The Express.
London, England, 1863-07-29 00:00:00

EXPRFSS FROM PARIS.

(ROE OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

PARIS, TUESDAY EVENIN.

I have good reason to believe that the Emperor,
in spite of much pressing &hi to to the contrary,
has made up his mind not to make war alone.
The journals seem to have no other orders at this
moment than to mystify and mark time. The
Monihtur now publishes Lord Napier's despatch,
rl and the Temps draws the inference that thin otep
having been taken, after time for reflection, ,hews
that the French government adopts his observations
to Prince Gortchakoff. I think the argument in-
conclusive, because the Mooiteur continues to sap.
press the despatch of its own ambassador, the Duke
de Montebello, which was no doubt written it. the
same tone as that of Lord Napier. The tardy pub.
lication of the English despatch signifies in my mind
nothing more than that it is absurd to pretend to
keep back a thing which all the world knows.
The Bourse opened with great buoyancy, and
Reute recovered 20c. from the lowest point of
Saturday, but it ultimately loot all the advantage,
and closed at 691 r. 95c., with a fall of 6c. Mobilier
rose 10fr., and railways were generally higher.
Lyons rose 121 r. 50c., and Northern sfr.
An entirely new point of law has just been
decided in an action between one of the most dis.

tinguished members of the old French aristocracy
and a prince of the mouey-ocracy of the empire.
The plaintiff is the Duchess do la Rochefoucauld-
Doudeauville, a name redolent of the fine Nov
of the Faubourg St. Germain, and the defendants
are the brothers Pereire, the respectable mil/Mu/wire
Jews who founded the Credit Mobilier. The sub-
ject in dispute is so ethereal, so remote from the
ordinary questions of pounds, dollars, or francs,
which are the primula mobile of most modern law-
suits, as to remind one of the solemn Roman plead-
ings upon the issue whether a citizen was entitled' o
a statue, or of the Greek play in which the interest
turns upon a question of funereal rites. The
orations pronounced by M. Jules Favre on the one
aide, and M. Mathieu on the other, were not un-
worthy of ancient prototypes. The facts were
briefly these. In 1855 the Duchess de la Roche-
foncauld-Doudeauville purchased the chateau of
Arniainvilliers for the sum of 500,000 fr. This
chateau, a very ancient one, belonged formerly to
the Orleans family, and Louis Charles de Bourbon,
Count d'En and Duke d'Aumale, added to his
other titles that of Count d'Armainvilliers from
this property. The name of Amalie/Wier, as
belonging to the house now the property of the
duchess, is not disputed, and rests upon usage
beyond all doubt or question. This part of the
Orleans property was, however, confiscated in the
great revolution of 1793, and it passed
through the bands of several purchasers
before coming to her. But a second confiscation,
quite immaterial to the point of law, but adding
to the curiosity of the case and affording materiels
for satirical remarks by counsel, occurred with
regard to a great portion of the old Armainvilliers
manor, of which the chateau was only a part.
A large tract of forest and amble land, part of
the Armainvilliers estate, belonged to the Orleans
family in 1852, and formed part of their large
possessions which were then confiscated by Louis
Napoleon. The Messrs. Pereire were the pur-
chasers of this outlying part of the Armainvilliers
domain, and as their counsel, M. Mathieu, said,
with an apology for using a purse-proud argu-
ment, it consisted of 3,s63acres, coating 1,428,620 ft,
whereas the Duchess de la Rochefoucauld's chateau
and appurtenances covered only 513 acres, and was
worth but 475,000 fr. The Messrs. Pereire have
built upon their newly purchased land a princely
palace, in which golds marble, precious woods, and
or-mole are displayed with all the advantages that
the best Paris workmen, paid by an unfathomable
purse, are capable of giving. To thin incomparable
dwelling it has pleased the Messrs. Pereire to give
the name of " the Chateau d'Armainvilliers." To
this appellation the Duchess de la Rochefoucauld-
Doudeauville objects, and she brings her action—
an unprecedented action, as her counsel M. Jules
Favre admits—for an injunction to prevent
the Messrs. Pereire from using the old name
of Armainvilliers as applicable to their new
house. K Jules Favre said that although the
Messrs. Pereire, in buying au estate now that they
were rich, were only illustrating the words of the
poet—

Status ills qui procul oegotus
Ut prima gems mortaliwn.
Patents run bobus °tercet suis,

they could not adopt the addition,

Solaw omoi fmnore

M. Mathieu, for the Messrs. Pereire, made a long
speech, the main argument of which was that any-
body building a house on any part of the land
known as the Armainvilliera estate, had a right to
call his house the Chateau d'Armainvilliers. Ac-
cording to his reasoning, if Baron Rothschild
were to become the purchaser of a corner of
Windsor forest and build a house upon it,
he would have a right to call it Windsor Castle.
As I remember, there would be no law in England
except the great law of ridicule and the greater
one of right feeling to prevent him from doing se.
The Paris court, however, has decided that the law
of France meets such a case as this. It holds that
the right to the name of an ancient residence is a
property of which the courts will take notice, and
it issues an injunction restraining the Mews.
Pereire from calling their new country house the
Chateau d'Armainvilliers. The defendants will
therefore be obliged to burn all the letter paper
which they have had manufactured with the words
"Chateau d'ArmainTilliers" in the corner.