So completely was the ordinary framework of European society broken up in France by the Revolution of 1789, that the leaders of every great political movement, since that time, have sprung from an entirely different class of society from what they were before that event. The old territorial noblesse no longer appear as the leaders in action, or the rulers of thought. The time has gone by when an Admiral de Coligny, or a Henry of BÉarn, stood forth as the chiefs of the Reformed movement; a Duc d'Orleans no longer heads the defection of the nobles from the throne, or a Mirabeau rouse a resistance to the mandates of the sovereign. Not only the powers of the sword, not only the political lead of the people, but the direction of their thoughts, has passed from the old nobility. The confiscation of their property has destroyed their consequence, the dispersion of their families ruined their influence. Neither collectively nor individually can they now lead the people. The revolution of 1830, begun by Thiers and the writers in the National newspaper, was carried out by Lafitte the great banker. That of 1848, springing from the columns of the RÉforme and the DÉmocratie Pacifique, soon fell under the lead of M. Marrast the journalist, and M. Lamartine the romancer and poet. And now the latter of these authors has come forth, not only as the leader but as the historian of the movement. Like CÆsar, he appears as the annalist of his own exploits: like him, he no doubt flatters himself he can say, "I came, I saw, I conquered."

The reason is, that mankind cannot exist even for a day but under the lead of a few. Self-government is the dream of the enthusiast, the vision of the inexperienced: oligarchy is the history of man. In vain are institutions popularised, nobles destroyed, masses elevated, education diffused, self-government established: all that will not alter the character of man; it will not qualify the multitude for self-direction; it will not obviate that first of necessities to mankind—the necessity of being governed. What is the first act of every assembly of men associated together for any purpose, social, political, or charitable? To nominate a committee by whom their common affairs are to be regulated. What is the first act of that committee? To nominate a sub-committee of two or three, in whom the direction of affairs is practically to be vested. Begin, if you please, with universal suffrage: call six millions of electors to the poll, as in France at this time, or four millions, as in America—the sway of two or three, ultimately of one, is not the less inevitable. Not only does the huge mass ultimately fall under the direction of one or two leading characters, but from the very first it is swayed by their impulsion. The millions repeat the thoughts of two or three journals, they elaborate the ideas of two or three men. What is the origin of the whole free-trade principles which have totally altered the policy, and probably shortened the existence, of the British empire? The ideas of Adam Smith, nurtured in the solitude of Kirkaldy. Would you learn what are the opinions generally prevalent in the urban circles in England, in whom political power is practically vested, on Wednesday or Thursday? Read the leading articles of the Times on Monday or Tuesday. The more men are educated, the more that instruction is diffused, the more widely that journals are read, the more vehement the political excitement that prevails, the more is the sway of this oligarchy established, for the greater is the aptitude of the general mind to receive the impulse communicated to it by the leaders of thought. The nation, in such circumstances, becomes a vast electric-machine, which vibrates with the slightest movement of the central battery.

Lamartine, as an author, can never be mentioned without the highest respect. The impress of genius is to be seen in all his works: nature has marked him for one of the leaders of thought. A mind naturally ardent and enthusiastic, has been nurtured by travel, enriched by reflection, chastened by suffering. His descriptive powers are of the very highest order. We have already done justice, and not more than justice, to the extreme beauty of his descriptions of Oriental scenery.[12] They are the finest in the French, second to none in the English language. His mind is essentially poetical. Many of his effusions in verse are touching and beautiful, though they do not possess the exquisite grace and delicate expression of Beranger. But his prose is poetry itself: so deeply is his mind imbued with poetical images—so sensitive is his taste to the grand and the beautiful—so enthusiastic is his admiration of the elevated, whether in nature or art, that he cannot treat even an ordinary subject without tinging it with the colours of romance.

From this peculiar texture of Lamartine's mind arises both the excellences and defects of his historical compositions. He has all the romantic and poetical, but few of the intellectual qualities of an historian. Eminently dramatic in his description of event, powerful in the delineation of character, elevated in feeling, generous in sentiment, lofty in speculation—he is yet destitute of the sober judgment and rational views which are the only solid foundation for either general utility or durable fame in historical composition. He has the conceptions of genius and the fire of poetry in his narrative, but little good sense, and still less of practical acquaintance with mankind. That is his great defect, and it is a defect so serious that it will probably, in the end, deprive his historical works of the place in general estimation to which, from the beauty of their composition and the rich veins of romance with which they abound, they are justly entitled. These imaginative qualities are invaluable additions to the sterling qualities of truth, judgment, and trust-worthiness; but they can never supply their place. They are the colouring of history; they give infinite grace to its composition; they deck it out with all the charms of light and shade: but they can never make up for the want of accurate drawing from nature, and a faithful delineation of objects as they really exist in the world around us. Nay, an undue preponderance of the imaginative qualities in an historian, if not accompanied by a scrupulous regard to truth, tends rather to lessen the weight due to his narrative, by inspiring a constant dread that he is either passing off imaginary scenes for real events, or colouring reality so highly that it is little better than fiction. This is more especially the case with a writer such as Lamartine, whose thoughts are so vivid and style so poetical, that, even when he is describing events in themselves perfectly true, his narrative is so embellished that it assumes the character of romance, and is distrusted from a suspicion that it is a mere creation of the imagination.

In addition to this, there is a capital deficiency in Lamartine's historical works, for which no qualities of style or power of composition, how brilliant soever, can compensate; and which, if not supplied in some future editions, will go far to deprive them of all credit or authority with future times. This is the entire want of all authorities or references, either at the bottom, of the page or at the end of the work. In the eight volumes of the History of the Girondists, and the four on the Revolution of 1848, now before us, we do not recollect ever having met with a single reference or footnote containing a quotation from any state paper, speech, or official document. It is impossible to overestimate the magnitude of this defect; and it is astonishing how so able and well-informed a writer as Lamartine should have fallen into it. Does he suppose that the world are to take everything he says off his hand, without reference or examination; or imagine that the brilliant and attractive graces of his style do not increase the necessity for such authorities, from the constant suspicion they beget that they have been drawn from the store of his imagination, not the archives of history? No brilliancy of description, no richness of colouring, no amount of dramatic power, can make up for a want of the one thing needful—trust in the TRUTH of the narrative. Observe children: every one knows how passionately fond they are of having stories told them, and how much they prefer them to any of the ordinary pastimes suited to their years. How often, however, do you hear them say, But is it all true? It is by making them believe that fiction is the narrative of real event that the principal interest is communicated to the story. Where the annals of event are coloured as Lamartine knows how to colour them, they become more attractive than any romance. The great success of his History of the Girondists, and of Macaulay's History of England, is a sufficient proof of this. But still the question will recur to men and women, as well as children—"But is it all true?" And truth in his hands wears so much the air of romance, that he would do well, by all possible adjuncts, to convey the impression that it is in every respect founded in reality.

