The Express.
London, England, 1867-05-10 00:00:00

A FRENCH CRITIC UPON THE ENGLISH IN
PAM&

A new Paris Guide, just published at the French
capital, has an article headed " La Colonic' Anglaise," by
John Lemoine. He tells us that while in Paris there
are Englishmen and Englishwomen there is no English
society properly so called, as the English never care for
their countrymen abroad. The foreigner is utilised in-
stead. An Englishman is in himself England. He
carries not only his nation about with him but
his church, and travels over the earth with his
Bible. In England society is scored like a music book.
" It has a severe hierarchy in which the merest idiot lord
passes before a man of genius who has no title." There is
no possible comparison between a Frenchman in London
and an Englishman is Paris, or at least the comparison is
only an antithesis. If a Frenchman pays a pairing visit to
England be is received with unlimited hospitality ; if be
shows a wish to take root, the soil is refused to him, and
society shuts itself up and intrenches itself, as if there
were an invasion of the territory. True, it is not the
cream of French society that is seen in England. The
reason is very simple ; a Frenchman never thinks of going
to England for pleasure ; he does not reside in it by choice,
and his only wish is to quit it as soon as possible. The
mere pressure of the social atmosphere in England would
stifle a Frenchnuin.

In the indulgences of the table M. Lemoine allows that
the English are improved, and that they do not drink to
excess as formerly, when after soaking for hours they
finished by remaining under the table. Now, when the
ladies retire after dinner, which suits them as well as the
men, they content themselves with pushing round the
claret for b) minutes or so. The English are really gay
alter their manner ; their piety is expansive and noisy, but
they are not gay with everyone, nor at the outset. They
must thaw ; they are like Bordeaux wine, which requires
to be warmed, and which is all the better for being so.
It is certain that the English race is more robust than
others—the women as well as the men. They consume
more and absorb more. " Look," says M. Lemoine,
"how well those pretty Englishwomen, white and red,
bear their sherry and their champagne ! Look at them
going to a pastrycook's in the middle of the day to take
coffee, chocolate, ices, and all sorts of cakes and sand-
wiches. What an astonishing quantity of little pies they
contain ! It is pleasant to behold, particularly when one
knows that such an appetite is no bar to sentiment."
It is in ch.uch that English society in Paris is seen col-
lectively :
" On Sunday if you pass along the Faubourg St. Honore
about 2 o'clock, you fall in with a procession of Englishmen
and Englishwomen issuing from the Rue d'Aguesseau, their
books in their hands, and with their Sunday air. We say
church—we should rather say churches—for the English
have in Paris as many chapels as they have religions. There
is the Embassy Chapel for Anglicans of the established
church, an episcopal English chapel, Rue Bayard, a Scotch
presbyterian chapel, two methodist chapels, Rue Roque-
pine, without counting American chapels. This does not
mean that the English in Paris observe the Sunday as
strictly as they are obliged to do at home. Respect for
the Sabbath is a custom they very well know how to lay
aside when they are abroad. We see, indeed, from time to
time, on a Sunday, a person in black, never without an
umbrella appear to forget on a bench in a public garden
little printed sheets left to be picked up by the first passer
by, and which proves to be a dissertation on the observance
of the Sunday. There are perhaps still some hotels spe-
cially set apart for the English, where the Bible Society
contrives to leave in every bedroom a copy of the Scrip-
ture.. This ardour for propagandism is, however, beginning
to cool down, and generally speaking the English are not
among the lasti to enjoy the freedom of Sunday in Paris.
Whoever has seen London on the same day knows the dif-
ference." _ _ _

A Frenchman who has had experience of a Sunday in
England during church time will understand the relief of
an Englishman on finding that all is open to him in Paris,
Versailles, St. Germain, everywhere. There are few Eng-
lish families who will not rooms" on Saturday night,
because pleasure might encroach on Sunday ; but that
which in a sin in gland is not so in France, and Eng.
lishwomen make no scruple of remaining past midnight in
French *Gloat There are many things the English would
not do at home, but which they do abroad without feeling
the slightest shame. Once they crop. the Channel, they
Sing all restraint to the winds. In London they will not
go to the opera but in a black dress ; in Paris they go
en wegfice. M. Lemoine says :
" Behold Englishmen on the Boulevards, looking dis-
located, with their peletots from ready-made shops, the
product of the Belle Jardiniere ! Such jackets, such an
appearance, such legs, such beards, and such moustaches !
One of the peculiarities of the Englishman of our dar.4
the resemblance he seeks to give himself to an ape of
species. He is of the past, the Englishman carety
shaved, correctly dressed , antipathetic to anything that
resembled the soldier, and who thought he was not washed
if he had hut one day's beard."
This military fashion dates from the Crimean war, and
it reached perfection with the volunteers. With this
negligent appearance, their aspect like a virgin forest,
those legs of immoderate length made still longer by the
schoolboy jackets, those great arms that push through all
crowds, those capacious stomachs that engulf all sorts
of eatables, Englishmen let loose on Paris look like bar-
barians entering a conquered country. It is impossible to
show more complete contempt for the natives of the
country which they visit. Neither can it be said that in
acting thus at their ease they only act as if they were at
home. No such thing ; they never would think of doing
so at home.

Englishwomen are quite as strange as the men :
' When Paris has not yet produced on them the effect
of the Garden of Acclimatisation, the women seem to be-
long to another species. They are recognisable by their
incredible travesties in dram—bonnets that look like cab-
bage-gardens, assay ace gaudy in colour, impossible crino-
lines, French cashmeres so called because they are worn
only by Englishwomen. None but Englishwomen aro
capable of wearing straw bonnets in January and furs in
July. Look at them as they stride along the Boulevards,
and step out like the Cent Gerdes !"

WEATHER REPORT.-(THIS DAY.)

YLIDAY, MAT 10, I •.Y.