25 AUGUST 1866, Page 2

The French press is still furious at Prussian aggrandizement, and

the fury is supposed not to be displeasing to the Government. The Bill for the annexations has been made the occasion of long tirades about the shameless use of force by Prussia, and Hanover in particular is pitied to more than its heart's content. The exasperation appears to be genuine, but it must be remembered that the writers of these articles have often a double motive. They want, no doubt, to express their irritation against Prussia, but they want also to break the Napoleonic prestige. If they can show that the Emperor, so far from enlarging the borders of France, has petrified them, they will have done much to shake his regime. At the same time the republication of German insults to France in a demi-official paper is a very serious sign, would be most serious if the Mexican troops were home and the Exposition Over.