The demonstration of the Nat Anik Guard in Paris, last
wee. produced a reaction. Mei-. claim +re'keep up the select compa7 nies, and to retain the practice by which each company of the force chose its own officers, however reasonable in many respect,,,
was at least irrational in its inopportuneness. The old resinlyees of the National ; nard failed in that of which it was their yens object to make a display—numerical strength. Thesiwc::;1. up to overawe the Government, but were vastly outnumberee. by the mob that went up to overawe it on the other side.
The Government was not overawed by the N ationa truards; it was so by-s;Ae-nsab, although keeping up a brave. siga,,Nof ral independence. M. de Lamartine displayed all his iafrepTdity, adroitness, and skill in elocution ; and, thanks to the peculiarity which so powerfully subjects the French to the dominion of words, he contrived to parry the searching and rather dan- gerous cross-examination of the demagogues. M. de Larnartine fairly talked the crowd over. But he and his colleagues thought it safest to render some substantial compliance wits their de. mantle.
The Provisional Government has been at the receipt of deputa- tions—Savoyards asking " annexation " of Savoy to the Republic ; Irishmen presenting an address with " the Irish flag." The British Ambassador afterwards asked for an explanation of that apparent recognition of a separate symbol for It:eland; but M. de Lamartine disavowed any intention of the sort. The creature of a street riot, the Provisional Government is forced to run the gauntlet in a reciprocation of equivocal courtesies, like a Parlia- mentary candidate at election-time ; and the only surprise is that it does not fall into more mistakes. But the awkward position into which it has been betrayed by foreign deputations shows the inconvenience of receiving such fractional waifs and strays of an alien community as representing any foreign " people."
The greatest dangers of the French Government, however, are the financial and social disorganization. Although the commer- cial classes, headed by M. de Rothschild, are using every effort to aid in supporting credit, there are unmistakeable signs of the universal distrust. The depreciation of the paper currency has begun; its early symptoms appear in manoeuvres to keep up the value by small cash premiums, and the like, on the payment of money. An inadequate revenue is to be made good by excessive taxation. M. Louis Blanc's din" organization of labour" is ex- posed, in the shape of persuasive official appeals to the workpeople, urging them to return to the work which they have abandoned. All classes profess to "respect the Government " ; but the mob, that created, cannot help calling it out every now andllien,—as a young girl worries her first lapdog to death by incessantly dragging it out to be looked at and show its tricks. The Pro- visional Government comes when it is called, and goes through its performance ; standing confessed as no more than an or- ganized " shindy."
