PARIS.

Southland Times, Issue 1565, 19 April 1872, Page 3

PARIS.

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) January 10. Surprise, it has been observed, is the only thing in politics, and the defeat of Victor Hugo is the most extraordinary of surprises. No one expected his rejection, even his opponents believed, while giving battle, that ho would be victorious. However, the great poet and romantic politician has been beaten by M. Vautrain, a lawyer of third rank, the president of the Municipal Council of the city, and whose programme was simply moderation. It iathe triumph of good sense, won by the middle classes, the bourgeoise, who in all political changes find themselves the victims alike of dictators and demagogues, and who have to pay in the end for the follies of the pavement and the palace. Not only have the Communists been beaten, but the devotees of those pretenders, who in supporting Hugo aimed to carry a new element of disorder into the politics of the country. There are 459,000 inscribed electors on, the registers for Paris and its environs ; there have been 209,000 absentees in the election just terminated, a high figure it is true, but less by 15,000 than in the elections of. last July, where there were no divisions among the friends of order. The defeated even are , satisfied, as they claim the absentees as {

sympathisers ; the Radicals who opposed Vautrain tooth and nail are contented, for the newly-elected is a republican, only not of their Utopian school. Victor Hugo wns thrown at the Government as Rochefort was at the Second Empire ; he has lost, and the gain must be carried to M. Thiers. Ridicule is dead in the person of M. Hugo ; not even his backers console him. The mannikin is no longer serviceable. Parisians have made their " eternal adieus" to Hugo as to other epheiner.il idols ; like Plato, they e?:clude poets from their republic, but the former crowned with flowers those he banished ; the Parisians present a chaplet of thorns to their D.inte on his road to exile. " Europe," said Hugo, " has only one city — Paris." When he returned to this city on the fall of the Empire, after his self-banishment during the closing years of Napoleon's reign, the people flocked to the railway station to give him an ovation — "too flattering Bweet to be substantial." In the elections of February last he was named on every list, and was placed second at the close of the poll. Then he received 214,000 votes ; on Sunday last only 93,000. What a fall is there, my countrymen ! Ledru Rollin s;»id in .fuue, 1849, of the J populace — " lam their chief, and must follow them." Hugo has just acted that lamentable role. He is resolved to quit France for ever; perhaps in exclaiming like the Roman patriot — " Ungrateful country, thou shalt not have my bones." His eccentric farewell letter is a day too late. Even the party that sustained him had misgivings, but calculated on the influence of his literary renown ; they knew he was by family and training an " aristocrat ;" remembered his flirtations with the divine right of kings in the case of Charles X., and his adhesion to the monarchy of July ; personal spite drove him into republicanism, and his embracing the Communistic creed was only equivalent to a death-bed conversion. " When the age is in, the wit is out." But more than all this, he has the reputation of being a miser; he writes to elevate the masses, but never brijigs out a cheap, a popular edition of his works ; be sings the song of the shirt, but has never aided the seamstress ; he writes the lamentations of the poor, but is oblivious in the relief of their distress. His defeat is a sterling, proof that Paris is fatigued with the violent and Utopian school of politics he embodied ; and the few Radicals elected in the South, and the Bonapartists in the North, will not affect the moderate republicanism in the Assembly. The country is discontented, and reasonably so, at the little amount of work done by its Assembly ; there is a good deal of sterile labor however going on, in profitless debates, in commissions. In the latter case the Assembly fritters away its strength. There have been committees so long appointed, and that have not yet presented any report, that their whereabouts might rank with the lost tribes ; others dissolve, failing to agree, and some when " they do agree on the stage, their unanimity is wonderful." Their is no method in the conduct of the