one be found for a Minister of Education? But soon the Prefect of the Seine felt the controlling hand of the Emperor. The instruction of the youth of Paris was too important a matter to be confided to any one but an immediate servant of the Government. Much as in the case of the prisons, the maintenance was left to the Prefect, but the superintendence was placed in different hands.

'Les décrets de 1808 et de 1811 enlevèrent au préfet l'administration directe pour ne lui laisser que la surveillance de l'instruction secondaire. L'Université impériale forma un corps enseignant sous un chef unique et indépendant de l'administration. "Nos préfets," disait l'Empéreur dans le décret du 15 Novembre, 1811, "ne pourront donc rien ordonner, rien changer à l'ordre administratif des lycées ou colléges, ni rien prescrire, mais ils seront tenus d'adresser à notre Ministre de l'Intérieur les informations qu'ils auront recueillies, et ils les accompagneront de leurs observations et en instruiront le grand maître.” Les droits comme les devoirs des préfets furent reduits aux droits et aux devoirs d'un simple inspecteur général.'-Frochot, p. 321.

The hospitals, too, required the fostering care of the Prefect, and found in him the friend they required. Firmly, yet kindly, he appears to have dealt with

'All the vagrant train :

He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain.'

As in the case of the prisons, every point was disorganized. Ruin, despair, want, marked the condition of institutions which ages of piety had destined for the benefit of the poor. The funds had been misappropriated; in many instances the endowments were lost.

'Le désordre qui régnait dans les finances se traduisait dans l'aspect des bâtiments. La Révolution n'avait pas épargné les asiles de la pauvreté. Les murs écroulés, les toits enfoncés, les chapelles abattues, signalaient son passage. Ces édifices desolés, ces hôpitaux, que l'anarchie avait livrés à l'avide domination des entrepreneurs, était le réceptacle d'une foule de jour en jour plus nombreuse. Les uns entraient sous prétexte de maladie et restaient sous prétexte de pauvreté ; les autres couraient d'hôpital en hôpital, et cette course éternelle s'appelait un pélerinage. Les sexes étaient confondus comme les maladies! Plusieurs malades dans le même lit! Toutes les maladies dans les mêmes salles! Et quelle encombrement, quelle licence, quels désordres dans les hospices! Comment la corruption des mœurs n'aurait-elle pas triomphé d'une discipline illusoire, et transformé en lieux de scandale des maisons de bienfaisance?'-Frochot, p. 461.

As with the schools so with the hospitals. The Revolution had sadly devastated their substance; before it, they possessed an income of more than eight million francs, derived from their property. The year X. saw this really magnificent revenue dwindle to less than one quarter of its previous amount. A charge

own

upon the octroi duties enabled Frochot in some measure to supply the deficiency. Some assistance, too, was afforded by the profits of the pawnbroking establishment, the Mont de Piété, which appears to have been organized upon such a system as to be of real benefit to the poor. Doubts have sometimes been cast on the successful working of this institution, but it may be observed that it receives full praise in the pages of the artisan reports to the French Exhibition of 1867, from one of a class likely to be a good practical judge of such matters. In other ways, also, Frochot did good service, especially in one less conspicuous than many, but peculiarly characteristic of a good departmental head, in establishing a system of retiring allowances for the employés of the prefecture. It would seem that the doing this must have caused the Prefect some self-denial, as well as personal labour, for he appears to have started the fund with the handsome sum of 39,000 francs, d'économies par lui faites sur son abonnement des frais d'administration.'

This slight sketch will enable the English reader to understand some portion of the labours, troubles, and successes of the first Prefect of the Seine. He is described as being a zealous yet prudent man, indefatigable in his work; prosperous in carrying out the improvements which he planned. But all his zeal, all his labours, all his success, did not avail him for one instant when his conduct failed to be approved by the Emperor. The wild conspiracy of Malet incidentally involved the Prefect of the Seine. There was not the slightest suspicion of complicity. It was enough that his sagacity appears to have failed him at that anxious moment. To doubt, to hesitate, were unpardonable faults in the eyes of the Emperor. Frochot was deprived of his post, and the Prefecture of the Bouches du Rhône was assigned to him. This included the government of Marseilles. Bright and fierce and fickle is the South,' and the descendants of the Phocœans have not always been the most orderly of citizens. Frochot showed his good sense by not rejecting the inferior post to which he was appointed. At Marseilles, as at Paris, his character soon won him general respect, and he was able to do the State good service in the dangerous risings in the year 1815. The Restoration finally consigned Frochot to retirement. His biographer draws, with affectionate solicitude, a charming picture of the old official en retraite, cultivating a farm on the borders of the Côte d'Or, the district of his early associations. A pleasure in the pursuits of the country, which we are apt to think impossible to a Frenchman, formed the solace of Frochot's retirement, while a pension from the municipality of Paris smoothed his declining years. He died in 1828. The good city of Paris desired that their

first Prefect should be laid among them. Consistent in death as in life, the funeral cortége was marked with more than republican simplicity.