There is no work which has been published in France, of late years, which has met with anything like the success which his History of the Girondists has had. We have heard that fifty thousand copies of it were sold in the first year. Beyond all doubt, it had a material effect in producing the Revolution of 1848, and precipitating Louis Philippe from the throne. It was thus popular, from the same cause which attracts boys to narratives of shipwrecks, or crowds to representations of woe on the theatre—deep interest in tragic events. He represented the heroes of the first great convulsion in such attractive colours, that men, and still more women, were not only fascinated by the narrative and deeply interested in the characters, but inspired by a desire to plunge into similar scenes of excitement themselves—just as boys become sailors from reading terrific tales of shipwreck, or soldiers, from stories of perils in the deadly breach. In his hands, vice equally with virtue, weakness with resolution, became attractive. He communicated the deepest interest to Robespierre himself, who is the real hero of his story, as Satan is of the Paradise Lost. He drew no veil over the weakness, the irresolution, the personal ambition of the Girondists, so fatal in their consequences to the cause of freedom in France, and through it to that of liberty over the whole world; but he contrived to make them interesting notwithstanding their faults—nay, in consequence of those very faults. He borrowed from romance, where it has been long understood and successfully practised, especially in France, the dangerous secret of making characters of imperfect goodness the real heroes of his tale. He knew that none of the leading characters at Paris were Sir Charles Grandisons; and he knew that, if they had been so, their adventures would have excited, comparatively speaking, very little interest. But he knew that many of them were political Lovelaces; and he knew well that it is by such characters that in public, equally as private life, the weakness of the world is fascinated, and their feelings enchained. And it is in the deep interest which his genius has communicated to really worthless characters, and the brilliant colours in which he has clothed the most sinister and selfish enterprises, that the real danger of his work consists, and the secret of the terrible consequences with which its publication was followed is to be found.

In truth, however, the real cause of those terrible consequences lies deeper, and a fault of a more fundamental kind than any glossing over the frailties of historical characters has at once rendered his work so popular and its consequences so tremendous. Rely upon it, truth and reason, all-powerful and even victorious in the end, are never a match for sophistry and passion in the outset. When you hear of a philosophical historical work going through half-a-dozen editions in six months, or selling fifty thousand copies in a year, you may be sure that there is a large intermixture of error, misrepresentation, and one-sidedness in its composition. The cause is, that truth and reason are in general distasteful in the outset to the human mind; and it is by slow degrees, and the force of experience alone, that their ascendency is established. What attracts, in the first instance, in thought, independent of the charms of eloquence and the graces of composition—which of course are indispensable to great success—is coincidence with the tendency and aspirations of general thought. But so prone to error and delusion is the human mind, from its inherent character and original texture, that it is a hundred to one that general thought at any one time, especially if it is one of considerable excitement or vehement feeling, is founded in error. And thus it often happens, that the works which have the most unbounded success at their first publication, and for a considerable time after, are precisely those which contain the largest portion of error, and are likely, when reduced into practice, to have the most fatal effects upon the best interests of the species. Witness the works of Rousseau and Voltaire in France, to whose influence the first revolution is mainly to be ascribed; those of Lamartine, Victor Hugo, and Eugene Sue, who have been chiefly instrumental in bringing about the still more widespread convulsions of our times.

The fundamental principle of Lamartine's political philosophy, and which we regard as his grand error, and the cause at once of his success in the outset and his failure in the end, is the principle of the general innocence and perfectibility of human nature. It is this principle, so directly repugnant to the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, that it may be regarded as literally speaking the "banner-cry of hell," which is at the bottom of the whole revolutionary maxims; and it is so flattering to the hopes, and agreeable to the weakness of human nature, that it can scarcely ever fail, when brought forward with earnestness and enforced by eloquence, to captivate the great majority of mankind. Rousseau proclaimed it in the loudest terms in all his works; it was the great secret of his success. According to him, man was born innocent, and with dispositions only to virtue: all his vices arose from the absurdity of the teachers who tortured his youth, all his sufferings from the tyranny of the rulers who oppressed his manhood. Lamartine, taught by the crimes, persuaded by the sufferings of the first Revolution, has modified this principle without abandoning its main doctrines, and thus succeeded in rendering it more practically dangerous, because less repugnant to the common sense and general experience of mankind. His principle is, that dÉmagogie is always selfish and dangerous; dÉmocratie always safe and elevating. The ascendency of a few ambitious or worthless leaders precipitates the masses, when they first rise against their oppressors, into acts of violence, which throw a stain upon the cause of freedom, and often retard for a season its advance. But that advance is inevitable: it is only suspended for a time by the reaction against bloodshed; and in the progressive elevation of the millions of mankind to general intelligence, and the direction of affairs, he sees the practical development of the doctrines of the gospel, and the only secure foundation for general felicity. He is no friend to the extreme doctrines of the Socialists and Communists, and is a stanch supporter of the rights of property—and the most important of all rights, those of marriage and family. But he sees in the sway of the multitude the only real basis of general happiness, and the only security against the inroads of selfishness; and he regards the advances towards this grand consummation as being certain and irresistible as the advance of the tide upon the sand, or the progress from night to morning. In this way he hopes to reconcile the grand doctrine of human perfectibility with the universal failure of all attempts at its practical establishment; and continues to dream of the irresistible and blessed march of democracy, while recounting alike the weakness of the Girondists, and the crimes of the Jacobins—the woful result of the Revolution of 1789—and the still more rapid and signal failure of that which convulsed the world sixty years afterwards.

The simple answer to all these absurdities and errors, productive of such disastrous consequences when reduced into practice, is this—"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked."—"There is none that doeth good, no, not one." It is from this universal and inevitable tendency to wickedness, that the practical impossibility of establishing democratic institutions, without utter ruin to the best interests of society, arises. You seek in vain to escape from the consequences of this universal corruption, by committing power to a multitude of individuals, or extinguishing the government of a few in the sway of numbers. The multitude are themselves as bad by nature as the few, and, for the discharge of the political duties with which they are intrusted, incomparably worse; for, in their case, numbers annihilate responsibility without conferring wisdom, and the contagion of common opinions inflames passion without strengthening reason. In the government of a few, capacity is generally looked for, because it is felt to be beneficial by the depositaries of power; but in that of numbers it is as commonly rejected, because it excites general jealousy, without the prospect of individual benefit. Democratic communities are ruined, no one knows how, or by whom. It is impossible to find any one who is responsible for whatever is done. The ostensible leaders are driven forward by an unseen power, which they are incapable alike of regulating or withstanding: the real leaders—the directors of thought—are unseen and irresponsible. If disasters occur, they ascribe them to the incapacity of the statesmen at the head of affairs: they relieve themselves of responsibility, by alleging, with truth, the irresistible influence of an unknown power. No one is trained to the duties of statesmanship, because no one knows who is to be a statesman. Ignorance, presumption, and ambition, generally mount to the head of affairs: the wheel of fortune, or the favour of a multitude incapable of judging of the subject, determines everything. The only effectual security against spoliation by the rulers of men, the dread of being spoliated themselves, is lost when these rulers are men who are not worth spoliating. Durable interest in the fortunes of the community is no longer felt, when durable tenure of power is known to be impossible. The only motive which remains is, that of making the most of a tenure of power which is universally known to be as short-lived as it is precarious; and prolonging it as long as possible, by bending, in every instance, to the passions or fantasies of the multitude, nominally vested with supreme power, really entirely guided by a few insolvent and ambitious demagogues—

