François; Monsieur François, jostles no other
butcher. Nobody is flustered and aggravated.
Nobody is savage. In the midst of the country
blue frocks and red handkerchiefs, and the
butchers' coats, shaggy, furry, and hairy: of
calf-skin, cow-skin, horse-skin, and bear-skin:
towers a cocked hat and a blue cloak. Slavery!
For our Police wear great coats and glazed
hats.

But now the bartering is over, and the calves
are sold,  "Ho! Gregorie, Antoine, Jean, Louis!
Bring up the carts, my children! Quick,
brave infants! Hola! Hi!"

The carts, well littered with straw, are
backed up to the edge of the raised pavement,
and various hot infants carry calves upon
their heads, and dexterously pitch them in,
while other hot infants, standing in the carts,
arrange the calves, and pack them carefully
in straw. Here is a promising young calf,
not sold, whom Madame Doche unbinds.
Pardon me, Madame Doche, but I fear this
mode of tying the four legs of a quadraped
together, though strictly à la mode, is not
quite right. You observe, Madame Doche,
that the cord leaves deep indentations in the
skin, and that the animal is so cramped at
first as not to know, or even remotely suspect,
that he is unbound, until you are so obliging
as to kick him, in your delicate little way,
and pull his tail like a bell-rope. Then, he
staggers to his knees, not being able to stand,
and stumbles about like a drunken calf, or
the horse at Franconi's, whom you may
have seen, Madame Doche, who is supposed
to have been mortally wounded in battle.
But, what is this rubbing against me, as I
apostrophise Madame Doche? It is another
heated infant, with a calf upon his head.
"Pardon, Monsieur, but will you have the
politeness to allow me to pass?" "Ah, Sir,
willingly. I am vexed to obstruct the way."
On he staggers, calf and all, and makes no
allusion whatever either to my eyes or limbs.

Now, the carts are all full. More straw,
my Antoine, to shake over these top rows;
then, off we will clatter, rumble, jolt, and
rattle, a long row of us, out of the first town-gate,
and out at the second town-gate, and
past the empty sentry-box, and the little
thin square bandbox of a guardhouse, where
nobody seems to live; and away for Paris, by
the paved road, lying a straight, straight line,
in the long avenue of trees. We can
neither choose our road, nor our pace, for that
is all prescribed to us. The public convenience
demands that our carts should get to
Paris by such a route, and no other
(Napoleon had leisure to find that out, while he
had a little war with the world upon his hands),
and woe betide us if we infringe orders.

Droves of oxen stand in the Cattle Market,
tied to iron bars fixed into posts of granite.
Other droves advance slowly down the long
avenue, past the second town-gate, and the
first town-gate, and the sentry-box, and the
handbox, thawing the morning with their
smoky breath as they come along. Plenty
of room; plenty of time. Neither man nor
beast is driven out of his wits by coaches,
carts, waggons, omnibuses, gigs, chaises,
phaetons, cabs, trucks, boys, whoopings, roarings,
and multitudes. No tail-twisting is
necessary—no iron pronging is necessary.
There are no iron prongs here. The market
for cattle is held as quietly as the market for
calves. In due time, off the cattle go to
Paris; the drovers can no more choose their
road, nor their time, nor the numbers they
shall drive, than they can choose their hour
for dying in the course of nature.

Sheep next. The Sheep-pens are up here,
past the Branch Bank of Paris established for
the convenience of the butchers, and behind
the two pretty fountains they are making in
the Market. My name is Bull; yet I think
I should like to see as good twin fountains—
not to say in Smithfield, but in England
anywhere. Plenty of room; plenty of time. And
here are sheep-dogs, sensible as ever, but
with a certain French air about them—not
without a suspicion of dominoes—with a kind
of flavor of moustache and beard—
demonstrative dogs, shaggy and loose where an English
dog would be tight and close—not so troubled
with business calculations as our English
drovers' dogs, who have always got their
sheep upon their minds, and think about their
work, even resting, as you may see by their
faces; but, dashing, showy, rather unreliable
dogs; who might worry me instead of their
legitimate charges if they saw occasion—and
might see it somewhat suddenly. The market
for sheep passes off like the other two; and
away they go, by their alloted road to Paris.
My way being the Railway, I make the best
of it at twenty miles an hour; whirling
through the now high-lighted landscape;
thinking that the inexperienced green buds
will be wishing before long, they had not
been tempted to come out so soon; and
wondering who lives in this or that château,
all window and lattice, and what the family
may have for breakfast this sharp morning.

After the Market come the Abattoir.
What abattoir shall I visit first?
Montmartre is the largest. So, I will go there.

The abattoirs are all within the walls of
Paris, with an eye to the receipt of the octroi
duty; but, they stand in open places in the
suburbs, removed from the press and bustle
of the city. They are managed by the
Syndicat or Guild of Butchers under the inspection
of the Police. Certain smaller items of
the revenue derived from them are in part
retained by the Guild for the payment of
their expenses, and in part devoted by it to
charitable purposes in connexion with the
trade. They cost six hundred and eighty
thousand pounds; and they return to the
City of Paris an interest on that outlay,
amounting to nearly six and a half per cent.

Here, in a sufficiently dismantled space is the
Abattoir of Montmartre, covering nearly nine