The Sun.
London, England, 1871-01-20 00:00:00

BRITTANY AND THE WAR.

The correspondent of the Telegravk sends the following
from Morlaix, dated January 14 :—Now that the proba-
bilities of the much-debated bombardment are re-
solved into realities, it is here considered high
time that Trochu's redoubtable plan—if he ever
had any—should begin to shew symptoms or develop-
ment. We are daily expecting a real "grand sortie,'
and the Bretons inside the lines of investment
write confidently, and believe in its success. On the
next occasion the number of men to be hurled against the
Prussian entrenchments, they say, will render the assault
at once irresistible and conclusive, so far as cutting a road
through the Prussian lines is concerned. I fear the wish
is father to the thought. To add to all the other
miseries which now afflict the capital, we hear that
cholera has put in a claim for its quota of victims.
The call upon the purses of the peasants since the
opening of the war has been constant ; and now, as a
climax to these demands, M. Gambetta has appealed to
their patriotism to pay in a lump sum the taxes for the
ensuing year, which heretofore have been taken in
monthly instalments. This appeal they intend to ignore, or
else to wait until the invitation assumes another shape,
and comeg in a new decree demanding peremp-
tory payment. " No," they say, "we will not pay
a centime until we are actually compelled, to prose-
cute this savage war only to build up a Republic,"
against which all the peasants are dead set to a man.
In fact, they do not care how soon Paris falls, for
then they believe the bill would be sent in,
and in that case they could estimate the cost
of the present very expensive game. It is
whispered abroad that the Legitimist element,
which has many powerful adherents in Brittany,
is now pulling itself together for the struggle with the
Bonapartists, Orleanists, and Republicans, which is sure
to take place when the war is over. The ancient
noblesse are Bourbonists to the backbone, and all the
young men of this persuasion are now holding co.n-
mands in the different armies fighting for their
country. With them at this moment all politics are
dead ; ► but they will form a very important
part of the programme when Paris falls. For did not
M. Gambetta sound the tocsin the other day in his ,peech
at Bordeaux ? A certain part of it might be interpre-
ted, " We are fighting for our hearths and homes and
the Republic, but before all things the Republic."
The priests are working as hard as they can, and row
in the same boat with the nobles ; and their influence
cannot be lightly esteemed, although they certainly
are not propitiated by M. Gambetta. The other day,
when a zealous and no doubt worthy member of the
priesthood, who had accompanied the army, and shared
its hardships in the pursuit of his vocation amongst the
soldiers and wounded, applied for some little remunera
tion, he was told by the Dictator that his services
had not been requested, and therefore would not be
remunerated.

A telegram from Brussels states that one of the
twin daughters of the Count of Flanders, brother of the
King of the Belgians,. died on Wednesday. The life of the
other is in danger.

The western portion of Farringdon Market, which
for many years has been unused, is -how being removed,
the ground it occupied being required for the Holborn
Valley improvements -

The Marquis of Salisbury's committee on the
University Tests Bill will, it is said, meet immediately
after the reassembling of Parliament.

About twenty feet of Carlisle Bridge, Dublin, was
on Tuesday knocked down by a vessel going up the river
Liffey, dragging her anchor.

The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge cricket
season will be represented by Mr. W. Yardley, as captain
of the Cantabs, and by Mr. C. B. Tylecourt, as captain
of the Oxonians.

CRYSTAL PALACE. The first concert of the
second series will take place to-morrow, at which Mdlle.
Corani, Herr Stockhausen, and Madame Norman-Neruda
will appear. Schubert's unfinished Symphony in B
Minor, Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto, and the overtures
to " Medea" and " William Tell " will be- the orchestral
pieces. The pantomime will be played on the five days
of next week,