Extracts from Our Paris Letter.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4470, 3 May 1883, Page 2

Extracts from Our Paris Letter.

One milliard and a half of francs, sixty million sterling, must be added by a loan, to the national debt to balance the budget. Since 1869 the annual expenditure of France has increased 80 per cent.—the war of 1870 cost 12 milliards ; since 1876, the expenditure has increased by half a million. The future of France depends on her trade. At present a restriction rather than a stagnation of business exists. There is no actual commercial crisis among the working classes. Since deposits attbe Savings' Banks have increased, and with' drawals diminished. The money market is stiff, not that money is less abundant, but that the wants for money are more imperious, and Capital is timid, frightened by political spectres of all colors. Raw materials are too heavily taxed in France; labour is too dear, so that Monsieur is iv many cases beaten out of his own market by the foreigner. In the building trade of Paris, now undergoing a I check, contractors have been forced to import ready made'window and door wood-work from Norway, and iron requisites from Germany. Strikes ran up wages, and workmen left the provinces, to the injury of agriculture, for the 25 per cent higher wages of the capital. This explains why the artizans of Paris have doubled in number since 1876, and what a dangerous element that now is, when house-building is restricted. This restriction is due to the rush to invest capital in mansions ; money could be borrowed at 4 and 4§ per cent, and so invested, yielded 6 per cent. But now there are more new houses than tenants, for the rents are too high, owing to the luxuriant character of the construction; a fall of from 50 to 75 per cent in rent is inevitable. Now it is just the coming to the front of these home questions that disturb the Paddy-go-easy millions in France. We have the question of taxation in a budget that has drifted into disorganisation, and of labor in the general sense of production in the most unsettled of conditions. The annual budgetary expenditure of France is double that of England. Up to the present it has been balanced, not by normal receipts, but by expedients. The nation has been living on borrowed money, robbing Peter to pay Paul. Leon Say let the cat out of the bag, and his sublime warning happily has told. The truth is, France has been voting millions upon millions for scheme"* of public works of mixed utility; for scholastic institutions, whose want no one questions, but whose immediate realisation commands prudence ; for new officials whose services few can discover to be necessary, and that each fresh ministry, in order to provide for its troops of hangers»on, has to pension off the nominees of predecessors. To these categories must be added the ugly rush of deputies to obtain sub- J sidies for local schemes in the interest of ; their re-election. It is no wonder then that France at last begins to feel she is no i longer rich enough to pay for her glories, and that the frugality and thrift of her hard working, sober inhabitants has a limit. Palm Sunday was marked by very crowded attendance at the churches, and this is more gratifying aa it was the occasion of the first taste of spring weather. The severeties of Holy Week are apparent. I Fasting is more extensively observed, and I the Free Thinkers offend less by ostentaiiously parading their bills of fare. Easter has come upon us so early as to resemble a surprise. It will be necessary to go back to 1742 to find a fete .equal in date, and that there is no " oldest inhabitant" to remember. However, "Old Parr "died aged 141 years, bequeathing only his pills.