Close upon £100,000 sterling. Value of wine pillaged in the different cellars, Tuileries, Total, Francs. 7,300 18,541 220,500 80,080 326,421 "Everything of any intrinsic value was stolen," observes M. Véron, and he adds a curious remark as a further proof of this assertion. At the Palais Royal and at Neuilly, the pictures and books which were too voluminous to be carried away, were cut up, torn or burnt in the most savage manner, as also large glasses broken, and pieces of furniture (the larger ones especially) destroyed. This the heroes of February themselves did not deny. They said it was the consequence of their patriotic indignation at finding themWe believe that to this day may be found selves face to face with the "accumulated" riches" of the "dishonest tyrant" they had whose gains are based upon the sale of these respectable tradesmen" in Paris, a part of swpt away from the soil of France. One thing, however, struck the persons who had has been little or nothing. If we recapitu wines, the "cost price" whereof to them to verify the losses sustained by the royal late the losses sustained by the Royal Famfamily, namely, that the destructive rage in-ily, whether from absolute thievery or the spired by "honest indignation" found vent Vandal fury of the mob, we shall not be a exclusively in those parts of the royal resi- little surprised at the amount. dences where nothing could be laid hands on and carried off. Where portable treasures of any kind were to be found, pictures, furniture, glasses, and precious volumes were left untouched; and the presence of plate, jewels, money, or any other easily transportable article of value was invariably recognised to have served as a conductor to the lightning of popular wrath, and to have saved mere works of art from destruction. Take as an example the medal-room of the Palais Royal, everything of any price was stolen. In the sack of the Palais Royal and Neuilly, between the libraries and medal rooms alone, things amounting in value to upwards of 85,000 francs were stolen and destroyed; and the commission named by the Republic itself in 1850, was forced to admit, that in the "private" furniture of Louis Philippe at the Tuileries, (in that not belonging to the Crown,) a loss had been sustained by the privy purse of 203,000 francs. This was at the Tuileries, where only a part of the furniture belonged to the domaine privé, the rest being Crown property. But at the Palais Royal, at Neuilly, and at the little summer palace of the Raincy the whole was the exclusive property of the Orleans family, Edifices destroyed or degraded, Wine stolen and thrown away, Total, Francs. 3,065,246 768,780 85,100 2,460,750 231,757 and 326,421 6,938,054 About seven millions of francs! a value of nearly £300,000 sterling! in which are not counted the private losses (entirely ascribable to pillage alone) of the queen and princesses in dress, linen, jewels, and money, nor those of the same nature suffered by the occupants of the Hotel de Ville and of the different ministries. It is impossible to touch upon the last extraordinary scene of Louis Philippe's career as a sovereign, without being led into considerations which bear upon what preceded and what has followed his reign. You can as little separate the eighteen years of the Orleans' dynassty from the faults of Charles X., as you can prevent the despotic rule of Louis Napoleon from justifying (in Frenchmen's eyes) and holding up to regret the sive ordonnances de Juillet, if they had felt themselves backed by a power strong enough to support them in so doing. The mere love of freedom, therefore, in France, is by no means to be compared to the corresponding feeling with us, nor was the revolt caused by its violation in 1830 at all the unanimous movement we in England have supposed. firmness and sincere constitutionalism of the first ten years of the Restoration. The three epochs are inextricably linked together, and you cannot take any one of them and study it in itself; it is nothing alone, but is the product or producer of the others, and in conjunction with them only has a meaning. When we, in England, reflect on Louis Philippe's reign, we are apt to do so from an English point of view; so we do when Again, as to the government inaugurated we think of the old Bourbon rule; and so in July. We saw two houses of Parliaalso when we attempt to analyze the weak-ment and a king, and we thought a constiness or strength of the present government. tutional monarchy was formed in France. Thus it is that we are so often taken aback Here lay another great mistake. When the by what passes in France, and are so per- 24th of February threw down the existing petually obliged to declare that the French order of things, the general outcry was,— are to us an incomprehensible people. But" How wonderful that so well established an so is every people, unless judged from its own point of view. We are not going to attempt the absurd and thankless task of explaining dogmatically why the French nation has for the last forty years done so many things which to us appear incoherent, to lay down one principle or one theory to which all that has occurred in France for half a century may be referred. We merely propose to touch here and there on a few points which are as it were connecting links in the national character, and which take off in some degree the aspect of incoherency we have alluded to. edifice should crumble to pieces in an hour!" No well established edifice does fall into ruins at a touch. The July monarchy was, in fact, not established at all. In February 1848, all was as much in the imperfect progress of development as in August 1830. "The monarchy of July had no consecration, no right. It was a government of circumstance, compelled to live by expedients alone. The men clared, the doctrines proclaimed, all were but mochosen, the measures adopted, the tendencies dementary expedients to meet the embarrassments and necessities of the hour; everywhere was