By CRAIG S. SMITH

　　PARIS— The Arc de Triomphe, the tower of Notre Dame and, now, small tents for the poor. There is new architecture springing up along the streets of this stately city, a counterpoint to the stone monuments and Beaux-Arts apartment buildings for which the French capital is known.

　　Since the frigid days of late December, Doctors of the World, a French organization that helps the homeless, has been distributing nylon tents to the growing number of people who sleep on the city’s sidewalks and beneath its bridges. Not everyone is pleased.

　　 “They’re ugly,” said a short woman with a large red purse marching past two tents in the affluent Seventh Arrondissement, where four young Poles are living beneath the sycamores with a view of the Hotel des Invalides.

　　There are thousands of people living on the streets of Paris, many of them newly arrived immigrants from Europe and Union countries to the east, and Doctors of the World vows to continue distributing tents until the government finds housing.

　　For now, the city authorities tolerate the tents. But as word spreads among immigrants, the phenomenon could spread. Already, some charitable Parisians are living the homeless tents, and some of the homeless are procuring them on their own.

　　That’s fine with Doctors of the World, which says the more tents there are, the more pressure on the government to address the problem.

　　 “The moment will come when they will have to do something.” Said Florian Borg, head of the organization’s Paris chapter, peering through the fogged windows of a white van as he navigated the medieval twists and turns of the Latin Quarter.

　　In keeping with France’s centuries-long nod to the egalitarian ideals of the Revolution, anyone can stake out a patch of city sidewalk, as long as there is no public disturbance.

　　The homeless have long slept along the quays beneath the bridges over the Seine. Camping in public areas without authorization is illegal, “but the law doesn’t allow us to take forcible action,” said Captain Marie Lajus, a spokeswoman for the Paris police. “It is only punishable with a fine.” No fines have been levied so far.

　　The tents are yet another sign of the high unemployment and weakening welfare system that have set off unrest here in the past year. There are still relatively few homeless people in France; a 2001 survey estimated 86,500, of which 15,000 lived in the Paris region. But everybody agrees the number is growing.

　　Not far away from the Boulevard Montparnasse three young Poles, who gave their names as Roberto, Raphael and Annette, huddled in a tent with a pit bull named Ares. A white ceramic dish of dog food sat beside the tent.

　　Though they speak only rudimentary French, Roberto and Raphael said they each earned about $2,000 a month in construction. They’ve been in France for six months and have no intention of going back to Poland.

　　“We’ll buy a house someday,” Annette said.