Lamartine, regarding the march of democracy as universal and inevitable, is noways disconcerted by the uniform failure of all attempts in old communities to establish it, or the dreadful catastrophes to which they have invariably led. These are merely the breaking of the waves of the advancing tide; but the rise of the flood is not the less progressive and inevitable. He would do well to consider, however, whether there is not a limit to human suffering; whether successive generations will consent to immolate themselves and their children for no other motive than that of advancing an abstract principle, or vindicating privileges for the people fatal to their best interests; and whether resisted attempts, and failures at the establishment of republican institutions, will not, in the end, lead to a lasting apathy and despair in the public mind. Certain it is, that this was the fate of popular institutions in Greece, in Rome, and modern Italy: all of which fell under the yoke of servitude, from a settled conviction, founded on experience, that anything was preferable to the tempests of anarchy. Symptoms, and those too of the most unequivocal kind, may be observed of a similar disposition in the great majority, at least of the rural population, both in France and England. The election of Prince Louis Napoleon by four millions out of six millions of electors, in the former country—the quiet despair with which measures of the most ruinous kind to general industry are submitted to in the latter, are so many proofs of this disposition. The bayonets of Changarnier, the devastating measures of free trade and a restricted currency, are submitted to in both countries, because anything is better than shaking the foundations of government.

In treating of the causes which have led to the revolution of 1848, Lamartine imputes a great deal too much, in our estimation, to individual men or shades of opinion, and too little to general causes, and the ruinous effects of the first great convulsion. He ascribes it to the personal unpopularity of M. Guizot, the selfish and corrupt system of government which the king had established, and the discontent at the national risks incurred by France for the interests only of the Orleans dynasty, in the Montpensier alliance. This tendency arises partly from the constitution of Lamartine's mind, which is poetical and dramatic rather than philosophical; and partly from the disinclination felt by all intelligent liberal writers to ascribe the failure of their measures to their natural and inevitable effects, rather than the errors or crimes of individual men. In this respect, doubtless, he is more consistent and intelligible than M. Thiers, who, in his History of the French Revolution, ascribes the whole calamities which occurred to the inevitable march of events in such convulsions—forgetting that he could not in any other way so severely condemn his own principles, and that it is little for the interest of men to embrace a cause which, in that view, necessarily and inevitably leads to ruin. Lamartine, in running into the opposite extreme, and ascribing everything to the misconduct and errors of individual men, is more consistent, because he saves the principle. But he is not the less in error. The general discontent to which he ascribes so much, the universal selfishness and corruption which he justly considers as so alarming, were themselves the result of previous events: they were the effects, not the causes, of political change. And without disputing the influence, to a certain extent, of the individual men to whose agency he ascribes everything, it may safely be affirmed that there are four causes of paramount importance which concurred in bringing about the late French revolution; and which will for a very long period, perhaps for ever, prevent the establishment of anything like real freedom in that country.

The first of these is the universal disruption of all the old bonds of society, which took place in the first Revolution, and the general fretting against all restraint, human or divine, which arose from the ruin of religion and confusion of morals which then took place. These evils have only been partially remedied by the re-establishment of the Christian faith over the whole realm, and the sway which it has undoubtedly acquired in the rural districts. The active and energetic inhabitants of the great towns still continue influenced by the Revolutionary passions, the strongest of which is the thirst for present enjoyment, and the impatience of any restraint, whether from the influence of conscience or the authority of law. This distinctly appears from the licentious style of the novels which have now for a quarter of a century issued from the press of Paris, and which is in general such that, though very frequently read in England, it is very seldom, especially by women, that this reading is admitted. The drama, that mirror of the public mind, is another indication of the general prevalence of the same licentious feeling: it is for the most part such, that few even of the least tight-laced English ladies can sit out the representation. The irreligion, or rather general oblivion of religion, which commonly prevails in the towns, is a part, though doubtless a most important part, of this universal disposition: Christianity is abjured or forgotten, not because it is disbelieved, but because it is disagreeable. Men do not give themselves the trouble to inquire whether it is true or false; they simply give it the go-by, and pass quietly on the other side, because it imposes a restraint, to them insupportable, on their passions. Dispositions of this sort are the true feeders of revolution, because they generate at once its convulsions in like manner, as passions which require gratification, poverty which demands food, and activity which pines for employment. Foreign war or domestic convulsion are the only alternatives which, in such a state of society, remain to government. Napoleon tried the first, and he brought the Cossacks to Paris; Louis Philippe strove to become the Napoleon of peace, but he succeeded only in being the pioneer of revolution.

The great and durable interests of society, which the indulgence of such passions inevitably ruins, are the barrier which, in ordinary circumstances, is opposed to these disorders; and it is this influence which has so long prevented any serious outbreak of anarchy in Great Britain. But the immense extent of the confiscation of landed property during the first Revolution, and the total ruin of commercial and movable wealth, from the events of the maritime war, and the effects of the enormous issue of assignats, has prevented the construction of this barrier in anything like sufficient strength to withstand the forces which pressed against it. Nine-tenths of the realised wealth of the country was destroyed during the convulsion; what remained was for the most part concentrated in the hands of a few bankers and moneyed men, who aimed at cheapening everything, and depressing industry, in order to augment the value of their metallic riches. The influence of the natural leaders of the producing class, the great proprietors of land, was at an end, for they were almost all destroyed. The six millions of separate landed proprietors, who had come in their place, had scarcely any influence in the state; for the great majority of them were too poor to pay 200 francs a-year (£8) direct taxes—the necessary condition towards an admission into the electoral body—and as individuals they were in too humble circumstances to have any influence in the state. The returns of the "ImpÔt fonciÈre," or land-tax, showed that above four millions of this immense body had properties varying from £2 to £10 a-year each—not more than is enjoyed by an Irish bogtrotter. In these circumstances, not only was the steadying influence of property in general unfelt in the state, but the property which did make itself felt was of a disturbing rather than a pacifying tendency; for it was that of bankers and money-lenders, whose interests, being those of consumers, not producers, went to support measures calculated to depress industry rather than elevate it, and thereby augment rather than diminish the distress which, from these causes, soon came to press so severely upon the urban population.