some remedy sought for against the dangers of Viewing the French from the solid heights party spirit. The memory of the Empire was of our own freedom, from the eminence of evoked to throw into shade republican ideas and our "British Constitution," and the victories the hopes of the Legitimists; Bonapartism was of 1688, we thought nothing in the world so the expedient against these two. An emeute even easy to understand as the Revolution of Thiers' parliamentarism. was sometimes hailed as as expedient against M. It was living from July 1830. We believed it to be the rea-hand to mouth; and more thar once Louis Phisonable resistance of a whole nation, anxious lippe, discouraged, would sadly gainsay M. Guifor and worthy of political liberty to an or- zot's fine predictions of the future, saying, 'No! der of things which, to our minds, seemed no! you and I are using in vain, you, your courinsupportable. We believed, first, that the age and eloquence, I, my perseverance and expewhole country was unanimous in its repurience of men and things; we shall never found diation of the Bourbon rule, and next, that the liberal element newly promoted to power contained the amount of statesmanship needed for the solid establishment of any political constitution or system, whatever its name. We were mistaken in both respects; and were Louis Philippe alive now, we suspect that no one would corroborate our assertion more entirely than he. The "whole country" was not only far from condemning the measures which deprived Charles X. of his crown, but, on the contrary, was partly composed of men who highly approved them, and who manifested as much on the 2d December 1851. All those who adhered to the coup d'etat, and to Napoleon's policy of compression, were not mere cringing slaves, or cowards, or men void of principle or honour; but all of them were men who would have approved of the far less oppres anything in France, and a day will come when my children may want for bread.' "'* We quote this passage from M. Véron's book, because it is he, a bourgeois de Paris, imbued with all the prejudices of his order, who admits these truths. We could, of course, have found the same opinion upon the monarchy of July a hundred times over in M. Néttement's volumes; but we are bound to say it is more cautiously and more gently expressed by the Royalist writer than by the man who represents the juste milieu, and whom, because he does represent it, we quote. We are accustomed to fancy in England, that the hardest time for the head of the House of Orleans was that which imme * Mémoires d'un Bourgeois, de Paris, vol. iv. pp. 42, 43. diately followed his accession to the throne; | Philippe's Government, denominated "repand that the period of his reign where he resentative," was wholly false to its pretendmost tended towards a consolidation of his ed principle, for the very reason that it reppower was that which intervened between resented nothing at all. The crown was the marriage of the Duc d'Orleans in 1838, actively and intensely individualised instead and the Revolution of 1848. The very re- of being an abstraction; the deputies did verse is the truth. Whilst, between the not represent the mass of the people, but years 1830 and 1839, Louis Philippe had in merely their own interests. The peers did a manner to fight for his throne, his throne not represent the higher classes, whether in was more or less identified with the notions wealth, splendour, or talent; the aristocracy, of peace and stability conceived by the natural or constituted, without which (in its greater portion of the French people; every proper sense of the best) no nation is great, emeute brought him adherents, and so long represented nothing, scarcely even themas the country was agitated his dynasty was selves. The governing elements failed in tolerably safe. The real difficulties of Louis the hands of the Orleans dynasty, there was Philippe began on the day when open-hand- not the material to form a prosperous coned resistance to him ceased. From 1839 to stitutional monarchy. No "solid edifice" 1848, the weakness, the hollowness, the false- fell to the ground in February 1848, no ness of the whole system became more and house was overthrown from cellar to roof,— more visible; and during those nine years, no house was in reality ever built. under an outward aspect of ever increasing A very curious lesson might be learned prosperity, the country was gradually de- by those who live out of France, if they taching itself more and more from its Gov-were to study the appreciation by Louis ernment. Nothing real lived or breathed Philippe himself of the events of February under the mask of Constitutionalism in and of July. We in England fancy we disFrance. The peers were not a third power cover in the Duke of Orleans a truly conin the realm; they had no action, no in-stitutional prince, a man who, from the sad fluence, either to guard the rights of the examples of the last half century, had crown against the encroachments of the peo- learned to cast off the faults and follies of ple, or the rights of the people against the his race, and who, because he partook in ambition of the crown. The commons nothing of these family follies and faults, were, with few exceptions, lazy, ignorant, was fit to be the sovereign of a free and incorrupt, noisy, and timid, incapable of the telligent people. In reality the very contransaction of business, and most of all trary was in more than one sense the case. careless of the freedom to which we, with Louis Philippe was every inch of him a our British notions, believed them devoted. Bourbon, was prouder of being so than we The Crown was placed in the most fatal po- can conceive, and only did not feel himself sition of all; for, recognising the insuffi- easily and securely a king, because he felt ciency of the other two powers, it could it himself so narrowmindedly, if you will, but self be nothing but by a double usurpation. so intensely a Bourbon.