New-York tribune. [volume], January 04, 1920, Page 8, Image 74

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Famous Par?s I
Tourists May Take in Comfort
the Perilous Journey Made
Famous by Jean Valjean
By Fred B. Pitney
UNDERGROUND Paria is
again open to the public
No, not the Paris "under?
world," but underground
Paris. In other words the Paris
sewers may be visited by tourists
after having been closed during the
war to all except officers of the
Allied forces.
They are the same sewers of
which Victor Hugo wrote:
"One day in 1805, during one of
the rare apparitions which the Em?
peror made in Paris, the Minister
of the Interior, some Dec?s or Cr?tet
or other, attended his master's lev?e.
In the courtyard clattered the
swords of all those extraordinary
soldiers of the great republic and
the great empire; there was a swarm
of heroes at Napoleon's gates?men
from ' the Rhine, the Scheldt, the
Adige and the Nile; comrades of
Joubert, of Dessaix, of Marceau,
Hoche and Kleber; aeronauts from
Fleurus, grenadiers from Mayence,
pontoon builders from Genoa, hus?
sars on whom the Pyramids had
looked down, artillery men who had
been bespattered by Junot's cannon
balls, cuirassiers who had taken by
assault the fleet anchored in the
Zuyder Zee; some had followed
Bonaparte upon the bridge of Lodi;
others had accompanied Murat in
the trenches of Mantua, while
others had outstripped Lannes in the
?unken road of Montebello. The
whole army of that day was thert
in the court of the Tuileries, repre?
sented by a squadron or a companj
and guarding Napoleon in repose
and that was the splendid perioc
when the great army had Marengc
behind it and Austerlitz before it
'Sire,' said the Minister of the In?
terior to Napoleon, 'I saw yester?
day the most daring man in your
empire.' 'What man was that?'
rsked the Emperor sharply, 'and
what has he done?' 'He wishes tc
do something, sire.' 'What?.! 'Tc
visit the Paris sewers.' "
Yes, they are the same sewers
r-nd yet vastly different.
For where Hugo said of the visr
of Bruneseau?that was the naim
of the most daring man ii
Napoleon's empire?"It was a fear
ful campaign?a nocturnal battl
against asphyxia and plague," i
can now be said that an excursio:
through the sewers of Paris pre
sents nothing disagreeable and i
certainly less sad and, perhaps, mor
curious than a visit to the cats
. combs of Paris. Paris is now justl
proud of her sewers, and a visit t
them is something which no visite
during the summer months shoul
miss. It is both a treat, an unusui
experience and a lesson in saniti
tion for other capitals. The eno:
mous volume of water poure
through them, the swiftness of tl
current, three feet a second, ar
the active ventilation by the moutl
of the silt basins and various othi
openings prevent the atmosphere <
the sewers from being deleteriou
The only sensation is one of co<
ness and humidity, like being in
damp cellar or cave.
Of Ancient Origin -
But they are the tame sewe
that Bruneseau visited, for they n
in the same channels. The emplac
[ menta are the aame. In fa?
Bruneaeau found on the keysto
of one of the arches the date 141
and no one knows how old th
really are, save that some time 1
tween 1364 and 1382 Hugt
Aubrfot, mayor and governor
Paris under Charles V, who laid t
cornerstone of the Bastille and bu
I* Petit Chatelet and the Pont Sail
Michel, began the construction
the flrst of the great main drai
that form part of the present s;
tarn. And when the reconstruct!
and modernization began it was fou
that some of the ancient, oublieti
of the Conciergerie had been wall
up and arched ever to form part
the sewer system. In two of t
oubliettes ?tapies were found in t
wall, with pieces of chain atill i
inched to them an<f a leg bone
_____________________
the embrace of one of the chains.
Balzac says that after Aubriot
began the first of the main drains
of Paris his work was continued by
the Trade Provosts, the chiefs of
the merchant guilds, and 'Hugo adds
that up to the end of the old mon?
archy, which died with the Revolu?
tion, fourteen and a half miles of
Se wers,
peculiar; among others the skeleton
of an orang-outang which disap?
peared from the Jardin des Plantes
in 1800?a disappearance probably
connected with the famous and in?
disputable apparition of the devil
in the Rue des Pernardins in the
last year of the eighteenth century.
The poor animai was finally drowned
in the drain.
