The only time that I ever experienced anything but politeness in Paris, was when in a great hurry I chanced to hit a workman with a basket upon his head.  The concussion was so great that the basket was dashed to the pavement.  He turned round very slowly, and with a grin upon his countenance said, “Thank you, sir!” This was politeness with a little too much sarcasm.  It was spoken so finely that I burst into a laugh, and the Frenchman joined me in it.

The shop-keepers of Paris are a very polite class, and are as avaricious as they are polite.  The habit which they have of asking a higher price than they expect to get is a bad one.  It is a notorious fact that foreigners in Paris can rarely buy an article so cheaply as a native.  There are always quantities of verdant Englishmen visiting Paris, and the temptation to cheat them is too great to be resisted by the wide-awake shop-keepers.  Besides, it satisfies a grudge they all have against Englishmen.  I always found it an excellent way not to buy until the shop keeper had lowered his price considerably.  Sometimes I state my country, and the saleswoman would roguishly pretend that for that reason she reduced the price.  I remember stopping once in the Palais Royal to gaze at some pretty chains in the window.  A black-eyed little woman came to the door, and I asked the price of a ring which struck my fancy.  She gave it, and I shook my head, telling her that in the country which I came from I could get such a ring for less money.  She wanted to know the name of my country, and when I told her it was America, she said in a charming manner, “Oh! you come from the grand republic! you shall have the ring for so many francs,” naming a sum far less than she had at first asked.  Of course, I did not suppose she sacrificed a sou for the sake of my country, but it showed how apt are the Paris shop-keepers at making excuses.  An Englishman or American would have solemnly declared he would not take a penny less—­and then very coolly give the lie to his assertion; at any rate, I have seen English and American tradesman do so.

A majority of the shop-keepers of Paris are women, and many of them young and pretty.  I certainly have seen more beauty of face in the shops than on the Boulevards of Paris.  Young girls from the ages of fifteen to twenty-five, are usually the clerks in all the shops, which are often presided over by a grown-up woman who is mistress of the establishment, her husband being by no means the first man in the establishment, but rather a silent partner.

The grisettes are often girls of industry and great good-nature, but the morals of the class are lamentably low.  They are easily seduced from the path of right, and are led to form temporary alliances with men, very often the students of the Latin Quarter.  They rarely degrade themselves for money or for such considerations, but it is for love or pleasure that they fall.  They are given to adventures and intrigues,