OUR PARIS LETTER.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 454, 26 November 1880, Page 3

OUR PARIS LETTER.

(Fkcom our own Correspondent.)

Paimis, 'October 7

The Ferry Cabinet is doomed to death, but fated not to die, till the meeting of Parliament. So say the journals, and psrbKc opinion gives itself no concern about the matter. .Ministers made a (terrible blunder in refusing permission to Rochefort arid liis friends—Pyatt and Bl an gui—to sp'itl yarns ; in the circus a few days ago. The refusal was based on an -old second empire law, which only added insult to-the rejected demand. The sole reason given for -the refusal was—"The "Government does not wish it." Louis XIV. !

•or Napoleon 111. could net be more auto-

cratic, and if the Republic has no other models of liberty aud free discussion to

follow, why (as the song has it in " Mdme -"* Angot") it was not worth while changing ■the Government. Opinion is pretty unanirmous that this kind of thing will not doAll Rochefort required was the public nneeting to protest against the Albanian

International Regattas people who, white

•sympathising with the object of the meet■"iing and regretting the duty had not been

taken up by others, not the less desired to give expression to the dissatisfaction of the French fleet being sent to co-operate _in the execution of a menace that might have drawn France into a general war.

Besides, public opinion, irritated against the non possiunus of Turkey, is not at all in favor of handing over the Albanians, Jike so many head «sf ©atitle, to the uncouth Montenegrins. Such work, it is alleged, is fitting for monarchies, but not for a "republic. If Rochefort and Co. could Uieak up that eighth wonder of the world —the perfect harmony of the European Powers on the Eastern question—they are not to be despised. If their rant and fustian could shake tho Republic, the latter can have no foundation on a rock.

jyiie Reformed Church of France has been restored to its original position of a :tfree fight, which existed from 1852 to 1874. In the latter year old G-oizot. by a combination of bis proverbial intrigue and 5, packed 83' nod, carried a decision that no ■Olvinist was entitled to vote in the local Presl>3 - te)ies—government of the church, flection of minister, schoolmaster, etc., who did believe, not in thirty-nine, but in two articles, the inspiration of the Bible, and the doctrine of redemption. It was a Mow at the Unitarian party and the liide-

pendents, who claimed, as Protestants, the right to interpret the Scriptures as they pleased, and repudiated all synodical infallibilities. The Republic has just rescinded the Guizot Test Act of 1874. so that the Calvinists, Unitarians, etc., will ■exist as two hostile caiupa throughout France, either ruling the roast as they miay* command the local majority. The Republic being Atheists, in tie sense of professing no official religion, will let therr^ fight it out like Kilkenny cats, or till the separation of Church and State be accomplished — a consummation both Israelites and Protestants have frequently d§*routly wished for. But they have never yet given the example of voluntarily refusing the endowment. they accept their quota of the fifty-one million francs of tho donation with the same pious alacrity asjhe Catholic clergy. Unlike the latter, they are not the opponents of the Republic,

There are 6,000 children under 16 years of agg morally abandoned in Paris; they are either illegitimate or orphans, or under no control from their parents. They beg when they cannot steal, and thieve when they"fcannot beg. Not a few of this floating population of city Arabs have, been arrested several times as vagrants, and each new arrest plunges them deeper into vice and indifference. Juvenile reformatories are failures —till they bo reformed— and it is only in extreme cases that the judges exercise their power to send an infant there. The Municipal Council is occupied with the difficult problem ; it wishes to save the 6,000 sheep from being lost. It £& opyesed 'to imprisonment, and seeks to : attach tho children to society by the ties of wrjrk and moral elevation. It is pro posed to farm the young vagrants, under certain conditions, to artisans in the country districts, ,who (for a certain annual sum) would represent both parental and legal authority, and in addition teach the wards trades. Happily the number of occupations in the country admits of the arrangement being carried out. A judge thenWl have the right to send a neglected | child to be brought up in a sober family, subject of courso to the surveillance of the authorities ; if the child proved rebellious to this system of reform by family and labor, the judge—having still the power to make his sentence definite —could send the incorrigible to tbe reformatory, which is tantamount to committal to prison. France is prepared to vote millions for the cause of education; for the furtherance of which no questions will be ask«d Ckiring tho last few months the GovernnenPfias organised a series of educational •eforms which, ton years ngo, would have mon deemed Utopian. They are now in

operation. There is a central dep6t where all who desire to become teachers can have their claims and competency registered ; permanent Governmental commissions exist to study the best plans of school buildings and their fitting up ; to glean all that is new or improved in the systems of education of other countries. and to adopt whatever may be useful in French schools; another commission devotes its exclusive attention to schoolbooks and apparatus, and, having selected types and models, invites contracts for their execution nl 'fixed prices. Many books are supplied gratuitously. Tims Herbert Spenver's work on "Physical,; Moral, aud Intellectual Education " has: been translated, and is literally sown broadcast among teachers and school libraries. Any person may write or compile a book, invent an apparatus : Ire has only to send it to one of the central commissions ; If approved of his fortune is

made