The Sun.
London, England, 1869-05-18 00:00:00

THE SUN, LONDON, TUESDAY EVENING, MAY 18, 1869.

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LONDOW, TUESDAY, MAY 18, 1869.

The trail of a six-rounder over the pavement of
our streets was once upon a time—not in a mythical
epoch, but only a very few years ago—seriously re-
commended to the authorities by an insensate mem-
ber of Parliament, speaking from his place in the
House of Commons, as about the most effectual
means that could well be hit upon for the restoration
of order in the case of any popular disturbance within
the precincts of London and Westminster. The re.
medy has proved in its time, upon extreme emergen-
cies, not quite so unsuitable in France, perhaps, as it
would most certainly prove among ourselves. Thrice
at least in her later history, the roar of cannon in the
densely-peopled streets of her metropolis has an.
nounced the restoration of order in that capital, the
enforcement of obedience to her laws, and the
gathering up of the reins of dictatorial power
within the grasp of her Government. Upon the
first of these occasions—it was on the sth of
October, 1795, young General NAPOLEON BONA-
PARTE suppressed a rebellion of 30,000 Royalists
against the authority of the convention. And in
that way the Directory may be said to have been
established and proclaimed at the cannon's mouth.
Upon the second occasion, during those terrible
days of slaughter, as one might say, by wholesale,
namely, on the 24th, the 25th, and the 26th of June,
1848, Red Republicanism was scattered and shat-
tered by discharges of artillery and by the deadliest
fusillades, under the direction of the Democratic
Dictator of the hour, General Louis EUGENE CA-
VAIGNAC, then for a brief interval President of the
Republic. The third and last occasion upon which order
was re-established, as one may say, by the trail of
cannon over the streets of Paris, and power confirmed
in the hands of the ruler of France, in answer as it
were to resolute discharges of musketry, was at the
time of the memorable coop d'itat at the very begin-
ning of the December of 1851—when CHANGARNIER
LAMOEICIERE, CAVAIGNAC, TRIERS, and very nearly
two hundred members of the National Assembly were
all of them simultaneously arrested in the dead
of the night. Extreme occasions these were, un-
doubtedly. "Few and far between"—not like
" angels visits," but visits of a very opposite character
—they have left so vivid a remembrance behind
them that it need hardly be much matter for wonder
chat outbreaks like those of Friday last in the streets of
Paris should have appeared to some as nothing less
than the significant prelude to another very similar
occurrence. Happily, while History does undoubtedly
repeat itself, it very rarely indeed repeats itself in
regard to these kind of supreme and certainly most
lamentable necessities. NAPOLEON the GREAT, with
all his indifference to bloodshed, whenever it appeared
to him in any way inevitable, never repeated his
achievement of the 13th Vundemiuire. CAVAIGNAC,
we may rest assured, would never—had his authority
been confined to him instead of being transferred to
his formidable rival, the Prince Louis NAPO-
LEON BONAPARTE—wouId never, we may be quite
certain, have found occasion for repeating his
uncompromising deed of June, when through the
destruction of 8,000 lives he crushed out the Ultra-
Democratic Insurrection. Not lightly again, we may
be very sure, would the present Ruler of France, whose
possession of power for four years as Pr, sident, and
between sixteen and seventeen as EMPEROR, has now
lasted for more than a good score of years altogether
—not lightly we may be very certain would NAPO-
LEON 111. ever dream of resorting to the ex-
treme measures which be conceived to he forced
upon him at the periol of the coop d
Ftie earlier accounts con eyed to us hum Paris,
HI regarl t) the dis urhatics of last w‘ek,
prove fortunately to have been monstrously exaggc-

rated. Instead of the armed and mounted function-

tries who were then, as the enforcers of the law,
Jeing the wanton assailants bf the populace, the for-
ner were, in the first instance, the assailed—assaile I
tot simply by hustling and so forth, but by Mows
nflicted by missiles and cudgels. The ugliest wounds
!ecuived were those received by the e.uissarie3 of
he PIETRI. " Remove the corpse," the police were

laid to have been heard to mutter from behind a door-

way : but the " corpse" so called was, in point of
fact, the insensible, happily not the inanimate, body

of one of their own principal officer.

