The official press of France and the supple courtier who
calls himself Prime Minister, have of course availed themselves of this discovery to urge on the people that every ' no ' to the piebiacite of to-morrow will mean sympathy with revolutionists and assassins, while every 'yes' will be a support to order and liberty. The effect of these appeals is, however, somewhat diminished by the recollection that before the plebiscite which established the Empire in 1852, a similar plot was manipulated to a similar end by the Emperor's Government, and that, after the plebiscite, nothing more was heard of the plot. The Government has justly given great offence by banishing Signor H. Cernuschi, an Italian for twenty years resident in France, for subscribing 2.4,000 to the anti-plebiscite agitation; while M. De Rothschild, an Austrian subject, who had subscribed /40 to the fund for the agitation in favour of the plebiscite, is left unmolested. The only effect on Signor Cernuschi. himself has been to cause him to subscribe another /4,000 to the same object from his Italian exile, and it is said that the money has been actually received. There seems little doubt that the plebiscite will receive the adhesion of a great majority of the French voters,—the violent tempers of the ouvriers causing daily more alarm to the peasant and shopkeepers of France. But M. 011ivier himself, and the Government he directs, lose dignity and repute with every day.
