present reign,
every means has been adopted to infuse within the minds of the French an
interest for naval affairs, hence apartments have been fitted up in the
Louvre, as before stated, with models, and representations of all
connected with a ship, whilst the best artists have been employed to
paint different naval actions, which have reflected honour on the French
flag, and really I had no idea that they could have cited so many
instances, in regard to encounters with our shipping, but on reference
to James's Naval History, they will be found mainly correct, giving some
latitude for a little exaggeration in their own favour, a habit to which
I believe every nation is more or less prone. The government have
certainly succeeded beyond their wishes, in engendering an extreme
anxiety in the people with regard to the navy, which has just been
elicited, in the singular anomaly of the opposition voting on the motion
of M. Lacrosse a greater sum by three millions of francs for the navy
than the minister demanded. With an eye also to the marine,
Louis-Philippe has made some sacrifices to the promotion and extension
of foreign commerce, and not without a considerable degree of success.

There is not at present any branch of art, science, or industry, that
the French are not making great exertions to encourage, for that object
many societies and companies are formed, of which I will state a few of
the most important. There are four societies styled Athenaeum, the Royal,
which is at the Palais-Royal, No. 2, devoted to literature, and three
others at the Hotel de Ville for music, for medicine, and for the arts.
The Geographical Society, Rue de l'Universite, 23. Royal Antiquarian
Society, Rue des Petits-Augustins, No. 16. Asiatic Society, and for
elementary Instruction, Agriculture, Moral Christianity, No. 12, Rue
Taranne. Society for universal French Statistics, Place Vendome, 24. The
Protestant Bible Society of Paris, Rue Montorgueil. Geological Society,
Rue du Vieux-Colombier, No. 26. Philotechnic Society, No. 16, Rue des
Petits-Augustins. Philomatic Society, Entomological, and for natural
History, No. 6, Rue d'Anjou, Faubourg St. Germain. Society for
intellectual Emancipation, No. 11, Rue St. Georges, as also a variety of
other medical, surgical, phrenological, etc., etc., a number of schools
besides those I have already alluded to, veterinary, for mosaic work,
technography, and other purposes.

Although I have observed that in