THE EMPRESS EUGENIE AND THE QUEEN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIX, Issue 9022, 29 October 1892, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE EMPRESS EUGENIE AND THE QUEEN.

The Queen is believed to have been sorely distressed by the references made to the ex-Empress of the French in that amusing book, " An Englishman in Paris," of which people are still talking.. The author, who —in spite of the denial by the Spectator is believed to have been thelato Sir Richard Wallace, simply repeats what all the French papers were saying in 1872. Some of the worst disasters of- '70 and '71—Sedan amongst them —are indirectly attributed to her interference. After the first defeats of the French Army ib was decided by the Emperor that the best means of stemming tho Prussian invasion was to retreat to Chalons, and there fight a great battle on a carefully-prepared site. The EmpressRegent, however, was informed by her advisers that this step would inevitably be followed by a revolution in Paris. The orders were, therefore, countermanded, and the troops led into the fatal trap of Sedan. The idea that the Emperor should save his dynasty by sacrificing his life at the head of his troops, according to " the Englishman in Paris," was first suggested by the Empress. The Emperor, it is well known, courted death at Sedan, as a relief to his physical tortures and ignominious defeats. History as it is written in France will never, pardon the Empress. "The Englishman in Paris" has merely repeated the story. If the Queen is offended, it is probably because she hears the story now for the first time. By a strange coincidence, M. Zola's wonderful novel, " La Debacle," was pub lished shortly after the appearance of the work attributed to the late Sir R. Wallace. The two pictures of tho Empress are identical. Neither account excites surprise outside of England. Directly after the downfall of the Empire the part played by the Empress was discussed with intense bitterness by the French press, and her papers and telegrams were published. From a feeling which is creditable, the English newspapers almost; unanimously refrained from printing anything calculated to wound the feelings of a family which had sought our hospitality, and whose tragic overthrow had paid the debt of their errors. The Second 'Empire sowed the wind and has had to reap the whirlwind. Zola's great novel marks the last vortex of a national cyclone. Its publication ten years ago would have thrown the French into a fronzy. The incidents are now remote enough to be history. The book is read in France with "sombre acquiescence," and will probably raise its author to the seat amongst tho " immortals" he is believed to covet.