The Sun.
London, England, 1870-09-27 00:00:00

DISCIPLINE IN TA E FRENCH ARMY.

The correspondent of the Telegraph at Tours writes
as follows :—" On Wednesday, for three successive
hours, an artillery train filed along the Rue Royal,
the principal street of Tours, on the way, I believe,
from Lyons, to some destination which is, of
course, kept secret ; and yesterday a commis-
sariat train, which took about three-quarters of an hour
to pass a given point, passed in the same direction,
The sight would have been instructive to those who
are deluded by ' the pomp and circumstance of glorious
war.' Real war presents little pomp, but abundance of
squalor, dirt, rags, and all manner of unsightliness.
The horses of the artillery and the commissariat waggons
were lean, shaggy, hungry looking, tired, and covered
with dust. The men by whom they were driven and
accompanied were pictures of recklessness, and of the
effects which spring from the want of cold
water. Some rode their steeds in the usual
fashion ; others sat sideways on the heavily-
accoutered waggon-horses, gravely smoking their
short, black pipes ; while others lay at full length
on bundles of hay in the military carts. Some
wore great coats, and others had on jackets which
they did not seem to have put off for a fortnight.
Bayonets, sabres, carbines, Chassepots were car-
ried in half a dozen fashions—hung at the
saddle-bow, tied to the side of the waggon, slung
around the neck, or carried upside down, with a
picturesque disregard of military instructions. In-
deed, they all looked like a horde of peasants,
dressed in the cast-off clothes of soldiers, and
careless about everything but food and sleep. War
is two serious a thing to be compatible with
devotion to pipeclay, or the barber, or even the bath. But
discipline is the very soul of war, and the strange lack
of discipline among the troops is the subject of some cora-
meat. Yesterday I witnessed a scene which would have
shocked an English officer. A mounted corporal
ordered the first driver of a string of artillery
waggons to stop ; the man, who seemed to be slightly
intoxicated, accompanied his act of obedience with what
sounded like a curse ; al last the result was what your
French neighbours call an ' altercation,' and then the
corporal rode off as if nothing was the matter. Next
the mutinous driver began to quarrel with a
comrade. In French fashion, they made faces at
each other, shook their fists, placed themselves in the
French equivalent for a pugilistic attitude (shade of Tom
Sayers ! what ignorance of the noble art of self-defence !)
and, but for the diplomatic mediation and forcible inter-
vention of their comrades, they would hays come to blows
half-a-dozen times. More than once they fervently shook
hands, and seemed to swear eternal friendship
and then, drawing back again, they ' squared' at each
other, and dared each other to come on. The scene was
amusingly French in its wealth of gesticulation and
speech, in its twin manifestations of hatred and
love. But it lasted for nearly a quarter of an
hour in the principal promenade, before the win-
dows of the chief hotel, and ' within sight of
the Palace of Justice. No officer, commissioned or non-
commissioned, put a stop to the quarrel nor, indeed, was
any officer to be seen. And, from an Englishman who
left Paris on Saturday night by the last train that issued
from the capital, I barn that the lack of discipline
among the troops which throng such thoroughfares
as the Rue de Itivoli is astounding. The soldiers lie
about the streets anywhere, and in any fashion, apparently
uncared for, and far from convinced of the fact that in
prompt obedience to command the soldier should see the
first of laws. The Empire, which was supposed to be
the very symbol of order, has in reality left the
Republic a legacy of what hears too close a likeness to
anarchy."

STAMPED PENNY ENVELOPES.-011 and alter the
Ist October stamped penny envelopes will be sold to the
public for 2s. 2d. per packet of 24 envelopes.
It is stated that £1,000,000 has been discoverer in
the vaults of the Bank of Bengal, in bonds and securities
belonging to the Nawab Nazim of Bengal. The money
was deposited thirteen years ago for investment, and, had
been overlooked ; and now the interest at six per cent. is
equal to another million.
A German writer, Eugene Richter, has been calculat-
ing the expenses of the war which Germany can demand
from France. He reckons them under several heads,
such as the reconstruction of Kehl, the indemnity for the
blockade, compensation for the families of men in service.
compensation for the invalids, for the expelled Germans,
for the Landwehr, and the State expenses. Altogether,
he brings the amount to 276,000,000 thalers, or
1,425,000,000 f. This would be double the amount
which France paid in 1815 to the Allies, which was
700,000,000 f.