College of Surgeons, who were designated by the appellation of Surgeons of the Long Robe, whilst the barbers were styled Surgeons of the Short Robe; he also recalled the Jews, whom his father, after having persecuted in divers manners, banished and confiscated their property; amongst other indignities which were put upon them by Saint Louis, was that of forcing them to wear a patch of red cloth on their garment both before and behind, in the shape of a wheel, that they might be distinguished from Christians, and marked as it were for insult.  In Philippe’s reign, however, merit found its reward, no matter how low the origin from whence it sprang, and several authors, particularly poets, wrote boldly against the extreme hypocrisy which existed in the preceding reign, and literature made great progress.

In 1285 Philippe the Fair, so named on account of his handsome person, succeeded to the throne of his father; in his ardent thirst for money he changed the value of the coinage three times, and caused a riot which ended by his hanging twenty-eight of the conspirators at the different entrances of Paris, and had numbers of persons accused of crimes in order to have them executed that he might obtain possession of their property; thus hundreds were burned alive and tortured in various manners.  One act, however, threw a degree of lustre on his reign, and that was the organisation of the Parliament at Paris, establishing it as a sovereign court, their sittings being held in the Palais de Justice, the residence at that period of the kings of France.  For several succeeding reigns Paris appeared to make but little progress; some churches were built as also other establishments, but none which are now standing, except some portions of them which may have escaped destruction and are now in the occupation of different tradespeople.  The government became exceedingly poor, and several measures were adopted in order to repair the finances of the state; amongst others, that of suffering serfs to purchase their emancipation, of which many availed themselves, but not sufficient effectually to replenish the exhausted treasury.  For the same reason the property of the Lombards was confiscated, next recourse was had to the Jews, and even the exactions imposed upon them were inadequate to the wants of the nation.  The succession of several weak kings had brought affairs into this state, when Philippe the Sixth of Valois crowned the misfortunes of the country by entering into a war with England, at a time when the funds of his kingdom were at the lowest ebb; constantly engaged in hostilities, he had not leisure or the means of attending to the welfare of the Parisians, and the disasters he encountered caused his reign to be remembered as a series of misfortunes.  Several colleges, however, were founded in his reign; amongst others, that of the College des Ecossais (Scotch College) then in the Rue des Amandiers, but now existing in the Rue des Fosses St. Victor.  It was first instituted by David, Bishop of Murray, in Scotland, but the present building was erected by Robert Barclay in 1662.