Marat's Winding Sheet
"The most surprising discovery
was at the entrance of the Great
Sewer. This entrance was formerly
closed by a grating, of which only
the hinges now remained. From
one of these hinges hung a filthy,
.?_____-?
sewers had been built under Paris. I
To-day there are 646 miles.
The Revolution was too busy fill?
ing sewers to build new ones, but
Napoleon added three miles in his
time, and Charles X six and three
quarter miles. Louis-Philippe then
built another fifty-five and three
quarter miles, the short-lived re?
public of 1848 fifteen and one
quarter miles and Napoleon III
more than 200 miles, ?So that by
1874 Paris had 366 miles of sewers,
and the system has been completed
by the 300 miles built since that
time.
One sees that Bruneseau's seven
years' tour of the sewers of Paris,
lasting from 1805 to 1812, has been
fruitful of results?63Q miles bura
in the last one hundred years, as
contrasted with seventeen and a half
miles in the four and a quarter cen?
turies preceding. But there has been
much more accomplished than the
building of a subterranean network
beneath a great city.
It took Bruneseau seven years tc
explore and map the fourteen anc
a half milef 'milt by the old mon?
archy, and Hugo says of his tour:
"They advanced with difficulty. II
was not rare for the ladders to sinl
i into three feet of mud. The Ian
terns burned dim in the mephitic at
mosphere. From time to time i
sewerman was carried away in i
fainting state. At certain spot
there was a precipice. The soil ha<
given away, the flagstones had crum
bled and the drain was convertc<
into a bottomless pit; nothing soli?
could be found. A man disappear*
suddenly and they had great dim*
culty in dragging him out. The wal
was covered in places with shape
less fungi which might have bee?
called tumors. The stone it sel
seemed sick in this unbreathable at
mosphere.
"A few of the things found yer
shapeless rag, which doubtless j
caught there as it passed, floated in j
the shadow and gradually moldered
away. Bruneseau raised his lantern
and examined this fragment. It
was of very fine cambric, and in one
corner, less tattered than the rest,
they made out a heraldic coronet
embroidered above these seven let?
ters signified ,Laubespine. They rec
that of a marquis and the seven let
trs signified Laubespine. They rec?
ognized that they had before them
a piece of Marat's winding sheet.
"Marat in his, youth had love af?
fairs, at the time when he was at
Pictures -.7 Brown Uro?.
These pictures of underground Paris, made before the
war, are an artist's conception of a trip through the
sewers, and also show, by means of the exposed
cross-section, the magnitude of the passages
Itached to the household of the Comte
?
I d'Artois in the capacity of physician
!to the stables. Of these love affairs
?with a great lady, which are histori?
cally notorious, he retained this sheet
as a waif or a souvenir. On his
death, as it was the only fine linen in
his possession, he was buried in it.
Old women wrapped the tragic
friend of the people for the tomb in
this sheet wherein he had known
pleasure. Bruneseau passed on. The
rag was left where it was.
"Altogether the relic was a
?strange one. A marchioness had
.slept in it; Marat had rotted in it; it
! had passed through the Panth?on to
?end with the sewer rats. This rag
j from an alcove, every ctcease in which
Watteau would once have joyfully
painted, ended by becoming worthy
of the intent gaze of Dante."
Balzac records that up to the be
| ginning of the nineteenth century the
I street openings into the sewers were
?great open holes. They were found
! in the center of the city, in the Rue
! Montmartre, the Rue du Temple, etc,
For many years their ancient sites
were marked by sudden risings of the
?roadway, when the waters rushing
j through underground after a great
! storm sought to escape through these
I ancient caverns.
In 1816 a little girl carrying som.
diamonds for an actress at the Th?
?tre Ambigu was caught in a storn
and swept by the rush of the water
into the opening of the drain in th?
i Rue du Temple. Only the courag?
and agility of a passer-by saved he:
from being drowned. This acciden
?caused a great outcry for the open
'ings to be covered, and they wer
protected by movable gratings, five
feet high, which saved pedestrians,
but aiso caught rubbish, and as the
residents generally forgot to remove
the rubbish the cellars of neighbor?
ing houses were quite likely to be
flooded with every storm.
The Resort of Thieves
But in 1832 the sewers were still
the resort of the thieves, the
marauders, the assassins, the evil?
doers of all kinds of the Paris of
that day.
"Winding, cracked, unpaved, full
of pits, intersected by fissures, jolted
by odd elbows, rising and falling
illogically, fetid, savage, ferocious,
submerged in darkness, with cica?
trices on its stones and scars on its
walls, gruesome, such was the old
sewer of Paris," said Hugo.
