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ITH most cities life begins at the ground floor (collars, sewers and electric tuber al- Waya excepted) and ends at the top story, but In Paris, while busi ness is being profitably conducted in the bright sunshine of the loftiest stage, it is also being as profitably pursued in the darkness of the depths below, far beneath even the sewers and the famous Metropolitan Railway of which the Parisians are so proud, for Paris is honeycombed with sub terranean vaults and passages. It is literally built upon columns and walls, and if one fine morning the world awoke to learn that the bottom had fallen out of the Gay Capital and It had crumpled up like a house of cards It would be no surprising thing to those familiar with the underground world of Paris. It would seem as though the former inhabitants had devoted their efforts to hhewing out a place wherein they might seek refuge in case of dire necessity, for, though few are aware of the fact, the entire popu lation of Paris could hide itself be neath the city. To build the city we know so well today past generations delved and dug beneath it for the coveted stone. What then were quarries have now be come caves, portions of which have been converted into catacombs and to! ‘1 @ bones of the dead, while nth ‘e Hsed for the very mundane po f growiog mushrooms—those ma ty Ute champignons with 14 no ragent is complete and wh ie never fails to find on a frene. menu. The mushroom is a cemestible particularly favored by the French. Wagon-loads from near and ‘or find their way into the central markets of the city every day in the year, and the annual consumption by the Parisians of this vegetable repre sents a value of over a quarter of a million sterling. Both beneath the city itself and outside it these strange Mushroom-caves extend for miles in all directions; and in them hundreds of men, who often never see daylight from morn till eve, pass their lives in cultivating the champignon. I was told that I should find these “onder-boulevards” of the great city well worthy of a visit, and in a weak moment of curiosity I accepted the offer of an influential friend to obtain permission for myself and a photog rapher to descend into the bowels of the earth and learn something of the art of underground mushroom-grow ing. We departed one fine morning, the photographer and I, for Malakoff, on eee earl .This shaft leads right into them, said the farmer, indicating a covered circular hole in the ground I had not hitherto noticed. He pulled the boards away and I looked down, shuddering, for I looked only into fathomless dark ness. How we were to get down puz sled me, how the photographic ap paratus was going to fave worried the photographer, and we were both im mensely relieved to learn that this shaft was not the entrance, but only the place where they pitched the mutterings for the mat who was to work the canta. The famous Mushroom-body were at l our feet. We were, in fact, walking in the arrow space between them—a path perhaps a foot in width. They ran along the caves in rows, two against the sides and a pair down,the centre. They seemed to be banks of sand some two feet in hreight, and th iining up from a two foot base to a rounded top. The sof) was clammy and crumbling to the towvh, and inlaid with round white discs, varying in circumference from the d bvensions of shifting to a small-sized saucer—the precious champignons. “Is there much of this?” I asked of the farmer leading us. Whi seemed prepared to walk on forever. “Seven or eight kilometres,” he an manure down. TI still had hopes of gavning entrance other than by de scending a shaft—a gentle slope or something of that sort was what I wanted—and I felt convinced that this would be the case when our guide said we had rather a long walk before us. It proved a good three-quarters of an hour's journey, over fields and down country lanes, ere he stopped suddenly before a small square fence and told us we had reached our destination. And we had been following the line of one of the underground passages all the time! Opening a gate, the farmer reversed a shaft. After our guide had disappeared over the ledge and reached the bottom the photog rapher followed him. When the prim itive ladder oscillated no longer be neath his weight I went slowly and silently down, landing safely in about three inches of mud. It had been 120 degrees to the sun above, for the day was particularly fine. Down here it was cold, damp, dark and uninviting, so cold that I shivered in my shirt-sleeves, for I had left my coat above. Our guide shout ed, and his voice, being in keeping with his stature, filled the blackness, rumbling away down the many arteries leading from where we were standing and coming back again from a dozen different directions. In answer to his call there presently danced in the dark void ahead of us a couple of lights. They heralded the approach of a couple of champignonnistes, who, emerging from their habitual gloom, disclosed themselves as short, dark individuals, of none too prepossessing appearance, attired, with but scant re gard for the temperature, in blue cot ton trousers, blouses and wooden shoes. Provided with lght—small round cotta-oil lamps fixed on the ends of sticks—and encumbered with the photographic materials, we moved for the outskirts of Paris. We found the mushroom-farmer on his farm await ing us—a well-built, bluff, hearty speci men of French fermier, M. Burvingt by nae. I looked around for signe of leaves, but failed to find them, nor did I see any hills in the neighborhood under which they might be In an swer to a gheation I was informed that they were just fifteen metres under our feet ward, and then the real torture of the experience began. We formed a weird and ghostly pro cestion as we moved forward through the inky blackness, the silence broken only by our footsteps as we splashed along through the puddles, the solemn drip, drip of water from the walls and roof, an exclamation now and