ecessors toward France sixty years since,
and which converted what was meant to be a permanent peace into the mere
truce of Amiens. Insolent and egotistical as a class, though there are
highly honorable exceptions, those journalists have done more to make
their country the object of dislike than has been accomplished by all
other Englishmen. Their deeds show that the pen _is_ mightier than the
sword, and that its conquests are permanent. It has been said that
France has been as unfriendly to us as England, and that, therefore, we
ought to feel for her the same dislike as that of which England is the
object. But, admitting the assertion to be true, we know little of what
the French have said or written concerning us. The difference of
language prevents us from taking much offence at Gallic criticism. Not
one American in a hundred reads French; and of those who do read it, not
one in a thousand, journalists apart, ever sees a French quarterly,
monthly, weekly, or daily publication. Occasionally, an article from a
French journal is translated for some one of our newspapers, but it is
oftener of a friendly character than otherwise. The best French
publications support the Union cause, at their head standing the
"Debats," which is not the inferior of the "Times" in respect to
ability, and is far its superior in all other respects. Besides, judging
from such articles from the French presses devoted to Secession
interests as have come under our observation, they are neither so able
nor so venomous as those which appear in British Secession journals and
magazines. Most of them might be translated for the purpose of showing
that the French have no wish for our destruction, while the language of
the British articles indicates the existence of an intense personal
hostility, and an eager desire to see the United States partitioned like
Poland. We should be something much above, or as much below, the
standard of humanity, if we were not moved deeply by such evidences of
fierce hatred, expressed in the fiercest of language.

In assuming a strictly impartial position, England follows a sense of
interest, which is proper and praiseworthy. She cannot, supposing her to
be wise, be desirous of our destruction; for, that accomplished, she
would be more open than ever to a French attack. Let Napoleon III.
accomplish those European purposes to which his mind is now directed,
and he would be impelled to quarrel with England by a variety of
co