The Sun. — 1860-04-28 (London, England)

MARIE ANTOINETTE. He need not have gone so far back for his illustration, had he simply required an illustration of the kind to which we are now alluding. He has selected the particular period specified, however, simply because it suited his whim that that time and no other, earlier or later, should be the theme of his eloquent disquisitions. And it certainly must be allowed to possess beyond all other eras in human history, ancient or modern, supreme attractions. Otherwise if contented (tol point the moral and adorn the tale ho would tell) with a lesser degree of fatuity on" the part of the rulers thus blindly rushing on to their own destruction, thus frivolously dancing away their last hours of pride and power over the flower-strewn crater of the hidden volcano, thus marching in solemn procession (as to a crowning ovation) over the edge of the unseen Tarpeian—M. Louis BLANC need not have gone further back than to a period so absolutely contemporary, that he, though but now in the 47th year of his age, 12 years since, personally and conspicuously, participated in the events which grew out of the catastrophe alluded to! The catastrophe of the abrupt and ignominious downfall of the Orleans dynasty in the revolution of 1848—an occurrence portented by a series of dark and evil doings, not unlike in some particulars those which have now been brought to a hideous climax at Vienna by the suicide of the distinguished Minister of Finance in the Emperor FRANCIS JOSEPH'S ominously ill-fated Government.  The Marquis and Marchioness of Exeter and Lady Mary Cecil arrived in Grosvenor-square yesterday from Burghley House, near Stamford.  The Countess of Clonmel and family have arrived at Thomas's Hotel, Berkeley-square. The Earl and Countess Fitzwilliam have arrived in Grosvenor-square—the noble earl from Newmarket and the countess from Milton-park. Viscount and Viscountess Doneraile have arrived at No. 12, Hereford-street, for the season. The Marquis and Marchioness Townsend, Viscount Raynham, M.P., Mr. St. Aubyn, M.P., and Lady Elizabeth St. Aubyn, have arrived in Lower Grosvenorstreet.  Sir John Dick-Lauder, Bart., and Captain A. Mitchell lanes have left Fenton's Hotel for Oxenford Castle.  Sir Edward and Lady Caroline Kerrison have left the Queen's Hotel, Upper Norwood, for Suffolk. Mr. and Mrs. Petre have arrived at their house in Berkeley-square, from Paris, for the season. Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher Norton, have arrived in Mansfield-street, from Elton Manor, Notts, for the season.  Mr. and Mrs. Edgar Disney and the Misses Disney have arrived at the Brunswick, Jermyn-street, from the Hyde, near Ingatestone. Mr. and Mrs. James Fletcher have arrived at Fenton's Hotel from-Wootton-hill, Lancashire.  DOVER, April 27.—His Excellency the Earl of Elgin, with the countess and their youthful son, arrived at the Lord Warden Hotel last evening. His lordship sailed by mail packet last night for Calais. Her ladyship slept at the hotel, and will return to London to-day. Count Cavour has been presented with the citizenship of Florence by the municipality of that city,  A Vienna letter says :—" It is considered certain here that as soon as the reorganisation of Hungary is completed, the Archduke Maximilian will be placed at the head of the adminigration of that kingdom. It is stated that this office was proposed to him during his recent stay at -Vienna, but that he declined to accept it at the moment." The German Journal of Frankfort states that the Austrian clergy, comprising 13 archbishops, 52 bishops, 700 convents of men and 276 of women, amounting in all to 28,000 persons, and possessing property to the amount of 500 millions of florins, only subscribed 300,000 florins to the new loan.  What were some of the more conspicuous of these lamentable auguries at Paris in the winter of '47-'4B, justifying again in a literal sense the wisdom of the poet's dictum that— " Coming events cast their shadows before ?"  Let the historian of Modem Europe answer in one sentence. Sir ARCHIBALD writes in his " Continuation" (ch. xlvii. p. 682)—" The corruption among the public functionaries at this period had become such that it could scarcely be credited if not attested by the incontrovertible evidence of judicial proceedings and judgments." And he immediately goes on to remark yet further that " Every day revealed fresh instances of it either in the public function• aries or in some persons connected with them; and so common that they reached not only the in