then from myself as I nearly tripped over ong of the mushroom beds, and strange swered, unconcernedly. We had arrived at a bend. How long I had been creeping onwards, bump ing now my head and now an arm, stumbling, sprawling ,and saying things, I know not, but my back ached frightfully, and I appreciated more than ever before the comforts of being a short man. it seemed we had walked for ages. “We will take a photograph here,” I said, which brought the party to a halt. A blue, blinding glare went up, ilumming the space around with such light as it had never seen before, and showing up plainly the trio of champignonistes crouched down as they worked, and searing a million files and spiders and goodness alone knows what other insects and vermin. The light died down and went out, and again the lamps sprang into life ,and shed their flickering, welcome gleams around. After securing some pictures we gladly sought the upper world, again, I had no ambition to explore the caves in their entirety, but only to get my cramped spike once more into its nor mal position, to sit down and gather mushroom knowledge from the Ups of the grower himself. fifty years be fore, he told me, these waves had been open to the broad light of day. They were the scene of great activity, re sounding continually with the explo sions of gunpowder, for there men were quarrying the stone that helped to build Paris. Later on they had been abandoned and covered, in, to be finally taken over by the cultivator of mush rooms. This is the history of most of the caves which are now used for this purpose, not only in the neighborhood of the capital, but throughout France. But all are not of the genre I have just described. The famous caves of Issy-les-Moulineaux, owned by cham pignonniste Sauvegeot, are in decided contrast to those previously visited, as large as the others were small—thirty feet in height at least. And there was no ladder to descend; one walked straight into the tunnel from the day light, for it pierced a bill, a chal hill whence had been quarried thousands of tons of chalk of the quality that breB anaes a main ty eu clean into the IM for a dreve not less than 260 yards, would have easily admitted a carriage and palr eure caves St may, migh go it ,was certainly a handsome time, but just as cold and, on as any other. With a switchbad sort of road leading from the entrance to the bottom of the caves. Here there was space for six lines of musabroois beds to wend their irregular ways side by side, as Will be seen fn,our photo raph. 7 There were slx of these large galler ies, from which numerous oahiers ran off, twisting and winding about to the length of some seven kilometres. Cut in the sides of the passages were numerous little “chapels,” some on a level with the ground, others high up ly the side of the wall. In all, these caves contained some sixty kilometres of five mushroom-beds, spiders and ties we found there is their millions, tat only occupants beyond being rats and’ the cats that are kept there to catch them, so no cave of such dimensions are all te m mushroom-beds fo the same stage of advancement at one While, some thousands of metres are in full bloons, others are not so far‘advanced, and fi sent passages the beds are only fart being laid down, while in others the work of clearing out cold and useless beds is being carried on. Scrupulous cleanliness is an abvolute sine quai non ere a new bed can be laid down. The cave must be cleared of the old bed entirely; not a particle of it must be left, for with at the mushroom’s aptitude for lightning growth it is something of a dandy in the vegetable world. New beds are laid down every five or six months, and as they do not bear until three months have passed the harvest neeth be a rich one, for the average cost of a bed ere It shows signs of produce to two and a half francs per nerve. First the manure has to be secured, nd then, ere it can beo used, it wilt be prepared, the work taking from three to six weeks. When realy it is carried into the cave or shoveled down a shaft ay occasion re quires, ‘The building of the beds is a peculiar and laborious process. Sitting astride the portion of the bed he has first made the worker gathers armfulls of manure and presses the material down to any even height in front of him. Thus he is always provided with a seat. Ere the spawn is sown the temperature of the beds must have reached about twelve degrees to fourteen degrees eab. The spawn sown, the manure is covered with sand and then every two or three days the beds must be liberally watered. At the end of three months the “buttons” poke thet heads through, then gradually the beds become cov ered with white hoods, which on at taining the required size are collected for market.. Unless, however, a metre yieldé four kilos of mushrooms at the least: the proprietor of the cave has little occasion to be cheerful, for its creation and care account for an out lay of three francs, while the harvest only fetches a franc: per Ieilo. Winter is the best season for the champignonniste. Then, M. Sauvageot told ‘no, he sends to a market no fewer than one hundred baskets a day, which means 1100 kilos, while during the other seasons of the year forty baskets or 440 kilos is the daily output. In the production’ of this perennial harvest thousands of workmen find employ ment round Paris alone—men who pass their days in damp anid darkness, with only spiders, and fires to keep them company, and yet seem to experience no evil’ effects, as the result of their strange surroundings.—The Wide World’ Magazine, cus PARMER DESCENDS TO TUR “LOWER ReaiOnS. ” THE ROUND WHITH DISCS ARE YOUNG MUSHROOMS—THE CEIL ING HERE () ABOUT THREE FEET FROM THE FLOOR, A BEND IN THE GALLERY SHOWING “CHAMPIGNONNISTES AT WORK, BASKETS OF FRESH-GATHERED MUSH ROOMS AWAITING COLLECTION,
Newspaper Details
Madison New Enterprise
Madison, Florida, US
Thu, Oct 02, 1902
Page 6
Full Page
Clipped by
Charlie H.
USA 05 Feb 2026
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