business of the French Assembly, and the haphazard manner of legislating is injuring the position of M. Tliiers. The reason is, that all parties hesitate to deal with fundamental questions — to ' take a " leap in the dark." It is nearly eighteen months since Prussia has applied her plan of public education in Alsace and Lorraine. France has unanimously demanded a similar system, in the obligatory point of view, and it is only now the discussion is commencing, the Bishops taking the lead in opposing such a popular scheme as tyrannical — a greater misfortune than the invasion, and opposed to the practice of civilised nations. There is no mistaking this war-cry, aijd the clergy unhappily appear to illustrate what Cardinal Bonnechose said in the late senate — " My clergy is as a regiment ; when I tell them to march they must." It will be for the deputies to unloose the gordian knot. The required additional annual revenue has yet to be raised, and the source from which to draw it, has not yet been found. M. Thiers depends on the imposition of protectionist duties to fill up the void, and a few days will show if his propositions are acceptable. In the meantime the nation has not yet felt the pinch of the crushing financial burthen it must bear. The military reorganisation of the country remains in the limbo of investigation. The trial of the prisoners accused of the brutal murder of the Archbishop of Paris and his fellow victims has commenced. The twenty three accused — of which twoare women — differ from previous batches in presenting greater evidence of degradation and ferocity. Their attitude is more brutal and revolting. Four of them are one-eyed. Frangois, the governor of the prison of Roquette, is about thirty years of age, with hard expression of features, but military looking ; his mistress, one of the two women iv the dock, is a terrible looking vixen, and near her accouchement. The commander of the executing party is Pigerre, forty years of age, an escaped convict, with a striking resemblance to Dumollard, the infamous murderer of female servanta, whose crimes a few years ago so horrified the world. The table of the court is occupied with the spoils of the victims — for they were robbed after being murdered ; upwards of 25,000fr5. in silver and gold, rings, watches, lockets ; the pectoral cross and pastoral ring of the Archbishop, &c. Tbero is also a plan of the place of execution, and of the positions of the bodies ; one wretch confesses, the poor Archbishop attempted three times to rise though mortally wounded, and he became frightened at this dying struggle, while continuing to fire on the writhing body with a revolver. Fifty francs was the blood-money paid to each of the assassins, and sous the price awarded to the men who conveyed the remains in a hand-cart and buried them in an obscure corner of Pere-La-Chaise cemetery. The buttons were torn off the clothes of the deceased, and in strip-

piug the shoes of Mgr. Darboy of their silver buckles, one of the wreckers cut bis finger and kicked the corpse in revenge. Beyond these incidents, the trial differs nothing from the general character of those concluded, denials, asseverations of innocence, recriminations, &c. No amnesty could over be extended to the actors of such a. rcoltini; tntpedy. Twelfth Night wound up the holidays of the*, asm, inaugurated on Christmas Eve, and was the merriest of all — for old and young folks mixed in ita frolics on equal terras. The pastry-cooks and bakers were working over-time to supply tlio demand for cakes containing the historical " bean." When the guests are all assembled, the cake is cut up, and he who finds the bean, is till midnight king of the revels. It ever happens that the right man is in the right place. Once elected, he proceeds to rule his subjects with autocratic sway. Disdaining an alliance with royal houses, he selects his queen from among his subjects; the prettiest face being the only recommendation for elevation to the throne, and a kiss the only nuptial ceremony. When his majesty " drinks," the subjects do the same, announcing the event by the tiinehonored formula — le roi boit. Games ] of every description succeed; "forfeits" being in high favor, the penalties decreed by royalty resembling the laws of the Medes and Persian?, which alter not. At the first stroke of midnight the king becomes again mortal, an 1 many subjects avail themselves of the occasion to revenge any of