Imme-

diately tidings of the people and of the
municipal officers having come into collision,

were reported to the Tuilerie3, an imperial mandate

is said to have been immediately despatched thence
to the Minister responsible in this matter to the So-

VEREIGN, the Minister of Police, M. PIETRI, a message
running laconically to the effect, " Respect Liberty,
but also respect Order !" It is absurd to imagine for
a moment that there was in any way peril just
now in Paris of another revolutionary movement.
So long as the present EMPEROR lives, a movement of
that character is simply out of the question. The
poiition occupied by him as the holder of power is
strategically, in one word, impregnable. The
three days of July, the three days of Feb-

rnary, the three days of June cannot be re-

peated. Barricades are incapable of being any longer
constructed. Artillery could sweep the main streets
of the capital from end to end, were the deadly need

of it required—from central points—as from the radi-

ating spokes of an enormous wheel. The possessor of
power has the ball at his foot so long as he

retains, as NAPOLEON M. undoubtedly does, unmarred
to this moment, the loyal adhesion of the army and
the loyal enthusiasm of the peasantry, constituting,
the last mentioned, the vast majority of the possessors

of the franchise under the system of Universal Suf-

rage,

IRELAND has just been doing honour to one hero,
_ _

England to another. Dublin has been removing the

dead body of DANIEL O'CONNELL from its old rest-
ingford has been uncovering the statue of RICHARD
place to a new one deemed more suitable ; Brad-
OASTLER. The difference between the two men
marks the difference between the two countries.
The first was a political agitator, the second
was a social agitator. The first is still called
by his fellow-countrymen the Liberator, because
he opened to them the doors of the Legislature :
the second deserves that title almost equally well,
for he redeemed the children of our factory towns
from the tyranny of ignorance and overwork. Yet,
for one man that knows who RICHARD OASTLER
who m°
aNkNeEs
1.
vL
was there are a hundred who lave heard the name
TofheDiAnNanlE
L O'C Probablyathis elation ms inevitable.t
almaost
of upon
m ost
of necessity be more prominent than the man who
makes war upon a class. W e are all of us interested
when a question affecting the political unity of
the kingdom is raised. We care very little
when a question affecting the social condition of a
class is raised. We are all of us born politicians;
only a few of us are born phil %nthropists. Far be
it from us to magnify the seconl 1 at the expense of
the first; there is a time and a pl ace for both.
Neither career was smooth or peaceable. Both

lived militant lives. O'CONNELL i 'iad to fight against
the English aristocracy and tilt ► Protestant Esta-
blished Church; OASTLEB had t
fight against the
manufacturers. In both instanc( tl le battle was oneishn .ess on the other.
of justice on the one side, self
A
That most religious sovereig, :ORGE IV., after
consorting with the emancipa tors du :ring his father's
lifetime, affected towardi the ,close 4ef his pious life

scruples about his coronation oath, which made him
oppose the admission of Roman Catholics to
civil rights ; and it was only when the Duke of
WELLINGTON declared that the sole alternative was
between concession and civil war that those rights were
granted. But with O'CONNELL this was merely the
beginning of the campaign. Having won the
engagement, he spent the rest of his life in endea-
vouring to win another—the establishment of a
native Parliament, the gift of autonomy to Ireland.
Not only did he not live to win that position, but it
seems as far from being won now, a quarter of a
century after his death, as it was then. True, angry
Protestants talk about cutting off their heads to spite
their noses ; talk of punishing Mr. GLADSTONE by
raising the cry of the green flag ; talk of revenging
themselves upon the Parliament of the United
Kingdom, in which the Protestants form over 90 per
cent. of the assembly, by establishing an Irish Par-
liament in which they would not form 40 per cent.
But it is all mere talk. None of them expects to see
the change which they prate about so glibly.
Repeal—O'CorrNELL's dream—is still only a dream.
Nevertheless, his was not a fruitless career.
The full results of it have not yet been seen,
though they are beginning to be. The abolition
of Protestant ascendancy, of the few over the
many, which is now being achieved, is due indirectly
to his efforts. The settlement of the land question,
which we are bidden to look for next year, will be
another result. Before the new monument over the
remains of the " Liberator " is completed, a great,
portion of his work will have been accomplished.
RICHARD OASTLER'S career teaches the important
lesson that no class can be trusted when the public
good is supposed to militate against class interests.
Naturally the manufacturers were, ready to promote
education and sanitary reform, and all legislation
tending to the promotion of mental and bodily
vigour. But they opposed the Ten Hours' Factory
Bill with a vehemence and obstinacy that was
comparable only to that with which the landlords
opposed Free Trade. Both professed to be guided
by public interests. The landlords summoned the
political economists to their aid, and argued that if
England were made dependent upon other countries for
her supply of food that dependence would prove fatal
to her in the event of war. The manufacturers
contended that it was against all sound political
economy for Government to interpose between the
employer and the employed. There was something
to be said for both arguments, but the nation was
too wise to be seduced by them, and so the Corn
Laws were abolished—the Ten Hours Bill was passed.
The part which Mr. OASTLER took in this latter
achievement is known best to Yorkshiremen and to I

:,ord SHAFTESBURY. Between the Commoner and

the Peer there was very little in common, except
their object. OASTLER, it must be confessed,
was somewhat of a firebr mcl, did occasionally say
indiscreet things, and was fond of setting class
against class. Lord SHAFTESBURY—the Lord
ASHLEY of that time—was more prudent, and had,
therefore, more weight. The turbulent oratory of
RICHARD OASTLER would scarcely have carried the
factory child's magna Marta. Nevertheless OASTLER
was an efficient coadjutor, and it is well to see the
survivor of the two doing honours, as Lord
SHAFTESBURY did on Saturday, to the memory
of his old comrade. There was enough result
of their labours for them to divide the honours and
yet for each to come off well crowned. An artist in
search of a subject could scarcely find a more taking
one, or one that would attract a larger crowd around

it in the Royal Academy, than a two-panelled picture
of the factory child of to-day and the factory child
of the time when Mrs. BARRETT BROWNING wrote
her pitiful " Cry of the Children."