By 1832, thanks to Bruneseau, it
had been greatly improved; it was
paved, walled and straightened, and
the police made regular tours of it,
but still it was into the sewer that
Jean Valjean escaped with thi
wounded Marius from the barricade
in the Rue de la Chanvrerie.
"After the flashing whirlwind o?1
combat came the cavern of miasmas
and snares; after chaos the cloaca,'
?aid Hugo. "Jean Valjean hac
fallen from one circle of the infern<
into another."
Yet how different was the excur
sion of Jean Valjean from the toui
of Bruneseau. "The passage alonf
which Jean Valjean was now walk
ing was not so'narrow as the first
He advanced with some difficulty
The rain of the previous night ha<
not yet run off and formed a smal
A Vocati
/ / Tj?^VERY disabled service
?"""l man should be made
? aware of the advantages
of vocational training
which are his for the asking. It is
his duty, not only to himself and
family but to the country, to make
himself a useful and contented citi?
zen. The government has provided
the means. It is up to each man to
take advantage of his opportuni?
ties."
So says Major General William G.
Haan, assistant chief of staff, for?
merly in command of the 32d Divi?
sion (Red Arrows) in France, but
now in charge of the War Depart?
ment's soldier re?mployment pro?
gram. His bureau, the office of the
assistant to the Secretary of War,
has entered this new field ? voca?
tional training. Its numerous em?
ployment bureaus scattered through?
out the country, and its force of
traveling representatives will hci-e
after assist disabled men in every
possible way. Personal attention
will be given to individual cases.
A school is now being conducted
in Washington where district offi?
cers are being instructed in how to
pass on applications for training. In
addition, on December 11 last, a fly?
ing squadron started on a tour of all
the district office?. The" squadron
carries a force of experts competent i
... . ,
on for Eve
to pass immediately on all questions
arising in connection with the grant?
ing of training, and also carries its
own clerksand stenographers, and ad?
vance agents who arrange accommo?
dations in the different towns visited.
When the ordinary daily work at the
office stops, at 5 p. m., the flying
squadron moves in and works from 5
I until midnight, in reviewing and dis?
posing of all cases pending. In this
manner it is expected that twenty
five hundred cases a night will be
handled and the entire accumulation
disposed of by February 1. To date
the number of cases approved for
training is 38,268, and the men ac?
tually receiving instruction total
20,081.
The question will be asked: What
sort of training does the government
give? Is it worth while, and where
is it given? May a man eligible for
training select any occupation suited
to his needs? la aotry-out or prepar?
atory course allowed him in either a
shop or school in order! that he may
decide more intelligently as to his
future occupation?
In brief, an ex-service man may
receive training in agriculture, in?
dustry, commerce, transportation or
the professions. Training is given in
the best schools and'colleges, or
"training on tho job" is arranged for
in manufacturing establishments, in?
dustrial concerns, offices and on
farms. The length of training is de?
termined by the ambition and abil?
ity of the man and by the skill re?
quired for the work he has chosen.
While in training the pupil will
:ry Disable
receive not only his school expenses,
but for maintenance he will be paid
$80 a month if without dependents,
and if he has dependents he will re?
ceive $100 a month, plus the addi?
tional amounts allowed for depend?
ents, not to exceed in any case
$150. While being trained on the
job he receives the same allowance
for himself and family as if he were
in school, and no deduction will be
made because he earns some wage
incidental to his work.
"But how will this affect my com?
pensation and insurance?" many
men ask.
A man entitled to vocational train?
ing to overcome some handicap of a
disability suffered in the service re?
ceives the allowance of the Federal
Board for Vocational Education in
lieu of the compensation paid by the
Bureau of War Risk Insurance, un?
less such compensation is in excess
of the allowance of the Federal
Board, in which case the Bureau of
War Risk Insurance pays enough to
make up this difference. The
amounts paid the man under the in?
surance provisions of the War Risk'
Insurance act are not diminished or
affected in any way by the fact that
he takes vocational training.
Few persons realize tho remark?
able work being done in making over
men broken by the war.
"I never hoped to sing again," said
a young soldier whose voice, before
ho was gassed in tho Argonne, had
been his chief means of livelihood.
"But a miracle has been worked and
my voice is now better than ever."
sd Soldier
The lad's vocal cords have been
built up under one of the most cele?
brated vocalists in the country, and
this young soldier, after turning
down an offer of $100 a week,*rs now
considering several offers to sing in
musical comedy.
