m'occupais de sa layette avec Clémentine, de son éducation avec Mademoiselle Brun.”

We

Now, neither Madame Lafarge, nor her friends, nor her very able counsel (to whom, we have heard, this book was submitted), could possibly expect any one to place the slightest credit in this profession of simplicity. Why, then, was it hazarded? Those who are thoroughly conversant with the French character will require no explanation; and we despair of making any explanation intelligible, or at any rate perfectly satisfactory, to those who are not. The truth is, the French are so fond of melodramatic display, and so accustomed to the artificial, both in feeling and action, that they cannot withhold their admiration from a tolerably good pretender to sensibility, or help sympathising with a noble "sentiment," though they know it to be put on or invented for the nonce. will illustrate our reasoning by a fact. The inscription of Desaix's monument, alleged to be his last dying speech, stands thus: "Dites au Premier Consul que je suis mort pour ma patrie." An acquaintance of ours was reading it in company with a French officer, who gave vent to a burst of maudlin sentimentality. When he had indulged himself to the top of his bent, and made, as he thought, a sufficient impression on our friend, he coolly turned away, saying, "Mais après tout, il n'a rien dit de tout cela; il a dit, 'Je suis mort,"" which every one knows to be the truth. Just so, many a Parisian dame will give Madame Lafarge the full benefit of her assumed ignorance, and end by saying, "Mais après tout, c'est passablement ridicule; elle a très-bien su ce que vous savez bien."

The French were always suspected of an undue attention to effect; and, time immemorial, have we prided ourselves, with or without reason, on the possession of certain sterling qualities as opposed to their

showy ones; but at the same time we tacitly allowed them a decided superiority in mere manner, and in all those outward airs and graces which are supposed to exercise so powerful an influence on the fair. We now consider ourselves fully justified in contesting that superiority.

Sir Henry Bulwer remarked in 1834:—

"You no longer see in France that noble air, that great manner, as it was called, by which the old nobility strove to keep up the distinction between themselves and their worseborn associates; that manner is gone, and the French, far from being a polite people, want that easiness of behaviour which is the first essential to politeness."

M. Janin remarked a few months ago (1842):

"I am no great admirer of the young men in Paris: I find them idle, self-conceited, full of vanity, and poor; they have too little time, and too little money, to bestow upon elegance and pleasure, to be either graceful or passionate in their excesses. Besides this, they are brought up with very little care, and are perfectly undecided between good and evil, justice and injustice, passing easily from one extreme to the other; to-day prodigals, to-morrow misers; to-day republicans, to-morrow royalists. At the present time, the Parisian youth, usually so courteous to ladies, cares for nothing but horses and smoking. It is the height of French fashion not to speak to women, not to bow to them, and scarcely to make way for them when they pass."

The cause of the change is obvious enough. Good breeding has been well described as the art of rendering to all what is socially their due; but, beyond the precincts of the noble Faubourg, there is no admitted criterion for determining what is socially due to any one in France; and where all are striving to be the equals of their superiors, or the superiors of their equals, the prevalent tone must be one of uneasy, dissatisfied, restless, pushing pretension. If a young Frenchman be somebody, there is a slight chance of

his preserving an inoffensive deportment; if he be nobody, he invariably takes credit for what he may become, and his insolence is as unbounded as his expectations. Even the Tuileries, where one would expect rudeness to be suppressed by the genius of the place, has witnessed curious scenes since the citizen king became its lord. An instance is related by M. Janin. "I am told that one day when M. Dupin ainé was with the king, he struck Louis Philippe's shoulder; upon which the king, who is about as great a lord as M. de Talleyrand, said, pointing to the door, 'Sortez. M. M. Dupin did go out, but the next day he was at the king's petit levée, humbly asking after his majesty's health." As the story was originally told, the king said "Sortez de chez moi," and M. Dupin refused to go out, on the ground that he was not chez the king, but chez the nation.

