FRANCE.

New Zealander, Volume 8, Issue 626, 14 April 1852, Page 3

FRANCE.

A correspondent of the Times, Captain Jesse, a British officer, in describing the late scene in Paris, gives the following appalling account of the events of Thursday :—: — " Opposite my apartment ia he Restaurant Bonnef.iy. and leaving this about half-past ten, a ccunirunan on a cart-horse was pointed out to me as having jiit-t had his waggon taken from him, loMp 10 form a barricade near the Porte St Denis. The circulation of carriages in that direction very soon ceased, and at eleven the shopkeepers commenced pulling up their shuiters Between this hour and one o'clock I was at the MmiMer of the Interior's Rue de Grenelle, and both going there and returning everything seemed quiet ; there was no apparent tuovenipnt amongst the troops within the iion railings of the Tmlenes, or on the Orroucel ; the shops however, were closed in the Rue Richelieu. At two o'clock, when approaching tho extn mity of the Rue Viriennr, 1 obse/ved the tioops pacing along the Boulevard, which they cleared, driving ilie people into the side streets, who ran down it crying out '< Sauvetvous." I sought refuge with my wile in a simp, and subsequently reached my own house. At three o'clock, returning from the Place de 111 Bur.-c,B >ur.-e, it was wnh great diftuulti 1 got back again. The guns lud been distinctly heard for some time in th. j direction of the Faubourg St. Denis, end the passage of troops that way continued for a quarter of an hour after 1 came brick. Having wiitieu a note, I went to the balcony at which my wile w;w standing. and remained there watchinn- the troop*. The whole Boulevard as far as the e\e could reich (1,000 yards) was crowded with tlwin, principally infantry, in sub-divwonsaiquaiter distance, with here and there a batch of twelve-pounders and howitzer*, some of which occupied the rising ground on the Boulevaid Poiasonniere, The windows were crowded with people, principally women, tradesmen, servant-, and children, or, like oui selves, the occupants of apartments. The mounted officers were smoking their cignra — a custom introduced into the army, as I have understood, by the Princes of the Orleans family — not a very soldier-like one, but, at such a moment, particularly reassuring, as it forbad the id. a that their services wpre likely to be called into immediate requisition. Of the Boulevard dcs Italiens I could see but little, on account of an angle, but in the direction of the Porte St, D-nis I could see distinctly as f.ir as the end of the Boulevard Nouvelle. Suddenly, and while I was latently looking with my g'ass nt the troops i» (he distance eastward, a few musket shots were fired at the head of tho column, which consisted of about 3,000 men. In a lew moments it spread, and after ha gmg a little, came down the Boulevard in a waving shpet of flame. So tegular, however, was the fire, that I thought it was a/etWe-joie for some b.uriciide taken in adrance, or to signal their position to some other division, and it was not till it came within h'f'y yards of me that I recogniz.-d the sharp ringing report of ball cartridge; but even then I could scarcely believe the evidence of my eais, for as to my eyes, I could not discover any enemy to fire at, and I continued looking at ihe men until the company b^low me weie actually raising their firelocks, and one vagabond, sharper t an the rest — a mere lad, without either whisker or moustache — had covered m**. In an instant I dashed my wife, who hail just stepped baclf, against the pier b tween the window s, when a shot struck the ceiling imme limely over our deads, and covered us with dust and broken plaster. In a second niter I placed her upon the floor, and in another a volley came against the whole front of the house, the balcony, and windows ; one shot broke the mirror over the chimney-piece, another the shade of the clock; every pane of glass but one was smashed ; the curtains and window frames cut; the room, in short, was riddled. The iron balcony, though rather low, was a great protection, still five balls entered the room, and in the pause for reloading, I drew my wife t< the door, and took refuge in the back part of the bouse. The rattle of muskptry was incessant for more than a quarter of an hour after this, and in a very few minutes the guns were unliinbered, and pointed at the mugabin of Mr. Salandrouze, five houses to the right. What the object or meaning of all this might be was a perfect enigma to every individual in the house, Fiench or foreigner; some thought the troops had turned lound and joined the Reds, others sii#gf>ted that thpy must have been fired upon somewhere, though they certainly had not from our bouse, or from any other on the Boulevard Moitmartre, or we must have >crn it from the balcony, llnsides which, in the temper ia which the soldieis proved to be, had that been the case, they would never havp waited for any signal from the head of the column 800 yards (iff. This wanton fusillade must have been the result of a panic, lect the windows should have been lined with concealed enemies, and they wauled to sccuie then sl.i-is by the fust fire, or it was a «nn<rmii iry impulse— other motive being equally discreditable to them, as soldieis in the (lie case, of citizen* in the other. As a military man, it is with the deepest » egret that I feel compelled to entertain the latter opinion. The men, as i have already slated, fired