* Had the Duc de That Louis Philippe should be a king at all Bordeaux died, the whole position and attiwas, as we know, a grave offence in the eyes tude of Louis Philippe would have been of a very large portion (and a more influen- suddenly changed, and he would have gained tial portion than we fancy) of the nation; a strength in his own mind and conscience and, on the other hand, that he should act as a quite inexplicable to us, but which if we king, that he should interfere in the work of will not admit, we must perpetually misun. Government, was declared by those who derstand the man. He was, in his own called him to the head of that Government, to private appreciation, sovereign of France, be an outrage on the country, a usurpation because a Bourbon, and to render this soveof the nation's prerogative.* * In fact, Louis reignty secure too much was wanting. * In 1832, M. de Montalivet, in his Report upon the question of the Liste Civile, had the misfortune to speak of the king's "subjects." Never was such a tumult witnessed, and the result was a protest, signed by 64 Deputies, against the possible idea, that any man in France could be the "subject" of another! The close of the séance, however, was remarkable, as being so essentially French. The Minister of Justice, M. Barthe, got up and asked permission to read a petition from the Municipal Council of Paris to the King, signed by names as little tainted by royalism, as "pure" as those of Mauguin, Schonen, Andry de Puyraveau, &c. He read it, and at the end,-"How do you think it finishes?" asked he. Every one looked inquisitive, and a deep silence ensued,-"It finishes," said M. Barthe, "in these words; and we remain, Sire, with the utmost respect, your Majesty's most humble and most obedient servants, and most faithful subjects.' The effect was irresistible, the absurdity of the position was instantly appreciated, and the tempest burst in a peal of laughter. "One of the most important personages of that time, and one most often admitted to Louis Philippe's intimacy, has frequently repeated to me, 'He never felt himself king!"-Mém. d'un Bourg. de Paris, vol. iv. p. 21. Louis Napoleon wields as yet whole and entire. The compression exercised by myriads of policemen, gendarmes, sergeants de ville, and minor functionaries of all kinds, all acknowledging the action of the army against the people as its ultima ratio, this The proof how all-important is some sup- the prophet's own apprehensions or desires. posed rightful claim to any one who seeks We will, therefore, simply enumerate a few to rule over the French nation, is evident of the causes of the present Emperor's in the conduct of Louis Napoleon also. Two weakness and strength. Strength in a govspecies of right are admitted, the historical ernment, as in an individual, is of two or traditional, and the elective. Of the kinds,-physical and moral. The former, first, the Count de Chambord remains possessed; but of the second, the present Emperor of the French declares himself the representative. We might think in England that if by the workings of universal suffrage eight millions of men really did elect Louis Napoleon for their Emperor, force is formidable and unimpaired. But that was right enough in all conscience; but such does not seem to be his opinion, for he styles himself Napoleon III., legitimate successor to his uncle and cousin, and Emperor in virtue of hereditary right; le droit héréditaire! that which Louis Philippe had not and would have given anything to possess.* Napoleon III. has also two sources of moral strength. One consists in the hereditary right he invokes, and which many people are glad to admit, in order to escape from the charge of supporting a revolutionary government; the other lies in the difficulty of deciding what political form or system would be better calculated to endure than the present, and in the mutual hatred of Revolutionists and Royalists, who, rather than see their rivals attain to power, would put up with any other mezzo termine. From this point of view the death of the Duc d'Orleans was a severer blow than has been supposed out of France. This prince, to whom royalty would have come transmitted, was already one remove from usurpA third cause of moral strength might ation and the insecure tenure of a merely have existed for Louis Napoleon-success personal power, and one move nearer to in uniting the nation cordially with himself: the possible assumption of a right of which but as yet this is wanting. He has commit he had begun to talk, and in which he be- ted the fault of attempting to conciliate two lieved. He was the strength and hope of incompatible principles. He has felt himthe men of July; and when he was gone self condemned to be absolute-and he has they one and all felt the precariousness of a tried to be popular. Herein he has failed. monarchy which would have to struggle Every important measure he has proposed through the dislocation of its forces conse- has had for its aim to ingratiate himself quent on the death of its original founder, with the lower classes, to whom he has perand the weakening anxieties of a long min-petually promised what neither he nor any ority. Few saw that the chief danger to other Sovereign could insure. His laws the State lay in the determined obstinacy and enactments have had a socialist tendency, of the King, and that his old age was likely and have hitherto been framed more or less to be more fatal to the existing order of in defiance of the rules of political economy. things than his death, which would have The French people, who are ignorant beyond left the regency in the hands of the Duc de belief of that science, and therefore more easiNemours. ly deceived than ours would be, have not un We are unwilling to be drawn into spec-derstood precisely where or how they have ulations upon the actual position of affairs been misled, and have merely supposed in France, and yet all that occurs there or they were indulged and cared for