We will give another instance. In the course of his speech on the "Regency Bill," M. Thiers, describing the implied contract between the nation and the throne, made the nation address the reigning dynasty in this manner: "Voilà à quelles conditions légales nous vous appartenons comme sujets respectueux." We despair of giving a notion of the tumult that ensued, though we were present and witnessed it. The extreme left rose as one man: "Nous ne sommes pas sujets ; nous ne voulons pas être sujets;" and M. Arago exclaimed at the pitch of his voice, 66 Nous ne sommes les sujets de personne. C'est du Montalivet tout pur. Nous ne sommes pas sujets; nous nous appartenons à nous-mêmes!" Even a voice or two from the centre suggested that the expression was too strong, and M. Thiers was obliged to change it into "sujets de la loi."

This is not the calm confidence of a great and free nation reposing on its strength; and whilst such a spirit is to be found in great men and high places, it

will be vain to look for ease, dignity, self-respect, becoming deference, or mutual forbearance, in society at large.

March, 1858.-Parisian society has undergone a variety of convulsions and mutations since 1842, but, according to all available tests, it has not been changed for the better. French light literature is still deemed so objectionable, that M. Granier de Cassagnac, the prose-laureate of the Tuileries, has recently set up a new journal for the avowed purpose of chastening or chastising it. The rage for gambling on the Bourse continues unabated, to the neglect and detriment of regular industry; and the excessive expenditure in dress and other articles of vanity or luxury, would go far to justify a sumptuary law. Contrasting strangely in this respect with the domestic circle of the citizen king, the imperial family encourage the popular extravagance; and, to find a parallel for their frolicsome doings at Compiegne and Fontainebleau, we must revert to the halcyon days of le Petit Trianon, when "Scampativos" was in vogue. Indeed, it would seem as if Napoleon III. were especially anxious to remind the French people how little they have gained by disturbing the civilised world for more than half a century, since the very hunting paraphernalia of Louis Quinze has been revived. Add the uncertain duration of the Empire-which has been aptly denominated an interlude-with the all-pervading feeling of distrust, and the result will be a well-founded doubt, whether those who boast of having "saved," have simultaneously refined, elevated, consolidated, or in any way improved, Society.

The present occasion may not be deemed altogether inappropriate for setting down a few remarks on recent French history, suggested or confirmed by frequent communication with some of the most distinguished actors on the scene.

Perhaps the most striking and unexpected phenomenon of 1848 was the result of universal suffrage coupled with ballot, in a country where the law of equal partibility had been more than half a century in operation. The proprietary interest had grown all-powerful, and the majority of voters had become intensely conservative. Thanks to the complete centralisation of authority, any person or party that can

seize the reins of government in France, will be acknowledged, will be flattered, will enjoy all the outward signs of popularity for a period. During some weeks after the instalment of the self-nominated Provisional Government, addresses after addresses poured in from all the leading towns, great corporate bodies, and high functionaries of every sort, civil and military. The moment the National Assembly met, their reign was over. The leaders of the Rouge section. attempted another insurrectionary movement, failed, and took refuge in England. Their followers, after a prolonged and bloody street fight (June, 1848), were decimated by Cavaignac; who really did, and did effectually, what Louis Napoleon afterwards pretended to do, and assumes to have done.

The constitution framed by this assembly was open to grave objections; yet, under it, the nation obtained a larger amount of tempered liberty, personal and political, than they had enjoyed before, or are soon likely to enjoy again; and we should be slow in this country to declare the clamours of faction, or the violence of the press, sufficient grounds for superseding a representative assembly by a military despotism. Moreover, the proximate cause of the overthrow of the constitution was the clause limiting the consecutive tenure of the presidency by the same person to four years, and forbidding the immediate re-election of the outgoing chief magistrate. The known determination of Louis Napoleon not to retire peaceably into private life, was the only substantial cause of the undefined alarm which pervaded the public mind in the autumn of 1851, and which he adroitly turned to his purpose as a well-founded dread of socialism.

Within a month after his election to the presidency, he began making advances to Changarnier and others to join him in a coup d'état, and these were continued down to the autumn of 1851, when, finding he could not induce any of the generals or statesmen of established reputation to act with him, he began looking out for instruments of another description.

"Flectere si nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo."

Suppose a scion of royalty, or any other pretender, were to pick out half a dozen of the cleverest habitués of the Turf Club or Tattersalls, secretly name one of them minister of the