The Express.
London, England, 1851-12-08 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, MONDAY EVENING, DECEMBER 8, 1851.

I take advantage of the tranquillity of desolation
which now momentarily prevails to offer one or two
remarks upon the coup.creltat generally. I cannot
follow in the wake of those who either admire the
dexterity, extol the daring, admit the necessity, or
expect the ultimate success, of the act of Louis Na-
polcon. I am deliberately of opinion that among the
deeds of bold bad men, history does not record a
more flagrant breach of a high and sacred trust, a
more foul perjury, a more wanton aggression upon
Ithe liberties of a people, than the coup trawl of the
12nd of December. I will state fairly the excuses
that are made for him. I hear it said that he was
driven to this act in self-defence; that the As-
sembly was plotting against him; that it was
intended to depose him and send him to Vincennes,
and to erect the Assembly into a convention. It is
farther said in his favour that the immense majority
d the French nation is devoted to him, that the
Assembly stood between the people and universal
suffrage, and that there was no other way to restore
this their right to them, but the violent way which
the president has taken.
The admixture of truth contained in this defence
renders it sufficiently plausible to deserve an aliswer.
True it is that it has been lately in contemplation to
send him to Vincennes. But why? Because the
whole course of his government has been one
continued conspiracy for his own personal ag-
grandisement, and against all laws, all institutions,
all parties, and all men that stood in the way of that
one ruling object of his life. It is utterly untrue
that it was ever contemplated by any fraction of the
Assembly to molest him in the constitutional exer-
cise of his powers, or to shorten by one hour the du-
ration assigned to them by the constitution, before it
became demonstrably evident that he was abusing
those powers to prepare the way ter the crime which
he has now accomplished. I have no sympathy with
the Assembly as a body. The majority have
met with a just retribution for the counte-
nance they long gave to the crooked policy
of the man who is now their master. But
to talk of a plot is ridiculous. Fancy
Cavaignac, the stern, honest republican; Changar-
nier, the legitimist; and Crionieux, the Montagnard,
laying their heads together for any common purpose
whatsoever. And yet these men, and upwards of
100 representatives of the people, were dragged
from their bed by armed praetorians in the night of
the 2nd of December, and consigned to a gaol. The
plain truth is, that the President arrested every
general and statesman from whose courage, honesty,
or influence he feared opposition ; and the plot is a
miserable pretext. He now calls himself the pro-
tector of the republic, when it is notorious
that he has ever studiously avoided the mere
mention of the word republic until the other
day when, in contemplation of what has since
cui-red, he used it in his speech at the Cirque to gain
popularity. Ile claims credit as the restorer of uni-
versal suffrage, as if he had not been the willing ac-
complice of the Assembly in destroying it. When
the law of May destroying universal suffrage was
passed, he consigned journalist after journalist to a
dungeon for saying that that law was a breach of
the constitution ; and now he would throw the whole
blame of that law upon the Assembly. And what
is the universal suffrage. now pretended to be re-
stored ? It is the privilege to answer at the
point of the bayonet the leading question, whether
the people will accept the chimerical term of govern-
ment which he designs to propose to them. The
dictator will have this question answered first, and
if contrary, under the eircumseances, to all reasonable
expectation, the answer should be no, the subse-
quent question of what is then to be done remains
entirely in his own breast. True, he says he will
in that case resign his powers into the hands of the
Assembly, but when or how that Assembly is to be
elected, is not yet in the programme. What security
is there that the man who has broken his oath will
keep his word? His emissaries in the press have for
weeks past been writing against parliaments
alto ether. A man must be simple indeed to fancy
that now that he has usurped all the powers of the
state, he would allow one to be elected that would
be likely to thwart him.
In a country where there is so little sense of jus-
tice, so little appreciation of true liberty, so little
steadiness of purpose, and so little moral courage, as
in France, it is quite possible that the bold scheme of
the President may for a time appear to have suc-
ceeded. Ile has filled all the offices in the country.,
civil and military, with his creatures; he has impri-
maned the flower of the genersl4 of the Frenot
army. With a cunning equal to his audacitys
ha has placed the nation in such a dilemma
I that not to vote for him may be to vote for civil war,
and a civil war in which half a dozen conflicting
larmies may be in the field. With such a prospect
I before them, and when no man throughout France
dares, at the risk of his life, to canvass for an oppo-
sition vote, it will be no wonder if the natural tiim-
Idity and uncertainty of a divided people taken by
Isurprise should lead them to do as their master tells
them. But when he shall have succeeded, who
can suppose that France will have made one step
towards a settled or a tolerable government. Thirty
millions of the most enlightened people in the world
cannot for ever be kept down by the terror of the
sword; and it requires but a small glimmering, in-
deed, of prophetic vision to foresee that the govern-
ment which Louis Napoleon proposes to inaugurate
must inevitably perish by the violent means to which
it will have owed its birth.

