The Sun.
London, England, 1871-01-30 00:00:00

OUR COTEMPORARIPS—This Morning

THE CAPITULATION OF PARIS.

The Times, in its remarks on this important intelli-
gence, says : —Before we attempt to look any further to
the possible consequences of the armistice, we may con-
gratulate ourselves and the world on the fact
that Paris at all events, is saved from further misery
and destruction. The war St outrunee party within its
walls have not been able to enforce their desperate pro-
ject of one more sortie. General Vinoy has actually
acknowledged that the Parisians had come to the end of
their fighting powers, and if it was so three days since,
with all the Forts and all the. implements of war in the
hands of the Army and the garrison, it will certainly not
be otherwise 20 days hence, when all the soldiers will be
disarmed, and when the City itself will be at the mercy
cf those very batteries, which for four months have so
strenuously warded off the enemy's attack. The French
Provincials will probably accept the decision of the
Capital, whose lead. they have so long been wont to
follow, and which by its heroism never perhaps in the
whole history of the country deserved greater deference,
or was entitled to exercise higher authority.
The soundest as well as the most sponta-
neous instinct of the French people has for
centuries been that of national cohesion. There are few at
Bordeaux, at Lyons, or Marseilles who will not see that
the most immediate result of any attempt to " fight for
their own hand" will be to imperil the unity of the
country. M. Gambetta's conduct will point out the course
that most of his partisans will follow. The intelligence
of the Versailles negotiation, we are told, "fell upon
Bordeaux like a clap of thunder." M. Gambetta endea-
voured at first to discredit the report by stigmatising it as
" a lie and a calumny," precisely as he did, weeks ago,
the report of the fall of Metz ; but he has not dared to cast
upon his Republican colleagues that charge of treason which
he hurled at the Imperialist Marshal, and, according to
the latest intelligence, he has limited his protest to the
resignation of his office. We look upon this act as an
acquiescence in an inevitable decision, and we think his
countrymen ought to take his self-denial into account. M.
Gambetta can no longer urge the people to fight when ob-
viously there is no one left who can fight. All the particu
Jars that reach us of Chanzy's and Faidherbe's armies
speak only of demoralisation and dispersion ; while as to
Bourbaki, nothing but the armistice can save his army
from utter destruction, and, without German help,
the armistice itself can scarcely save it from
starvation. Indeed, the forbearance shown by the
Germans at this juncture toward an enemy so thoroughly
vanquished augurs well for the success of all further
negotiations. Fairer and, indeed, more generous terms
the French, reduced to such extremities .as they
are, could never have been entitled to expect. France
will accept the conqueror's terms, and all the world, that
conqueror himself not excepted, are interested in making
those terms as-tolerable as the_circnmstances of the case
will allow.
The Standard observes :—The capitulation of Paris, it
is reasonable to believe, brings us to the end of the war
between Germany and France. There is little room to
doubt that the provinces will accept the surrender
of the capital as bringing to a termination all
hopes of further resistance. It is impossible that
France can continue the unequal struggle any
longer. The Government of the National Defence
have clone their duty, on the whole, gallantly and well,
but from the first the chances of success have been most
slender. From a military point of view all hope of re-
trieving the misfortunes of the war was gone from the
moment it became evident that the French armies in the
field were unable to come to the relief of Paris. The
disastrous result of every attempt to break through the iron
circle around Paris, either from within or from without,
has precipitated that conclusion for which all Europe has
for some time been prepared. Paris has fallen, and all
is lost to France except honour and the hope of future
vengeance. The more harsh and arrogant Germany
is now in her hour of triumph the more speedy
and sure will be her Nemesis. All that the Germans can
reasonably demand are the costs of the war from France
and such securities as may ensure them against the danger
of a sudden attack. Absolute and complete immunity
against any future enterprises of their enemy is what no
Power has a right to claim, for it would imply the total
ruin and permanent degradation of their rival.
In the opinion of the Daily News, the surrender of the
Paris forts and garrison—which is equivalent to the sur-
render of the city—will altogether alter the aspect of
the war. It will in the first place deprive France of -
the services of a large number of soldiers upon
whose release many hopes were founded ; and
it will set free an enormous German force, who
will use the Parisian forts to dominate the centre of the
country. In the second place, it will give France time to
deliberate, so soon as she has fulfilled her first and impera-
tive duty of sending in provisions to the starving
capital. If the country elects to carry on the war
the various provincial armies will be deprived
of the immediate object of their recent efforts. It
will be a struggle on the part of France, not to save Paris,
but to ensure at any cost the integrity of her soil. Events
have given a cruel retort to the cries of " A Berlin !" which
Paris uttered last July. Paris is herself a captive. We
would fain hope that the victors may spare France the
bitter humiliation of seeing German soldiers actually in the
city. Will not the occupation of the forts—which, in
a military sense, means the possession of the city—be
enough ? Scarcely anything more cruel could fall to the
lot of France than the fact which history will record of
the first German Emperor of modern times hav-
ing accepted that dignity in Versailles. Over
the record of that event the patriotic French
schoolboy will hurry with burning cheeks. If, in
coining to the story of the fall of Paris, he
reads how that German Emperor successfully besieged
the mighty fortress, he will perhaps console himself
with the thought that it was a German Emperor
who failed to defend the city during the first siege which
the history of Paris records. Since then Paris has
suffered many sieges, sometimes with evil fortune, some-
times with good ; and on many an occasion she has wit-
nessed the coming and going of foreign troops through
her streets. Is there, too, reason to hope that the Ger-
man commanders will be satisfied with the capitulation of
the city, and relinquish that triumphal entry which has
been held before the eyes of the troops as the dazzling re-
ward of their labours ?

