The Sun.
London, England, 1870-11-30 00:00:00

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LONDON, WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1870.

A FRENCHMAN, homme de lettres, redacteur, patriot,
what not, soars out of beleaguered Paris in a balloon,
lands on our shores, enters this City of London, and
finding himself one day face to face with a crowd of
people assembled together in the Cannon-street
Hotel, for the purpose of what is called a Peace Con-
ference, incontinently addresses himself to that
gathering of Englishmen. M. FONVIELLE is the
Parisian journalist we are here alluding to. The
speech thus made by him was delivered as recently
as on last Monday afternoon. It was addressed
to a meeting called together, as the housemaids say,
promiscuously-7-no one knows by whom or for what
precise purpose. In the chair was Mr. MERRIMAN.
Among the notabilities immediately around the
chairman was County Court Judge BEALES, M.A.
There were resolutions and there were amendments•
There was the utmost harmony and discord in the
proceedings. Harmony was the most effec-
tively represented by Dr. CHARLES MACKAY, the
popular lyrical poet, a charming song writer, who
sets his words to a music of their own, and who
showed his skill in doing so on Monday afternoon,
even in the manner in which he worded his resolu-
tion. Discord, on the other hand, was by far the
most effectively represented upon the occasion by
Mr. CEEMER, the working men's advocate. Catcalls
tumult, cries of " Turn him out," "Sit down,"
appeals to him from the chair, appeals to the chair
from dissentients in the meeting who were desirous
of having the obnoxious oration suppressed, and that
summarily—inci.lente of this character preceded not
inappropyiately the 41141 bringing to the fore of the,
French gentleman already referred to as having
been recently ballooned from Paris on his
way to London. M. FONVIELLE spoke, and the
hubbub was hushed. M. FONVIELLE continued
speaking, and applause gave way to a burst of
laughter. M. FONVIELLE finished his address, anti
10, he had already contrived, while speaking, to half
empty the room, like the indifferent parish
organist who pushed HANDEL from his stool
saying " Bah ! you don't know in the least
how to play out the congregation." M. Fox-
VIELLE had spoken when he bad far better
have held his tongue. His address throughout was
a violation of good taste; it was a derogation of self-
respect; it was ',in many ways an insult to his
hearers' understandings. Throughout it he raved
against the late Imperial ruler of Franco—now
prownless, now dethroned, now swallowed up and
swept away by a very tornado of misfortunes—
M, FONVEILLE spoke of him, or rather snarled at him
through his teeth, all the most brutal epithets he could
lay his tongue to. " Bloody tyrant," "Murderer,"
such and such-like were his emphemistic utterances.

Al. FON VEILLE, as is the way with all his con-
geners, being utterly blind to the fact that in being
thus scurrile to the Emperor NAPoLEoN.III. they are
scurrile to the last degree to the nati( nwhO picked him
out for their ruler, who selected him by acclamation
in preference to men like CAVAIGNAC and LAMAR-
TIzIE ; who confirmed him again and again in power
by 5,0,0QQ, by 0,00,900, by 7,000,000, by nearly
i()00,00Q votes; who covered him with their adula-
tion during a Prosidency of two or three years'
duration and a reign as Emperor of eigh!een years
altogether; who were ready to lick the dust
from his feet during all those years,
while he was yet prosperous, but who revile
him and cover him with infamies in the hour
of his supreme misfortune. Appeals for our
sympathy, such as these, simply alienate the feelings
of the great mass of Englishmen. It is our prejudice
to nave 4 dislike for kicking a man when he is down,
or for standing by complacently while he is being.
kicked. Added to which, in the present instance,
the Emperor NAPOLEON 111., whatever else may
be said of him has been the true and firm and con-
sistent and untiring friend and ally of England from
the hour of his first elevation to power as Chief of
the State in France to the moment when upwards of
twenty-one years afterwards, power slipped from
his hitherto strong grasp, and was rolled
in dust and blood upon the foughten
field of Sedan on the opening days of
this last September. Returning to M Vortintg4,E,
however, the excited and recalcitrant, what is it
that we find in the midst of his address on Monday
afternoon, but as vivid a realization as we ever re-
member to have lit upon of the literal significance of •
one of the most famous mots of the Great NAPOLEON
—his saying, that is, about there being but one step
from the sublime to the ridiculous. M. FONVIELLE
was discanting at the moment upon the peculiarities
observable in the present sufficiently appalling
situation of Paris.; upon the gathering together of
the strength and skill of the Parisians for one last
supreme effort at their own deliverance ; upon the
straights they are driven to for food, causing them
to devour rats and mice, and cats and dogs and