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"A thousand years ago, by the rim of a tiny spring, a monk who had avowed himself to the cult of Saint Saturnin, robed, cowled and sandalled, knelt down to say a prayer to his beloved patron saint. Again he came, this time followed by more of his kind, and a wooden cross was planted by the side of the "Fontaine Belle Eau," by this time become a place of pious pilgrimage. After the monk came a king, the latter to hunt in the neighbouring forest."

It was this old account of fact, or legend, that led the author and illustrator of this book to a full realization of the wealth of historic and romantic incidents connected with the French royal parks and palaces, incidents which the makers of guidebooks have passed over in favour of the, presumably, more important, well authenticated facts of history which are often the bare recitals of political rises and falls and dull chronologies of building up and tearing down.

Much of the history of France was made in the great national forests and the royal country-houses of the kingdom, but usually it has been only the events of the capital which have been passed in review. To a great extent this history was of the gallant, daring kind, often written in blood, the sword replacing the pen.

At times gayety reigned supreme, and at times it was sadness; but always the pageant was imposing.

The day of pageants has passed, the day when lords and ladies moved through stately halls, when royal equipages hunted deer or boar on royal preserves, when gay cavalcades of solemn cortèges thronged the great French highways to the uttermost frontiers and ofttimes beyond. Those days have passed; but, to one who knows the real France, a ready-made setting is ever at hand if he would depart a little from the beaten paths worn smooth by railway and automobile tourists who follow only the lines of conventional travel.

France, even to-day, the city and the country alike, is the paradise of European monarchs on a holiday. One may be met at Biarritz on the shores of the Gascon gulf; another may be taking the waters at Aix or Vichy, shooting pigeons under the shadow of the Tete de Chien, or hunting at Rambouillet. This is modern France, the most cosmopolitan meeting place and playground of royalty in the world.

French royal parks and palaces, those of the kings and queens of mediæval, as well as later, times, differ greatly from those of other lands. This is perhaps not so much in their degree of splendour and luxury as in the sentiment which attaches itself to them. In France there has ever been a spirit of gayety and spontaneity unknown elsewhere. It was this which inspired the construction and maintenance of such magnificent royal residences as the palaces of Saint Germain-en-Laye, Fontainebleau, Versailles, Compiègne, Rambouillet, etc., quite different from the motives which caused the erection of the Louvre, the Tuileries or the Palais Cardinal at Paris.

Nowhere else does there exist the equal of these inspired royal country-houses of France, and, when it comes to a consideration of their surrounding parks and gardens, or those royal hunting preserves in the vicinity of the Ile de France, or of those still further afield, at Rambouillet or in the Loire country, their superiority to similar domains beyond the frontiers is even more marked.

In plan this book is a series of itineraries, at least the chapters are arranged, to a great extent in a topographical sequence; and, if the scope is not as wide as all France, it is because of the prominence already given to the parks and palaces of Touraine and elsewhere in the old French provinces in other works in which the artist and author have collaborated. It is for this reason that so little consideration has been given to Chambord, Amboise or Chenonceaux, which were as truly royal as any of that magnificent group of suburban Paris palaces which begins with Conflans and ends with Marly and Versailles.

Going still further afield, there is in the Pyrenees that chateau, royal from all points of view, in which was born the gallant Henri of France and Navarre, but a consideration of that, too, has already been included in another volume.

The present survey includes the royal dwellings of the capital, those of the faubourgs and the outlying districts far enough from town to be recognized as in the country, and still others as remote as Rambouillet, Chantilly and Compiègne. All, however, were intimately connected with the life of the capital in the mediæval and Renaissance days, and together form a class distinct from any other monumental edifices which exist, or ever have existed, in France.

Mere historic fact has been subordinated as far as possible to a recital of such picturesque incidents of the life of contemporary times as the old writers have handed down to us, and a complete chronological review has in no manner been attempted.

	CHAPTER	PAGE
I.	Introductory	13
II.	The Evolution of French Gardens	14
III.	The Royal Hunt in France	43
IV.	The Palais de la Cité and Tournelles	61
V.	The Old Louvre and Its History	75
VI.	The Louvre of Francis I and Its Successors	85
VII.	The Tuileries and Its Gardens	106
VIII.	The Palais Cardinal and the Palais Royal	131
IX.	The Luxembourg, the Elysée and the Palais Bourbon	151
X.	Vincennes and Conflans	168
XI.	Fontainebleau and Its Forest	180
XII.	By the Banks of the Seine	203
XIII.	Malmaison and Marly	215
XIV.	Saint Cloud and Its Park	229
XV.	Versailles: The Glory of France	244
XVI.	The Gardens of Versailles and the Trianons	260
XVII.	Saint Germain-en-Laye	279
XVIII.	Maintenon	296
XIX.	Rambouillet and Its Forest	309
XX.	Chantilly	324
XXI.	Compiègne and Its Forest	342
	Index	363

Terrace of Henri IV, Saint Germain	Frontispiece
The Louvre, the Tuileries and the Palais Royal of To-day	12
"Jardin Français—Jardin Anglais"	15
Henri IV in an Old French Garden	20
Parterre de Diane, Chenonceaux	27
Plan of Sunken Garden (Jardin Creux)	30
A Parterre	32
Bassin de la Couronne, Vaux-le-Vicomte	42
A "Curée aux Flambeaux"	46
An Imperial Hunt at Fontainebleau	52
Rendezvous de Chasse, Rambouillet	56
Bird's Eye View of Old Paris (Map)	74
The XIV Century Louvre	82
The Louvre	90
Original Plan of the Tuileries (Diagram)	106
Salle des Marechaux, Tuileries	116
The Galleries of the Palais Royal	146
Bourbon-Orleans Descendants of Louis Philippe (Diagram)	146
Palais du Luxembourg	154
Door in Throne Room, Luxembourg	156
The Petit Luxembourg	156
The Luxembourg Gardens	158
The Throne of the Palais Bourbon	161
Vincennes Under Charles V	168
Chateau de Vincennes	172
A Hunt under the Walls of Vincennes	174
Conflans	176
Original Plan of Fontainebleau	180
From Paris to Fontainebleau (Map)	180
Palais de Fontainebleau	186
Salle du Throne, Fontainebleau	190
Fragments from Fontainebleau	192
Cheminée de la Reine, Fontainebleau	194
Monument to Rousseau and Millet at Barbison	200
Chateau de Bagatelle	204
Chateau de Malmaison	218
The Gardens of Saint Cloud	236
The Cascades at Saint Cloud	240
Cour de Marbre, Versailles	264
The Potager du Roy, Versailles	270
The Bassin de Latone, Versailles	272
The Fountain of Neptune, Versailles	274
Petit Trianon	276
Laiterie de la Reine, Petit Trianon	277
Saint Germain (Diagram)	280
The Valley of the Seine, from the Terrace at Saint Germain	288
Fauteuil of Mme. de Maintenon	297
Chateau de Maintenon	300
Aqueduct of Louis XIV at Maintenon	306
Chateau de Rambouillet (Diagram)	309
Laiterie de la Reine, Rambouillet	312
Chateau de Rambouillet	316
Chantilly (Diagram)	325
Statue of Le Notre, Chantilly	326
Chateau de Chantilly	336
Compiègne (Diagram)	343
Napoleon's Bedchamber, Compiègne	352
Cours de Compiègne	356