The chief topic of the French newspapers during the week
has been the impeachment of the late Ministers. This subject was discussed at the sittings of the 27th and 28th September. On the order of the day being, read, M. de MARTIGNAC said he had been requested by Prince POLIGNAC to assist him with his legal advice ; and therefore he declined to take any share in the debate. M. GESTAN DE LA ROCHFOTJCAULT opposed the motion for the impeachment in respect of the ordinances. He was followed at great length by M. DE BERRYER. The latter deputy contended that the constitution did not recognize two responsibilities—a re- sponsibility of the King and a responsibility of the Ministers ; that if the one were made to suffer, the other ought not to suffer also ; that by extruding CHARLES the Tenth from the throne be- cause of the ordinances, the nation had punished him for their pro- mulgation, proceeding on the view that they were his act,—while, by the impeachment of the Ministry, the Chambers were about to declare that the ordinances were not the act of the King, but of his advisers. This is the argument of M. DE BERRYER, stripped of the verbiage in which it was enveloped. There is a plain answer to all such reasoning,—the agent is equally guilty with the principal whom he knowingly and voluntarily assists. Having established the responsibility of the King, M. DE BERRYER left the guilt of the Mi- nistry exactly where he found it. If the Ministers did not concur with their master, they were at liberty to resign; if they did concur, they became parties to the treason against the state which the King had perpetrated. M. DE LARDEMEL defended the ex-Ministers from intentional wrong. They had, he thought, only erred in judgment, by misinterpreting the 14th article of' the old Charter. This plea will of course avail the impeached, if they can show that their interpretation was warranted by any fair construc- tion of the article in question. Several other members joined in the debate ; some supporting, and others opposing the motion. It was agreed that the vote should be taken separately for each individual to be impeached. On the votes being called in the case of Prince POLIGNAC, there appeared for the impeachment 244, against it 47. Next day the debate was resumed; when the im- peachment of Messieurs de PETRONNET, CHAMELAUZE, and GIIERNON-RANVILLIC, was carried by majorities of 178, 147, and 141 respectively. The following gentlemen have been appointed commissioners to conduct the prosecution in the neme of the Chamber—MM. de BERENGER, PERSIL, and MADIER MON
JAULT.
• - A letter has appeared in the Quotidienne, signed" KEnoonta-st," in which the writer contends that the Duke de BORDEAUX is the only legitimate heir to the throne, and by consequence, that Louis PHILIP is an usurper. The letter Was adverted to in the sitting of the Peers of the 27th; but the discussion dropped, on the Duke de BROGLIE informing the Chamber that proceedings had been instituted against the two journals in which the letter had been inserted, and would be taken against Count KERGORLAX if he ac- knowledged the authorship. The Messager des Chonbres has volunteered a long answer to KERGORLAY'S letter; whch might, perhaps, have been spared. There have been repeated rumours of the dissolution or modifi- cation of the French Cabinet ; but hitherto the event has belied them. • The ground of difference among the.members was said to be the proposed suppression of the popular Clubs. The Duke de BnoGLIE and Guizor would, it was said, go out, and M. LA- FITTE was confidently mentioned as the future President of the Council ; and several other changes were anticipated. If there were disputes among the Ministers, they appear to have been made up, at least for the present. It had been proposed during the late reign, to decorate the Chamber of Deputies with three historical pictures ; but the sub- jects were not fixed. A report has been made to the King and ap- proved of by him, proposing as subjects—the Royal sitting of the 9th of August, at the moment when his Majesty tool: the oaths; MIRABEAU replying, in the name of the Constitutional Assembly, to the Grand Master of the Ceremonies, at the sittings of the 23rd of June 1780; and BOISSY D'ANGLAS, saluting the head of De- puty FERAUD, which represented the prairial revolts. The anti-Jesuit feeling continues to display itself in the pro- vinces. The Gazette de France of Sunday quotes from a journal called L' Arnie de la Religion a long lamentation over the deface- ment of a cross that had been destroyed at Beaune. It was erected by a mission in 1824. The Christ was torn from it, and "given up to profanation," and the cross was burnt. Worse things have been perpetrated by a Protestant mob among ourselves. A riot took place at Toulouse on the 16th. The mob assembled to the number of two thousand, and proceeding to the office of the Droits Reunis, burnt all the records that it contained. The toll on the bridge recently constructed over the Tarn next at- tracted their attention. They burnt the 'gates and the collector's lodge. A party of the National Guard keeps watch at the bridge to receive the toll until the lodge be rebuilt.
Letters from Nantes speak in very desponding terms of the coming vintage ; the long-continued rains will, it is feared, blast all the hopes at one time entertained of it.
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