THE TABLET

A W eekly Newspaper and Review.

D um VOBIS GRATULAMUR, ANIMOS ETIAM ADDIMUS UT IN INCCEPTIS VESTRIS CONSTANTER MANEATIS.

From the Brief of H is Holiness to T he T a b l e t , June 4, 1870.’

Vol. 45. No. 1 8 1 9 . L o n d o n , F e b r u a r y 2 0 , 1 8 7 5 .

P r ice 5d. By Post

[ R e g is t e r ed a t t h e G e n e r a l P o s t O f f ic e a s a N ew spaper.

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C h r o n ic l e o f t h e W e e k :—

Collapse of the New Coalition at Versailles.— Rejection o f the Senate Bill.— Ministerial Crisis.— -Russia and England.— The Baroda Affair.— The Home Rulers and Mr. Lopes.—The Working Men’s Dwellings Bill.— O’Keeffe v. Cardinal Cullen.— The Election •of Mr. Mitchel.— Dr. Kenealy’s Election.— Spain.— The Engageâ t Lacar.— Germany and Spain.— The Pope’s Visit to St. Peter’s.— And the Declaration of the German Bishops.— The (late) Irish Church.—The Carnival in Rome. — The Evangelical Alliance and Turkey.— Mr. Alexander Dumas 225

CONTENTS

L e a d e r s :

The Constitutional Muddle in

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France ......................... . 229 The Bishop of Raphoe and Irish

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Literary, Artistic, & Scientific Gossip 236 C o r r e s p o n d e n c e :

“ The Fallibles ” .. . . . . 236 Grammar Schools— The Masters

Presbyterians .. .. .. 229 Crime and the Roman Carnival . . 231 O u r ,P r o t e s t a n t C o n t em po r a r ie s :

The Spirit of the Age .. . . 2 3 1 R e v ie w s :

F. Gondin’s Theological Treatises 233 Ramble Round the World . . 233 A Letter Addressed to His Grace the Duke of Norfolk on occasion o f Mr. Gladstone’s Recent E x postulation .. . . . . 235 S hort N otices : ,

Debrett’s Peerage and Baronetage 236 1 Essays of Elia ......................... 236 Cyclopaedia of Costume . . . . 236 I

of Them .. . . . . . , 237 A Pilgrimage to Rome . . . . 237 The Catholic Press.. . . .. 237 The New Church on Tower Hill 237 The Alderney Poor Schools . . 238 A Voice of Lamentation from the

Hills, Monmouthshire .. . . 238 P a r l ia m e n t a r y S ummary . . 238 R ome :— Letter from our own Cor­

respondent . . . . . . 241 Peter’s Pence . . . . .. 243 L en ten Pa st o r a l s .. . . 243 D io c e sa n N ew s :—

Recent Decisions of the Sacred

Penitentiary . . . . .. 244

D iocesan (continued) :

Westminster.. . .

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. . 244

Southwark . . . . .. . . 245 Beverley . . . . . . 24^ Clifton ....................................... 245 Hexham and Newcastle . . . . 246 Newport and Menevia . . . . 246 Salford . . . . .. .. 246 Shrewsbury . . . . . . . . 246 United States . . . . . . 246 I r e l a n d :

Letter from our Dublin Corre­

spondent . . .. . . . . 24.6 F oreign N ews

France.. . . . .

. . 247

Germany . . . . .. . . 248 M em oranda :—

Religious .......................................249 Gen e r a l N ews .............................. 250

CHRONICLE OF THE WEEK.

