October 12, 1870

The Nation. PORK, THURSDB Y, OCTOBEB 10, 1870.

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state of thingiizFmn,y z~ppeys,,.?~~ &ow norse and worse. Every day nlalres the hopelkssnee%&Jui sfruggle dearer, and nothing does more to dishearten the fricndsof France than the attllospllcre of falsehood by which everybody connected k t 1 1 the press or with pub- lic affairs, except General Trochu, appears to be hboring to surround himself and the public. Everybody seems to be engaged either i n de- ceiving himself or his neighbors; and even the nlen of thought, like Mazade and Louis Blanc, have completely lost their heads. Rlazadc, on the 15th of September, pours forth the same strain of folly as in the R e w e of the previous fortn,ight, and consoles l~i~nself for the horrible reverses of Sedan by the reflection that to France belongs ;the glo- rious privilege of astonishing the world. Louis Blanc, w110 has a well-earncd reputation as an accurate observer and cool reasoner, raves like the lunatics of the Gacdoiu or and, though an educated IIIRII, calls King Willia~n the Attila of the Nineteenth Century, apparently for no other reason than that the former, like the latter, has fought battles in Champagne, and that the defeat of the Prussians on the plains of Chblons would be an agreeable occurrence. Jules Favre, of whom we dislike to speak with anything but respect, has published an account of his interview with I3ismarck which reads like a letter from a young lady delegate to a womans rights convention, rather than the report of a statesman deputed to debatc with one of thc keen- est diplonmtists of the age the fate of a great people, and that people his own country~nen. The figure he cut himself appears all through to be uppermost in !?is mind. He keeps an exact record of all his emo- tions; tells how he started from his chair, and how he writhed and agonized under Bismarcks dastardly propositions ; how his strength was near failing him, and how near he came to breaking down, and so on-a most pit,iful record, and well calculated to increase the contempt of the Prussians for their adversary, and harden their hearts against him.

As far as sin~ple, unadnlterated lying goes, it must be adn~ittcd that the Republic has, thus far, outdone the Gralnonts and Palikaos, and with less excuse. Attcmpts are no longer made to conceal disas- tere, but stories of successes are invented and spread, and, what is worsc,

_L stories of arnmnlents and succors, and risings and reinforcements, + \\+ich the men in power Itnow have no foundation whatcver. The I

Army of Lyons, of which we have heard so much of late, has now bees converted into the -4rmy of the Loire, probably because it m-as felt to be a little too barefaced to assign it to any specified locality, and it is nom oh the Loire, and rolling up into the hundreds of thousands, and making ready to eat the Germans at a mouthful, although the

~ Prussians are advancing without serious opposition on Tours-the regular troops flying before them. course, dozens of these disgraceful fictions - are found out by the people every day, and every such discorery in- creases the want of confidence in the leaders which has been the curse of the war, as far as the French are concerned, and which is already threatening society with dissolution. The prefectsreportincreasing diffi- culty in preserving order in their departments ; the orders of the Govern- ment are disregarded, and the levies refuse to march. In many cases the National Guard are returning their arms, and many of the towns refuse -to allow themselves to be defended, feeling certain of defeat, and dread- ing the Prussian artillery. Better pay contributions, they say, than be bombarded and burnt. Indeed, it would be almost impossible to find a parallel for the present state of things in France. Many weeks more of it, without some great success, which is very unlikely, would make Prus- sian conquest welcome to all owners of property.

From Trochu, on whom may now be said to rest the whole .burden of the natjons sorrow, we hear little. is -undoubtedly laboring

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as best he can to infuse order and discipline into the vast unwar- like host now under his orders in Paris, and llis plan apparently is to break them in by means of small encounters with the encn~y, brought on under favorable circumstances, and not pushed far enough to try them too severely. This mode of bringing undisciplined trobps up to the mark has often been tried and succeeded, but never, we believe, under similar circumstances. I t nlay be said to be essential to its success that the army should be in camp, or in a fortress to itself, away from civilians and civilian influences, and completely under the control of the general. The nrn~y of Paris is not only, however, made up largely of men fresh from civil life, but of still in civil life. It is surrounded by inillion or nlorc of non-cornbatmtc, to whose cackle i t listens when off duty, whose moods it is inevitably affected, and whose fears and panics and despondency it must inevitably share. Moreover, these non-combatants will soon begin to suffer seriously from scarcity of provisions, and the troops will be constantly cognizant of their privations, and constantly within hearing of their plaints. If Trochu can make a body so sit.uated a match, even behind stone walls, for such an army as that of the Crown Prince, he will do ulore than any military n ~ a n 113s ever done bcfore him. The exposure of the city to bombardment becomes every day more inexcusable, :N it is every day more evident that no relief from the outside is to lw Iookrd for.

