three orphans, the son of a
father seventy-one years old dependent on his labour, all of whom are
family supports. He joins with these all young men who enlist in one of
his civil militias, in his ecclesiastical militia, or in his university
militia, pupils of the Ecole Normale, seminarians for the priesthood, on
condition that they shall engage to do service in their vocation, and do
it effectively, some for ten years, others for life, subject to a
discipline more rigid, or nearly as rigid, as military discipline.

_IV.--The Prefect Absolute_

Yet another institution which Napoleon gave to the Modern Regime in
France is the Prefect of a Department. Before 1870, when this prefect
appointed the mayors, and when the council general held its session only
fifteen days in the year, this Prefect was almost omnipotent; still, at
the present day, his powers are immense, and his power remains
preponderant. He has the right to suspend the municipal council and the
mayor, and to propose their dismissal to the head of the state. Without
resorting to this extremity, he holds them with a strong hand, and
always uplifted over the commune, for he can veto the acts of the
municipal police and of the road committee, annul the regulations of the
mayor, and, through a skilful use of his prerogative, impose his own. He
holds in hand, removes, appoints or helps appoint, not alone the clerks
in his office, but likewise every kind and degree of clerk who, outside
his office, serves the commune or department, from the archivist down to
and comprising the lowest employees, such as forest-guards of the
department, policemen posted at the corner of a street, and
stone-breakers on the public highway.

Such, in brief, is the system of local and general society in France
from the Napoleonic time down to the date 1889, when these lines are
written. After the philosophic demolitions of the revolution, and the
practical constructions of the consulate, national or general government
is a vast despotic centralised machine, and local government could no
longer be a small patrimony.

The departments and communes have become more or less vast
lodging-houses, all built on the same plan and managed according to the
same regulations, one as passable as the other, with apartments in them
which, more or less good, are more or less dear, but at rates which,
higher or lower, are fixed at a uniform tariff over the entire
territory, so that the 36,000 communa