M. Gambetta went to Tours on Thursday, with no great
.display, and there was apparently some falling-off in the popular enthusiasm of his reception on the route, due, per- haps, to the dissatisfaction with which the peasantry have observed the wish to hurry the elections, lest the war in North Africa should assume larger proportions. At Tours, however, M. Gambetta was received with much enthusiasm ; and in the evening, he made a speech of a very moderate kind, in which he praised M. Grevy very warmly, defended. the 363 Deputies against the censure they had undergone, and regretting the failure of the Scrutin de Liste, declared that that failure would render it necessary to introduce into the mode of nominating the Senators the principle of the proportionate equality of the Communes, and to take away from the Senate the power of electing its permanent members by co-optation, perhaps to hand it over to the National Assembly, composed of the two Chambers sitting together. Further, he was very much bent on so graduating the system of national education as to help clever children educated in the primary schools to win for themselves, step by step, a completely gratuitous education of the highest order. M. Gambetta is evidently very anxious to combine the peasantry with the artisans in his support.
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