Les Halles at Christmastime at the flower market - le marche des fleurs coupees et du feuillage. In the rue transversale, the long covered through road linking six Baltard pavilions, the road is still clean, not covered in rubbish, so the market is not quite open to the public. The market was extended because it was Christmas. The whole inside of the market had the flower stalls down one side and back up the other. Small farmers and growers had cages in which they put the mistletoe and holly which could be transported strapped on the back of an open truck with the cages piled on top of each other so they would not be crushed or blown away or stolen. Photographer Harold Chapman recalls... "I've obviously got inside there - somewhere else with none of the covered pitches. In this part there are no pitches or little shelters, stands, because they are not selling the same things in the same way as the market traders with their stalls - it is entirely different." He has gone along and is looking back and recalls that... "I walked around looking at the different entrances and the ease of being able to slip in. I always used to turn up early. The lighting is quite different. If you're going to expose for the dark interior which is mainly lit with electric lamps, the shadows will be darker." Two small farmers are looking curiously at the photographer. A porter with an overall is carrying two boxes packed with flowers. Customers did not carry out huge quantities of flowers - it was left to the porters inside. Christmastime is a big buying time and crowds of people will be queueing up outside anxiously waiting to be allowed in. Wicker baskets on the ground are filled with holly, Christmas foliage and greenery. In the carreau forain looking towards rue de la Cossonnerie, Quartier des Halles, 1er arrondissement, Right Bank, Paris, France, circa 1960s.