English: View of the Boulevard des Italiens, crowded with passers-by, riders and horse-drawn carriages. There are several pillars on the side of the road. A bookstore on the corner. Numbered bottom right: N.286.

2 Rue Laffitte, Paris, formerly the hôtel d'Aubeterre or townhouse of the Aubeterre family, with a full-height bow window at the corner, was situated on the corner of Rue Laffitte and the Boulevard des Italiens. It faced on the other side of the Rue Laffitte (far left) the famous Restaurant de la Maison-d'Or.[19][20] 2 Rue Laffitte was purchased by the 4th Marquess of Hertford, when his mother vacated it to live on the rue Taithout.[21] After Wallace's death it was eventually inherited by his secretary Sir John Murray Scott, during whose ownership the house and contents are described by Vita Sackville-West in Pepita, her biography of her mother Lady Sackville (Scott's mistress), who ultimately inherited the contents, of which the Wallace Collection was therefore deprived:[22] "A vast apartment ... a treasure-house which brought visitors from every part of Europe"