Connecticut western news., 1872-10-18
French COnsoriptiOn.

SOuSOAApbAVus
 For the last fortnight young France has been pulling the tickets out of the boxes, and wry faces along l with them. During fortnight more, the man lotteries will be continued in the provinces and then the republic will stand provided with the last army | to be levied under the system of 1882. The conscription forma!ities are enter | taining to witness for those who take no part in them but they are never gay, even in Paris. 1t is all very we'll to deck ones head dress with tri-colored stream CTS, to pin the unlucky ticket one has drawn jauntily to the crown of 1t, to trudge twelve of row with brother con- scripts, all bawling the "Chant du De- part" and to be generally merry for two days and nightR But th1s does not constitute gladness of heart. If one could follow to his gartet the Parision ex- -gami,, who is just turned twenty, and whose ticket entities him to be shot at for his country's sake during the next seven years, at tho rate of sou day, one might see q curious picture of ami nal grief, not much tempered by patriot. ism. Paris is all to this pale faced, pert tongued hero; and the memories of it must come back to him very fresh and alluring as he sits rubbing the knuckles of his thin hands into those habitrally shrewd and mocking eyes of his. At five he was cast loose into the streets, merry in rags, delft at clearing puddles, defter still at making grimaces when coachmen shouted at him to get out of the way. Older gamia,S taught him to charcoal his name and those of public men, on newly painted walls, to wait for scraps outside barrack gates at four P. M,, when soup and beef are eaten, to dip his fingers into those tubs of stewed prunes and brown sugar which stand outside grocers' doors. By and by he learned to fill up his days for himself. the regimental bands leading battalions to target practice at V1ncennes, to man. @uvres at Longchamps, or to parade at picked up cigar ends on the boulevards, sat fishing Intellectually but blithely Tor gudgeon, with Q string and Q crooked pin, under the bridges of the Cite, or hung about newspaper offices, where, if there were a special edition coming out, he would be entrusted with a few copies on depositing some portion of his raj ment (generally his shoe) as guarantee for the receipts. The evening found him fattenlng his nose against restaurant windows, opening the doors of carriages outside theatfes, begging for counter marks, which he resold if he could, or mounting guard at stage entrances, and coaxing silver money out of actresses who happened to be in good humor from being applauded. That reck-a-day life of his was perpetual holiday, and yet 8 perpetual lesson for who so vers- ed as this ganain in the unpublished facts of contemporary history? If any man of importance were married, buried or beheaded if there were big trial, a fire, state pageant, a revolutlon-there was he to the front, peering and seeing as much of he''sight as coul be witness ed gratis. Then he gamboled home and it was his glib tongue that retailed those picturesque accounts of the occur renee which, borne from ear to ear on the lips of an imaginative people, be- came accepted as the popular version" that stumbling block of perplexity to the truthful historian. Yes, indeed; it was joyous life; and every day of it must beam under the touch of memory like a pearl on Q chaplet and yet now they are going to take the poor gamia, sheath his meagre legs in red trousers, and teach him the art of surpressing his neighbour He whose will was as free as the sparrow's or the gadfy's, he who de- throned Cesar, and maybe helped to set his country's capital on fire, will be fet- tered by regulations, the military code, and the gear of the guard room. They will pipeclay him, crop him, drill him. They will hint to him that he had best walk upright as ramrod, salute his superiors, behave himself in the streets, and throw less levity into his relations with the other sex. No wonder he snivels and sobs. No wonder that when his bonne annie comes in from her work, she finds him looking limp as Q washed out rag. She asks what's mp and he points mutely to the paper number on his cap. Then. she, too, sits down and sobs, not without @ few sub thoughts as to whether she had not better take up with young Jules, the wheelwright, who drew an exemption number last year.
 Your pumpkin conscript is not less afflicted Frenchman than his brother of Paris; but his grief assumes a more pub lie form. He has no sooner realized the fact that he is to serve his country than he bleats like sheep, and fills the whole mairie of his native village with his un- manly wailings. His woman relatives, and the girl of his choice, who are wait ing outside, take up the dirge, and so does his thoughtful father, who reflects that he must now hire boy at twelve pounds Q year to do some of the work which this son of his performed. It Is an affecting family scene; and round and about are other bowling groups. The yellow belted gendarmes outside the 'nairie doors shrug their shoulders inn patiently, and cry, ''Pass on, pass on!" to the string of hobbledehoys who arc hurrying up every minute to draw under the escort of their respective mayors
 (the conscription beng done at the chief
 towns of cantons, not in each commune:) and pass on they do treading on one anothers hobnailed heels. At one end of the municipal room is table, and, seated behind it, the perfect, the general of the military division, the recruiting captain ana secretary. Before them stands the instrument of mlsery-a mahogany cylinder hung on pivots be- tween two .uprights; and each rustic as
 his name is called, slouches up to the table, gives the box touch so as 10 set it spinning, and, when the whirling has stopped, opens the lid, and dips his hand in. Some dip at once, unhesitatingly i;
 but these are strong spirits. The ma jority sign themselves with the cross,
 mutter invocetions, produce a talisman generally leaden image of saint from under their waistcoats, and rever- entIy kiss the same. It grieves one to add that, when the dip is not successful,
 the leaden saint is often kicked into the roadway with every manifestation of ig
 nom1ny. By twelve o'clock the con scription is usually over; and then the