These causes were the necessary results of the dreadful waste of property, and ruin of industry, which had taken place during the first Revolution. The multitude of little proprietors with which France was overspread, could furnish nothing to the metropolis but an endless succession of robust hands to compete with its industry, and starving mouths to share its resources. What could the six millions of French landowners, the majority of them at the plough, afford to lay aside for the luxuries of Paris? Nothing. You might as well expect the West-End shopkeepers of London to be sustained by the starving western Highlanders of Scotland, or the famished crowds of Irish cottars. The natural flow of the wealth of the land to the capital of the kingdom, which invariably sets in when agricultural property is unequally distributed, and a considerable part of it is vested in the hands of territorial magnates, was at once stopped when it became divided among a multitude of persons, not one of whom could afford to travel ten miles from home, or to buy anything but a rustic dress and a blouse to cover it. At least sixty millions sterling, out of the eighty millions which constitute the net territorial produce of France, was turned aside from Paris, and spent entirely in the purchase of the coarsest manufactures or rude subsistence in the provinces. The metropolis came to depend mainly on the expenditure of foreigners, or of the civil and military employÉs of government. This woful defalcation in its resources occurred at a time, too, when the influx of needy adventurers from the country was daily increasing, from the impossibility of earning a livelihood, amidst the desperate competition of its squalid landowners, and the decline of agriculture, which necessarily resulted from their inability to adopt any of its improvements. Thus the condition of the working classes in Paris went on getting constantly worse, during the whole reign of Louis Philippe; and it was only in consequence of the vast influx of foreigners, which the maintenance of peace and the attractions of the court occasioned, that they were not reduced many years before to the despair and misery which at once occasioned and followed the last revolution.

Amidst a population excited to discontent by these causes, another circumstance has operated with peculiar force, which we do not recollect to have seen hitherto noticed in disquisitions on this subject—this is the prodigious number of natural children and foundlings at Paris. It is well known that ever since the close of the first Revolution the number of illegitimate births in Paris has borne a very great proportion to the legitimate; they are generally as 10,000 to 18,000 or 19,000. For a long time past, every third child seen in the streets of Paris has been a bastard. Hitherto this important feature of society has been considered with reference to the state of morality in regard to the relation of the sexes which it indicates; but attend to its social and political effects. These bastards do not always remain children; they grow up to be men and women. The foundlings of Paris, already sufficiently numerous, are swelled by a vast concourse of a similar class over all France, who flock, when they have the means of transport, to the capital as the common sewer of the commonwealth. There are at present about 1,050,000 souls in the French metropolis. Suppose that a third of these are natural children, there are then 350,000 persons, most of them foundlings of illegitimate birth, in that capital. Taking a fourth of them as capable of bearing arms, we have 85,000 bastards constantly ready to fight in Paris.

Consider only the inevitable results of such a state of things in an old and luxurious metropolis, teeming with indigence, abounding with temptation, overflowing with stimulants to the passions. The enfant trouvÉ of Paris, when grown up, becomes a gamin de Paris, just as naturally and inevitably as a chrysalis becomes a butterfly. He has obtained enough of instruction to enable him to imbibe temptation, and not enough to enable him to combat it. He has in general received the rudiments of education: he can read the novels of Victor Hugo, Eugene Sue, and George Sand; he can study daily the RÉforme or National, or DÉmocratie Pacifique. He looks upon political strife as a game at hazard, in which the winning party obtain wealth and honour, mistresses, fortunes, and enjoyments. As to religion, he has never heard of it, except as a curious relic of the olden time, sometimes very effective on the opera stage; as to industry, he knows not what it is; as to self-control, he regards it as downright folly where self-indulgence is practicable. The most powerful restraints on the passions of men—parents, children, property—are to him unknown. He knows not to whom he owes his birth; his offspring are as strange to him as his parents, for they, like him, are consigned to the Foundling Hospital: he has nothing in the world he can call his own, except a pair of stout arms to aid in the formation of barricades, and a dauntless heart ready at any moment to accept the hazard of death or pleasure. Hanging midway, as it were, between the past and the future, he has inherited nothing from the former but its vices, he will transmit nothing to the latter but its passions. Whoever considers the inevitable results of eighty or ninety thousand men in the prime of life actuated by these dispositions, associating with an equal number of women of the same class, affected by the same misfortune in their birth, and influenced by the same passions, constantly existing in a state of indigence and destitution in the heart of Paris, will have no difficulty in accounting for the extraordinary difficulty which, for the last half century, has been experienced in governing France, and will probably despair of ever succeeding in it but by force of arms.

We hear nothing of these facts from Lamartine, whose mind is essentially dramatic, and who represents revolutions, as he evidently considers them, as the work of individual men, working upon the inevitable march of society towards extreme republican institutions. He gives us no statistics; he never refers to general causes, except the universal progress towards democracy, which he regards as irresistible. Least of all is he alive to the ruinous effects of the first great disruption of the bonds of society which naturally followed the Revolution of 1789, or disposed to regard the subsequent convulsions, as what they really are—the inevitable result and just punishment of the enormous sins of the Revolution. And—mark-worthy circumstance!—these consequences are the obvious result of the great crimes committed in its course; the confiscation of property which it occasioned, the overthrow of religion and morals with which it was attended. They have fallen with peculiar severity upon Paris, the centre of the revolutionary faction, and the focus from which all its iniquities emanated, and where the blood of its noblest victims was shed. And if revolutions such as we have witnessed or read of in that country are indeed inevitable, and part of the mysterious system of Providence in the regulation of human affairs, we can regard them as nothing but a realisation of that general tendency to evil which is so clearly foretold in prophecy, and indications of the advent of those disastrous times which are to be closed by the second coming of the Messiah.

We have all heard of the mingled treachery and irresolution—treachery in the national guard, irresolution in the royal family—which brought about the revolution which Lamartine has so eloquently described. It is evident, even from his account—which, it may be supposed, is not unduly hostile to the popular side—that it was the bar-sinister in its birth which proved fatal, in the decisive moment, to the Throne of the Barricades; and that the revolution might with ease have been suppressed, if any other power had been called to combat it but that which owed its existence to a similar convulsion.

"The King was lost in thought, while the tocsin was sounding, on the means by which it might yet be possible to calm the people, and restrain the revolution, in which he persisted in seeing nothing but a riot. The abdication of his external-political system, personified in M. Guizot, M. Duchatel, and the majority of the Chambers entirely devoted to his interests, appeared to him to amount to more than the renunciation of his crown; it was the abandonment of his thoughts, of his wisdom, of the prestige of his infallibility in the eyes of Europe, of his family, of his people. To yield a throne to adverse fortune, is little to a great mind. To yield his renown and authority to triumphant adverse opinion and implacable history, is the most painful effort which can be required of a man, for it at once destroys and humbles him. But the King was not one of those hardy characters who enjoy, with sang-froid, the destruction of a people for the gratification of their pride. He had read much of history, acted much in troubled times, reflected much. He could not conceal from himself, that a dynasty which should reconquer Paris by means of grape-shot and bombs would be for ever besieged by the horror of the people. His field of battle had always been opinion. It was on it that he wished to act; he hoped to regain it by timely concessions. Only, like a prudent economist, he higgled with opinion like a Jewish pawnbroker, in the hopes of purchasing it at the smallest possible sacrifice of his system and dignity. He flattered himself he had several steps of popularity to descend before quitting the throne."—(Vol. i., p. 102.)