bis arbitrary acts, so that many a sovereign anxiously watches an opportunity to fly for the nearest available cab, just like Louis Philippe. A good deal of ironey has changed hands during the fetes ; among those who have most liberally parted with it have been the Americans ; they have made many a tradesman stare at the extensiveuess of their orders. The masked balls are being better supported ; there is no falling off in strangers who come to see the sport, from the Emperor of Brazil down to more humble mortals. There is greater variety in costumes ; one of the newest and drollest was an artistic combination of oyster shells, with mussels for trimming. Rousseau observed — "Luxury corrupts all; the rich who enjoy it, and the poor who covet it." Amongst other innovations taking place, is the fashion of getting married at midnight — possibly because the clergy are so occupied by the demands in the day-time ; "to annihilate time and space, and make two lovers happy," they have to officiate over hours. The Madeleine is the favorite church for the celebration of midnight weddings, which are generally accompanied with the execution of excellent music. In cases of adultery in Prance, the parties convicted are ordinarily sent to prison for three or twenty-four months, independently of subsequent proceedings, which can only terminate in separation — never in divorce. A banker, a millionaire — .ill are considered such in Paris, as Russians are to be princes — has appeared to prosecute his wife on a charge of adultery, and who was arrested in jlagrante delicto. Wife and paramour were in the dock side by side, the latter being a civil engineer, and father of a young and respectable family. The wife had been previously convicted of the same crime : on the present occasion there was but the changing of a lover. The husband becomes thus liberated from supporting his wife ; but he prosecuted another charge against her, that of conspiring with a lady friend, who, for a sum of 10,OOOfrs. was to make an assignation with the husband at a masked ball, to sup with him, and place some " quieting powder " in his wine, and thus end his miseries. The " lady friend " retracted her deposition, so the charge fell to-the ground. The wife was sent to prison for six months, and the engineer, considering the disgrace he had incurred, was fined 500 fr 3 . Two curious suicides from among the many occurring. One, that of a young man, who shot himself, alleging he did so because he only won IGOOfrs. during a night's gambling. The second was a pretty young girl, aged 17, who had been deserted by her seducer, and put an end to her existence by swallowing two cupfuls of a decoction of snuff. In Paris, an event is hardly expected to survive three days. The resignation of the Bishop of Orleans as member of the Academy has been no exception to the rule. The general opinion condemns the step he has taken, and highly disapproves of his attack on M. Littre. further, the country is in no mood to be led into any polemical agitation, the Bishop having sat for a score of years in company with atheists and heretics, might continue to be an "immortal" till his death — as the motto of the Academy is, "We only liberate the dead." The Bishop is hasty, but means well. He is severe and kind to bis clergy. On one occasion he spoke sharply to a Vicairef and afterwards apologised. The latter reminded his Grace, " that Orleans was famed for its excellent vinegar." Once the Bishop preached a charity sermon, and observing the congregation was reluctant to contribute, descended from the pulpit, and commenced collecting. On approaching two wealthy ladies, they apologised for not having their purses, " Neither have I mine," observed the Bishop, taking the golden cross from his neck and placing it in the collecting bag. A shower of jewels succeeded. During the reign of Louis XI, the price of the postage of a letter was left to the honor of the sender, who marked on the address the sum to be paid on delivery ; and travellers who posted could not compel the postillion to "gallop " the horses without the owner's consent, whicb, if granted, necessitated double the payment for a trotting pace. A nobleman was killed during the storm last week by a chimaey-pot falling on his head-— twenty years previously, his father was the victim of a similar accident, in the same place. Liberty, equality, and fraternity, has been defined aa a lie between two Utopias.

