Étienne Jeaurat (1699-1779) (after) Le Transport des filles de joye à l'hôpital. Circa 1770. Engraved by Jean-Charles Le Vasseur. Sight: 545x450mm. Fine proof on laid paper, sun-stained. Some foxing and tears at the edges of the folio. Margins. Frame (not examined outside the frame). The scene takes place in the capital, at the end of the Pont de la Tournelle, on the left bank of the Seine, from the Île Saint-Louis. In the background, a closed cart fitted with bars carries the prostitutes to the hospital where they are confined. "The engraving depicts, in the cart pulled by two soaring horses whose collars bear the royal coat of arms, the girls being conveyed by the City Archers to the Hôpital de Lourcine, in the Faubourg Saint-Marceau (formerly the Hôpital de la Charité founded by Marguerite de Provence, and which became the Hôpital des Vénériens in the mid-16th century). As the engraving is, as usual, a counterpart to the painting, the topography of the scene could be misunderstood. The convoy has just arrived on the Left Bank via the Pont de la Tournelle, and a first carriage - the forerunner of today's cellular cars - has entered under the Porte Saint-Bernard (rebuilt in 1606 under Henri IV, then replaced in 1674 by an Arc de Triomphe erected to the glory of Louis XIV to the designs of architect François Blondel, with reliefs by Baptiste Tuby, demolished in 1793). To the right of the door, (actually to the left), the Château de la Tournelle (prison for galley slaves [...] The present print is a counterpart to Carnaval des rues de Paris, by the same engraver and painter". (François Louis Bruel, Collection De Vinck 1, Ancien Régime, Paris, Bibliothèque nationale, 1909, pp. 586-587, n°1242). From the end of the seventeenth century onwards, the morality police were increasingly vigilant, particularly with regard to prostitutes. Founded in 1658, the Salpêtrière was equipped with a "quartier de la Force" for the confinement of women. In 1747, Nicolas-René Berryer created a dedicated department, the Bureau de la Discipline des Mœurs, whose inspectors relentlessly tracked down prostitutes before locking them up at the Saint-Martin depot.