l assert that his influence on the life of France exceeded
that of many of her so-called heroes.

In fact, it would be difficult to point out in any country during the
Nineteenth Century, since the time of Bonaparte's Consulate, a work of
political, economic, and social renovation greater than that which went
on in the two years during which Thiers held the reins of power. Apart
from the unparalleled feat of paying off the Germans, the Chief of the
Executive breathed new vigour into the public service, revived national
spirit in so noteworthy a way as to bring down threats of war from
German military circles in 1872 (to be repeated more seriously in 1875),
and placed on the Statute Book two measures of paramount importance.
These were the reform of Local Government and the Army Bill.

These measures claim a brief notice. The former of them naturally falls
into two parts, dealing severally with the Commune and the Department.
These are the two all-important areas in French life. In rural districts
the Commune corresponds to the English parish; it is the oldest and
best-defined of all local areas. In urban districts it corresponds with
the municipality or township. The Revolutionists of 1790 and 1848 had
sought to apply the principle of manhood suffrage to communal
government; but their plans were swept away by the ensuing reactions,
and the dawn of the Third Republic found the Communes, both rural and
urban, under the control of the _prefets_ and their subordinates. We
must note here that the office of _prefet_, instituted by Bonaparte in
1800, was designed to link the local government of the Departments
closely to the central power: this magistrate, appointed by the
Executive at Paris, having almost unlimited control over local affairs
throughout the several Departments. Indeed, it was against the excessive
centralisation of the prefectorial system that the Parisian Communists
made their heedless and unmeasured protest. The question having thus
been thrust to the front, the Assembly brought forward (April 1871) a
measure authorising the election of Communal Councils elected by every
adult man who had resided for a year in the Commune. A majority of the
Assembly wished that the right of choosing mayors should rest with the
Communal Councils, but Thiers, browbeating the deputies by his favourite
device of threatening to resign, carried an amendment limiting this
right to towns of less than 20,000 inhabitants. In the large