Desnoyers’s is the Cadran bleu de la Canaille, (the resort of the lower orders;) but before stepping over the threshold of the cabaret of Guillotin, even the canaille themselves look twice, as in this repository are only to be seen prostitutes with their bullies, pick-pockets and thieves of all classes, some prigs of the lowest grade, and many of those nocturnal marauders who divide their existence into two parts, consecrating it to the duties of theft and riot.  It may be supposed that slang is the only language of this delightful society:  it is generally in French, but so perverted from its primitive signification, that there is not a member of the distinguished “company of forty” who can flatter himself with a full knowledge of it, and yet the “dons of Guillotin’s” have their purists; those who assert that slang took its rise in the East, and without thinking for a moment of disputing their talent as Orientalists, they take that title to themselves without any ceremony; as also that of Argonauts, when they have completed their studies under the direction of the galley sergeants, in working, in the port of Toulon, the dormant navigation on board a vessel in dock.  If notes were pleasing to me, I could here seize the opportunity of making some very learned remarks.  I should, perhaps, go into a profound disquisition, but I am about to paint the paradise of these bacchanalians; the colours are prepared—­let us finish the picture.

If they drink at Guillotin’s they eat also, and the mysteries of the kitchen of this place of delights are well worthy of being known.  The little father Guillotin has no butcher, but he has a purveyor; and in his brass stewpans, the verdigris of which never poisons, the dead horse is transformed into beef a-la-mode; the thighs of the dead dogs found in Rue Guenegaud become legs of mutton from the salt-marshes; and the magic of a piquant sauce gives to the staggering bob (dead born veal) of the cow-feeder the appetizing look of that of Pontoise.  We are told that the cheer in winter is excellent, when the rot prevails; and if ever (during M. Delaveau’s administration) bread were scarce in summer during the “massacre of the innocents,” mutton was to be had here at a very cheap rate.  In this country of metamorphoses the hare never had the right of citizenship; it was compelled to yield to the rabbit, and the rabbit—­how happy the rats are!

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Father Guillotin consumed generally more oil than cotton, but I can, nevertheless, affirm, that, in my time, some banquets have been spread at his cabaret, which, subtracting the liquids, could not have cost more at the cafe Riche, or at Grignon’s.  I remember six individuals, named Driancourt, Vilattes, Pitroux, and three others, who found means to spend 166 francs there in one night.  In fact, each of them had with him his favourite bella.  The citizen no doubt pretty well fleeced them, but