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this inference be not supported by all the authorities on the question, then the whole philosophy of the subject resolves itself into this absurdity-Reformatory training is necessary for every criminal, but it shall only be extended to him when he shall have been, at the cost of the community, committed and recommitted so often to the common gaol, that he shall be, by wearied Justice, at length degraded to the convict gang.

We regret that, owing to the lateness of the period in the quarter at which we received this excellent Report, we have been unable to write of many important matters contained in it. However, its chief topics are now before the reader, but if the question of prison discipline, in all its various phases, interest him, he will read the Report itself with instruction and advantage.

ART. X.-PARIS CORRESPONDENCE.

No. II.

THE RUE DE RIVOLI, AND ITS NEIGHBOURS.

Dear Editor,

Contrast is ever a favorite with the many, and its charms prevail in due measure with the few. It has a two-fold principle of life, which does not perish by, but is renewed in change. We should not prize so much the green hopes of the young Spring, did we not remember the gloom and poverty of the bare winter. And, when the glory of Summer has exalted itself, the very cloy of its exuberance makes sweet the sober pride of Autumn, whose decline in turn endears, while it prepares, the shortening days, with the cheery fires and bookevenings of recurring winter in near perspective. Pleasant, or happy, have been the bright months gone-hope we, then, that those to come may be made comfortable-the word has been naturalized here and is good French-till the trees shall once more awaken from their winter sleep, and put on their garment of foliage to honour nature's court-days.

We prize not contrast the less in our social relations. Amongst our friends, are there not some we love for their thoughtfulness and even for the reserve, all the more that we have been ofttime charmed by the gay èlan, and frolic humour of others? And in our books we love change. How sweet to relieve the inspired verse of Milton's human story divine with the sparkling page of Moore, or to turn from the stately gravity of knightly Spenser to the light fantastic measure of laughter-moving Hood. Or withdraw your regard from the gorgeous mosaic of Carlyle, of him whose books are the "illustrated manuscripts" of these latter times, painted with quaint thoughts and glowing words; repose your eyes on a "paper" of Addison, and be at home with the easy grace, and ingenious artlessness of the first author who made authorship a fashionable accomplishment, and introduced literature to the fine gentlemen and witty ladies of the modern drawing-room. What child does not appreciate the power of contrast that makes the fun of the pantomime ? What have we there? A fairy palace, with, for roof, a sky blue only as skies can be at the play, and stars stuck all about it of "magnitudes "unknown

to any astronomer other than a scene-painter, and beneath them volcanic illuminations instead of vulgar wax-candles, and a throng of young ladies all in white muslin, roses, and legs. Slap! goes Harlequin's wand-" wots" up now? A magic cave, lighted by a queer-looking moon, "back" in whose shine a small green devil, all over scales, dances, dives, and doubles himself up for the amusement of a blue devil and a red, his particular friends. And who knoweth better than your book-maker himself the trick of effect? Take up any romance of the day—are you not hurried, in chapter 2, if not before, from St. James' to St. Giles'-from the "gilded saloons of rank and beauty," &c., &., to the "dark abodes of vice and misery"? In truth, we have seen more than enough of this on the stage, and in books, nettement posé. In such form it has ceased to be a wonder. But contrast in our days has broken new ground, and taken a new shape. It is no longer content to be shut away out of sight with a closed volume laid by, or to be ravished from our vision by a change of scene at a theatre. This time if it proffer novelty, as of old, it has invoked permanence, too. Here, in Paris, men have carved it into stone, have made fast its feet in the earth, built it up into the air, and made of it a human habitation, and they have given it a name, and the name is the Rue de Rivoli. A street, straight from the Tuileries to the Faubourg St. Antoine-with Princess Wealth and Imperial Power at one end, and, at the other, precarious Labour and sullen weakness-a street that links with its long line of lamps the new city to the old, Paris of the Revolution to Paris of the Empire-the middle ages to the nineteenth century—this is indeed a strong contrast. Truly, the Rue de Rivoli is a "broad effect."