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,inlong the campaign stories of the week * has been a report I~III~OUIIC- ing the raising of the siege and the general retreat of the Irussians. There as another, from Tours, heralding the dest,rnction, 1)s the firc of the Fort da Mont ValErien, of all the Prussian works i n rircnit of six kilometres ; the clriving of their engineers from Clau1art, Meltdon, and Montretout : the recapture of Villejuif and Champigny, and a nuutber of other exploits achieved by the Parisians. there mas also an offcia1 bullet.in, issucd by Gambetta, at Tours, 1)roclainling that, on thc 12th inst., the Prussiana wcre driren out of a11 the Imitions they had been occupying for weeks . . . drivel1 beyond Stains. Pierre- fitte, and Dugny ; beyond Joinville, Creteil, Champigny ; * forced from Has-hleudon and St. Cloud, and thrnwn back on Versailles. The truth of the matter, h o ~ c v e r , ic, that the exploits of the more than ever heroic pcoplc of Paris consisted in some feeble reconnoissances snd sorties, which caused the falling back of the Prnssian outposts, and ended, like all preceding ones, with repulses; that the fire of Mont ValGrien did its principal I~avoc in the chatenu of St. Cloud ; and that the Prussiwns continue to hold their positions all around the city, whose only means of cornnlnnication with the second capital, Tours, remains the balloon. A conveyance of this kind lately took out M. [

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- ridges among the men preparatory to marching on the HGtel Ville. The establishment of a revolutionary commune, as it existet during the Reign of Terror, is demanded-and that within hearing o the Prussian guns, and while food is getting scarce. Fblix Pyat, a herc of 1848, whose deeds have altvays been words, reproaches the Govern nlent with having betrayed Toul and Strasbourg by their cowardlg negotiating for peace, and after elegantly telling them that Toul is frontier lost, Strasbourg is a gate of Paris, also reproaches them wit1 scattering flowers of rhetoric, and then cruelly exclaims : Begone your deposition is pronounced ! More patriotically disposed, Victol Hugo turns the shafts of his rhetoric chiefly against the Prnssians, and tells them that they are doomed, the theatre of mar having changed N o more forests, no more thick fogs, no more tortuous tactics, nc more gIiding along in the dark. The strategy of the cat mill not avai when you meet the lion. In vain you will step softly. The very dead will hear you. Paris is watching you-the thunder in her hand. . . Your facile successes arc o m . . . . And theu he calls them nanm .- Borussians, ; Vanda1sand quotes Shakespeare against Noltke- if we understand him aright.

_________ Where Paris does not watch the Germans-- the thunder in

hand, as Victor Hugo says-they continue to achieve more less :facile succcsses. They have reduced Soissons by heavy bomb:rrd. ment, under thc Duke of JIeclilenburg-Schmerin, capturing four thou. sand prisoners and one hundred and thirty-two guns; they have cap- tured spinal and Vesoul, the capital towns of the Departments o1 Vosges and Iiaute-SnGne; have closely invested Verdun and ?\en Brisach ; have entered Solnme in force, occupying illontdidier and threatening hmiens; have occupied Ureteuil, in Oise, and Lee Andelys, in Eure, reached Fleury, in tlle very vicinity of Rouen : have pushed their advance westward as far as Blenqon, in Orne : have achieved anotlrer victory near OrlCans, on thc i l th , entered that city, crossed the Loire, and pressed the French forces back beyond La Fert&-St.-Aubin, the latter probably retreating in the direction of Blois and Tours. official report by the general com- manding the French Fifteenth Corps, which was successively defeated on the 10that Artenag-and on thc i l t h , shows the disastrous char- acter of its last ruverse: Our troops, who . . . had taken part the day before in the batti: of Artenay, gave \vi>y. . . . I mas oblig- ed, in order to check the enemys progress, to go forward personally with three battalions of the reserve. . . . The enemy was checked for three hours, but at last were broken and overcom~ IJY their shells. The general praises the bravery of his troops, but a corre- spondent of the with the Army of the Loire-a term, as it .qeems, identical with &Fifteenth Corps-restricts his praise to the JIobile Garde, the Foreign Legion, which ( mas almost entirely destroy- ed, and the Pontifical Zou~~ves, and speaks very severely of the de- moralization pervading a part of the line. If the description given by that correspondent of things witnessed around OrlBans and in be in t.lle main correct, the condition of affairs in that quarter must be really deplorable.

