ack into Paris, and quartered in the barracks which
have been erected along the outer line of Boulevards, it seems monstrous
cruelty to keep them freezing outside. The operations, however, on
Wednesday are regarded as very far short of a success. General Trochu
does not venture, in the state of public opinion, to bring the troops
back into Paris, and thus confess a failure. The ambulances are ordered
out to-morrow morning; but I cannot help thinking that the series of
operations which were with great beating of drums announced to have
commenced on Wednesday, will be allowed gradually to die out, without
anything further taking place. The National Guards are camped in the
neighbourhood of Bondy and Rosny. They have again, greatly to the
disgust of the Mobiles and Line, been congratulated in a general order
upon their valorous bearing. As a matter of fact, there was a panic
among these braves which nearly degenerated into a rout. Several
battalions turned tail, under the impression that the Prussians were
going to attack them. One battalion did not stop until it had found
shelter within the walls of the town. General Trochu's attempt, for
political ends, to force greatness upon these heroes, is losing him the
goodwill of the army. On Wednesday and Thursday several regiments of the
Line and of the Mobiles bitterly complained that they should always be
ordered to the front to protect not only Paris but the National Guards.
The marching battalions are composed of unmarried men between
twenty-five and thirty-five, and why they should not be called upon to
incur the same risks, and submit to the same discipline as the Mobiles,
it is difficult to understand. We may learn from the experience of this
siege that in war, armed citizens who decline to submit to the
discipline of soldiers are worse than useless. The lesson, however, has
not profited the Parisians. The following letter appears in the
_Combat_, signed by the "adjoint" of the 13th arrondissement. The
defence on the part of this municipal functionary of a marching
battalion, which, at the outposts, broke into a church, and there
parodied the celebration of the mass, is a gem in its way:--

"The marching companies of this battalion left Paris on the morning of
the 16th to go to the outposts at Issy. The departure was what all
departures of marching battalions must fatally be--copious and
multiplied libations between parting friends, paternal handshakings in
cabarets, patr