During the French Revolution the aristocratic party made an attempt
to get rid of their most obnoxious opponents by incessant challenges. So publicly was the design spoken of that the group concerned were known by the nickname of the " Spa.dassins," and were accused of hiring bravoes. The scheme failed owing to popular hostility. but it has, accord. ing to the Paris correspondent of the Times, been revived against the leading Jews. The Count de Lubersac is said to be the leader in the affair, and he insulted Baron Robert de Rothschild avowedly on account of his Hebrew origin. The Baron, a lad of twenty, accepted the challenge, and though the arbitrators decided that he could not, as a minor, be allowed to fight, a shower of challenges has followed, intended, as M. de Blowitz evidently believes, to compel the Rothschild family to quit France. Such plots always fail, but the incident is curious evidence of the height of inveteracy to which aristocratic and clerical feeling has risen in Paris. The Judges would, of course, give the Rothschilds protection, but if they applied for it they would be universally boycotted, French gentlemen retaining, as Carlyle said, " the single virtue of perfect readiness to fight duels." A few years ago an unlucky editor who had made a sarcastic remark on the hunger for dainties displayed by young officers received twenty challenges, and worked steadily through them till he was severely wounded.
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