Dulaure, a severe judge of aristocracy, denounces the pretension of the Montmorencies to be the _Premiers Barons Chrétiens_, affirming that they were neither the first barons, nor the first Christians, by a great many. He says, that the extravagant title has most probably been a war-cry, in the time of the crusaders. According to his account of the family it originated, about the year 1008, in a certain Borchard, who, proving a bad neighbour to the Abbey of St. Denis, the vassals of which he was in the habit of robbing, besides, now and then, despoiling a monk, the king caused his fortress in the Isle St. Denis to be razed; after which, by a treaty, he was put in possession of the mountain hard by, with permission to erect another hold near a fountain, at a place called in the charters, Montmorenciacum. Hence the name, and the family. This writer thinks that the first castle must have been built of wood!
We took a road that led us up to a bluff on the mountain, behind the town, where we obtained a new and very peculiar view of Paris and its environs. I have said that the French towns have no straggling suburbs. A few winehouses (to save the _octroi_) are built near the gates, compactly, as in the town itself, and there the buildings cease as suddenly as if pared down by a knife. The fields touch the walls, in many places, and between St. Ouen and the guinguettes and winehouses, at the Barrière de Clichy, a distance of two miles, there is but a solitary building. A wide plain separates Paris, on this side, from the mountains, and of course our view extended across it. The number of villages was absolutely astounding. Although I did not attempt counting them, I should think not fewer than a hundred were in sight, all grey, picturesque, and clustering round the high nave and church tower, like chickens gathering beneath the wing. The day was clouded, and the hamlets rose from their beds of verdure, sombre but distinct, with their faces of wall, now in subdued light, and now quite shaded, resembling the glorious _darks_ of Rembrandt's pictures.
Rural Drives.--French Peasantry.--View of Montmartre.--The Boulevards. --The Abattoirs.--Search for Lodgings.--A queer Breakfast.--Royal Progresses and Magnificence.--French Carriages and Horses.--Modes of Conveyance.--Drunkenness.--French Criminal Justice.--Marvellous Stories of the Police.