iged to accept any terms; and, for no satisfactory object, they will
be the cause that many will starve before the town can be revictualled.
They call this, here, sublime. I call it folly. Its sublimity is beyond
me. As is the case with a sick man given over by the physicians, the
quacks are ready with their nostrums. The Ultra journals recommend that
the Government should be handed over to a commune. The Ultra clubs
demand that all generals and colonels should be cashiered, and others
elected in their place. One club has subscribed 1,600frs. for Greek
fire; another club suggests blowing up the Hotel de Ville; another
sending a deputation clothed in white to offer the King of Prussia the
presidency of the Universal Republic; another--and this comes home to
me--passed a vote yesterday evening demanding the immediate arrest of
all English correspondents.

I am looking forward with horrible misgivings to the moment when I shall
have no more money, so that perhaps I shall be thankful for being lodged
and fed at the public expense. My banker has withdrawn from Paris, and
his representative declines to look at my bill, although I offer ruinous
interest. As for friends, they are all in a like condition, for no one
expected the siege to last so long. At my hotel, need I observe that I
do not pay my bill, but in hotels the guests may ring in vain now for
food. I sleep on credit in a gorgeous bed, a pauper. The room is large.
I wish it were smaller, for the firewood comes from trees just cut down,
and it takes an hour to get the logs to light, and then they only
smoulder, and emit no heat. The thermometer in my grand room, with its
silken curtains, is usually at freezing point. Then my clothes--I am
seedy, very seedy. When I call upon a friend, the porter eyes me
distrustfully. In the streets the beggars never ask me for alms; on the
contrary, they eye me suspiciously when I approach them, as a possible
competitor. The other day I had some newspapers in my hand, an old
gentleman took one from me and paid me for it. I had read it, so I
pocketed the halfpence. My wardrobe is scanty, like the sage _omnia mea
mecum porto_. I had been absent from Paris before the siege, and I
returned with a small bag. It is difficult to find a tailor who will
work, and even if he did I could not send him my one suit to mend, for
what should I wear in the meantime? Decency forbids it. My pea jacket is
torn and threadbare, my trousers are frayed at the