The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1871-06-03 00:00:00

A GERMAN VIEW OF THE PARIS
REVOLUTION.

A cry of horror at the deeds of the Paris mob echoes
through Germany (writes The Times' Berlin corre-
spondent). The papers of all parties are unanimous in
denouncing the crimes committed by an infuriated
populace. Enter whatever company you may, you
hear the same condemnation in unmitigated teems.
That a people should thus turn against themselves and
destroy the memorials of what they have so long
prized as the most glerioue illustrations of their history
is All act of which not even the French, with all their
excitable and perverse caprice, were thought capable.
That the scum of the metropolitan suburbs should by a
million of reep.ctable inhabitanta be suffered to destroy
invaluable worka of art and revel in blowing up
churches and palaces is an event which even the con.
stitutional timidity f the bourgeois and the traditional
ruffianism of the barricade.men had not prepared us
for. All these features are duly pointed out in our
Press, and there is not • paper but endeavours to draw
amoral from the lesson. . . . Few pops re—and thia is
a characteristic symptom—care to hint at what has
born the primary agency in setting Paris on fire. The
dread word Socialism is scarcely so much as mentioned
by the Press. Feeble and spasmodic as the Commu-
nistic doctrine haa hitherto been in Germany, it is
enough of a bugbear to prevent editors from point.
log to it as the origin of this horrid catastrophe.
With only an exception here and there, our jouroale
are fain to ascribe the conflagration of Paris t
vices suppoesed to be pecniitar to the French. . . If
the journals passed over the fact that the Paris
Communista, baring failed to se-core aseendency, have
taken to burning the property in which they cannot
hope to share, the Berlin professors of the eocialistic
creed were determined to publish the naked truth in
the most effectual way. While Paris was blazing
away, one of the four Communist members whom
manhood suffrage has inflicted upon the German Par.
lisment rose in a public sitting of the house to justify
the act. This extraordinary scene, in it, way ecarcely
less notable than the Paris crisis itself, occurred in a
sitting held the day before yesterday. Availing himself
of an opuortunity offered by the Aleace.Lorraine debit. e,
the well-known Herr Bebtl—a turner by trade and
member for a weaver district in Saxony—got up to tell
the legislators of Germany what he thought of it all.
Hie words deserve to be quoted :

" The aim of the ParM Commune is neither an im-
possible nor a venation@ one, as it has been erroneously
called by a precious speaker. On the contrary, in all
Europe those classes not dead to all feeling of liberty
and independence look upon Paris as their staff of hope.
Nerer in tad whether the insurrection is suppressed, what
i.t doing now at the French oapital is only an outpost
skirmish, which will be followed up some day by a great
European battle. War to the palaees, peace to ths cot-
tages, and death to luxuriates idleness is and will crer be
the watchword of the Pruidariate in all parts of the
icorld."
These sentiments elicited to severer remonstrance
than laughter accompanied by cries of derision. The
House looked upon tea socialistic declaration of was as
mere bravado, and Prince Bismarck, who was the next
speaker, expressly observed that there was not tbe
slightest occasion for a reply.