The Sun. — 1871-01-24 (London, England)

AFTER THE SORTIE.  From Paris, January 20, the special correspondent of the Daily News writes :—The number of wounded was very great. It was the Prussian musketry fire that did most execution. The artillery was comparatively harmless. The Prussian gunners fire with a beautiful regularity, which is, however, little serviceable. If you marked where a shell fell, you were  pretty sure to note that every twenty seconds other shells would fall in the same place, or thereabouts with the mechanical regularity of a steam hammer. Beware of that particular spot, and you were comparatively safe. It was, I have said, the musketry that did most execution, and its effect was murderous. In the rear of the battle the sight of the ambulance carriages and the stretcher-bearers leading up to them was to be compared only to the precincts of the Italian Opera in London on a grand night, when you see long lines of carriages, sometimes three deep, waiting to carry home the gay assemblage. If any of your readers go to the Opera after reading this letter, let them imagine, instead of neat broughams and capacious carriages filled with bright-eyed beauties, long files of stretchers, three deep, each containing a wounded man, groaning and bleeding, and blanched of feature, and each borne off tenderly by two men, one at the head and the other at the foot. Itiy imagination full of this terrible sight, I told the people as I entered the walls of Paris that there were many wounded. They were greatly agitated ; and then came the women round me, anxious to know of their kindred. One had a son in this regiment of the National Guards, another a husband, a third a brother, some one else a father. I shall never forget the trembling of the people waiting to have news of their nearest and dearest—their faltering voices, their swimming eyes, their restless manner. And if ever you wish to picture to yourself the horrors of war, do not let imagination rest alone upon the battlefield. Think also of the thousands of people at the gates of this great city—thousands of all classes, fine ladies and poor women —in agony for those they loved the best ; wondering whether they are safe; fearing they are dead ; certain they must be wounded. This it is to fight with National Guards. They fight with their families in sight, and the agony of these families waiting at the gates is in some respects greater than the agony of the field of battle itself. The crowds, let me add, were not merely at the gates. All up the Avenue General Uhrich, formerly known as the Avenue de l'lmperatrice, they stood in groups. Half-way up is a solid.barricade right across the Avenue. They got on the top of this barricade trying to see something, and all round the foot of the Arc de Triomphe they stood watching with an intensity which it was most painful to witness.  The Rev. J. M. Rodwell, the rector of St. Ethelburga, Bishopsgate-street, preached on Sunday night on "The doctrine of the Real Piesenceln the BleSied Sacrament." There was ari overflowing congregation, most of those present evidently belonging to the extreme High Church and Ritualist party. Mr. Rodwell wore a bright red stole over his surplice.  A. Parliamentary return of all expenses incurred by the Royal Commissions severally appointed during the year 1869 to inquire into the existence of corrupt practices at elections in the city of Norwich, and the boroughs of Beverley and Bridgwater, has just been made, from which it appears that Norwich cost £3,183 12s. 4d. ; Beverley, £2,550115. 2d. ; and Bridgwater £3,111195, 9d. ; making in all £8,846 3s. 3d.