NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE sensations based on the Panama Scandals multiply in Paris. The Government, alarmed by the tone of the public mind, and by the narrowness of its majority against investing the Panama Committee with judicial powers, has taken the matter into its own hands. On Monday it ordered the arrest of the more prominent directors of the Canal Company, including M. Charles de Lesseps ; and on Tuesday it demanded from the two Chambers permission to arrest ten Deputies and Senators, the principal being M. Rouvier—said to have re- ceived on one occasion 23,600—on charges of receiving bribes to give their votes corruptly. Cheques or counterfoils can be produced against all the accused, annotated by Baron R,einach ; but, of course, they may be able to show there was good reason for receiving them. One, indeed, M. Jules Roche, denies absolutely that the initials given refer to him, or that he Sever had any transaction, bad or good, with the Panama Canal Company. Neither the Senate nor the Chamber at- tempted to resist the demand for permission to arrest, but in the latter, M. Rouvier tried hard to defend himself. As, how- ever, he only pleaded that he had received money from "financial friends" to supplement the Secret Service Fund, and had expended it for purposes unspecified, and that all politicians did the same, his defence was received in silence. It is believed that, as evidence accumulates from the papers now being seized in every direction, many more arrests will be made, but as yet the only clear case is that of the late M. Barbe, Minister of Agriculture. A note has been found in which he acknowledges the receipt of £18,000 "for the Panama affair."
