France, like England, is engaged in Easter amenities ; and
the business of the Assembly would be dull, but for such incidents as M. Eugene Respell's slapping M. Point's face for looking at him quizzically—or, as the angry man expressed it, "with a certain affectation "—through his eye-glass. The International Pleasure Party and Picnic Asso- ciation has been received by the Parisians with much courtesy ; "God save the Queen" being substituted for " Jamais en France" with the most touching cordiality of applause. Our neighbours were rather dis- aupointed at seeing no uniforms and no artillerymen among the visiters ; Mt they very politely concealed their contempt for plain clothes and round hats ; and the respectable Englishmen have had the run of Paris, Just as the National Guard had of London.
The French Socialists, however, know no relaxation of their labours. The truly earnest men on the Continent appear, after all, to be the Com-
munists; and no doubt their zeal means something. At one of their most re. cent banquets figured an editress ; and the same lady has offered herself as a candidate for election to the National Assembly by the Department of the Seine : Madame Deroin puts the same interriretation upon "universal suffrage" which makes Mr. Roebuck object to it—she interprets it to include women. And truly her brief address is not less nervous or pithy than many which have emanated from masculine pens. Madame Deroin may plead an analogy in England : the parishioners of Ackworth have just elected Miss Tempest, a sister of Sir Charles Tempest, to be their overseer of the poor.
