Bastille into an open public area, with a tall column at the centre surrounded by fountains, dedicated to Louis XVI as the "restorer of public freedom". The number of prisoners held in the Bastille at any one time declined sharply towards the end of Louis's reign; the prison contained ten prisoners in September 1782 and, despite a mild increase at the beginning of 1788, by July 1789 only seven prisoners remained in custody. Before any official scheme to close the prison could be enacted, however, disturbances across Paris brought a more violent end to the Bastille. By July 1789, revolutionary sentiment
Writers in Paris de Navarre, until his last days. Many of his poems had Paris settings; one poem from "Sonnets pour Hélène", was set in the new Tuileries gardens, created by Catherine de' Medici: (When I think of that day when, near a fountain in the royal garden, enchanted by your gentleness. Love revealed to you the secrets of my heart, And how much pain had filled my soul...) Of the prominent French writers of the century, Moliere, the Marquise de Sévigné, La Rochefoucauld and Charles Perrault were all born in Paris. Pierre Corneille was from Normandy, Descartes from the Touraine, Jean Racine