in their neighbourhood, that no serious resistance
had been made at either. It was highly satisfactory
.to observe that the people had all returned to
their work in this quarter; all the shops were
open, the traffic animated, and the passers by
cheerful. I now returned, and passed by
the Place den Vosges into the Rue Rambuteau,
where I heard the severest fighting had taken place,
and where the barricades were strongest. There
could not be a greater contrast to the brisk Faubourg
ISt. Antoine, with its shining furniture-shops. The
streets were thronged with a moody population, that
slouched along under the smashed windows of ball-
sserrad houses. At all cross streets the corner
buildings were occupied from shop to garret with
soldiers, who stood at the open windows musket in
band. Strong pickets of infantry were drawn up along
the pavement at frequent intervals. Where the
Rue Rambuteau crosses the Rue St. Martin, there
were traces of a strong barricade. Generally all
down this street the windows are completely
smashed. Every tenth house seems full of troops.
The whole of the Rue St. Martin from this point to
the Porte St. Martin is unpaved, and several strong
barricades crossed the street. No circulation for
carriages was of course possible. I penetrated
into a labyrinth of narrow streets in the
space enclosed between the Boulevard, the Rue
Martin, and the Rue Rambuteau, and found
them all defended with barricades, and the houses
occupied by soldiers. Here evidently were the
head-quarters of the insurgents. Their plan
was to secure a retreat from the barricade of
the Porte St. Denis, behind those of the Porte
St. Martin and the Rue St. Martin on the one
hand and the Rue Rambutean on the other, and thus
to envelope the troops in the narrow streets, from
which they might pour a murderous fire on their
heads. No doubt, if the insurgents had been nume-
' sous and resolute, great carnage would have
resulted from the completion of this plan.
But it is evident that their resistance was
by no means of a serious character at any point.
This is proved to demonstration by the trifling loss
of the military. I met strong bodies of infantry
pouring up the Rue St. Martin, and altogether there
was a feeling that the ashes of the insurrection were
still smouldering here, and might at any moment
blaze out again. This was the only spot in a wide
ramble which presented a sinister aspect. The
Tlarter is occupied by ingenious workmen
in bronze, ormolu, watches, jewellery, and
various other departments, but is essentially
a colony of handicraft workers, who swarm thick to-
gether in small streets of squalid lodgings, with nu-
merous wine-shops. As I returned along the Boule-
vards I observed the work of reparation going on
busily in all quarters. Endless glaziers were rig-
ging the windows with fresh panes, the trowel was
busy everywhere stopping the rents of ruin. Al-
reatly half the gap made by cannon in the
house next to D'Aubusson's manufactory was
bricked up. Meanwhile, at the Hotel Dieu and
other hospitals lay perforated frames of flesh and
blood, alas: not so easily mended. " Dire was
the tossing, deep the groans." I am happy, how-
ever, to state upon authority that the total number
of wounded brought to the WWI Dieu and the
Chariti, up to last night was only 30. Generally I
am disposed to think that the reported slaughter has
been greatly exaggerated ; and the first estimate of
1 300 killed which I sent seems, from all I have since
been able to learn, certainly not under the mark, al-
though there arc not wanting persons who report the
casualties at upwards of 1,000.
Passing along the western Boulevards on my re-
turn I met a battalion of Chasseurs de Vincennes,
followed by a battery of 12-pounders, probably on
their way to the quarter of St. Martin. The Place
de la Concorde and Champs-Elysees seemed quite
deserted. On the steps of the Legislative Palace the
guard seemed thinner than during the ordinary
sitting of the Assembly. About Fnincones Circus,
which is now used to house the troops, an ani-
mated scene presented itself, the soldiers being busily
engaged in preparing their ,rd-ailleit, and kindling
Ares in holes dug in the ground. Horses, baggage-
sns, all around under the leafless trees, added
to picturesque appearance of the camp. There
were fewer soldiers than even in ordinary times
about the Elysee. But the neighbourhood of the
Circus camp supplied the want of a strong post on
the actual spot.
