The "Ferris" wheel put up for
the exposition of 1900 is close by. And a stone's throw from the
military school are the Hotel des Invalides, Napoleon's tomb, and the
magnificent Esplanade des Invalides down which one looks straightway to
the glinting Seine and over the superb Alexander III bridge toward the
tree-embowered palaces of arts on the Champs-Elysees.
On the other side of the Hotel des Invalides from that occupied by the
military school and Champ-de-Mars is the principal diplomatic and
departmental district of Paris, with many embassies (not ours, however,
nor the British--which are across the river) and many administrative
offices of the French nation.
Soldiers and government officials and foreign diplomats dominate the
quarter--and homes of the old French aristocracy.
The Hotel des Invalides, founded by Louis XIV and designed to
accommodate, as an old soldiers' home, some seven thousand veterans of
his unending wars, has latterly served as headquarters for the military
governor of Paris, and also--principally--as a war museum.
Here are housed collections of priceless worth and transcendent interest.
The museum of artillery contains ten thousand specimens of weapons and
armor of all kinds, ancient and modern.
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