Equally interesting is the case of
a full-blooded Sioux Indian, twenty
i four years of age,, whose right hand
was badly injured by a machine gun
bullet. By a skillful feat of modern
surgery it has been restored so that
he can use it again. He has de?
veloped unusual talent as an artist
and is learning the principles of
drawing and design at an art school,
where he shows promise of becoming
a really good craftsman. Many a
struggling art student envies this
young Indian the financial backing
which the government gives him by
reason of the wound suffered in its
service.
"In doing this work the govern?
ment has been faced with tremen?
dous difficulties," says General Haan.
"At the start, few men were quali?
fied to give final decision as to which
. cases were eligible under the law
to receive training. All applica?
tions had to be referred to Wash?
ington, resulting in endless confu?
sion and delay. A decentralization
policy has now been adopted, where?
by the country is divided into four?
teen districts and authority dole
gated tomako a final decision at the
district office on all applications for
training. Heroic measures have
boon taken to disdftae of the pending
and incoming cases which have ac?
cumulated."
Doing Underground Paris Is One
of the Regular Sightseeing
Trips in Time of Peace
torrent in the center of the floor,
and he was forced to hug the wall
in order to keep his feet out of
water. He went on thus darkly, re?
sembling some being of the night,
groping in the invisible and lost be?
low the earth in veins of gloom.
"Still, by degrees, whether because
distant gratings sent a little flicker?
ing light into this opaque mist or
because his eyes had grown accus?
tomed to tlje obscurity, he regained
some vague vision and began to get
a confused glimpse now of the wall
which he touched, and now of the
vault under which he was passing.
He advanced anxiously but calmly."
Further on: "A little beyond an
affluent he paused. He was very
weary. A- tolerably large grating,
probably the opening into the Rue
d'Anjou, afforded an almost bright
light." The light was sufficient for
him to read an entry in a notebook.
Later: "Only the growing pallor of
the flakes of light, which he met
from time to time, indicated to him
that the sun was leaving the pave?
ments and that day would soon be
over."
Finally, Jean Valjean came to the
outlet of the sewer on the banks of
the Seine. In two hours he had
traversed a greater length of the
sewers than Bruneseau was able to
penetrate in a year.
The next great improvement came
in 1855. From time immemorial the
Seine had been the main sewer of
Paris. Balzac, in his studies of
Catherine de' Medici, describes thai
unbelievable pollution of one of the
great capitals of Europe. But the
same thing was true of London and
the Thames. Paris was not behind
the times. It was sanitation that
was behind?consideration of the
public health. And even when Paris
came to the reconstruction and mod?
ernization of her sewers through
the work and studies of Bruneseau,
the Seine still remained the greal
drain.
The new sewer system of Paris
was built with six main outlets, all
into the Seine, and the pollution ol
the river and the city, the dangei
to the public health, still remained
It was Belgrand who changed that
He introduced, in 1855, the reforn
o? no sewer emptying into the rivei
in its passage through the city. Ht
stopped up all the outlets in the citj
and by a huge tunnel emptied th<
entire sewage of the city into thi
river at Asni?res and St. Denis.
This situation remained un
changed until 1874, by which timi
the complaints of Clichy made a nev
government investigation of th<
drainage system of Paris necessary
The report went into detail concern
ing the pollution of the river belov
the point where the "great collector'
had its outlet. No living fish and n<
green herbage were to be found it
that portion pf the river exposed fc
the contamination, and the water di<
not recover a healthy condition fo;
many miles below the place wher
the sewage entered the river.
It was to remedy this conditio*
that the authorities first began se
riously to consider sewage irrigation
Long before, in 18o4, M. Mille dre.
up a plan for distributing the sew
age of Paris on the plain of Genne
villers, and in 1867 a departmen
was organized with that object i:
view. But on account of the grea
prejudice against the idea and th
consequent difficulty of getting an;
one to cultivate the land under sew
age irrigation the plan made slot
headway. An experimental statio
of seventeen acres was establishec
and its success, from an agricultura
point of view, was so signal that th
station was increased from seven
teen to fifty-four acres.
In the war of 1870-'71 the Genn.
villers plant was destroyed by th
Prussian gunfire, but it was rebuil
in 1872, and by the end of 187{
thanks to the investigation of th
year before, there were nearly se\
anteen miles of conduits for sewag
irrigation over the plains of Gennc
?illers, and in June, 1878, there wer
914 acres under treatment, usin
about 10,000,000 gallons of sewage
_ay.
