PARIS.

Otago Witness, Issue 1161, 28 February 1874, Page 5

PARIS.

(FJBOM GV® OWN tfORRB&POarDENT, )

December 27th,

"The ioA jtfvel is the most welcome guest Vi France, and elsewhere perhaps, on Christmas eve. He is the children's delight and ho pc ; for while they are locked in sweet

reams, he places in their shoes, ranged before the chimney, toys and bon-bon?. For infants not good, a birch rod is substituted. is said that peoples are like children ; but

overnments are not as the good Noel—i n France at all events ; for here the children receive more frequently the rdd than the sweetmeat. What a surprise It would have been for France, i{ lit wakened up on Christttas morning, smiling and happy, to find the Majority of the Assembly, and their alter ego —rate Ministry — had placed in its shoes the promise that instead of a policy of exasperation and combat — of indifference to the national wish, and in opposition to the experiences of history and the principles pf well-ordered liberty, they had Resolved to adopt the programme of good- will towards their fellow-countryman, who differ from tkem in the u*e of their political eyes. The occasion has not been improved for practising sincerity, displaying toleration, and adopting fair play. So long as the country persists in affirming its belief in, rather than its love, perhaps, for, the Republic, so long may the present fatal course of Government be expected to be pursued, till compression becomes collapse. Ministers gain nowhere support in the country. Their intentions may be honest ; their projects of law, after the Imperial patterns, may be deemed states-craft ; the removal of Liberals from office may be viewed as precaution ; but they are all tainted with the common vice, to crush out the Republicanism of France, and allow Borne kind of Royalty to fill up the vacuum. Unfortunately for them no vacuum is likely to be created, and the more the Cabinet labours to monopolise parish government, to apply their severities against the independent Press, to hatch projects for superseding universal suffrage, in a word, to manufacture Royalty, the more sturdy becomes the resistance of the Opposition. This antagonism must soon end ; the instinct of the country must be recognised and submitted to. Sufferance cannot be the badge of all trade and industry. Work has claims before Royalty, and the cry for bread is more potential than corps d'armte. The committee appointed to frame organic laws is fading into the background ; yet it must give an account of itself— it must pro pose the Republic, or something in its place. That something is neither visible nor definable. It was| supposed to be represented by Henri V., and the renegade Royalists desire to find it in the Comte de Paris. At all events the massing of forces is quietly taking place. An Armageddon battle is a certainty, and "the voices, and thunderings, and lightnings," of that coming struggle may be heard by those who attentively listen, It is a social revolution that is to be dreaded this time ; perhaps it may be leavened with religious warfare if the Ultramontane party prove equal to the occasion. And the nation truly was never in a better state of mind to be governed, to dwell in peace, to work overtime to pay taxes, to meet the deficiency in the budget, to maintain the financial honour of the country. Instead of socialists we have re-actionists ; monarchists are medievalists ; Red Republicans have become Conservative ; Imperialists remain — what they have ever been.

The midnight masses on Christmas Eye afforded a strong test that Paris is not indifferent to religious matters. Never were all the churches so thronged — outside as well as inside. The public arrived in battalions, not exactly to hear the charming music, as crowds remained to partake of the Communion. Not less worthy of remark, the crowd were composed in three parts of men, though the night was fine. Another test was the supper parties, called the reveillon, but which were so quiet and orderly that not a baby in all Paris was awakened. This annual supper institution, whose base rests upon every dainty that the pork butcher can supply, is among the most honoured of hypocrisies. People sit down to table, and however republican may be the guests, they follow the example of Victor Emmanuel on formal occasions, by eating nothing. Unless a man had a stomach like a steam-boiler, how could he attack, after finishing his dinner about nine o'clock, devilled kidneys smothered in champagne, pigs' feet trufUed and defended with pickles, sausages as various in colour as in make up, with sourkraut to make all digestible, and onion soup as a substitute for bitters ? Yet such is the , banquet that ladies and gentlemen wish to patronise, more in restaurants than in private houses. It is calculated that one hundred aud fifty miles of black pudding were consumed on Christmas Eve, and yet there are persons who growl over the stagnation of affairs.

Perhaps Christmas Eve is nowhere so particularly observed as at Marseilles. There, not only does the classic pig's pudding figure, but also cod-fish ; the piece de resistance, however, is a cauliflower. The supper party ib always held at the residence of the most aged member of the family, who provides himself with sweotmeats in three colours — red ; white, and black. Before sitting down to table, grandpapa takes the youngest baby in his arm?, and putting its tiny Sands together in the attitude of prayer over the table, supplicates a blessing. In that city also, it is the custom of employers to present their employes with a turkey, an 4 the Go-

veto&i&em^ offers no objection to holding poultry lotteries, especially as no seditious cries, save from the birds, are expected to be uttered. In Burgundy it is believed that the oxen speak in their stables on Christmas Eve, and the shepherds, accompanied by their dogs and crooks, go in procession to hear a midnight mass.

Ever old but always new, are the booths along the Boulevards. The toys are as infinite as the sands of the sea, and like the stars differ ill glory, as well as in price, for the same article. Tne presence of so many monstrosities in Paris doubtless acc6unts for the extraordinary combinations of natural history. The artisans have anticipated Darwin, It strikes me there is a shade over the Fancy Fair this year : the siren cries are less joyous on the part of the sellers, who in addition, poor people, have in too many cases a raft of Medusa cork. A good many foreign toys are offered for sale, with English names, evidently, from the orthography, made in Germany. The exterior Boulevards are not the least interesting, as there one observes installed on the flags the most heterogeneous collection of every kind of second-hand articles— a sort of world's fair of cast-off wearing apparel, penates, tools, «&c. It would be a land of pure delight for Pickwickians, and judges of old curiosities would certainly pick up a thing of beauty among the mountains of rubbish that might prove a joy for ever. The purest of freetrade principles are observed ; you may take away as much of what you please in exchange for what you may condescend to offer. The sales must be quick, as the fair lasts but a fortnight, so the returns may be subject to the same law. Beyond doubt, much business is done, for everyone seems to buy what he doea not want.