This street was commenced in the beginning of the present century, and its western end was completed under Louis Philippe. Its prolongation was the work of the Revolution which drove that monarch into exile, and set up the principle of the organization of labour in the place of the Citizen-Kingship of 1830. The provisional government of 1848, forced to find work for the insurgent population, turned its thoughts to the continuation of the Rue de Rivoli, and the improvements of the late reign were resumed under the authority of the National Assembly. To pull down old houses was found to be less expensive to the State than to erect new barricades, and the Emperor, whose power had its foundation in the opinion of the masses, has bent all his energies to consolidate it through their welfare. The Rue de Rivoli is an epitome of the Empire, and unites in

one unbroken line of habitations, some the homes of wealth, and others the abodes of industry, the workshop and fortress of the people, the Faubourg St. Antoine, to the seat of imperial power at the Tuileries, with the Hotel de Ville between, the palace of the middle class. The Tuileries are bounded on the north by the Rue de Rivoli, whose western extremity is terminated by the Place de la Concorde. The origin of the Palace dates under the reign of Charles the Ninth, whose mother, Catherine de Medicis, wishing to possess a residence apart from that of the King at the Louvre, took possession of a house which Francis the First had purchased from his mother in the beginning of the 16th century, and which had therefore been the property of the Sieur de Villeroi. It was then outside Paris, and derived its name of Tuileries from the fact that the ground, a portion of which it occupied, had been used for the manufacture of tiles. This humble designation has little in harmony with the destinies which have caused its meanness to be forgotten, save by the antiquarian. "What's in a name?" Nothing, or everything. There is no medium. The palace of the French monarchy owes no charm to its appellation. The French monarch owes much to his courage and his wisdom, much more to his name than to either. His election to the presidency was the lie direct to the Revolution of February, so far as it affected to declare anything beyond the dechance of the Orleans dynasty. The name of Napoleon was a rallying-point for the broken energies of the people, a pledge, a sentiment, and of that sentiment Louis Napoleon found means to make a creed, himself its prophet and chief expounder.

It was to Philibert Delorme that Catherine de Medicis entrusted the task of constructing a palace on the site of the Tuileries, and the architect of the Renaissance in France acquitted himself of his duty with success. His part of the work may yet be traced amidst the mass of additional structures, which ages have erected on this spot to which, now as often times in the past, the eyes of Europe are attracted by the spell of momentous destinies. As the sun sets behind the noble arch of the Barrière de l'Etoile, his last glance is bent on the façade of the stately palace which fronts the Champs Elysées. At the close of the day, whatever yet remains of light clings to the walls of the Tuileries, as if to give in the brightness reflected from its hundred windows a promise of returning glory, withdrawn but for awhile, to be renewed on the morrow. Even so, at the close of that forty years peace, which, amidst trials and dangers, has been a day of progress and of hope for Europe, the regard of the fading era

turns to the Tuileries, and there lavishes its pledges of a return of light when the morrow of this Russian night, which now darkens over us, shall dawn for Europe with the brightness of a recurring civilization. Within these imperial precincts we cannot but humbly behold the foresight of Providence manifested in that same Revolution of February, which, once regarded as a great error and great calamity, we now recognize as the fortunate removal of a weak dynasty, whose uncertain principles and divided counsels could give no help to England in the deadly struggle in which the nations of the world are now involved. The pride of uninterrupted prosperity has corrupted her strength, whilst France has emerged from disaster in the possession of a redoubled capacity to meet the emergencies of the times. How sagacious, how prophetic, the instinct which centred the energies of the nation in a single hand, which might curb émeute at home, and conquest abroad! And how wonderful the elasticity of the national character, how prolific the resources of national industry, which arise out of the ruins of revolution with a courage and strength which long prosperous England may admire or envy-but cannot emulate! The French equip fleets, and enlist armies; you print blue-books, and pass resolutions. "You have sent an army of journalists to the Crimea," said a Frenchman to one of our country-men some time since, "we have sent there an army of soldiers." Of all the destinies which, in turn, have made the Tuileries their habitation, that of Napoleon the Third is surely not the least. Providence has ordained him the protector of order in France, and the champion of liberty in Europe. The prisoner of Ham, the Emperor of the French! Digitus Dei. Well may he head his proclamations, "Napoleon III, par la grâce de Dieu, et la volonté nationale," he, the chosen of the one, and the accepted of the other. Strongest page in his eventful history, heir to the hatreds as well as to the power of the Empire, he has cemented an alliance with the nation which had most to fear from the souvenirs of St. Helena, and forgiven provocations launched at his own person in the magnanimity which forgot all things save the vindication of the threatened interests of Europe. The restored Bourbons were your protegés, the Orleans dynasty your tool or your dupe; a Bonaparte can compromise no dignity, can wound no susceptibility, in courting an alliance with a people who have still more benefit to derive from it than he. Were the worst to come, France could fight Russia single-handed-could you?

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