Much besides what is noticed here will be found in this volume. Sketches of Mirabeau, of Sièyes, and Talleyrand, of the National Assembly, of the terrible days of 'la Terreur,' of the time of reaction, of the stealthy steps with which 'l'ordre absorbait la Liberté,' will reward the reader. There is a graphic description of the excesses of the Revolution in the provinces, and of the triumphal installation of the Proconsul of Sans-culottisme in the hotel of the former President of the Parliament of Dijon. Frochot's efforts to preserve order, the dangers he incurred, the devotion of his wife, whose exertions saved him from imminent peril, tell a story of troubles and sorrows and escapes experienced by many at that epoch. Perhaps the simplicity of character which appears to have marked the first Prefect of the Seine during life may have been deepened by the remembrance of those sad days. This volume gives few reminiscences of what both in Paris and London is frequently considered as at least one of the most important of civic duties. The festivities of the Hôtel de Ville were beyond question in keeping with the requirements of the time, but the Prefect would seem to have presided over them as a function which it was his duty to fill, not as revelries which he desired to encourage. There is no catalogue in these pages of the magnificence of feasts, of dresses, of decorations, of fruits, and bouquets of camellias, counted as now by the hundreds of thousands. Doubtless the flowers of the present régime are even more full blown than those that bloomed in the early days of the century.

M. Frochot's biographer speaks with a warmth of praise, doubtless well deserved, of the personal character of the man whom he celebrates: 'J'ai commencé ce travail avec l'esperance 'de remplir un devoir de famille, et je le termine avec l'assurance 'd'avoir fait une bonne action.' We may well believe that the first of the Prefects who brought to his official position the remembrance of the sorrows of the last years of the monarchy, of the yet more bitter agonies of the Revolution, straightforward in conduct, and simple in character, evoked order out of chaos, and reformed many abuses. The appointment of a Prefect of London has sometimes been urged. But no success in administration, however great, no organization of municipal government, however perfect, should deter us from desiring that, if London is in these points more closely assimilated to Paris, it should be done with that consideration to the taxpayer which is only likely to be preserved when the contributors to the revenue possess a direct control over the disposal of the funds

so raised. Nor should the venerable fabric which now exists be rudely swept away by an undiscriminating hand. The best of the old work should be preserved; the best modern work that can be found should be carefully adjusted to the ancient substructure :

'So let the change which comes be free
To ingroove itself with that which flies,
And work, a joint of state, that plies
Its office, moved with sympathy.'

110

ART. VI.-1. The Case of the Established Church in Ireland. By JAMES THOMAS O'BRIEN, D.D., Bishop of Ossory, Ferns, and Leighlin. London: Rivingtons. 1868.

2. Facts respecting the Present State of the Church in Ireland. By the Rev. ALFRED T. LEE, M.A., LL.D. London: Rivingtons. 1868.

THE one absorbing topic which during this session has swamped every other, has many peculiar features about it, which, on calm. reflection, will assuredly modify both the decisions of the present House of Commons, and also the heated expressions of fear and of triumph that for some months have now agitated the world outside. The most striking feature of the discussion has been its sudden and personal character, so very suggestive of political exigencies, and, as following from this, the small amount of clearly or truthfully stated argument in defence of so gigantic a change in the whole constitution of the country: no unfair charge against the party which has thus, with unseemly haste, pushed the measure forward, and has even grasped at its conclusion by at once, at all hazards, anticipating its confiscation powers by means of the Suspensory Bill. We cannot but discern a singular fitness, though at the same time a painful display of political skill, between this sudden obtrusion of a constitutional question, that ought to have been approached with a singular calmness, and the two great actors in this drama. No one can be more aware than Mr. Gladstone of the utter mistiness that exists on all matters of Church government and order in the mind of the great mass of even educated English laymen, and consequently in the House of Commons. His own long training in ecclesiastical matters must have brought this ignorance very forcibly to his attention on the part of many friends and political partisans recently formed. If it was objected to Mr. Disraeli that he had educated his party, it can at least be answered that Mr. Gladstone led a party which he knew to be grievously uneducated on the very delicate subject he so vehemently thrust before the House. Strong and overwhelming convictions were his plea; but the individual antagonism that has marked the whole of the debate at once suggests to any candid and reflecting mind, that convictions may in their character be personal as well as strictly rational; and that such, in fact, is the true analysis of much worldly vehemence in forwarding any desired object. The divisions of the House were indeed against the Government by what is justly considered a large majority; but