New-York tribune., 1871-03-29
ANARGHY IN PdRTS.

IIUcfUdt nee n}ergItur IS the motto OF tnat
heraldic ship which is supposed to carry the
fortunes Of Paris on the city's cOat-of-arms.
A commonwealth cannot sink nor be utterly
destroyed but no great city ever yet seemed
so near ruin rs Paris bodybuilding helpless and
water-logced i'll the trough of the sea. Never
in those disastrous and bloody days of June.
which in 1S4S prepared the public mind for the
surrender to despotism; never in The days Of
September nor in the cTOwning atrocities OF
Thermidor, did the old revolution indulge in
more fantastic and causeless follies than are
seen every day among the well meaning men
who ardenuy desire the triumph of the Re
public if it can be attained iii their way,
and who would wreck the whole machine
of Government rather than yield one
lot of their pTejudices and prepOssessiOns.
They began by factiOus opposition to all
the necessary acts of the Assembly, and,
growing bOlder by the adhesion OF the mer-
curial and half-infOrmed radicals Of the
faubourgs, they at last rose in overt insur-
rcction; and so powerful was the cOntagion
of revolt, and so weak the restraints Of law
and loyalty, that the national militia which
WAS sent against them fraternizcd with
them, and anarchy assumed the manner
and style of municipal government. They
ordered elections for municipal officers. The
people of good viii mostly avoided the polls.
Only two-ffths of a vote was polled The law
and order party as it is too apt to do III Paris
and elsewhere, stayed at home and bolted It's
doors, but the scatter Drained radicals rallied
in force, and elected nearly all their candi-
dates.
These are, it is to be presumed, mere gradu-
ates of the gutter as the dispatches inform us
that they are all obscure men, with the eXccp-
ton of Flourens, Blanqui, Pyat, and Gambon.
These can hardly be called obscure-in fact,
their names might be properly marked with
the initials which Mr.. WTagg attached
to the names of cities where he had
borrowed good deal of money,
signifying Too Well Known. The first is one OF
| those restless spirits who are irresistibly at
tracted by any sort of a row. They imagine
themselves on fire for liberty, but their patriot
ism is half adventure and half egOtism.
Flourens, for instance, is a professional free
lance-in the best sense, as he pays his own ex-
penses. Whenever the telegraph brings the
report of freedom being ill-treated anywhere
he starts off to the rescue of this lady Of his
thoughts. He has shed his blood for her in
|
Bois de BOulOgne. Blanqui is a veteran dis
turber of the public peace. Pyat and Gambon
have passed their lives in conspiracies and
prisons.
1t is under such guidance as this that Paris
has cut itself off from the rest of France, and
adopted an impossible regime of communism.
At last advices the cities of the interior have
refused to be dragged into this disastrous
path. Marseilles is quiet. Lyons has returned
to its normal relations with the General Gov
ernment. st. Etienne has recovered from its
mOmentary intOxication, and has restored its
regular municipal officers. But as yet there
seems no prospect of the sober second
thought making itself heard in Paris. There
! appear to be but two ways of ending the in
suiferable situation which now afllicts France
and the world-and both are almost equally
painful. One is by civil war and the slaughter
of citizens by each other; and the alternative
is the reoccupatiOn of the city by the Prussan