The Sun. — 1871-02-09 (London, England)

THE ELECTIONS IN FRANCE.  The Standard says : Yesterday France elected a National Assembly whose business and duty it will be to perform a task far exceeding in importance and in difficulty any ever before imposed upon a representative body. The Assembly is especially convoked to determine the question of peace or war—to decide, in other words, whether it will be wiser for France to accept a peace inflicting upon her a moral humiliation and material losses, from which she cannot hope at the best to recover in less than a quarter of a century, or renew a war from which, according to the general opinion, very little can be hoped, and in which much will probably he lost. The German negotiations will be carried on with the Assembly, and not with the present Provisional Government, and with the Assembly will rest the responsibility of the decision which puts France upon her knees before the conqueror, or condemns her to the continuance of a struggle to which it is now apparent a very considerable proportion of Frenchmen have, for reasons which we do not care to appreciate, the strongest objections. The vote upon this question may decide the destinies of France for generations, and the members of the National Assembly who appear at Bordeaux next Sunday will have accepted a responsibility which their sense of patriotism may indeed call upon them to assume, but which they will not be justified in assuming unless they are resolved to subordinate all personal feelings and political views to the one object of the promotion of the true interests of France. It is hardly possible, therefore, to exaggerate the importance of the resolution the National Assembly may take. They may save, they may destroy France, so far as such words may be used in the present condition of that country; and the composition of the new National Representation is therefore a subject of the greatest interest.  The Telegraph observes i—Paris elected its representatives to the National Assembly yesterday, and the provinces are about to follow its example. Yet, on the eve of the most important elections which France has witnessed since the great Revolution, the country seems to be strangely listless. We hear of o mass meetings, although the right of assembling is free to all. The journals do not put forth fiery philippics, although the freedo)n of the press is practically mitless. The Legitimists are dumb, the Orleanists have s, oken only through the Due d'Aumale, the Bonapartists have slunk into a corner, even the Reds do not shriek with their wonted shrillness, and the only party which makes itself heard is that of the moderate Republicans. What is the reason of so notable a change ? The secret of such a deviation into virtue is to be found in the tremendous realities of the struggle— the great Prussian army which lay outside ; the inability of the world-renowned cnnital to link itself with the world save by the agency of 1, ;loons ; the hunger which grew day by day like the tide which rose inch by inch upon the martyrs who were exposed by fanaticism to the billows of the unpitying sea ; the shells which dropped into the crowded streets and crashed through the roofs of quiet homes, smiting down the innocence of childhood and the beauty of women. Such realities stunted the conventionalities of life. They reared up a new set of miseries which could not be soothed by the solace of suicide, and which annulled the temptations to commit vulgar crime. The completeness with which the Germans have put to nought the gigantic appliances for the defence seems to have crushed the Parisians as an earthquake shakes the latent feeling that the earth is stable. So the greatest political issue which has affected the capital for generations seems to have been debated with such listlessness as we English discuss the fitness of Poor-law guardians. And that is likewise the case throughout the provinces. There is no agitation. All politial parties seem to take it for granted that the victory must lie with the moderate Republicans, as the party which holds the reins of power. Everybody, also, seems to assume that it is hopeless for France to prolong the fight, and that she must make terms with Prussia at whatever cost. Even the leaders of the nation seem to be rushing away into holes and corners. Some will not accept a seat in the National Assembly. General Ducrot declines, because his heart is too full of rage and despair, to fulfil the mission of Deputy with wisdom or moderation. He is " too much a soldier to become suddenly a politician." General Trochu refuses because, on assuming the Governorship of Paris, he announced that his functions should cease when the siege should end. The fact is that both Ducrot and Trochu are paralysed by the sense of despair. They see that the misfortunes of France are irreparable ; that she must submit to . the decrees of Count Bismarck ; and that the men who take part in the final negotiations can bear only the odium of ignominious surrender. So they hold aloof. The spectacle is not very edifying ; but it is French, and it is excusable.  We are officially informed that Captain ltobert Hall, C. 8., will succeed Vice-Admiral Sir Spencer Robinson as Comptroller of the Navy and third Larof the Board of Admiralty.—Daily News.