The immediate cause of the overthrow of the throne, it is well known, was the fatal order which the delusion of M. Thiers, when called to the ministry, extorted from the weakness of the King, to stop firing—to cease resistance—to succumb to the assailants. Marshal Bugeaud was perfectly firm; the troops were steady; ample military force was at their command; everything promised decisive success to vigorous operations. Marshal Bugeaud's plan was of the simplest but most efficacious kind.

"Marshal Bugeaud, with his military instinct, matured by experience and the habit of handling troops, knew that immobility is the ruin of the morale of soldiers. He changed in a moment the plan of operations submitted to him. He instantly called around him the officers commanding corps. The one was Tiburie Sebastiani, brother of the marshal of the same name, a calm and faithful officer; the other, General Bedeau, whose name, made illustrious by his exploits in Africa, carried respect with it, to his companions in arms in Paris. He ordered them to form two columns of 3500 men each, and to advance into the centre of Paris—the one by the streets which traverse it from the Boulevards to the HÔtel de Ville, the other by streets which cross it from the quays. Each of the columns had artillery, and their instructions were to carry, in their advance, all the barricades, to destroy these fortresses of the insurrection, to cannonade the masses, and concentrate their columns on the HÔtel de Ville, the decisive point of the day. General LamoriciÈre was to command a reserve of 9000 men, stationed around the palace."—(Vol. i., pp. 136, 137.)

The despair of the troops when compelled to retire before a tumultuous mob—to confess defeat in their own capital, and in the face of Europe, is thus described:—

"At daybreak the two columns of troops set out on their march; their progress was, every ten minutes, reported by staff-officers in disguise. They experienced no serious resistance on their way to the HÔtel de Ville; the crowd opened as they advanced, with cries of 'Vive la RÉforme!' they trampled under foot, without firing a shot, the beginnings of the barricades. Nevertheless, the uncertainty of what was passing in the Tuileries paralysed the arms in the hands of the soldiers. The Marshal, at length constrained by the reiterated orders of the King, sent orders to his lieutenants to make the troops fall back. Marshal Bedeau, upon this, made his battalions retire. Some soldiers threw their muskets on the ground, as a sign of despair or fraternisation. Their return across Paris had the appearance of a defection, or of the advanced guard of the revolution marching on the Tuileries. The troops, already vanquished by these orders, took up their position, untouched but powerless, on the Place de la Concorde, in the Champs ElysÉes, in the Rue de Rivoli. The French troops, when disgraced, are no longer an army. They felt in their hearts the bitterness of that retreat; they feel it still."—(Vol. i., p. 139.)

But it was soon found that these disgraceful concessions to mob violence would avail nothing; that M. Thiers and M. Odillon Barrot were alike unequal to stemming the torrent which they had put in motion; and that the King, as a reward for his humane order to the troops not to fire upon the people, was to be called on to abdicate! In the disgraceful scene of pusillanimity and weakness which ensued, we regret to say the princes of the royal family, and especially the Duke de Montpensier, evinced as much cowardice as the princesses did courage;—exemplifying thus again what Napoleon said of the Bourbons in 1815, that there was only one man in the family, and that man was a woman. The decisive moment is thus described with dramatic power, but, we have no doubt, historic truth, by M. Lamartine:—

"M. Girardin, in a few brief and sad words, which abridged minutes and cut short objections, said to the King with mournful respect, that changes of ministry were no longer in season; that the moment was sweeping away the throne with the councils, and that there was but one word suitable to the urgency of the occasion, and that word was 'abdication.'

"The King was in one of those moments when truths strike without offending. Nevertheless, he let fall, upon hearing these words, from his hands the pen with which he was arranging the names of the new ministry. He was desirous of discussing the question. M. Girardin, pitiless as evidence, pressing as time, would not even admit of discussion. 'Sire!' said he, 'the abdication of the king, or the abdication of the monarchy—there is the alternative. Circumstances will not admit even of a minute to find a third issue from the straits in which we are placed.' While he thus spoke, M. Girardin placed before the King the draft of a proclamation which he had prepared and he wished to have printed. That proclamation, concise as a fact, consisted only of four lines, calculated to attract the eyes of the people.

The abdication of the King.

The regency of the Duchess of Orleans.

The dissolution of the Chamber of Deputies.

A general amnesty.

"The King hesitated. The Duke de Montpensier his son, carried away, doubtless, by the energetic expression in the physiognomy, gesticulations, and words of M. Girardin, pressed his father with more vehemence than rank, age, and misfortunes should have permitted to the respect of a son. The pen was presented, and the crown torn from the monarch by an impatience which could not wait for his full and free conviction. The rudeness of fortune towards the King was forgotten in the precipitance of the council. On the other hand, blood was beginning to flow, the throne was gliding away. The lives even of the King and his family might be endangered. Everything can be explained by the solicitude and the tenderness of the councillors. History should ever take the version which least humiliates and bruises least the human heart."—(Vol. i., p. 127.)

Observe the poetic justice of this consummation. The member of his family, who at the decisive moment failed in his duty, and compelled his infirm and gray-haired father to abdicate, was the Duc de Montpensier—the very prince for whose elevation he had perilled the English alliance, violated his plighted word, endangered the peace of Europe! The heir-presumptive of the crown of Spain was the first to shake the crown of France from his father's head! Vanquished by his personal fears, unworthy of his high rank and higher prospects, a disgrace to his country, he evinced, what is rare in France in any station, not merely moral, but physical pusillanimity. To this end have the intrigues of the Orleans family, from EgalitÉ downwards, ultimately tended. They have not only lost the crown, to win which they forgot their allegiance and violated their oaths, but they have lost it with dishonour and disgrace: they are not only exiles, but they are despised exiles. Such have been the fruits of the Orleans intrigues to gain the crown of France.

As a bright contrast to this woful exhibition, we gladly translate M. Lamartine's account of the memorable scene in the chambers, where the Duchess of Orleans nobly contended with an infuriated and bloodthirsty rabble for the crown, now devolved to her son by his grandfather's abdication. Had such spirited devotion been found in her husband's family, they might have transmitted the honours they had won in the Orleans dynasty.

"The great door opposite the tribune, on a level with the most elevated benches in the hall, opened; a woman appeared dressed in mourning: it was the Duchess of Orleans. Her veil, half raised on her hat, allowed her countenance to be seen, bearing the marks of an emotion and sadness which heightened the interest of youth and beauty. Her pale cheeks bore the traces of the tears of the widow, the anxieties of the mother. No man could look on those features without emotion. At their aspect, all resentment against the monarchy fled from the mind. The blue eyes of the princess wandered over the scene, with which she had been a moment dazzled, as if to implore aid by her looks. Her slender but elegant form bowed at the applause which saluted her. A slight colour—the dawn of hope amidst ruin—of joy amidst sorrow—suffused her cheeks. A smile of gratitude beamed through her tears. She felt herself surrounded by friends. With one hand she held the young king, who stumbled on the steps, with the other the young Duke of Chartres: infants to whom the catastrophe which destroyed them was a subject of amusement. They were both clothed in short black dresses. A white shirt-collar was turned over their dresses, as in the portraits by Vandyke of the children of Charles I.