LATEST INTELL LGENCE

(REU"'ER'S TELEGRAMS.)

AMERICA

NEW YORK', May 17.
The Allan steamship Mc] avian arrived at Quebec

to-day.

CORRESPONDENCE FROM PARIS,

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.)

PARIS, MONDAY, May 17.
Paris has relapsed into a state of complete calm. So far
as all present signs go, this, the last day of the public elec-
tion meetings, promises to pass off quietly. Yesterday
not fewer than seventeen electoral meetings—one journal
says nineteen —were held, and there was not the
slightest disturbance at any one of them. Whether
the exhortations of the Liberal papers or the
edicts of the Prefect have produced this effect it is
difficult to say, but the fact is none the less satisfactory.
There was some very hot and exciting discussion yester-
day, beyond doubt, but in no case was the ordinary fire of
a Paris political meeting exceeded. The dangerous
moment—the departure of the audience--in no case gave
rise to any trouble.
The election news is of course multifarious and impor-
tant. Without entering into useless details about M.
This and Baron That, I may remark that in Paris the
field is left more and more clear to the Opposition. In 1863
the Government contested every circumscription ; in 1869
it scarcely shows fight at all. But as the Left
carried all the divisions on the last occasion, this absten-
tion on the part of the authorities is of no great import-
ance. The Opposition can do no more than elect its men,
with the additional enjoyment of being able to afford the
luxury of an internecine struggle. M. Emile 011ivier has
become more and more in receipt of Government support,
and his chances have waned in proportion. Everything
at present looks favourable for the extreme men. But
Paris always did and always will elect opponents of the
Government. The important question is, what will the
provinces do?
Beyond question the new City of Paris Loan has proved

a great success. For the last few clays the Faris Municipal
Council, the Mayor, and several hundred clerks have
been employed in the exhilarating task of opening and
classifying the immense number of letters con-
taining applications for allotments. This work is
of truly Herculean dimensions. It occupies no fewer than,
150 tables. On Friday evening the amount of the sub-
scription was 110 times the sum asked for; and there still

remained 30,000 letters to be opened and sorted, and the
result of subscriptions in four or five departments more to be
received. The 30,000 letters last arrived at the Hotel de
Ville were to have been all examined in the course of
Saturday. The mass of securities and bank notes forming
the unprecedented avalanche that has fallen on the Hotel
de Ville completely fills a small room, which is strictly
guarded night and day. All other business is suspended
for the time.

It is said that the Queen of England has written an
autograph letter to the Emperor Napoleon, thanking his
Majesty for the attention shewn to the Prince and Prin-
cess of Wales during their late stay in Paris.
The rare sentence of death has been passed by the tri-
bunal of Hainault, in Belgium. The crime was one of
exception al horror. Awom an, named D escam ps, was charged
with murdering her granddaughter, an infant, by imbed-
ding needles in the child's head. The only motive alleged
for this lArbarous crime is that the prisoner did not like
to see her daughter, who is married, have a family. The
woman seemed utterly overwhelmed on hearing the sen-
tence; but the audience attempted applause at the deci-
sion—not a charitable proceeding, notwithstanding tho
barbarous character of the murder.

Another trapeze accident Las occurred. Whilst the
gyinnast Bonnaire, who performs at the Cirque de
l'lmperatrice, was springing from one trapeze to
another he missed his hold, but succeeded in
seizing hold of a rope which hung from the ceiling, and
down which he slid so rapidly as to knock to a distance
one of the men who stood below to hold it taut, while he
himself struck against a heavy weight suspended for the
same purpose, and fell rather heavily on the ground. Ile
had evidently suffered a severe shock.-

A duel of unusual determination took place at Anvers
between two officers a couple of days ago. Both
officera were captains. One had used insulting
language to the other in the presence of their
comrades, the officer to whom the offence was
given retorted in very free language, and a duel to the
death was resolved on. Three pistol shots were exchanged
without serious effect, one of the combatants being very
slightly grazed on the left arm. The fourth pair were
loaded, but one of the weapons missed fire. The
other duellist discharged his in tha air. This
magnanimous proceeding did not, however, terminate the
conflict. A fifth charge was made, and it was agreed that
instead of remaining at twenty-five paces, the distance
hitherto kept, each combatant should have the right of
advancing five paces. The reduction of the distance
immediately proved decisive. The officer who had spa ecl
his adversary's life was shot in the head, and, it is
feared, mortally wounded.