I hear from a good private source that a good
many eminent conservatives, although far from
approving all that Louis Napoleon has done,
are still of opinion that his coup d1,,/at
has saved France from the socialists. Certainly
there is a fearfully strong adhesion to Louis Napo-
leon in certain classes, who look to a military dicta-
torship, ruthlessly carried out, as the only remedy
far the distracted state of France. lam sorry to
add that these classes, utterly indifferent to all but
what they call order, form an immense portion of the
population. Press and parliament they dread and
loathe almost as much as they do the subversive acts
and doctrines of socialism. this will in some mea-
sure account for the astounding rise of the funds.
There was a rise to-day of 31 francs in the Five per
Cent. Rentes.
I call your attention to a circular of the Prefect of
Police, which threatens to prove the source of endless
vexations. It calls on the commissaries of police to
institute the most rigorous searches in all quarters
after papers. The following circular has been sent
by the Prefect of Police to the different police com-
missioners:
Paris, Dec. 5.
Mr. Commissary,—The insurrection is put down. Oar
enemies arc henceforth powerless to re-erect the eareisedes.
Nevertheless the excitation to revolt continuos. Arafat
demagogues go about from group to group to provoke agi-
tation and to spread false news. The ex-Montsgnard re-
presentatives arc taming to account the last vestiges of
their former prestige, to lead the people to follow them.
Furnished hotels, cafe's, and suspicious houses, become the
receptacles of conspirators and insurgents. Arms, munitions
of war, and incendiary writings, are concealed in them.
All these causes of agitation must be suppressed by prac-
tising the system of arrests, and the searching of houses
upon a vast scale. These are the means of restoring to the
city that tranquillity which a handful of factious persons
seek to rob her of. You have all under my own eyes done
your duty with so much courage and devom, that I donut
doubt but that in order to fulfil this new and important mis-
sion, you will find in yourselves all the *llama gad enery
which circumstances command.—The Prefect of Police, DE
MAtrAS.
Dr. Hoffe, an English dentist, residing at the Cite
Yinde, was among the persons killed on the Boule-
vards on Thursday, who were mere spectators of the
operations. His body is said to be pierced with
twelve balls.
Disturbances of a very serious character have
broken out again in the Cher. The valley of the
Loire seems destined to give the government some
trouble yet.
A friend just come from England tells me that in
the train from London to Dover he met Louis Blanc ;
but that he was detected at Dover, and prevented
from embarking for France, by the noise attending
this discovery. It is believed, however, that he went
to Ostend.
A government organ states, this evening, that
some attempts at insurrection were made at Lyons,
in the hulsourgs Vaise and de la Guillotiere, but
without any result. At Auzin some workmen
threatened a strike, but were deterred by a simple
demonstration of the authorities.
M. Madier do Montjau's wounds are said to be
going on well. The representatives, MM. Etienne
Chegaray and Talhouet are also much better. They
received their wounds on the 2d December, at the
moment when the representatives quitted the house
of M. Daru to enter the Assembly. A battalion of
Vincennes Riflemen charged upon the representa
tires who endeavoured to force open the doors of the
Assembly, and wounded some of them with their
bayonets. In attempting to enter the Assembly by
the side door in the Rue de Bourgogne, M. de ker-
drel narrowly escaped a bayonet thrust. Admiral
Leine gallantly laid hold of the musket which was
directed against M. lierdrel. In thus protecting his
brother representative, the admiral's arm was caught
in shutting the door, and it was some time before his
friends could release him.
SATCBMAT, 4 o'cuiett.
It were idle to deny that up to the present mo-
ment the army of Paris, to all outward appearance,
adheres to Louis Napoleon. The reign of military
terror is for the moment triumphant. Assuming for
a moment the justice of the cause for which they
have been fighting, the conduct of the troops must
be admitted to have been admirable. It seems to be
the general opinion that the merciless and indiscri-
minate way in which they fired on Thursday whom-
ever they met with the slightest show of resistance
has proved them to be thoroughly in earnest,
and by destroying all hope of successful opposition
has spared the necessity of more frightful carnage.

SUNDAY MORNING.
The Mionitear contains the following semiofficial
notice:—

Two journals of London—the 3fonsing Chronicle and the
Globe copying the former—publish, concerning the acts of
the government and the deeds of the 2nd December, the
most odious and absurd calumnies. We are authorised to
give these journals, whose introduction into France is for-
bidden, the most complete contradiction. We learn that
the correspondents have received to-day the order to quit
France.