volley upon voll-y for more than a quarter of an hour, without any return; they shot down many of the unIwppy individuals who remained on the Boulevard and could not obtain an entrance into any house— some p^r-ons were lulled cW to our dooi,aud (lieir blood lav in the hollows round the trees the next morning when we passed at twelve o'clock, The soldiers, entered houses w hence no shots ev<jr came, and though La I'alrie, the newspaper of the Elysee, pretended to specify them by name, it was, in a subsequent number, obliged to deny its own scandalous imputations. * * * The loss of innocent life must have been great, very great, more thati ever will be Known, for the* pre-s is more free now in Russia than in Fiance The Boulevard-, and tlie adjacent streets were in some points a perfect shamble, but I do not mean to state what I have heard and ascertained of that loss, for I do not wish to make the pictuie darker than jt need be."

The following melancholy incidents are related by tlip Correspondent of the Chronicle • — On the fatal Thursday, a p.irty of six, four of whom were English, break fa* toil together at the house of one of the latter. The KnglMi party conaMed of the master of the establishment and his wife, of his brother and of lit brother, the Fiench gentlemen being also allied to them by the matnage of leldtives. Alter breakfast, the genii' men separmed on their business, it being understood that the host V, brother and brothei-tn-law would return to dinner. The 1 hour arrived, and passed. Seven o'clock came—et«<ht—nine—tennothing wns heaid of the two rela ivea. The events of the tune made every one fiightfully anxious, but nothing could be done. At eleven o'clock, the lady was called to the. door to receive a wild, savage-looking messenger, who placed in her hand a piece of torn paper, soiled and stained with blood, and on which some pencilled words vrere just decipherable. They were 'from her brother, who told here that he bad been badly, wound' d, and was lying in a place to which his messenger w ould conduct her. She instantly set off with her husband, and in a filthy portion of the city found her unfortunate brother, lying in a dismal stable upon some wet straw. His thigh had been luoken by a shot, and he w as severely wounded in the foot and eWewheie. Tins was not the worst. The husband's hi other h.ul been torn down by a cannon shot, and his body was^at that moment among a heap of corpses in another part of the stable. 'Ihe terrified lady h.id to assist her husband in turning over twent) -five or tbiity bodies of slaughtered men before they could discover his ill-fatrd bi other. Both the French gentlemen of the party were killed on that same dreadful Thu-sday,— of the mot ncr of their de.nhs I have not been informid, but both were hunedyesterday. Such w,is the sequel to the breakfast paity. The names are of wursn Known to me, but there is no reason for mentioning them here. Almost as sad an event, and one which in itself is enough for the theme of a melancholy tale, occurred in the case of a young Russian nobleman who had arrivtd in P.nis with his i.ewl\ -married wife, t*o or three days only before the coup d'elut. lie went out horn his hoiel in ilih morning of one of the days of the masb.ieie. and neter returned. 1 1 is bride, half ftriutic, watched for him through hour a'ter houi oi ayony. But be never came. On the founh day the poor young creature was summoned to Montmaitre to cl.iim the corpse of her bridegroom trom among a ghas ly row of victims to " the noble army which lias saved the State."