New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1885-07-26
ONE DISCORDANT NOTE.

There is one discOrdant note in the European
tributes to General Grant. The French press
dishonors itself by an ill-timcd display of re-
sentiment Our cable dispatches attribute this
exhibition of spleen to prejudice, caused by
President Grants sympathy withGermany IN the
war which Napoleon III. wantonly provoked.
The Paris journalists, instead of uniting In the
worlds tribute of admiration and homage to a
soldier of genius and a man of action-of real
nobility of character and sincerity OF purpose
reprint Victor Hugo's foolish inyective, and
have recourse to vindictive abuse. The In
Justice Of such captious criticism Is glar-
ing. President Grant did not fail to dis
criminate between the Imperial Govern
ment and the French people. Americans
generally concurred in bis judgment that
Napoleon I'LL had dragged France into an I'M
lust war for which her army was unprepared.
Their sympathies went out TO the French peo-
ple in the msfOrtunes which the crowned IN
triguer had recklessly brought upon them after
desDOiing them of their hlrrties. For him in
his wantOn assault upon Germany there was a
lust feeling of adherence For France and
the Republic founded upon the ruins OF a dis
honest and turbulent Empire there existed a
cordial feeling of respect and good will. Presi-
dent Grant was only the leader of a united
American opinion respecting the crimes of an
Emperor who plotted against the liberties OF
| France, invaded Mexico and sought to cripple
Northern loyalty III its struggle to preserve the
| Unon and finally dragged his country to the
verge of ruin by involving it in an unjustifable
war.
Paris journalism gives expression in interna-
| Al 70 Apifa nftauar al N
| it voices National feeling With the BarthOdi
Statue in New-York Harbor, the grandest gift
| ever made by one people to another, Americans
have no reason to believe that the shrIeks of an
| ill-tempered capricious press find responsive
| echo In public feeling in France. AS America
has honored Theirs and Gambetta, the founders
| of the only government that is now possible in
France, SO General Grant lives in the memo
RES of Frenchmen as the heroic soldier whose
victories preserved the Union and made
a Republic possible in France. Lucid
| ity of mind. Matthew Arnold would
have us believe, is the strongest charac-
teristic of the French people. Their
historians and statesmen have recognized the
close relations existing between the American
and French revolutions and have acknowl-
edged that Lafayette and his associates were
| fighting in Washington's camp for principles
which they hoped would ultimately prevail in
their own country. The destinies of the two
| Nations have been linked together. If the dis
membermcnt Of the American Republic had
been the outcome of the civil war, French
Republicanism would not have been the hope
full and successful cause for which Theirs and
Gambetta labsred. General Grant in prevent
ing that ACKNOWLEDGMENT rendered q service to
the cause of Republicanism the world over
a service to France. Victor Hugo was toe
magnanimous a man, too sincere friend Of
liberty. to have reviled Americas creates,
soldier in the battle for the emancipation of +;
race and for the preservation of the Union.
This one shrill, dissonant note from Paris
cannot rise above the swelling chorus of eulog,
and sympathetic appreciation with which
Europe has greeted the death of our Nationa
hero. From Berlin, Vienna and London Their