because is in course of preparation, has now a vital interest for us. The question," Will Louis Napoleon's authority endure?" is one we cannot ask with indifference. a All prophecies of the duration or fall of government are mostly interpretations of they were feared. This has, in a great measure, prevented Louis Napoleon from gaining the popularity he has aimed at; and little by little, as the accomplishment of his impossible promises fails, which it has already done on more than one occasion, on that of the price of bread for instance,-the *The following anecdote is interesting in this anger of the people will rise in proportion respect. When Louis Napoleon had at length de- to the disappointment of their expectations, termined to re-inhabit the Tuileries, he, a few weeks before, invited some of his private friends to visit and, far more than for having tyrannized with him the newly arranged palace. One of these, over, they will abuse him for having fooled a lady, and wife to a son of one of the first Napo- them. The popularity he was not in the leon's Marshals, came up to the Emperor, saying, requisite condition to obtain thus failing "I congratulate your Majesty on being returned at last chez vous." The answer was, with a calm smile, him, as it probably will, and Louis Napo"Je n'y reviens pas, j'y ai toujours été." leon being reduced to the part of a despot,— 4. 5. 6. J. T. GILBERT, Hon. Sec. Irish Archæolo- Memoirs of Richard Lalor Shiel. By Sketches, Legal and Political. By R. L. SHEIL. Edited by MARMION SAVAGE. 1855. Sketches of the Irish Bar, with Essays, Literary and Political. By W. H. CURRAN. 1855. the only one which is, to use the French expression, "logically" his,-it remains to be seen whether, when he again has recourse to physical force, that force will be as obedient to him and as victorious over his opponents as it was in the beginning. The day may arrive when Napoleon III. has become one with France, and when it may be possible for him to do what M. Decazes, when Minister to Louis XVIII., was always labouring to accomplish, namely, to “royalize the nation, and nationalize royalty." But Ir is several years since we have brought that day is not yet come. The present Em- the subject of Ireland before our readers. peror of the French has doubtless more Since then great changes have taken place in sources of strength, and even stability, than that country. When the effect of the vast his enemies will allow; but we must not destruction of property, consequent on the exaggerate the advantages of his position. food of the people being blighted for several He has as yet no one class or portion of the successive years, was manifested in its full French people wholly his. Hated by the and distinct reality-when land had passed aristocracy (which still exists, whatever we from the hands of its former owners-and may suppose to the contrary); abhorred by when its former occupiers had either been whatever lays claim to intellectual superior- removed by emigration, or had utterly perity; he is viewed coldly by the bourgeoisie ished a state of things succeeded different whom he despises, and who in him vaguely from what any one had anticipated. Of the fear an enemy to both influence and purse; land which its former owners were unable and suspected by the masses, whose fidelity to retain, but little passed into the hands of to him, as we have said, depends upon the benefits he has pledged himself they shall enjoy under his reign. Louis Napoleon is, we fear, in many respects farther than he was six months after the coup d'état from any possible advance towards liberal institutions; and the existence in Paris of one free-spoken paper, conducted with talent, would be too much for his power. All this is no reason why his power should not endure. As long as he has the upper hand (no matter by what means), he may govern France, and even govern it better than could have been believed. His authority, resting mainly on the foundation of physical supremacy, may subsist entire and available longer than we can imagine. But it is on this foundation only that the present Government subsists, and if its present basis fails, unless immense modifications are introduced, there is nothing to fall back upon. We repeat it, the day may come when Napoleon III. can govern with the nation over which he rules; for the present, do not let us deceive ourselves, he governs against it. English or Scottish proprietors. A great change, no doubt, has taken place in Irish society, but the change is not from the natives of other parts of the empire coming to reside in Ireland, or from natives of the north of Ireland coming to the south. Instances of this no doubt exist, but they are exceptional, and not more in number or in effect than have been at all times frequent. The change is one of vastly better promise than this or anything of the kind could be. Assume the former state of society continuing to exist, little could have been done by the introduction of a few individuals with other habits of thinking and feeling, even were those habits of thinking and feeling admittedly better. The new settlers would, as at all former times, even for peace-sake, have fallen into the habits of those with whom they had to live. A change, in every respect better than this, has taken place. The distress had the effect of taking out of the hands of the peasantry of Ireland the land of the country. Large investments of capital have been applied in the cultivation of the soil, and a better system of agriculture has been every where introduced. The necessity of frequent negotia tion with the Government, to whom the entire land of the country became mortgaged for the repayment of loans and advances of one kind or another during the years of calamity, has compelled the gentry of each district to act in common, and to discuss fully and freely a subject in which they all had a common interest; and thus the habit of living apart, each man cn his own land, with his |