The Telegraph says :—There is no longerany uncertainty
about the great surrender. Conquered by a more terrible
enemy than shot or shell, Paris has capitulated ; she is
now prisoner of war, and German troops occupy her
circle of strongholds. And what will France do ?
To
answer that question lies in the domain of prophecy,
into which it is never safe to enter, and least of all
when the subject is the behaviour of the French
people. But those sympathisers with the vanquished,
who advise and seem to expect a continuation of the war,
appear to forget the prodigious effect which the news of
the capitulation must exercise upon the whole country.
Paris has been so thoroughly the heart and brain of
the nation, that when it knows the Germans
are in Mont Val6rien and holding the rest of
the forts, the effect upon the " patriotic fibre "
may easily be something like paralysis. The remaining
plans of •campaign which Gambetta and his generals
shared " fall into uselessness." 'Whither to march when
the capital is in the hands of the Germans ? Why cut the
communications of the invaders when the first result
may be to starve the Parisians ? or with what
battalions can successful resistance be offered when

200,000 of the enemy's disengaged troops are
held in readidess to crush out every new effort ? More-
over, the terms of the capitulation embrace a general
armistice by sea and land; and either the Delegated
Government must now respect this condition and stand
aside for France herself to speak, or it must try the

- -
dangerous step of declaring a third period of the war, to
which France will hardly set her imprimatur. The
dreadful sense, of general collapse which prevails
throughout the country is illustrated by Gatnbetta's re-
ported resignation, by the effect which the news has
created at Bordeaux—where the act of M. Favre appears
to be frankly accepted by the Delegation of the Govern-
ment—and by Bourbaki's melancholy attempt at suicide,
if, indeed, the intention has not really led to a fatal result.
It is, we feel in truth, cruel and guilty for outsiders
to say to France, " Fight on;" the resources, the
hopes, the energies of a whole generation have been con.
densed into this awful campaign. The land is bleeding to
death ' • it is beaten hopelessly ; it laid too much on Paris,
and it has lost all. With so bitter a prospect on every
side, it were better now to make peace ; peace
seems at this moment the highest courage and
the truest patriotism—peace is the only real hope of
the distracted nation whose double defeat under the
Empire and under the Republic has been so crushing, so
unrelieved by a single ray of changing fortune that the
conquerors themselves, humanity hopes, will be awed into
generosity by their astounding success.

The Royal gold medal for architecture will (ac.
cording to the Architect) probably be conferred by the
Queen, on the nomination of the Institute of Architects,
on Mr. James Fergusson, D.C.L., F.R.S., the writer of
the" History of Architecture."

The proposed scheme foi the compulsory retire-
went of assistant paymasters, so as to reduce the list
within reasonable limits, has been submitted to the Trea-
sury, and now awaits their sanction before it is made
public by the Admiralty.