The Sun.
London, England, 1870-07-22 00:00:00

GENTLEMEN'S CLOTHING CONT:

Summer Tourist Summer Dress ••
Suits. I Suits. Trousers. Trousers. M_ORNING EDITION.
245. 245. 10s. 6d. 15s.
28s. 28s. 12s. 6d. 16s. 6d.
LONDON, FRIDAY, JULY 22, 1870.
365. 365. 14s. 18s.
-
40s. 425. 15s. 6d. 21s. THE announcement of the deplorable tragedy
455. 48s. 17s. 6d. 245. occurring in America on Tuesday last, startled and
555. 525. 20s. 265. afflicted Europe yesterday, even though the news of
it arrived in the very midst of the breathless sus-
Also at Also at Also at Also at
other prices. other prices. other prices. other prices pease with which all observant spectators are await-

THE announcement of the deplorable tragedy
occurring in America on Tuesday last, startled and
afflicted Europe yesterday, even though the news of
it arrived in the very midst of the breathless sus-
pense with which all observant spectators are await-
ing at this moment the commencement of hostilities.
M. PREVOST PARADOL, a man of rare genius, one
of the Forty of the French Academy, one of the
most enlightened politicians in Christendom, a
celebrity in the very flower and prime of
manhood, being only in the fortieth year of his age,
—suddenly, astoundingly, lamentably—destroys him-
self with his own hand upon the morrow of his in-
stallation, as it were, as the French Ambas-
sador at Washington. A suicide so remark-
able in every way cannot but excite upon
the instant mingled feelings of grief and
astonishment. An incident so astounding in its
character, one so really exceptional in all its leading
circumstances, cannot but give rise to conjectures as to
the immediately existing cause by which it was origi-
nated. That cause—the source of M. PREVOST
PARADOL'S deplorable suicide—we cannot but think
is instantly recognizable. Political remorse we can-
not but think was in his instance the provocative to
self-destruction. Remorse, for what? For having
only just gone counter to all his own radiantly con-
spicuous antecedents as a publicist, as
a politician, as a consistent and persevering
and devoted advocate of Parliamentary or Responsi-
ble, as contradistinguished from Personal or Despotic,
Government ! For having—out of a conviction that
a change had at last, indeed, come over the spirit of
his dream, as a keen-eyed and unsparing critic
of the Second Empire—foregone all his old
antagonism to the Government of NAPOLEON
and actually acceptei under the rule
of that sovereign the high and responsible
post of ambassador at Washington. He, of all men,
PREVOST-PARADOL, Redacteu, en chef of the gallant,
outspoken, uncompromising Journal des Debats,
bending the knee to C.2ESAR, assenting to become
his alter ego, to be his accredited repre-
sentative tO the freest nation of the
earth—all the past to the contrary notwithstanding.
M. PREVOST-PARADOL had only accepted that posi-
tion—every one who was capable of appreciating the
integrity of his character, the clearness of his judg-
ment, and the serene and conscientious consistency
of his whole career both as politician and as man of
letters, knew this for certain upon the instant—M.
PREVOST-PARADOL had alone accepted that position
as NAPOLEON M.'s Ambassador at Washington,
because he believed at last in his heart that Personal
Government had become a thing of the past for France,
and that there had been substituted for it, under the
auspices of M. EMILE OLLIVIER, a new scheme of
Empire, of an Empire permanently and thoroughly
liberalised. Convinced of this, in his own mind, M.
PREVOST PARADOL accepts the position of Ambas-
sador to the United States, crosses the Atlantic,
assumes his diplomatic post at Washington, and—upon
the morrow of his having done so—receives from Europe
the astounding intimation of a war, by which all his
fears of Personal Government are revived, by which
all his hopes of Parliamentary Government are
shattered in the dust. Despair seizes him, and with
despair a sense of personal dishonour in having
allowed himself to be carried away by an illusion.
He suddenly awakens to a recognition cf the fact
that he, the most uncompromising and unsparing and
indefatigable of all the critics of the despotic power of
NAPOLEON 111, during all these years past, is installed
there at Washington of all places in the world as
ambassador of Imperial France, at the very moment
when, by the launching of the thunderbolt of war,
a new lease of supreme and irresponsible authority
appears to be assured to his former antagonist —now his
Imperial M aster—at the Tuileries. M. PREVOST-PARA-
DOL realises this, and he destroys himself ! His suicide
is one of political remorse—is one of political
despair. He takes—what appears to him to ba—
the one sole, Spartan, pagan extrication from a de-
plorable dilemma. The serenity of his fine intellect,
of his noble judgment, of his pure and hitherto un-
sullied conscience, the appalling news of
this most direful war suddenly destroys and darkens.
M. PREVOST PARADOL filled with shame
at his own egregious folly in having
ever yielded for a moment to what he re-
gards as having been all along the wildest of de-
lusions, considers himself to be dishonoured by
having yielded to a deception, and worse than that by
having yielded to it under the guise of a magnificent
temptation, the temptation of a great embassy !
Then it is that, carried away by a sense of scorn
for himself, as well as by a feeling of remorse and
despair, he, upon the spur of the moment, carries
out this desperate act of self-destruction. M.
PREVOST PARADOL'S suicide upon the opposite
shores of the Atlantic, we cannot but regard, for
these reasons, as the first death caused by this
deplorable war. It will not be the last. But, how-
ever terrible may be the number of those destroyed
by the war eventually, this death, among them all,
will not be the least deplorable.

TOPICS OF THE DAY.