" #pertater " August 18th, 1849
IN spite of grave assurances that there is no cause for fear, the aspect of affairs in France grows more and more unsettled ; and the country is so depressed, materially and morally, that the very efforts to restore her threaten to be mischievous in their first effects. An enhanced expenditure, a credit supported only by the faith that an effort is to be made, and a desperately sunken revenue, demand an act of strenuous exertion: every screw for raising revenue has been turned home, except one, and now M. Passy proposes an income-tax. The rate of the tax is to be 1 per cent., and it will take in all incomes. The more needed, the less is it likely to be levied. The Bourse is as frightened as if it were a declaration of civil war. M. Passy expects to raise 60,000,000 francs: he is more likely to raise 30,000,000 of people.
President Bonaparte has been making a tour which looks very like a tentative visit to "my people " ;- but if that was meant, he encountered great discouragement at Havre. The Deputy-Mayor made scarcely dis- guised allusions to the rumour that the President is looking for the imperial crown: he declared that " France has had enough of revolutions, and must stop at a republic" ; he advised M. Bonaparte " to let the love of France be his crown " ; and assumed that " he uould not suffer any party to attempt an impossible dynastic insurrection." The President made no reply to these insinuations ; for Prince Louis Napoleon has a decided talent for silence.
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