A FRENCH STATESMAN.
"THERE is a trite topic of consolation frequently in the mouths of a certain class of moralizers—" You are no worse than your neigh- bours." It is certainly not a very amiable characteristic of our nature, the power of finding pleasure in the reflection that others suffer as much as ourselves—that the range of misfortune is wide instead of narrow ; yet, if a man can alleviate his griefs by such a consideration, it would be cruel to prevent bim when no other con- solation is to be had.
And so it comes, that in the present lamentable dearth of states- men in England, we catch ourselves at times looking across the Channel, and muttering with a kind of satisfaction—" Well, if ours are bad, the French are no better." M. ()DILLON BARROT has just afforded us this melancholy pleasure.
" I combated," says M. BARROT, defending his advocacy of the fortifying of Paris, " a system of detached forts, which alarmed Paris and did not defend it ; and which would have left the popu- lation, as in 1814-15, mere spectators of the struggle which was to decide the fate of their country. I defy any one to cite a word of mine doubting the necessity of fortifying Paris." M. BARROT saw that the detached forts placed the inhabitants of Paris in the power of the garrison and its commander ; and of course he sees that the entire fortification of the city must do so to a still greater extent ; but then, M. BARROT sees something to be gained worth the sacrifice of immuring the representatives of France and the whole of Paris in one great Bastile. His objection to the detached forts was, not that they might enslave Paris, but that they would not give the Parisians the chance of a fight.
"It is evident, that as long as France remains without defence against new invasions, her alliance with England must be a compulsory one, unless she prefers to throw herself into the power of Russia. * • • A nation is not a first-rate nation but upon one condition ; which is her being able, in a good and just cause, to combat alone against all, and when Europe says yes to say no. • • • In this great and unequal duel, which we neither desire nor provoke, but which is possible and necessary to provide against, we should have to combat two powers, both beyond our reach—Russia and England ; one compassed by the ocean, the other with the entire breadth of Europe before her, and behind her the deserts of Asia. Are we to face such opponents with- out calque or armour?"
This valiant effusion reminds us of a passage in one of the " printed statements" regarding duels which have not taken place, so frequent in these degenerate days. The party who first ap- peared in print taunted the other with having remained in London : the latter quietly reminded him that the distance from Edinburgh to London is exactly the same as the distance from London to Edinburgh. Perhaps M. BARROT is not aware that Paris is as near to London as London is to Paris : nay, ships of war, at least trans- ports, may be tugged by steamers on the Thames up to the Tower— while a parallel operation on the Seine would be rather puzzling; and yet, however sceptical he may be, not one Englishman has ever dreamed that it is necessary to fortify London.
But then, the situations of the country are so different, M. Rumor will say. It is true, but his way of putting that point is not the most logical : one is tempted to think that O'Dillon blood really flows in his veins. France, if we understand him, is more exposed than Russia, because Russia is surrounded on all sides by large tracts of land; and more exposed than England, because England is surrounded on all sides by water. A country, we take it, must be invaded either by land or by sea ; and the one way may possibly present more difficulties than the other : but M. BARROT opines that both present insuperable difficulties when the question is of invading other countries, and none when the question is of invading his own. A foreigner cannot pretend to know so much of French history as M. BARROT; but it does occur to us that Paris was not fortified
when, at the commencement of the Revolution, her raw but enthu- siastic armies repelled from the frontier the forces of united Europe. We are quite aware of the folly of the language held by many re- garding the possibility of national enthusiasm being made a substi- tute for the organization and discipline of a standing army ; but we know also how little a standing army can effect unless the national sentiment go along with the struggle in which it is engaged. France has a better-organized army now than at the time of the Revolu- tion : does M. Beanor think that the present race of Frenchmen have so degenerated from their sires that an invasion of their territory, equally unprovoked with that which we have alluded to, would not prompt them to equal efforts ? He recalls the occupation of Paris in 1814-15 : does he believe that the catastrophe could have been averted had the city been fortified ? France and Paris were occupied by the Allies because the domineering of French armies over the whole Continent had at last roused in the rest of Europe the same spirit which formerly animated the French to repel the invading Prussians and Austrians, and because protracted wars to gratify the ambition of one individual had prepared many Frenchmen to welcome the invaders as friends. A fortified capital was not required to defend France in " a good and just cause" : it could not have defended her in a bad one.
The sacrifice proposed to be made by fortifying Paris is uncalled for : has M. Manor calculated the full amount of that sacrifice ? Let him turn to the twenty-ninth page of the second volume of M. FREGIER'S treatise "Des Classes Dangereuses de la Population dans les Grands Villes" : that writer, speaking of the demoraliza- tion of factory-children, gives the bad preeminence to the Depart- ment du Nord, and says emphatically of the fortz:fied town of Lille—" The workmen, unable to live beyond the walls because the gates are shut at too early an hour on account of the military regime to which the town is subjected, are obliged, for the sake of economy, to hire apartments in common, where they live in gipsy fashion. Some of them do not fear to take up their abode in cellars, where they sleep pell-mell, like that pomade race, without distinction of age or sex." This is only one of a thousand items of misery proposed to be entailed upon the large working-class po- pulation of Paris (75,000 adult males, according to the most mode- rate estimate,) by the advocates of the fortification-scheme. At the very time that the capitals and great marts of Europe are one after another throwing down their fortifications, because they have been found unavailing in war and in peace the cause of sickness and suffering, the men who boast themselves 'the most civilized in Europe are about to reverse this same procedure. Different people account for the folly in different ways. Some look at the measure much in the way that the inhabitants of the Scottish Borders may be supposed some two hundred years ago to have regarded the erection of a strong castle by a laird of questionable morality; others compare it to Hawser Trunnion's inability, from old habits, to relish a dwelling in which garrison forms were not kept up ; while others even hint at cowardice.
It is the business of our neighbours on the other side of the Channel—none of ours. We shall be neither the better nor the worse for the fortification of Paris. Any remonstrances, moreover, from foreigners, are regarded as proceeding from selfish motives. These remarks are meant not for Frenchmen, but for Englishmen. The moral of our tale is—when such niaiseries are vented by one of the foremost Liberal statesmen of France, one might learn to put up even with Lord PALMERSTON.
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