The Express.
London, England, 1852-03-12 00:00:00

FRANCE.

PARIS, TiVIIIDAT
M. Armand Marrast. whose health had been gra-
dually declining since the stroke of apoplexy, which
he suffered in November last, expired yesterday after-
noon. The name of this distinguished journalist has
acquired a place in history by the part which he
took in the administration of his country after the
events of February; and, in proportion to the failure
of the republican experiment, he has been assailed
by the parties who hated and tardily mined the
revolution which they had not the courage to meet
face to face at the hour of its birth. But, not-
withstanding the severity with shish the cha-
racter of Marrast has been judpie ami the ques-
tionable justice with whisk the ifismeafite
charter framed by thenendlimillainitils=
chew, charitable **rub will praise to sinew
ise merits as a publicist, rather than Ys
salts as a functionary, his vigorous articles in the
"Whop and National, rather than his turbulent
irdikion and ostentatious vanitimayor of Paris.
Marmot became inured to the polemics of the
Paris press under Louis P • Philippe,! and was
the most strenuous writer in the journal
which fell most frequently under the frown
of the government and the scourge of the tri-
banal.. When Armand Carrel fell, Armand Marrast
took his post at the head of the National, and con-
tinned to wage, with the indefatigable
.spirit of his
predecessor, a war of extermination against the go-
vernment

Every body knows the conspicuous part played by
the men of the Natioual in the revolution of February.
It was from the office of that journal that
the prootemion. which fanaticised the popu-
lace of Pans, by parading the bodies. of
the workmen shot on the Boulevard des Capucines.
In the famous sitting of the Chamber on the 24th
Marrast turned the scale against the regency pleaded
by Durgin, by opening the doors of the Chamber to
an armed mob. Just before the extinction of the
provisional government there are traces of Maryut
having flattered his ambition with the prospect of
sharing a triumvirate.
The orgies of the ex-editor when exalted to the
dignity of mayor of Paris are fresh in every
recollection, as well as the disputes which he
maintained, as president of the Constituent Amen-
bly, with General Changarnier, then commander-
in-chief of the army of Pans; and it is remarkable
enough that if the principle asserted by Marrast, and
afterwards by his opponent, of the right of the As-
sembly to the direct requisition of troops, had been
maintained, the coup cretat of the 2nd of December
would have been averted. With the dissolution of
the constituent Marrast disappeared ; and; while his
reputation was only shielded from obloquy by retire-
I meat and obscurity, his health sank under a prem.-
tare accumulation of infirmities.

The Illoniteur contains a decree for the formation
of a new street from the Boulevard St. Denis to the
terminus of the Strasbourg Railway. The state is
to furnish the considerable sam of 1,670,000 fr. to-
wards this undertaking, the remaining expenses of
which will have to be defrayed by the municipality
of Paris. Now, if you will consult your map or me-
mory of Paris, you will light on two fine, handsome
streets, close beside each other, both leading directly
up to the terminus of the Strasbourg Railway.
Whence, then, the necessity for a third street ?
This is what everybody to-day is asking, with-
out meeting with a satisfactory reply. The motives
alleged in the preamble of the decree are
absurdly at variance with fact. The chief is,
that the two broad streets of St. Denis and Bt.
Martin are not sufficient for the truffle in that direc-
tion, an allegation contradicted by the daily expe-
rience of persons frequenting those streets at the
most crowded hours. Hence the whole affair is sus-
pected to be a job.
The cessation of the complication with Switzer-
land has been announced rather prematurely in the
Swiss papers. To-day it is stated that this question
has assumed a graver aspect than ever. This is ad-
mitted even by the tuneries of the government.
We read in the Press :
The differences between the Fres& g0•0111111111d and
the Helvetic Confederation are seseetwi to be *ea wad.
If we are to attach faith to the venom, ttra•P=
whisk we have heard, the anestentent bee been e
at lam between Gen. Duller awl a gelid.* peesemp,
net Int =Neter of foreign niltin. Muted seassisisse are
sail le bate been made.

The members et the superior council of public
instrisetian who asses to form part of it in cause-
gauss, et the dares of the 19th instant, are :
JUL Thum Mestandoe, member of the cousistory
of the rehousi church; Bethmont, de Bt. &wean,
Barrisibrlourens, lleugnot, 0 a,
and
M. Persignyhae written a circular to the prefects
to explain die intentions of government in reference
to the decree of Feb. 25 concerning prison labour.
This is one of the few decrees since December 2 of
which it is possible to speak in terms of unqualified
praise. To hold that convicts should be res-
trained from productive labour for fear of
diminishing the gains of the honest artfsan—in
other worth—that criminals should be maintained in
idleness by the labour of the rest of the community,
is a heresy in political economy. Yet it is evident
from the infinite pains which the minister gives
himself to combat this absurd doctrine—one,
by the way, not extinct in England—that
it must be deeply rooted in France. M.
Persigny says that the principle laid down
by a law of January 9, 1849, that the produce
el convict labour should, so far u possible, be con-
sumed by the State, is intended to be maintained.
But those prisoners whose services may not be re-
quired for state purposes are nevertheless to be em-
ployed, and the
.produce of their labour is to be
sold. M. Persigny anticipates and replies to
two objections, which, however, seem to me sub-
stantially to be but one. First it suggested that
convict labour will come into disastrous competition
with free labour ; and secondly, that the low wages
paid to convicts will tend to lower wages generally.
To the first objection he answers that, if the convicts
had sought their bread from work instead of crime,
they would have absorbed a larger part of the whole
labour fund of the country than they can now do,
because it is well ascertained that a free man pro-
duces much more than a prisoner can be made to
produce. With regard to the alleged danger of
an undue depreciation of wages he relies
upon the efficacy of various regulations to
be made. Manufacturers who are to be ad-
mitted to the privilege of employing convicts
in prisons, will pay a fixed premium to the
state, who will in return be entitled to three-tenths
of the wages of the prisoners. A maximum and a
minimum number of the hands to be employed in
each branch of industry, will be settled. No
contract is to be made for supplying any
kind of goods at a lower rice thanone-fifth
less than the ordinary market price, but the contracts
may be for as much more as found practicable. Upon
all these points the prefects are requested to send
their opinion and advice to the minister. In the
meantime, the prefects are urged to explain to
their neighbours the true nature and object of
prison labour, and to dispel the prejudice that
exists against it. The circular obeerves that the
produce of the labour of convicts must ever be a
sanely-appreciable quantity compared with the
mass of production. (if the 17,000 prisoners in tho
Maisons Centrals there are, ho declares, only
12,800 who are employed in work—the others being
sick, or old, or engaged in the service of the gaols ;
and the work dour by those 12,800 is, he adds, only
half of what would be done in the same time by free
workmen.

The Moniteur contsins decrees approving of cer-
tain alterations in the statutes of the " hfelusine,"
maritime insurance company of Paris; the " tiphCre,"