82.
bed with a tent canopy, and a cupboard to wash in. Opposite
my window is a Blanchisseuse establishment, and as I rise, and
am dressing I see the women at work. Breakfast is accomplish-
ed in the room below, where we find occasion to admire the three
and four feet long French loaves, which are sometimes stuck in a cor-
ner of the room like sticks or umbrellas. The triumvirate out
with Marshall; though arcades [unclear word] and courts, past the
front of a great palace, which was being newly ornamented, (L. N.
initials appearing on it,) to the business place of Livingstone & Wells,
the American Bankers &c, there translating our English coin into
French. / And, bye the bye, a handfull of French money is sadly
suggestive of history. You ll get a two-franc piece, somewhat worn
but with the poor old gros tete of Louis the Sixteenth on it; its re-
verse will bear the inscription Roi de France, or if of later date,
Le Roi, le loi, et le Peuple. Then there ll be a coarsely exe-
cuted son, its year 1 of the French Republic, scarcely discernable.
Anon the keen, hungry face of Napoleon as 1st Consul, presently
to expand into broader development as Emperor, appears. Louis
the Eighteenth s very stupid, Bourbonic, self satisfied head; Charles
the Tenth s smaller but acrid-looking face; Louis Phillippe s
pear-head ; profiles of Liberty drawn, (by the French) entirely
from imagination, of the dates of 1848 to 1851; Louis le Petit s
as President, and lastly as Emperor, you ll get em all,
jumbled together.) Upstairs into the reading rooms, where
were the Yankee papers, and men reading em; and where, after
half an hour we were introduced to Doctor Holton, a Vermonter,
now studying in Paris, with intent to start a college in Michigan.
| Page |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Seven: page eighty-eight |
| Description: | Describes his hotel room in Paris and French coins. |
| Date: | 1855-06-14 |
| Subject: | Gunn, Charles; Gunn, Edwin; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Holton, Dr.; Marshall (France); Travel |
| Coverage (City/State): | [Paris, France] |
| Scan Date: | 2011-02-02 |
| Volume |
| Title: | Thomas Butler Gunn Diaries, Volume Seven |
| Description: | Includes an account of his family history and descriptions of his visits with family and friends in England, witnessing a procession for Louis Napoleon in London, traveling in Paris with his brothers Charley and Edwin, his friend Harry Price's mental illness, his journey across the Atlantic to New York on the ship Washington, the marriage of Fanny Fern and James Parton, meetings of the Ornithoryncus Club in New York, and Alfred Waud's elopement with Mary Brainard. |
| Subject: | Bohemians; Gunn, Thomas Butler; Marriage; Mental illness; Publishers and publishing; Travel; Women |
| Coverage (City/State): | London, England; Paris, France; New York, New York |
| Note: | Thomas Butler Gunn was born February 15, 1826, in Banbury, England, and came to New York in 1849. During the Civil War he worked as a correspondent for the New York Tribune and the New York Evening Post. He returned to England in 1863, and died in Birmingham in April 1903. The collection includes twenty-one volumes of his diaries, including newspaper clippings, letters, photographs, sketches, and various other items inserted by Gunn. Diary entries date from July 7, 1849, to April 7, 1863, and include his experiences with the New York publishing and literary world, his descriptions of boarding houses, his travels throughout the United States, and his experiences traveling with the Federal army as a Civil War correspondent. |
| Publisher: | Missouri History Museum |
| Rights: | Copyright 2011 Missouri History Museum. |
| Source: | Page images, transcriptions, and metadata of the Thomas Butler Gunn diaries have been provided by the Missouri History Museum. |
