  John  lighted  his  fire  on
their  doorsteps  with  superstitious  precaution,  for  fear  of  mis-
adventure. Brutal  and  frequent  executions  took  place,  not
only  on  the  Greve,  but  in  the  public  streets;  and  by  night,
in  those  same  dark  and  narrow  streets,  bands  of  mysterious
figures  in  mask  and  domino  swept  silently  by,  or  played
tricks  on  gay  cavaliers  with  clanking  swords,  or  on  the
humbler  citizen  going  home  from  tavern  or  wineshop.  The
Seine  was  then  the  principal  highway  of  traffic  for  the  city,
and  ponderous  barges,  laden  with  oil  and  wood  and  wine,  glided
slowly  into  the  capital ;  the  Champs  Elysees  were  veritable
and  delightful  fields,  a  fashionable  rendezvous  where  the  gay
promenaders  along  the  Cours-la-Reine  might  walk  or  meet
their  friends ;  and  the  Bois  de  Boulogne  was  a  dense  wood
outside  Paris,  through  which  people  usually  travelled  in  com-
panies as  a  protection  against  the  brigands  who  made  their
haunts  in  its  deep  recesses.
And  in  the  Letters  of  Madame  de  Sevigne  we  get  brilliant
and  detailed  descriptions  of  all  this  life  and  glow  and  colour ;
truthful  and  impressionist  pictures  of  the  moment,  which,  written
to  amuse  her  idolised  daughter  in  Provence,  have  delighted
countless  thousands  in  the  centuries  that  have  followed.  The
)  Marquise  did  not  dream  that  she  was  writing  for  posterity.