Fhe Seine Purified
During the next twenty year
there was a iontinual increase in th
iso of sewage for irrigation, and fiv
more government projects were d?
.eloped.-July 8, 1899, was a memo*
able date. On that day sewage
ceased to be discharged into the
Seine and was used entirely jn jrrj.
gation. There are now five of the?
irrigation plants. Besides the ope
at Gennevillers, which has been in?
creased to nearly 5,000 acres, thcr?
are plants at Argenteuil, M?vy,
Parc d'Ach?res, Carri?res-sous-Pois
sy and Mureaux.
The land under irrigation was for?
merly arid, and the system is self
supporting by the sale of irrigation
to cultivators, who are generally
small market gardeners, farming
two or three acres. The results on
the land are remarkable. Not only
is the soil constantly renewed, but
in the point of crops the average is
twenty-eight tons of cabbage ah
acre, twenty tons of carrots, forty,
eight tons of beets and six tons of
beans, while the best land will pro?
duce from fourteen to sixteen tons
of cauliflower an acre, from twenty.
four to thirty-two tons of eanots,
fifty-six tone of cabbage and from
twenty-four to thirty-two tona of
onions an acre. This is from too
to three times the result from ordi?
nary unirrigated land and is not in?
ferior to the best market gardens
where water and manure are freely
used.
This is the final result at th?
sewerage system of Paris that had
its inception with Hugues Aubriot
in 1364. It is six and a half cen?
turies of progress, undreamed of by
the medieval governor who laid
the foundations of the great tunnel
through which the present-day visi?
tor to the Paris sewers progresses
by electric train or electrically
driven boat under the glare of
electric arc lights.
A Tour de Luxe
Such is the vast change since Jean
Valjean carried Marius in his arm:;
to the outlet in the shadow of the
Pont des Invalides. One no longer
dropa through a manhole into an
unlighted drain, through which he
feels his way in the darkness and
in constant fear of a break, which
means a quicksand and death. The
tourist season extends from April
to October, and the curious visitor
applies to the Prefect of the Seine
for an authorization to make the
tour of the sewers on one of the
weekly trips.
The tour starts from the Place du
Ch?telet, and the visitor descends
to the level of the sewer by a wide
stairway. Arriving at the bottom
he finds himself in a well lighted
tunnel nineteen feet four inches
wide and with a vaulted roof four?
teen feet high. A ditch in the
center carries the sewage that is
mixed with a large volume of swift?
ly flowing water. Astride the ditch
on a track of four-foot gauge is a
train capable of carrying 100 pas?
sengers and drawn by an electric
locomotive of the storage battery
type. In the galleries of the eewer
are the water and gas mains, com?
pressed air conduits, the electric
light, telephone and telegraph wire?,
and there is a broad footpath on
either side of the central ditch.
The line of the tour follows the
Boulevard de Sebastopol to the Kue
de Rivoli, and along the Rue de
Rivoli to the Place de la Concorde.
At that point a change is made to
a tow of electrically drawn boats,
which proceed ?through a smaller
tunnel under the Rue Royale to the
Place de la Madeleine, where they
turn to the left into the Bouievard
de Malesherbes, and the halt is op?
posite the Church of the Madeleine
after a trip of one and a quarter
miles.
Up to 1894 the tours started from
the Boulevard de Malesherbes, and
the first part was made in boats
which were carried along by tin
force of the current, while after th<
change to the cars at the Place d?
la Concorde the motive power wa?
men. Both the boats and the can
were the ones used in cleaning thi
sewage ditches. But the work was s<
iiard and the men had to be change?
jo frequently that in 1894 the systen
>f electric propulsion was adopted
and while the boats used are still th<
ones for cleaning the ditches, tin
cars are special ones for passenge
service. The tours start now fron
sach terminal and there are thr?r<
trips each way on each visiting da;
during the.season.
The Paris sewers vary in *\M
from the small branches, thirt;
inches in diameter, to the great tur?
neis, eighteen feet high and mor
than nineteen feet wide. Altogethe
here are upward of fifty-sevci
?niles that can be traversed in boat
w electric cars, while by far th
argest proportion of the tax hun
Ired and fifty miles of drains ar
if sufficient size for the guards t
valk upright in making their ??
?pection*.