"The Duke of Nemours walked beside the princess, faithful to the memory of his brother in his nephews; a protector who would ere long stand in need of protection himself. The figure of that prince, ennobled by misfortune, breathed the courageous but modest satisfaction of a duty discharged at the hazard of his life. Some generals in uniform, and officers of the national guard, followed her steps. She bowed with timid grace to the assembly, and sat down motionless at the foot of the tribune, an innocent accused person before a tribunal without appeal, which was about to judge the cause of royalty. At that moment, that cause was gained in the eyes and hearts of all."—(Vol i. p. 177.)

But it was all in vain. The mob on the outside broke into the assembly. The national guard, as usual, failed at the decisive moment, and royalty was lost.

"An unwonted noise was heard at the door on the left of the tribune. Unknown persons, national guards with arms in their hands, common people in their working-dresses, break open the doors, overthrow the officers who surround the tribune, invade the assembly, and, with loud cries, demand the Duke of Nemours. Some deputies rose from their seats to make a rampart with their bodies around the princess. M. Mauguin calmly urged them to retire. General Oudinot addressed them with martial indignation. Finding words unavailing, he hastily traversed the crowd to demand the support of the national guard. He represented to them the inviolability of the assembly, and the respect due to a princess and a woman insulted amidst French bayonets. The national guards heard him, feigned to be indignant, but slowly took up their arms, and ended by doing nothing."—(Vol. i. p. 180.)

In justice to Lamartine also, we must give an abstract of his animated and eloquent account of the most honourable event in his life, and one which should cover a multitude of sins—the moment when he singly contended with the maddened rabble who had triumphed over the throne, and, by the mere force of moral courage and eloquent expression, defeated the Red Republicans, who were desirous to hoist the drapeau rouge, the well-known signal of bloodshed and devastation:—

"In this moment of popular frenzy, Lamartine succeeded in calming the people by a sort of patriotic hymn on their victory—so sudden, so complete, so unlooked-for even by the most ardent friends of liberty. He called God to witness the admirable humanity and religious moderation which the people had hitherto shown alike in the combat and their triumph. He placed prominently forward that sublime instinct which, the evening before, had thrown them, when still armed, but already disciplined and obedient, into the arms of a few men who had submitted themselves to calumny, exhaustion, and death, for the safety of all. 'That,' said Lamartine, 'was what the sun beheld yesterday, and what would he shine upon to-day? He would behold a people the more furious that there was no longer any enemies to combat; distrusting the men whom but yesterday it had intrusted with the lead,—constraining them in their liberty, insulting them in their dignity, disavowing their authority, substituting a revolution of vengeance and punishment for one of unanimity and fraternity, and commanding the government to hoist, in token of concord, the standard of a combat to the death between the citizens of the same country! That red flag, which was sometimes raised as the standard against our enemies when blood was flowing, should be furled after the combat, in token of reconciliation and peace. I would rather see the black flag which they hoist sometimes in a besieged town as a symbol of death, to designate to the bombs the edifices consecrated to humanity, and which even the balls of the enemy respect. Do you wish, then, that the symbol of your republic should be more menacing and more sinister than the colours of a besieged city?' 'No no!' cried some of the crowd, 'Lamartine is right: let us not keep that standard, the symbol of terror, for our citizens.' 'Yes, yes!' cried others, 'it is ours—it is that of the people—it is that with which we have conquered. Why should we not keep, after the conflict, the colours which we have stained with our blood?'—'Citizens!' said Lamartine, after having exhausted every argument calculated to affect the imagination of the people, 'you may do violence to the government: you may command it to change the colours of the nation and the colours of France. If you are so ill advised and so obstinate in error as to impose on it a republic of party and flag of terror, the government is as decided as myself to die rather than dishonour itself by obeying you: for myself, my hand shall never sign that decree: I will resist even to the death that symbol of blood; and you should repudiate it as well as I; for the red flag which you bring us has never gone beyond the Champ de Mars, dragged red in the blood of the people in '91 and '93; but the tricolor flag has made the tour of the world, with the name, the glory, and the liberty of our country.' At these words, Lamartine, interrupted by the unanimous cries of enthusiasm, fell from the chair which served for his tribune, into the arms stretched out on all sides to receive him. The cause of the new republic was triumphant over the bloody recollections which they wished to substitute for it. The hideous crowd which filled the hall retired, amidst cries of 'Vive Lamartine!—Vive le Drapeau Tricolor!'

"The danger, however, was not over. The crowd which had been carried away by his words was met by another crowd which had not hitherto been able to penetrate into the hall, and which was more vehement in words and gesticulations. Menacing expressions, ardent vociferations, cries of suffocation, threatening gestures, discharges of firearms on the stair, tatters of a red flag waved by naked arms above the sea of heads, rendered this one of the most frightful scenes of the Revolution. 'Down with Lamartine! Death to Lamartine! no Temporising,—the Decree, the Decree, or the Government of Traitors to the lamp-post!' exclaimed the assailants. These cries neither caused Lamartine to hesitate, to retire, nor to turn pale. At the sight of him the fury of the assailants, instead of being appeased, increased tenfold. Muskets were directed at his head, the nearest brandished bayonets in his face, and a savage group of twenty, with brutal drunken visages, charged forward with their heads down, as if to break through with an enormous battering-ram the circle which surrounded him. The foremost appeared bereft of reason. Naked sabres reached the head of the orator, whose hand was slightly wounded. The critical moment had arrived; nothing was yet decided. Hazard determined which should prevail. Lamartine expected momentarily to be thrown down and trampled under foot. At that instant one of the populace sprang from the crowd, a ball discharged from below grazed his face and stained it with blood; while it still flowed, he stretched out his arms to Lamartine—'Let me see him, let me touch him,' cried he, 'let me kiss his hand! Listen to him, oh, my citizens! follow his councils: you shall strike me before touching him. I will die a thousand times to preserve that good citizen for my country.' With these words he precipitated himself into his arms, and held him convulsively embraced. The people were moved at this scene; and a hundred voices again exclaimed 'Vive le Gouvernement Provisoire!—Vive Lamartine!'"—(Vol. i. pp. 393, 402.)