The Concierges, or house-porters, have at this critical moment of their annual history, an expression like what Christians might be expected to exhibit who disbelieve in the Millenium. The plall of reduced expenditure, which every citizen is more or less compelled to adopt, has acted on the caste, so that they have lost all faith in humanity, especially that portion of it confined to their sway as tenants for twelve months. There seems to be a palsy in their hands as they salute your going out, and curse you as they pull the bobbin to let you in. The moneyed interest and the employers are viewed and worshipped as gods on New Year's Day, only the fideles make the deities contribute the offerings. Honors, riches, health, prolongation of years here below, if you prefer them to a premature residence in Paradise, are showered upon you ; nothing can cut short the incense save putting your hand in your pocket, and presenting the address with a five-franc piece having the image and superscription of the Republic thereon ; never mind their Royalist feelings —the coin will not wound them. It is ouly an ttrenne. Wives, mothers, grandmothers, infants and cousins, males and femalec — all expect to be remembered. People have been known to commit suicide to avoid this income tax, involving social banishment if neglected ; and moralists have observed that bankruptcies are more general after New Year's Day. The Romans considered the presentation of gifts at the commencement of the year as a presage of succeeding prosperity. Singular way for increasing capital, by commencing to eat it up. A date, or a dry fig, satisfied the old Latins ; their successors would view you as a Prussian were you to revolutionize the custom with figs, eveu if offered in the name of the Prophet. It is the precedent of Caligula that is followed, sitting before the temple with both hands open to receive the black mail of the season.

The letter-carriers are the first who arise to demand their obole ; they commence the shearing operation on the first of December ; later follow their confreres who distribute the newspapers. By this time the epidemic has become general — every successor fearing the visit of a predecessor will dry up Pactolus. Not only do you receive visits from the known, but the unknown also. If you are not honoured with the Vendangeurs, you are by the Vhlangeurs, a class less poetical. The scavenger even " waits " and presents a collecting bag that would contain Caesar and and all his fortunes. The most deserving of all, and unworthy to be ranked among the parasites, is the newsboy. He arrives smiling, professes no hypocrisy, holds out his hand, accepts your freewill offering, salutes, and brings your journals, if possible, earlier and m. re regularly for 364 days afterwards.

Bazaine has disappeared from public gaze effectually ; it is said he has at last set out for his prison, whose whereabouts will be ultimately in the island off Cannes, though many think that destination maybe changed. All attempts to explain away the sentence have failed ; the French instinctively feel it is just, and this fact remains fixed in the memorj, that had Bazaine wished at a proper time to leave Metz, he could have cut his way out. Not much more of the trial is remembered. His name is being blotted out everywhere. There was a blind alley in the city called after him, which has been changed ; yet the im2>asse was not inappropriate. His autograph is very much sought after ; and, strange destiny, his photograph, according to prison rules, which, like the laws of the Medes and Persians, altereth not, has been "tiled" in the gallery of criminals in connection with the Ministry of Police. What a fall is there, my countrymen ! The portrait that was welcomed on palace walls, and among toutes les gloires of France 1 For Bazaine, " Glory's thrill is o'er." There is a remarkable free -masonry in the French Press; editors may fight like Christians, abuse each other, exchange shots and sword thrustß, when dynamite leaders fail to convince ; but

against theJPrussians they are found shoulder to shoulder. This, by a unanimity most strange, a mot d'ordra, not an opinion of what Germany expressed on the Bazaine verdict has found noticejin the journals. Curious, also, in private conversation there is not the slightest anxiety to know it, either. A bread reform is announced ; not in the making of it cheaper or better, but altering the name of a fancy loaf f i-om that commonly knotVn as "German," tb "Parisian." It may be a consolation for patriotic stomachs wanting every kind of bread, and their number is legion just now in Paris. Pain & discretion is what the people are most interested in at the present moment. The specimens of the siege bread, preserved, in so many drawing-rooms, under a glass case, and generally on the chimney-piece, beside the pandule — also a memento of the Teutons — ought to serve as adequate souvenirs of the invader. Indeed, neutrals who, have had to share, against their will, the heroism of the siege, and the bread of adversity, have no gushing gratitude for Bismarck. What is really strange in these changes of titles is, the rapidity with which they are accepted and acted upon. By-the-bye, several associations were formed a few years ago to repel all applicants for employment who were of German extraction. Even the cleaning of the streets and the permission to be a rag-picker— the only public appointments freely open to foreigners — were interdicted. It might be hazarded that Paris is as full as ever of the hated race. The hotels have ceased to refuse Germans, and never enquire into their nationality till they have paid their bill and departed. A gentleman informs me that he has just received the usual lithographed letter from his coal-man, announcing that his mother is dead, and inviting him to the funeral ; and there are cynics who assert that politeness is on the decline in France. The Society for the prevention of cruelty to animals is more correct than complimentary. Among its tracts that it distributes, it begs the attention of the gentle reader to the fact "that He who made you has made the brutes also."

A gentleman on entering a restaurant called for, a glass of Madeira, and inquired casually from the waiter, a young man from the country, if it was old. " Yes, monsieur, it was made this morning." The " cob- webbing " of wine is most extensively pursued at this season, so eminently auspicious for passing off all spurioixs articles. The process consists in coating the wine bottle with the dust of ages, giving it a "blackened" sepulchre look. Faith saves.