soon as Parliament
assembles," says _La Verite_, "that great statesman Disraeli will turn
out Mr. Gladstone, and then our old ally will be restored to us." The
_Gaulois_ observes that "the English journalists residing at Paris keep
up the illusion that Paris must fall by sending to their journals false
news, which is reproduced in the organs of Prussia." "These
journalists," adds the _Gaulois_, "who are our guests, fail in those
duties which circumstances impose upon them." Every correspondent
residing abroad must be the guest, in a certain sense, of the country
from which he is writing; but that this position should oblige him to
square his facts to suit the wishes of his hosts appears to me a strange
theory. Had I been M. Jules Favre, I confess that I should have turned
out all foreign journalists at the commencement of the siege. He,
however, expressed a wish that they should remain in Paris, and his
fellow-citizens must not now complain that they decline to endorse the
legend which, very probably, will be handed down to future generations
of Frenchmen as the history of the siege of Paris. The Prussians will
not raise the siege for anything either French or English journalists
say. The Parisians themselves must perceive that the attempt to frighten
their enemies away by drum-beating and trumpet-blowing has signally
failed. Times have altered since Jericho. It is telling the Prussians
nothing new to inform them that the National Guard are poor troops. For
my part, nothing would give me greater pleasure than to learn some
morning that the German armies round Paris had met with the fate which
overwhelmed Sennacherib and his hosts. I should be delighted to be able
to hope that the town will not eventually be forced to capitulate; but I
cannot conceal from myself the truth that, if no succour comes from
without, it must eventually fall. I blame the French journalists for
perpetually drawing upon their imagination for their facts, and in their
boasts of what France will do, not keeping within the bounds of
probability; but I do not blame them for hoping against hope that their
armies will be successful. I am ready to admit that the Parisians have
shown a most stubborn tenacity, and that they have disappointed their
enemies in not cutting each other's throats; but this is no reason why I
should assert that they are sublime. After all, what is patriotism? The
idea entertained by each nation that it is braver and better and wis