We purposely close our account of Lamartine's personal career with this splendid passage in his life. His subsequent conduct, it is well known, has ill accorded with this beginning. His popularity in Paris fell as rapidly as it had risen; and on occasion of the terrible revolt of June 1848, he retired from the government, with all his colleagues, from acknowledged inability to meet the crisis which had arisen. We have heard different accounts of the real causes of his mysterious alliance with his former opponent, and the head of the Red Republicans, M. Ledru Rollin, to which this fall was owing. Some of these stories are little to his credit. We forbear to mention them, lest we should unwittingly disseminate falsehood in regard to a man of undoubted genius and great acquirements. Perhaps, in some future "Confidences," he may be able to explain much which undoubtedly at present stands in need of explanation. We gladly leave this dubious subject, to give a place to his dramatic account of the dreadful conflict in June, in the streets of Paris, which is the more entitled to credit, as he was an eyewitness of several of its most terrible scenes:—

"Assemblages of eight or ten thousand persons were already formed on the Place of the Pantheon to attack the Luxembourg. M. Arago harangued them and persuaded them to disperse; but it was only to meet again in the quarters adjoining the Seine, in the Faubourg St Antoine, and on the Boulevards. At the sight of them the faubourgs turned out—the streets were filled—the Ateliers Nationaux turned out their hordes—the populace, excited by some chief, began to raise barricades. These chiefs were, for the most part, brigadiers of the national workshops, the pillars of sedition and of the clubs, irritated at the disbanding of their corps, the wages of which, passing through their hands, had been applied, it is said, to paying the Revolution. From the barriers of Charenton, Fontainebleau, and Menilmontant, to the heart of Paris, the entire capital was in the hands of a few thousand men. The rappel called to their standards 200,000 National Guards, ten times sufficient to overthrow those assemblages of the seditious, and to destroy their fortifications. But it must be said, to the disgrace of that day, and for the instruction of posterity, that the National Guard at that decisive moment did not answer in a body to the appeal of the government. Their tardiness, their disinclination, their inertness, left the streets in some quarters open to sedition. They looked on with calm eyes on the erection of thousands of barricades, which they had afterwards to reconquer with torrents of blood. Soon the government quitted the Luxembourg and took refuge in the National Assembly, where, at the headquarters of General Cavaignac, was established the supreme council of the nation.

"Government had reckoned on the support of the National Guard; but the incessant beating of the rappel failed in bringing it forth to its standards. In several quarters they were imprisoned by the insurgents. In fine, be it tardiness, or be it fatality, the army was far from responding in a body to the imminence and universality of the peril. Its numerical weakness aggravated the danger. General LamoriciÈre, invincible, though soon besieged by 200,000 men, occupied the whole extent from the Rue du Temple to the Madeleine, from the Rue de Clichy to the Louvre—constantly on horseback, ever foremost in fire, he had two horses shot under him—his countenance black with powder, his forehead running down with sweat, his voice hoarse with giving the word of command, but his eye serene and calm as a soldier in his native element, he restored spirit to his men, confidence to the National Guards. His reports to government breathed the intrepidity of his soul, but he made no concealment of the imminence of the danger, and the insufficiency of the troops at his disposal. He painted the immense multitude of the assailants and the vast network of barricades which stretched between the Bastile and the Chateau d'Eau, between the barriers and the Boulevard. Incessantly he implored reinforcements, which the government as continually summoned to its support by the telegraph, and officers specially despatched. At length the National Guards of the neighbourhood of Paris began to arrive, and, ranging themselves round the Assembly, furnished an example to those of the capital. Then, and not till then, confidence began to be felt in the midst of the chances of the combat."—(Vol. ii., pp. 480-481.)

It was a most fortunate event for the cause of order, and, with it, of real freedom throughout the world, that this great revolt was so completely suppressed, though at the cost of a greater number of lives, particularly in general officers, than fell in many a bloody battle, by the efforts of General Cavaignac and his brave companions in arms. It is said that their measures, at first, were not skilfully taken—that they lost time, and occasioned unnecessary bloodshed at the outset, by neglecting to attack the barricades when they began to be formed; and certainly the easy and bloodless suppression of the late revolt against the government of Prince Louis Napoleon, by General Changarnier, seems to favour this opinion. It must be recollected, however, that the revolt of May 1849 occurred when the memory of the popular overthrow of June 1848 was still fresh in the minds of the people; and it is not easy to overestimate the effect of that decisive defeat in paralysing revolt on the one side, and adding nerve to resistance on the other. It is evident that Louis Napoleon is not a Duc de Montpensier—he will not surrender his authority without a fight. But supposing that there was some tardiness in adopting decisive measures on occasion of the June revolt, that only makes the lesson more complete, by demonstrating the inability of the bravest and most determined populace to contend with a regular military force, when the troops are steady to their duty, and bravely led by their chiefs. The subsequent suppression of the revolts in Prague, Vienna, Madrid, and Rome, have confirmed the same important truth. Henceforth, it is evident, the horrors of revolution may always be averted, when government is firm, and the military are faithful.

And these horrors are in truth such, that it becomes evidently the first of political and social duties for the rulers of men to justify the eminence of their rank by their courage, and the troops to vindicate the trust reposed in them by their fidelity. Passing by the woful exposÉ of the almost hopeless state of the French finances, with a deficit of above Twelve Millions sterling, despite an addition of forty-five per cent to the direct taxes, made by Prince Louis Napoleon to the National Assembly, we rest on the following curious and important details taken from the Times of July 12, in regard to the effect of the revolution of 1848 upon the comforts and condition of the labouring classes in France:—

"It appears it is the middle class of tradesmen that are now most suffering from the effects of revolution. The funds on which this class had been living, in the hope that better days would soon arrive, and which amongst some of the small tradesmen formed their capital, have become exhausted. Those who had no money had, at all events, some credit; but both money and credit are now gone. The result is, that even in this period of comparative tranquillity more shops are closed than in the days of turbulence.

"The following statement of the fluctuations of the revenues of the city of Paris, occasioned also by revolution, and which goes back to 1826, is taken from the DÉbats:—

"'The returns of the produce of indirect impost is the unfailing testimony to the progress or decrease of public tranquillity. We proved this truth yesterday in publishing, on the authority of a well-informed journal, the comparative state of the receipts of the Paris octroi for the first six months of the years 1847, 1848, and 1849. It is still further proved by valuable documents which we have at this moment before us. Thus, the produce of the octroi was, in 1847, 34,511,389 francs; and in 1848, only 26,519,627 francs, showing a difference of 7,991,762 francs. This decrease is enormous, in relation to the immense necessities created by the political and social crisis, the works undertaken by the city, and the previous expenses it had to provide for. We could analyse the different chapters of this municipal revenue, which affords life to so many branches of Parisian industry; but it is useless to inquire, for each of these chapters, the particular causes of diminution. With the great event of 1848 before us, all details disappear. One sole cause has produced a decrease in the receipts, and that is the revolution of February; which, at first menacing society itself by the voice of democratic orators and the pens of demagogue writers, frightened away capital and annihilated industry of all kinds. In order to be able to judge of the influence of great political events on the receipts of the Paris octroi, it will be sufficient to recur to the years which preceded and followed the revolution of 1830:—

