Between 639 and the nineteenth century the Basilica of Saint-Denis was the burial place of forty-three kings and thirty-two queens of France. Cavaillé- Coll's initial proposal was for an organ of eighty-four stops, to be built over three years at a cost of 80,000 francs. Delays in the rebuilding of the cathedral allowed him time to reduce the stops to seventy-one.

The magnificent instrument M. Cavaillé has installed in the Église Saint-Denis has received unanimous approval. Even the maker's rivals are agreed in praising it, and organists can't stifle the regret that such a fine piece of work does emphatically not belong to Paris. It is indeed an admirable organ which combines, together with the finest qualities of the best organs of its kind, others which are unique to itself, thanks to details invented beyond doubt by M. Cavaillé. Its diapasons are very powerful, the reeds very strong and sonorous, and the cor anglais stop has a delightful timbre. There is a slight fault in the sixteen-foot stops in that the pedals are slow to speak. A remarkable new effect is that of the crescendo achieved by a mechanism placed under the feet but above the pedals, and which allows the organist to add as many stops as he likes without taking his hands off the keyboard. This is truly splendid, and you have to hear the build-up of these choruses, these accumulating orchestras, to have a real idea of this invention's merits. The vox humana, which seems to have been made in imitation of that in Fribourg, is far from being as perfect.