Tours appears now to be threatened by a double advance of the Germans, on both sides of the Loire, from La FertB-St.-Aubin, south of OrlBans, where they are said to havc established their headquarters after crossing that river, and from the picinity of ChBteaudun, in Eure- et-Loir, where they recently appeared in some force. The means of opposing this advance seem to be exceedingly scanty. The capacity of the defeated comnlander of the French forces on the Loire being doubted, he has been temporarily superseded by General Uourbaki, though the latter was to leave for the North, where all the large towns- fortified as well as unfortified-are apprehensive of attack by the Prue- sian forces made disposable by the capture of Soissons. or by others arriving as reinforcements. Gambetta, for the last few days the soul of the Government a t Tours, has left for the seat of the war in the East. Lyons and Xarseilles continue to be agitated by political rnovelnents of an extreme character. Disobedience to the new authorities manifests itself in various other localities. Rumors are also current that

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Bazaine, who has been quiet for a number of clays, is negotiating for the capitulation of Netz. And amid all these extraordinary difficulties and perplexities, the slight successes achieved here and there by Francs- Tirenrs or Guards over Prussian foraging parties, or now and then by the defenders of Paris in skirmishes before the ramparts, have thus beell the only events calcnlated to encourage either branch of the GOV- e rnnmt of National Defence in clinging to the determination to cede for peace ( neither an inch of territory nor a stone of a fortress. The Paris branch, however, can boast of having firmly stood a siege for a full month.

Anybody who wants really exciting war news we must advise to subscribe to the New York Worlit, the European despatches of whic]l are really as horrible reading as anybody can wi,h for. The way the Germans are nearly every day maltreated i n its columns is positively inhaman, and we protest against such atrocities in a neutral paper. At that last great fight before Paris, the Germans not only had their be- sieging lines broken in, but were slaughtered and otherwise disposed of to the extent of eight (eighty 7) tllousand men, not to speak of ar- tillery and standards. The poor devils are nary crouching in the woods around Paris, badly corned. At Soissons, the slaughter too so dreadful that the Dnkc of Necklenburbr-8ehn.erin wept and wrung his hands. From the accounts given by the W o d d of the earlier por- tiou of the campaign, we felt satisfied that the aR:tir \vould end pretty much as the World describes it-that is, in the imprisonment of the whole Prussian army around Paris, with angry pe:mnts rising around them, the great guns of the fortresses playing tllenl, Garibaldi and Bazaine cutting oE their retreat to the IZhine, and the National Guard cutting off everything else, and the Crown Prince wasting a rv~y with hunger in Versailles. They now see how much better i t would have been for them to have surrendered at, Sedan, aa the Frenrh would then have let them go home.

-___- Fuller returns from the late elections substantially contirtn the sum-

olnry we gave last meek. In Pennsylvania, sixtecn Congressional dis- tricts have been carried by the Repnblican~, seven by the Democrats, and one (ONeills) by the mixed supporters of an indepcndunt candi- date. This leaves the delegation divided practicillly the same as now, though thc Repub1ic;tns havc lost trvo districts (involving, we are not sorry to say, the rctirement, of Mr. Ihnicl J. Morrell), ancl gained one, namely, that which Judge Wooclwnrd lately represented more respcct- ~b ly t han most of his collengoes. In the State Legislature, the Repnh- licans have a majority on joint ballot, and in Phihdclphia thcy carried :heir local ticket by about 5,000 maiority in a vote which showed a I11:krked Falling off from that called out by national questions. In Ohio, ,he Repnblican State ticket was carried by abont 1:5,000 nlnjority, and here, too, the Congressional delegation remains unchanged cllrtr:lcter -each p;wty having gained and lost two districtsun1css Mr. Schenck ;uccccds in contesting his seat with Mr. Campbell. Thc Iattcr owes lis slight majority to two causes, doubtless-dissat,isfilction on the part )f certain Republicans with Mr. Schencks notions about the tariff, and :he really nloderate and sensible way in which the late Minister to flexico behaved when returned to the State Senate. The Democrats lave carried Indiana by a majority of about 2,000, and gain one repre- ;entathe. What is of more importance, and by no means a ntltional nisfortune, is the fact that have small m2Njority on joint ballot n the Legislature, thus ensuring a Democratic snccessor to Senator aorton in case he accepts the mission to England, which is now ren- jered very doubtful. In Iowa, finally, the Republicans seem to have ost one Congressman in the Third District, lately Mr. Allisons, by a rely considerable Democratic gain, but small majority. the whole, 1s me llave said; the Republicans have their and the Demo- :rats, it is certain, will not control the next Congress.