VERSAILLES. T

COLLAPSE OF

THE NEW COALITION AT

H E French Assembly has just put the last touch to its self-stultification. We have never had much opinion o f Constitution making, but in the' France o f to-day the process can only be com­

pared to the blowing o f bubbles without soap, the snaking ropes o f sand, or any other legendary pastime promising equal results. A t the beginning o f last week it was just possible that for some time to come we might have been spared the weary task o f recording repeated failures, and that the fluid elements o f the French Constitution might have crystallized into a provisionally permanent, legally revisable, form. But all depended on the Senate Bill— -for the promulgation o f the Ventavon Constitution was made contingent on the passing of that measure— and after all its clauses had been laboriously built up, one kick has brought the whole house of cards to the ground. The fact is that the Left has presumed too much on its new alliance with the Right Centre. It has shown the cloven foot, and from beneath the disguise of a Republic without Republicans has betrayed to its frightened confederates the form of a dreaded ■ enemy. Two days, Thursday and Friday in last week, were enough to bring about this total change in the aspect o f affairs. On the first o f those days the Senate Bill came on for discussion, and during the interval of a week since the passing o f the Ventavon Bill, the question with which everybody had been engaged was whether the Senate should be partially nominated by the President, whether it should be elected by the Councils-General, whether it should be composed in part of ex-officio members, and who these should be, and so forth. M. Fournier and M. Waddington had got an amendment entrusting election o f Senators to the Councils-General, and leaving them the right to elect whom they please, and M. Dufaure had another, limiting the choice o f candidates to certain categories. But M. Pascal Duprat moves that the Senators shall be chosen by universal suffrage and by the same electors who elect the members of the Lower House ; the Bonapartists are caught by a proposal which enables them to ride off on their own hobby, and the Extreme Right standing aloof, the Moderate Right and Right Centre are powerless to resist the combination. In a House of more than 700 members only 632 voted, and the amendment was carried by a majority of twelve. It may be that the Left did not wish for victory, did not intend to break up the newly-formed majority, but acted only out o f attachment to a theory; but it was just one of those cases in which a true political insight would have told them that theories were out o f place.

N ew Series. V ol. X I I I . No. 328.

M. Batbie immediately asked for an adjournt h e s e n a t e F m e n t i n t l l e name of tlle Committee, and the b i l l . next day brought something still more ominous in the shape o f an informal message from Mar­

shal MacMahon. General Cissey read a paper stating that the President would not authorize Ministers to take any further part in the debate on the measure, as it appeared to him that the vote o f the previous day would alter the nature o f the institutions the Assembly was called upon to establish, and would deprive the Constitutional laws o f all guarantee for Conservative interests. He considered it his duty to give this warning before those resolutions became definitive. This was o f course equivalent to a flat refusal to work with' such a Senate as the Assembly was manufacturing, ¡»nJ it was immediately followed by a declaration from M. Charreyron, o f the Right Centre, that he too and his friends would not accept it. They had been made the victims o f a surprise the day before, and had been abandoned by Conservatives (the Extreme Right) on whose assistance they had a right to count. There was an abyss at the bottom of the road they had been made to take— the abyss of the Commune— a statement against which the Left angrily protested. Then came a singular scene. The Chamber seemed resolved to vote the most Republican clauses in order to tear them up immediately afterwards. ’ After a somewhat pedantic argument from M. Laboulaye to the effect that the Republic having been voted, all the consequences o f Republican principles must be accepted, the House first rejected an amendment intended to be conciliatory, enacting that onethird of the Senators should be elected by the Assembly and two-thirds by universal suffrage, and carried another that each department should elect three Senators by the scrutin de liste, the system which gives least weight to local influence, and tells most in favour of the Republicans. The President then put the first clause, which was carried by a majority o f 127— 380 to 253. An amendment was next passed fixing categories from which Senators must be chosen, and providing that they must have attained their fortieth year. This formed three new clauses, substituted for seven incompatible clauses o f the original Bill. All the clauses, nine in all, were next voted, and then came the decisive division on the whole Bill, the motion being to pass to the third reading. A t this juncture the Extreme Right returned to the field ; 702 members voted, and the Bill was thrown out by twelve votes— 357 to 345— the same majority which the day before had carried M. Duprat’s ill-omened amendment. M. Brisson thereupon summoned the Assembly, as it had proved its impotence, to dissolve forthwith, to which the Due Decazes replied that it had pledged itself not to separate till it had passed a Senate Bill, as the-Bill for the trans­