The Sun.
London, England, 1871-01-26 00:00:00

GAMBETTA ON THE WAR.

The special correspondent of the Telegraph, writing
from Bordeaux on the 17th, says :—The opinion I have so
often expressed in my correspondence from Tours. and
Bordeaux, to the effect that the fall of Paris would not
end the war of resistance in France, was fully con-
firmed yesterday in a conversation of some length
which I had with M. Gambetta. I was ushered
through a large room—which had before this war
evidently served as one of a suite of reception rooms at the
Prefecture, but in which there were now several clerks,
all busy writing—into another large drawing-room. In a
corner of this apartment, at a table covered with papers,
letters, telegrams, reports, and official documents of all
sorts, sat M. Gambetta. When I entered he was on the
point of finishing off some business with a clerk or
secretary, and having signed the paper held by the
latter, he rose up, wheeled his chair round to one
which he pointed out to me, and begged that I would be
seated. There was nothing in the least degree official in
his manner. After a few opening observations, the con-
versation turned upon the war in general, and what I had
seen in some of the Departments through which I had
passed, and which were in the occupation of the Prussians.
But these topics have been so often already discussed in my
letters that they need not be renewed here—all the
more so as M. Gambetta confined himself to some general
remarks upon the subject. I then asked him whether,
after Paris fell, the war would come to an end, or whether
the struggle against the enemy would still be continued.
He replied—and his manner was, if possible, more
earnest than. before—that the fall of Paris would have
no effect whatever in putting an end to the war if
the conditions hitherto insisted upon by the
-Prussians were still maintained. " I do not speak," he
said, "in my own name, nor even in that of the Delega-
tion of the Government here at Bordeaux; but I repeat
the firm determination of every one of my colleagues, in
and out of Paris. that the war must continue, no matter
what the cost, no matter what the consequences. If
Paris falls to-morrow, she will have done her duty
nobly towards France. I cannot bring myself to
believe she will ever capitulate ; I believe the people

themselves would burn her, like a second Moscow, before
they would allow the enemy to take possession of the
town." "But supposing," I argued, " that she does capi-
tulate—l only seek for information—what then ? " I
that case," said M. Gambetta, "we must continue to fight
in the provinces. We have now, without reckoning the
army of Paris, half a million of men actually in the field,
and 250,000 more either on their way to join the army, or
ready to march from their depots. We have not yet
touched the levy of 1871, nor have we enrolled the mar-
ried men. The former will give us 300,000 recruits, the
latter two millions of able bodied men. We have arms
pouring in from all quarters. Money does not fail
us. The nation, including men of all political shades of
opinion, is with us ; and it will simply be a question of
our nation against the German nation—of our people
against theirs. Do you believe that the entire popu-
lations of all the countries in the German Confedera-
tion would he willing, for the sake of acquiring two
French provinces, to carry on a war of this kind ? As
for us, we can and we must do it. For us, it would
be dishonouring and dishonourable to give up. We are
fighting for our existence as a nation ; they for an in-
crease of territory which never will and never can do
them any good whatever. Do you suppose that,
wasted and exhausted as France is, parts of
Germany are not much more so? Look at the losses of
the Bavarian army alone. Look at the numbers of
widows and orphans all over the land. Our married men
have not yet taken arms, theirs have been killed by the
thousand. No," he continued, turning more fully round
to me, and laying his hand flat on the desk before
him, " I hold it to be mathematically impossible that if
we have patience, and continue the war, we should not
end by driving the invaders out of France. Every 24
hours are a day gained to us, and bring us nearer our de-
sired end; but every hour's delay increases the difficulty
of our enemies."

It is stated that the Portuguese Government is
contemplating an important financial measure, based upon
a new duty on the tobacco monopoly. .

An examination will commence at New College,
Oxford, on Tuesday, March 7, for the purpose of electing
to two open classical scholarships of the annual value of
£lOO, and tenable for five years.

At Bow-street Police-court a letter-carrier at
Rotherhithe, named Higham was committed for trial on a
charge of wilfully burning a number of letters entrusted
to him for delivery.

The new ironclad Sultan, which was to have left
the Medway on Saturday last, will not be ready to pro-
ceed to sea until early in the ensuing month. She will
then proceed to Portsmouth, to be fitted ont in all proba-
bility for a flag ship.

The committee for the selection of pottery at the
London International Exhibition will consist of the
following :—Lord Lichfield, Mr. C. M. Campbell, Mr. C.
Drury Fortnum, Mr. M. D. Rollins, and Mr. Alfred
Morrison.

r HER MAJESIY'S TOBACCO PIPE.—At the Com-
mercial Sale Rooms, in Mincing-lane, at the 182nd
Custom House sale, 532 lots of tobacco and other goods
are offered for sale. If the sale is not brisk, then her
Majesty's tobacco pipe, which smokes tobacco by the
ton, is likely soon to be well filled. This " pipe," or
furnace, is at the London Docks, and in it vast
quantities of tobacco in leaf, cavendish, negro-
head, and other sorts, that have failed to sell
in the Government sales, are burnt. Very many
tons are consumed in the course of the year. From one
department alone, and that a comparatively small one,
including seizures made for smuggling and rummage—
that is, goods out of date in warehouse—there were
recently sent • to this " pipe" several large casks
of various kinds of tobacco, weighing more
than two tons. The question may very naturally
arise, why not sell all this good tobacco, and not consume
it in this extravagant manner ? The answer is that the
goods have been offered for sale to the public in the
periodical Government sales in Mincing-lane, and, no
buyers being obtainable, it is better to destroy the tobacco
than to allow it to remain in a warehouse any longer, and
a Board's order is then obtained from the Hon. Board of
Customs for its destruction.