Messieurs, the Queen

For themselves, the French want no kings ruling over them. The last Emperor of France was tossed off the throne 86 years ago. Today unthroned royalty from other lands are a franc a dozen in the haunts of Paris' international set. The businesslike, democratic sovereigns of northern Europe frequently turn up in town without causing a ripple. But Parisians in all walks of life have been in a dither for weeks over next week's visit of Britain's Queen Elizabeth. Day laborers and priestesses of haute couture, florists and jewelers, architects and restaurateurs, waiters and street sweepers were busily engaged in last-minute titivations (at an estimated cost of 2 billion francs) for the first visit of a reigning British queen since 1855.

Elizabethan Barbecue. In the Elysee Palace alone, 263 workmen were getting things ready for Elizabeth and her husband. First it was decided that they should sleep in Napoleon Bonaparte's huge bronze and mahogany bed; then, perhaps because of Napoleon's hatred of England, the idea was abandoned. Landscape gardeners lined the Avenue de l'Opera with palm trees and changed its name for the occasion to Boulevard Mediterraneen. The managers of Maxim's, a favored haunt of Elizabeth's own playful great-grandfather, Edward VII, completed plans for three days of all-English menus, to the unconcealed horror of gastronomes. Maxim's even arranged to have a young British bull flown across the channel for an old-fashioned Elizabethan barbecue.

When Elizabeth and Philip glide along the Seine on a royal barge, they will be sung at by 60 separate groups of folk singers in native costume on the Pont Louis-Philippe and serenaded by 500 little boys in red surplices from the Pont Neuf. As the barge nears the Ile de la Cite, over Notre Dame will flash a mammoth display of pinwheels, Roman candles and flares, featuring (for the first time in pyrotechnic history) heliotrope skyrockets.

Lost Perfume. There will be a garden party spiced by the presence of Princess Grace of Monaco in becoming sables; there will be parades and reviews adorned by the uniforms of past French glory worn by staunchly republican soldiers. Beneath Napoleon Bonaparte's monument in the Place Vendome 50 French models will curtsy by torchlight as the royal Rolls passes by.

The Foreign Office will give the Queen a platinum watch from Carder's to replace one she lost; Renault will give her a new car--her favorite pastel blue; and the municipality of Paris will crack open an ancient bottle of cognac. There will be--among heaps of succulent goodies at every turn--a seven-layered, 72-lb. cake on a bed of crimson candy roses from the pastry cooks and confectioners of the Societe de la Saint-Michel. And for the visiting Queen's own very private use, there will be a single crystal flagon of perfume concocted with the help of the most sensitive nostrils in France as an "homage from the French Perfumers to Her Majesty Elizabeth II." "We have destroyed the formula," explained a spokesman for the perfumers. "This scent [strongly reminiscent of jasmine] will never be sold on the market."

As a final proof that the inheritors of the revolutionary tradition of Robespierre and Marat know how to treat royalty, French ladies invited to meet Elizabeth and Philip at official functions were warned not to wear costume jewelry; only genuine gems will be tolerated.

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