The Administration has committed serious mistakc in allowing fir. Cox to resign, or, to speak more correctly, in Itaring allowed free ?lay to the influences which have forced him to resign. All the able jnd most influential Republican papers acknowledge its gravity.

Oct. 20, 18701 T h e N a t i o n . 251 - ~- _____~ - - Mcssrs. Chandler and Cameron, probably two of the worst politicians in the country, are believed to be at the bottom of it, and, coming as i t does simultaneously with the Presidents absurd attempt to influence the Missouri State election by very gross abuse of his appointing power, i t opens np lather troublesome prospect for the remaining year of his term of ofice. I t i s not yet too late for him to retrace his steps, and retain what will be of tenfolcl more value to him than all the & mnnagcrs in the country can do for him, and that is tllc respect and confidence of the honest men outside politics, a body of con- siderable n4gl l t and influence in the long run. Gratz Bran-n, of wllose speech only a telegraphic summary has reached us, has openly declared war on the administration in Nissouri, denouncing the Presidents policy as intolerable.

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The state of politics in t!lis city is this : Last spring, when the New Yorlr Charter was passed, the Republican members of the Lcgis- 1;tture wcrc induced to support it, under an arrangement by w!lich Itepnblicans re to have a proper s h a x of the municipal ofices. This arrangement wvas ctrried out, and it created a bqdy of persons known as ( Tammany IEepublicans, who are powerftfby, and, as i t proves, overwl~clmingly, represented by the Republican Committee, which is charged, in New Work, with the care of the rights of and other interests of that nn,turc. The Young Democrats, or the new Democratic opposition to the T:tmmany Ring, have now had the grace to nominate Air. Ledwith. an honest and independent Democrat, for Mayor, and invite the Repnblicans to help then1 to elect him, as the first and best me:tns of ovcrthrowing the rule of the Ring. portion of the Republicans are ready to so, and a meeting of the committee was called to consider the matter last Saturday night. There was a fierce debate. which as only prevented from degener2:ting into a breach of the peace by the presence of a strong body of police ; but the Tammauy Republicans, who do not want to have LedRith elected, and therefore wish to make a separate nomination, or ( a straight Republican ticket, mnstered in such force that they carried their point amid tremendous uproar, and the minorit,y, lleadecl by Collector Murphy, left the room in disgnst. The minority includes Mr. Charles S. Spencer and other gentlemen of that stamp. One of his reasons for wanting to adjourn Tvas, he said, respect for the S:Lbbitth, the debate having been protracted beyond midnight-an annonncenlcnt which the wicked Tammany men received, we are sorry to sag, with derisive cheers. Our opinion is, however, that, in spite of Spencers open confession of his reverence for the Lords DAY, the piety of the two sections is about equal, and we would not havc any Republican hesi- tate between them on that ground. But any Republican who votes for the straight Republican Mayor, nominated by the Tanmlany Republicans, will to all intents and purposes vote for the nominee of the Ring and for the continuance of its vile rule. It will be the highest duty of every Republican, therefore, to repudiate on this occa- sion the regular party nomination.

