A meeting, respectable as to numbers, but of the "
miscel- laneous" sort as to persons, was held at the Cannon-Street Hotel on Thursday, to express sympathy with Franoe. The audience were addressed by Mr. Merriman, a solicitor who aspires to Mr. Bealea' place in politics, and who made rather a clever point in pleading that even Austria had spared Piedmont, after the abdica- tion of Charles Albert, but talked nonsense when ho objected to pay annuities to " German princelets engaged in crushing France." Would Mr. Merriman refuse to pay the interest on Consols to King William? He advocated a summary requisition to Prussia to quit France under penalty of war. Dr. Mackay, author, we suppose, of the song about " a good time coming," and of the letters which have produced most of the ill-feeling between England and America, advocated the cause of " Napoleon, " whom it was the fashion to decry, now that he was down ; " while Sir H. Hoare asked the meeting to say distinctly whether they meant war or not, which question was answered very decidedly by Dr. Kenealy in the affirmative. Mr. Sidney Smith apparently advocated war—he is either badly reported, or he was not clear—and Mr. Lloyd Jones made the shrewd point that Government, while refusing to recognize the Republic, asked it to help England against Russia. The meeting, according to the statement of the very hostile reporter in the Times, was divided as regards war, and as to the claim of Republican France over France under any other form of government. On the whole, the meeting represented pretty accurately the state of English opinion, which is getting angry with Germany, but is not yet resolute enough to bid Germany stop.
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