The Express.
London, England, 1866-02-02 00:00:00

EXPRESS FROM PARIS.

(IXON OCR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)
PARIS, TEMUIDLT Rvartia.
_

The semi-official prints try every day to explain
away the promise in the Emperor's speech to eva-
cuate Mexioo. They take it for granted that the
French troops will not retire until Maximilian's
throne is altogether consolidated, which is tanta-
mount to saying they may remain there for the
next twenty years, at least. This is certainly not
what the public understood by the " frankness" of
the Emperor's declarations, although a suspicious
American tells me that his words, if well weighed,
do not amount to more than this, " I said last
year I was coming away, and now I say I am
going to come away." Of course nobody can tell
what the Emperor, of all men, may be really
going to do, but this much is clear, that
his language in Jan. 22 imported a decision to
evacuate Mexico forthwith. A semi-monthly pub-
lication, the Berne Contemporaine, written gene-
rally under government auspices, makes the amus-
ing confession that France has got herself into the
present " fix " by not having bad the courage to
take part with the Confederate States, when all her
sympathies were with the South, and she hoped
the South would win ! This review says :
When the Mexican expedition was undertaken the great
American republic was a prey to an intestine conflict,
which, it was hoped, would result otherwise than it has
done. We were astonished at the time that France,
which had pledged her flag and risked large sums of
mousy in Mexico, did not recognise the government of
Richmond. It was a mistake not to have done so. The
only thing now to be done is to moil, the error, and get
out of the business in the best way we can.
The candour of this most true statement is ad-
mirable. We have here the whole question in a
nut-shell, and M. Drouyn de Lhuys' elaborate
despatches, trying to prove that French policy
as to Mexico has never varied, are but
barren scholastic ezercitations. The simple
fact is that the wise Napoleon HI. did make
a terrible miscalculation for himself. His
wish being all the while father to the thought he
did think the South was going to accomplish its
secession, and on that assumption his Mexican
scheme was very artfully planned. The South has
lost, is utterly extinguished, not only as a belli-
gerent, but as a political entirety, and now the
Mexican scheme has to be given up. That is the
long and the short of it. But of course this plain
truth cannot appear plainly in diplomatic de-
spatches. A great power like France must be let
down easy.
The Indlipendance Beige after having been, no-
body knows why, interdicted in France since De-
cember 24, is now (Feb. 1) again permitted, nobody
knows why, to circulate. The first number, that
of Jan. 31, is on Its good behavionr. Ido not find
a word in it at which the French government could
possibly take umbrage. Perhaps, however, what I
have seen is an expurgated edition ad ustsm
Prancorum, such as the /ndipendance was frequently

in the habit of publishing, and the editor hu
weeded out obnoxious matter more scrupulously
than formerly. You in England get the true
Brussels edition.
The Court of Rome is said to have in its own
opinion four great subjects for rejoicing at the
present moment :—l. The number of Jesuits is
daily increasing—[See statistics published by the
Monde] ; 2. The pontifical government has at

last effected a loan ; 3. Pius IX.. and all the
Cardinals regard as an eminently favourable'
symptom the way is which Napoleon 111. and
Victor Emmanuel have both appealed to the
" providential " government of the world ; and
4. The Holy Father has obtained from the French
government all possible guarantees for the main-
tenance of temporal power.
In consequence of the Countess Walewska being
in mourning for a near relation there will be no balls
this year at the palace of the Corps Legislatif. But
there are " receptions" every week so brilliant that
people only acquainted with the sad reality, and
not the etiquette of sacred grief, must fail to un-
derstand the nuance. Strauss's orchestra every week
encourages frolicsome steps round the promenade
concert-room, and it is announced that at the Coun-
tess Walewska'e carnival promenade concert ladies
must appear either in masks or dominoes.
The Bourse was on the whole very dull, although
Rents closed with the slight rise of 2}c. Mobilier
fell 12fr. 50c. The effect of the announced project
of doubling the capital, being coupled with condi-
tions of stricter surveillance and frequent publicity
of accounts, which many think not congenial to the
operations of that gigantic company, is not favour-
able. Italian rose Isc. ; Mexican rose