MULTUM IN PARVO LIBRARY.
Entered at the Boston Post Office as second class matter.
GAY LIFE
IN
PARIS.
How Life is Enjoyed by the
People of that Great
Metropolis.
Smallest Magazine in the world. Subscription price
50 cts. per year. Single Copies 5 cts. each.
PUBLISHED BY
A. B. COURTNEY,
Room 74, 45 Milk Street,
BOSTON, MASS.
THE QUEEN OF THE MABILLE.
GAY LIFE IN PARIS.
Preface.
There is an old Italian proverb, “See Naples anddie,” but the French paraphrase it in a morepleasant way and say “See Paris and pray to livethere until the end of the world.” It is with someof the females of Paris that we have to deal inthis little book. Life in the great Metropolis isfar different from the comparatively sober methodof living in our American cities. A well knownjournalist says: “Men and women plunge into[3]the lovely city as into a bath of pleasure, buffetwith the breakers, float a brief time on the cosysea of life there, and are then sucked down in thedark and sinister depths where ruin, disease anddeath lay in wait for the prey they are sure of inthe end.” Of course this writer doesn’t mean thatall men and women get into the evil way, but hedoes mean that a greater proportion are temptedby evil in Paris than in any other place.
The Jardin Mabille.
The day of the Jardin Mabille went by severalyears yet, but the memories of it remain. Thenearest approach to it, at present, is an establishmentin the Latin quarter of Paris. The Mabillewas a very elaborately and artistically arrangedgarden, a maze of thickets, odorous with flowers.It had an immense closed hall for winter use.Here once a week was held a masked ball whichlasted from Saturday night to daybreak of theSabbath. The wickedest dances, notably the can-canand the hula-hula, were invariably reservedfor the closing hours of the affair. The womenwho frequented these balls were bad, yes, verybad, and they were met there by men in all walksof life. Even Napoleon III has visited this den ofiniquity incognito. The writer of this had occasionto visit the Jardin Mabille and other similarplaces in Paris once in company with a dete