	Francs.
In 1826 the produce was	31,057,000
In 1827 (the first shock in consequence of the progress of the opposition in the country, and the dissolution of the national guard)	29,215,000
In 1828 (fall of the VillÈle ministry—continuation of the political movement notwithstanding the Montignac ministry)	28,927,000
In 1829 (ministry of the 8th August—presentiments of a struggle between the crown and country)	27,695,000
In 1830 (July Revolution)	26,240,000
In 1831 (incessant agitation—repeated outbreaks)	24,035,000
In 1832 (continuation of revolutionary movement—events of the 5th and 6th June)	22,798,000
In 1833 (progressive establishment of tranquillity)	26,667,000
In 1834 (the situation becomes better, with the exception of the events of the 13th and 14th April, which, however, were brief)	27,458,000
From 1835 to 1838 (calm—cabinet of 15th April—the produce in the latter year)	31,518,000
In 1839 (Parliamentary coalition, 12th May)	30,654,000
In 1840 (fears of war—rupture of the English Alliance, &c.)	29,906,000
From 1841 to 1845 (calm—progressive increase in the latter year)	34,165,000
In 1846 (notwithstanding the dearness of food, the receipts were)	33,990,000
In 1847 (commercial crisis, &c.)	33,033,000
In 1848 (revolution of February)	26,519,000

"The following from La Patrie gives a good idea of the effects of an unquiet state of society:—

"'Revolutions cost dear. They, in the first place, augment the public expenses and diminish the general resources. Occasionally they yield something, but before gathering in the profits the bill must be paid. M. Audiganne, chef de bureau at the department of commerce and agriculture, has published a curious work on the industrial crisis brought on by the revolution of February. M. Audiganne has examined all branches of manufactures, and has shown that the crisis affected every one. In the Nord, at Lisle, cotton-spinning, which occupied thirty-four considerable establishments, employing a capital of 7,000,000f. or 8,000,000f.; and tulle making, employing 195 looms, were obliged to reduce their production one-half. At Turcoing and Roubaix, where cloth and carpet manufactories occupied 12,000 workmen, the produce went down two-thirds, and 8000 men were thrown out of work. In the Pas-de-Calais the fabrication of lace and cambrics was obliged to stop before a fall of twenty-five per cent. The linen factory of Capecure, founded in 1836, and which employed 1800 men, was in vain aided by the Municipal Council of Boulogne and the local banks; it at last succumbed to the crisis. In the department of the Somme, 142,000 workmen, who were employed in the woollen, cotton, stocking, and velvet manufactories, were reduced to idleness. In the arrondissement of Abbeville, where the business, known by the name of 'lockwork' of Picardy, yielded an annual produce of 4,000,000f., the orders stopped completely, and the unfortunate workmen were obliged to go and beg their bread in the environs. At Rouen, where the cotton trade gave an annual produce of more than 250,000,000f., there were the same disasters; yet the common goods continued to find purchasers, owing to their low price. At Caen, the lace manufacture, which in 1847 employed upwards of 50,000 persons, or one-eighth of the population of Calvados, was totally paralysed. At St Quentin, tulle embroidery, which gave a living to 1500 women, received just as severe a blow as in March and April, 1848; almost all the workshops were obliged to close. In the east the loss was not less considerable. Rheims was obliged to close its woollen-thread factories during the months of March, April, and May, 1848. The communal workshop absorbed in some weeks an extraordinary loan of 430,000f. Fortunately, an order for 1,500,000f. of merinos, from New York, allowed the interrupted factories to reopen, and spared the town fresh sacrifices. The revolutionary tempest penetrated into Alsace and there swept away two-thirds of the production. Muhlhausen stopped for several months the greater number of its looms, and diminished one-half the length of labour in the workshops, which remained open. Lyons also felt all the horrors of the crisis. In the same way as muslin and lace, silk found its consumption stopped. For several months the unfortunate Lyons' workmen had for sole subsistence the produce of the colours and scarfs ordered by the Provisional Government. At St Etienne and St Chamond, the principal points of our ribbon and velvet manufacture, and where 85,000 workmen were employed, the production went down two-thirds. At Paris M. Audiganne estimates the loss in what is called Paris goods at nine-tenths of the production. The loss on other articles, he considers, on the contrary, to have been only two-thirds on the sale, and a little more than one-half on the amount of the produce. We only touch in these remarks on the most striking points of the calculation; the total loss, according to M. Audiganne, amounts, for the workmen alone, to upwards of 300,000,000f.'"

Such have been the consequences to the people of listening to the voice of their demagogues, who impelled them into the revolution of 1848—to the national guards, of hanging back at the decisive moment, and forgetting their oaths in the intoxication of popular enthusiasm.

And if any one supposes that these effects were only temporary, and that lasting freedom is to be won for France by these sacrifices, we recommend him to consider the present state of France, a year and a half after the revolution of 1848, as painted by one of its ablest supporters, M. Louis Blanc.

PROTEST.

"While Paris is in a state of siege, and when most of the journals which represent our opinions are by violence condemned to silence, we believe it to be a duty owing to our party to convey to it, if possible, the public expression of our sentiments.

"It is with profound astonishment that we see the organs of the counter-revolution triumph over the events of the 13th of June.

"Where there has been no contest, how can there have been a victory?

"What is then proved by the 13th of June?

"That under the pressure of 100,000 soldiers, Paris is not free in her movements? We have known this more than enough.

"Now, as it has always been, the question is, if by crowding Paris with soldiers and with cannon, by stifling with violent hands the liberty of the press, by suppressing individual freedom, by invading private domiciles, by substituting the reign of Terror for that of Reason, by unceasingly repressing furious despair—that which there is wanting a capacity to prevent, the end will be attained of reanimating confidence, or re-establishing credit, of diminishing taxes, of correcting the vices of the administration, of chasing away the spectre of the deficit, of developing industry, of cutting short the disasters attendant upon unlimited competition, of suppressing those revolts which have their source in the deep recesses of human feeling, of tranquillising resentments, of calming all hearts? The state of siege of 1848 has engendered that of 1849. The question is, if the amiable perspective of Paris in a state of siege every eight or ten months will restore to commerce its elastic movements, to the industrious their markets, and to the middle classes their repose."—L. Blanc.

It is frequently asked what is to be the end of all these changes, and under what form of government are the people of France ultimately to settle? Difficult as it is to predict anything with certainty of a people with whom nothing seems to be fixed but the disposition to change, we have no hesitation in stating our opinion that the future government of France will be what that of imperial Rome was, an Elective Military Despotism. In fact, with the exception of the fifteen years of the Restoration, when a free constitutional monarchy was imposed on its inhabitants by the bayonets of the Allies, it has ever since the Revolution of 1789 been nothing else. The Orleans dynasty has, to all appearance, expired with a disgrace even greater than that which attended its birth: the Bourbons can scarcely expect, in a country so deeply imbued with the love of change, to re-establish their hereditary throne. Popular passion and national vanity call for that favourite object in democratic societies—a rotation of governors: popular violence and general suffering will never fail to re-establish, after a brief period of anarchy, the empire of the sword. The successive election of military despots seems the only popular compromise between revolutionary passion and the social necessities of mankind; and as a similar compromise took place, after eighty years of bloodshed and confusion, in the Roman commonwealth, so, after a similar period of suffering, it will probably be repeated, from the influence of the same cause, in the French nation.