The Bonapartist organ, t L'Ordre, accuses M. Thiers of being a " traitor." His treason does not consist in want of confidence in the ex-empire, but in refusing to make every able-bodied citizen a soldier after the manner of Prussia, which the nation desires, but the President declines to carry out, under pressure from Berlin. The Union is the representative of Co nte de Cham'oord'a hopes, and charges M. Tliiers with slowly dissolving French soeiety, aud would prefer to his measured doses of petroleum, the vigorous application of that liquid d, la Commune. The Journal de Paris has for saint the due d'Auinale, and scratches at the President like a very angry old woman. The Eepublique F)-ancaise sets -up Gambetta aa the Messiah of France ; demands that the Assembly and the government be dissolved, and the republic declared a reality and not an experiment. I Such is the inventory of patties at the commeucement of the year. The official receptions were well attended, and passed off agreeably ; the pleasure being enhatrced by the discarding of all wind-hagism. M. Thiers studiously ! avoided " shop," .and " very glad to see you," was his stereotyped speech. He deliberately adopted a voice soft, gentle, and low, which, according to the divine J Williams, is"auexcellent thing in woman." i There were some little big men conspicuous by their absence — the due d'Auraale and the Prince de Joinville for instance. However, pretenders do not render homage to successful rivals. As a set-off, the due presented a box of chocolate I bonbons to Madame Thiers ; but Heriry. V. and Napoleon 111. gave no sign. General Manteuffel, as commander of the army of occupation, congratulated the Presideat, and hoped he might be successful in his patriotic work — to find three milliards for Germany. This well-wisher is regarded to be equal in drollery to Victor Emmanuel, presenting the compliments of the season to Pio Nono and the " country gentleman at Chiselhurst." The partizans of M. Thiera trumpet him as the first statesman in France — which is quite true, seeing that the country has only one. The members of the Judicial Bench — office held for life — appoiuted by the ex- dynasty for their services in sentencing to Lambeesa and Cayenne the men who took up arms against the Coup d'Etat, in defence of the law, did not call on M. Thiers — a modesty hardly expected, and hence the more welcome. The Boulevard fair is over ; the shanties are being removed ; the tenants during their week of occupancy did a very fair business rin knick-knacks. There was great liberality in presenting etrennes or New Tear's gifts ; and on the whole, the obsequies .of 1871 were conducted with gaiety. This time last year, a dozen of potatoes and a morsel of cheese composed [ a royal present ; a sausage of dog's flesh tied with ribbon favors w is a donation to |be remembered ; and a few rat's thighs in silver paper a benefit not to be forgotten. The authorities having put down the sale of portraits in mourning of those Communists, lost to sight, though to memory dear, political ingenuity has devised canes, with gutta-percha heads in the likeness of the fallen brave. The doctors now prescribe horse-flesh soup — all fat removed — for consumptive patients, and " perfect cures " are reported. It was the siege suggested this specific. A great many people, anything at all but badly-off, thrive remarkably well on the meat in question, though ia sound health. In France the rule of the Post-office is, to deliver a registered letter only to the person to whom it is addressed, and on signing a receipt. A postman had such a letter for a married lady, who not being at home, be declined to give it to her husband. The latter insisted as it was from his wife's paramour, and as husband, he legally claimed it, and secured it by knocking down the postman. The Tribunal decided the husband was right — he produced the letter confirming his suspicions — that the post officials ought not to lend themselves to aid adulterous correspondence, must pay damages and costs, and that a husband has the right to claim his wife's correspondence. During the last days of the first' siege a sailor found climbing on the walls of a powder-but a large snail. He picked it off, presented it to his lieutenant, who in turn made a gift of it to the commander. The latter sent for the cook, told him to have it prepared for the admiral, who was to dine with him that day. The cook " inclined," and ran off to extinguish the last candle that remained, to save it to do duty as butter in dressing the windfall. A provincial journal describes the Prince Eoyal of Prussia as a combination of Lucifer and Apollo — a Louis XIV. rectified, more of a catholic than a protestant, with a leaning to chants, perfumes, odors, and pomps. After the dog-and-rat battles, nothing more natural than cock fights ; a journal reports one of these with all the solemnity and importance as if it were a race for the Grand Prix of Paris. There is an exhibition of all the materials employed in writing since the days of Cadmus now being held, the proceeds to be applied to the relief of the victims of war. It is very interesting to trace back the history of the " grey goose quill." A newspaper in Paris announces the death of " Citizeness Kenat, aged fifteen months " — Friends will please accept this notice. A great many sons of the aristocracy are studying for the priesthood, and marriages never were more rife. There seems to be a rush to enter Holy and Matrimonial orders. Hasheesh-eating is on the increase in Paris ; it is the substitute for " big drinks" and " spots " of brandy in other civilised cities. But its effects are more immediately lamentable. Kobberies still are the order of the day ; some thieves throw a cloth on the head of a citizen, and relieve him of all valuables in a few seconds ; other robbers assume the dress of masqueraders, and reap abundant harvests.