Year: 1870

With the exception of few unimportant
movements in the provinces the situation in
France remains unchanged. Bazaine's shrewd
proposition to surrender portion Of his garri-
son at Metz with the idea of subsisting the
rest so much longer has been rejected by
General Won Moltke, who looks to full and
unconditional surrender before long. Mont
Didier on the north and Magny on the west
have been occupied, and the rear lines at
Orleans have been strengthened by the with
drawal of the Prussian troops from Beaugency
and Meuny.


General Bourbaki is on his way to take
command of the Army of the North at Lille,
and Rouen and Amiens are preparing for de-
fence with that inactive enthusiasm that alone
seems to have saved France from utter
paralysis. About Paris steady fire from the
Notifications is continually kept up, though it
is now stated that the Prussans, resting safely
behind their works, are not disturbed by it.
Such an incessant fire must have the effect ere
long to empty the French arsenals of their
bombs and other missiles The Napoleonic





like shirt Of Nessus to the authorities
of the republic. Napoleon himself was more of
a general than the world gives him credit for
since Sedan. His Italian campaign displayed
qualities that his uncle might have admired,
especially in those matters wherein he was 80
lamentably lacking in his latest war. The
admirable disposition and rapid transportation
of his troops were Of immense avail at the turn
ing point at the battle Of Magenta, when his
heavy reinforcements came on the ground in a
train of cars, and were advanced in line of
battle directly from the railroad. Of late
years, however, he became careless, and
left the important items of commissa-
riat and mobilization to his subordnates,
and the result was climaxed at Sedan. The
legacy of worthless commissariat and lack
of concentration has fallen with heavy hands
on the young republic. The National Guard
in the interior are disorderly, the organization
of Gardes Mobile is progressing with fatal
tardiness, the generals Of the republic act
mostly on their own shook" and sad lack of
system prevails throughout. Time, however,
will remedy all this, if France or Prussia,
either, for that matter, can only afford time.
The presence of Prussians in their country and
encrcling in hostile lines their own favored
capital will serve finally to weld Frenchmen
into one idea and one sentiment. 1t will make
France all French Alsace, Lorraine, Nice,
Savoy, will all feel the more tender love for
their common country while it continues over
run by German hordes. 1t will cement the
people together and thus make them streng,
as the Southern rebellion in our own land, in
bringing about the upheaval of old party differ
ences, showed us also our strengh and welded
us the more firmly together. With the Germans
away from home it is another matter. These
troops are not the hardened soldiery that
the fact Of their being drilled almost from in
fancy upmight possibly lead us to infer. They
are mainly the landwehr-the home guards of
Germany-answering to our national guards
The greater part of them, although trained as
soldiers, have never seen actual service until
the present war have never endured the hard
ships of sieges and marches and battles and
camp fever, and that peculiarly German NAL
ady, home sickness. They have not learned
to endure the deprvations of war in their little
provincial encampments any more than Fisk's
Ninth regiment has become equal to a Virginia
campaign by their camp instruction at Long
Branch. These men, therefore, during the
dreary, rainy winter that is about to set in,
will be troubled, like raw recruits with camp
fevers and colds and that dismal home sick
ness with which many stout men, not near SO
domestic in their temperaments as the Ger
mans, died in the far-away camps down South.