21 OCTOBER 1871, Page 2

M. Leon Say, the new Prefect of the Seine, has

come over to express the acknowledgments of Paris for the sympathy of Lon- don when, on the raising of the seige, her population seemed in danger of starvation. He was entertained with M. Vautrien,

president of the Municipal Council, at the Guildhall, on Wednesday, and made an excellent speech, the point of which, apart from a graceful expression of the gratitude of Paris, was! that order could not be restored in France without the aid of the Conservative party, and that the Conservative party there, as elsewhere, was ill inclined to Free Trade. This was in allusion to the contem- plated revision of Mr. Cobden's Treaty, which, however, he trusted would not greatly injure British manufacturers as the French producers were loaded with new internal taxes. That is to say, that because the consumer is taxed as well as the manufacturer, therefore he should pay more for British goods That is surely bad political economy, but M. Say probably wished only to be as conciliatory as he could. The remaining speeches were of little moment, the Mayor panegyrizing France in words borrowed from Dean Stanley ; M. Vautrien stating how deeply Paris had been touched by the friendliness of London ; the Bishop of Winchester declaring that war might be a necessity, and refusing to " counsel cowardice ;" and Archbishop Manning deprecating the miseries of that great scourge, and extolling Christian brotherhood. He took occasion, too, which nobody else did, to say a word of recognition for Mr. J. T. Knowles, the original promoter of the organization for the relief of Paris.