The Express.
London, England, 1853-10-22 00:00:00

FRANCE.

PARIS, FRIDAY EVINING.
The Presse his received a letter from Besika, dated
Oot. 7, which says :—" This morning four French
vessels left for Constantinople, being sent for by the
Sultan. The rumour runs in the fleets that we
shall all go to Constantinople the day after to-
morrow, and that the four vessels are but our ad-
vanced guard. Certain preparations made this morn-
ing in pursuance of orders from the two admirals
appear to confirm this rumour."
M. Emile do Girardin, of the Freese, anti M.
Hawn, of the Stick, formerly vice-president of the
Constituent Assembly, were summoned to the Mi-
nistry of the Interior the day before yesterday, to be
admonished in consequence of the remarks made ini
their journals upon the arrest of M. Goudchaux.
The remarks themselves were so innocent as to af-
ford
no plausible handle for a warning. The Sleds
merely stated the uudeniable truth that among
M. Goudchaux's papers no more seditious docu-
ments were found than receipts for subscrip-
tions, which it is notorious M. Goudchaux has
been in the habit of forwarding to the
unfortunate republican exiles, to enable them to
buy not gunpowper, but bread. M. Emile de
Girardin simply inquired whether that union of
public security with individual liberty which was
found so practicable in England and the United
States was incompatible with the nature of French.
men. The director of the press at the ministry of
the Interior told M. Ravin that he was expected to
insert in the Sleek the paragraph from the Paine,
narrating the arrest of M. Delescluse, and imputing
to M. Goudchaux a participation in his treasonable
projects. It is difficult for a French journalist to
reason with a power that can reply to the most can-
vincing argument by suppression. M. Ravin reluc-
tantly consented to insert the paragraph, but by a sort
of compromise obtained permission to print it among
the "faits divers," and not in a conspicuous position.
M. do Girardin, however, more courageous, refused
to insert it at all, and he has not done so. It was
represented to him that it was wrong to insinuate
that the French government was in the habit of
making arbitrary arrests, and an attempt was made
to justify the arrest of M. Goudchaux, as warranted
by serious grounds for suspicion. To this M. de
Girardin bluntly replied by a simple reference to facts,
and spoke of M. Myot, the ex-representative, Dr.
Vannean, and many other well-known persons now
languishing in prison or in a penal settlement who
have never had any sort of trial. There is not the
least foundation for the buil:nation of the Petrie that
M. Goudchaux is a party to any plot. The statement
that he was released " provisionally" on the ground
of ill-health is an untruth put forward to mislead the
public into the belief that there were serious grounds
for the arrest of a person of his open character and
high respectability. M. Goudchaux is in excellent
health, and did not understand when be was dis-
charged from custody that asv accusation was hang-
ing over his head. The police searched his house
in the most minute and offensive manner. At four
o'clock in the morning, they took his little child of
six years old out of her bed, and ripped open her
mattress. With all their pains, the only paper they
found with any semblance of a political meaning,
beyond the receipts for subscriptions for the refugees,
was one bearing the signature of Ledru Rollin sent
to M. Goudchaux for a collector of autographs, who
wished to have the signatures of the mem-
bers of the provisional government. The 140
receipts seized in this brutal manner are kept by the
police in order that the subscribers may be marked
I for the next list of proscription. This is all very
I serious, for one sees no prospect of an end to the state
of siege ssyyss of government.
The publication of the PAare de is Loire of Nantes,
of which M. Mangin and one of his sons are pro-
prietors, has been suspended since the arrest of those
gentlemen. Amongst the domiciliary visits at
Dilates was one to the residence of M. 'lecher, who
was commissary under the provisional government
for the five departments of the west. It appears
by a letter written to the Press. by M. Mangin the
elder, that he and his son have been released. M.
Guinan, a physician, and M. Foucher, the keeper of
the Café des Colognes, who were arrested at the
same time, have also been set at liberty; but M.
David, a merchant, of Nantes, M. Chevereas, a
formai to ens of the priucipal tailors of the town,
and a working printer, named Maseelin, are still in
custody.
The Indepenionee Beige was seized at the post-
'office this morning, is consequence, as it is supposed,
of its containing some details relative to the arrests.
The Union says :—lt is positively stated that at
Epernay two agents of M. Ledru Rollin were ar-
rested, having in their poeseesion some revolutionary
manifestoes.

Dr. Watesu, of Lille, one of the principal per-
sonages accused of a participation in the Opera
Comique plot, has just been released after three
months detention at Mazes, it being found impossible
to sustain the indictment against him.
The following paragraph in the Union is a con-
firmation of an important piece of intehigence which
I communicated some days since: —" The Impartial
de la ilearelte announced yesterday that the report
of the organisation of a military camp at Metz to be
commanded by Prince Napoleon was generally cre-