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We are about to have i n New York, on the first Tuesday in KO- vember, the trial of a question in which the whole country will be in- terested-namely, whether the United States Government can enforce order and regularity and honesty at elections in this city, in dcfianceof the Tammany Hall mob. Under the ncw law, the Marshal has full power over the proceedings, but if he were left to rely for support simply on his deputies, the mercenaries of the Ring wonld have no difficulty in overpowering him and having things their own way. We believe, however, that the Government has been advised to make, and is making, preparations to put the army and navy at his disposal, in much the sanx fashion in which they mere used to preserve order a t Lincolns election in 18G4. We have no doubt that we shall therefore have a day of extraordinary quiet, and an election of extraordinary purity. If it shonld not be a clay of quiet, however, and if an attempt should be made to carry out the Ring programne, and the Government should do its duty firmly, as we hope it will, ancl a number of our citi- zens should be removed by violence from their present spheres of ac-

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ivity, we must honestly confess that me are unable at this lnoment to hink of any good reason for regretting it. This sonuds inllunlan, but here arc so many of our citizens the bal!ot has so c;ompletely ailed either to elevate or to purify, and vhose growth in rascality is SO teady, that it ~vould really be hard even for their bestfriends to protest gainst their taking off.

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General Robert E. Lee died, on Wcdnesd:y week, of ncr1~011s pros- ,ration, brought on, doubtless, by the ftitigucs and ansietics of the aar, and, more immcdi:ttely, by the awfnl cllagrin-vc will not call i t .emorse-which must have come in the silence ancl t1esol:ltion of peace ,o every man who bore a prominent part at tlle South in carrying on ;he war. Skill, courage, patience. and fortitude, ancl all in t,hc Irighest legree, nobody can deny him, and we are glad to say t l l n t . so fhr as )ur observation has gone, not one who has noticed his dc:ttll has Ittempted to do so. Everybody acknowledges that, whetl~er ]lis share n the rebellion was his folly or his fault, he made, by his demeanor gince he laid down his arms, the best and, indeed, the only atonement I brave man could make without forfeiting his self-respect. now .bat i t is all over, and that mens judgments of him have, at best, only L literary value, we may say that he was a type of soldier which any ace may be proud to produce and ~ o u l d do well to cherish. Tlihen In3 matches what is happening in France, and sees h o w hard i t is even :or a nation trained to arms to bring to the surface, evcn in the throe3 of Icspair, the strong, silent man who can t:tlre the fortunes of the State on lhis single head, and bear them valiantly-sercne ttnd resolute and still- the North, as well as the South, may do worse than rrspect Lees mcmory, rebel and traitor though he was. How anybody can look at llim as a p ~ - - :hological puzzle because, having taken the military oath to tllc United States, he afterwards bore arms against then-and some (lo so-~ve xnnot vel1 understand. IIistory is full of cases in which men, greater md better than he, broke an oath of allegiance to an established Tovernment as he broke his, in the interest, real or imaginary, of higher things, and yet retained the respect of all the world and their own. That which will, perhaps, if anything will, cloud the cstinmtion in which he will be held by posterity is his failnre, when in thc very flush of his power and influence, to do anything to put a stop to the atroci- tics of the Libby and of hndersonville. That he did not know of these horrors it is hard to believe; that, knowing of them, he should have done nothing to hinder them, those who admire him as a man, still more than those who admire him simply as a Southerner, lvill always remem- ber as a great stain on a great name.

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We are surprised and pained to find that none of the lecturers this winter have made any preparations, so far as our knowledge goes, for the continuance of those assaults on caste which last year and the year before attracted so lnncll public attcntion. Miss Alma nickinson has gone off after Joan of Arc ; and Mr. Sumncr is, we are told, going to point sonle moral with the Franco-German Tar, and is going. \\-e fear, to have fnll swing. t h o ~ g h , it is true, n-c ha re not yet heard from General I q a n . Now, considering horn powerful caste was last year, and what fearful havoc it was playing with the body politic and social, and what desperate efforts its votaries ere making to confirm its hideous sway-witness the nose-pnlling case in Boston, and Gen- eral Shermans attempts to make himself a marquis, and give even- . ing parties; and considering, too, honr deep-seated was thc dislike of white people to marrying colored people, in spite of the plainness of their moral duty in that regard, nobody, we hope, will have the assu- rance to tell us that the danger is over, and that the lnonster has been slain by one course of lectures. We are, therefore, drivcn to some very painful conclusions about its last years assailants; but we sllall not utter them; our hearts are too fnll. This we may say, homver, that any undaunted politician, who boldly a v o m his hatred of caste, of aris- tocracy, ancl of monarchy and of orders of nobility, and his respect for the will of the people, will meet with the hcartiest support from us under any persecution to which h e may I E subjected. The:? are not the times to alloiv outspoken and fearless men to be put down.