when compared with its condition under
Napoleon—it enjoyed a tolerable amount of freedom.
Louis the Eighteenth was a man of ease,
who disliked energetic measures, and who,
besides, felt that it would be safer to let the liberals
declaim openly than conspire in secret.
Charles the Tenth was an altogether different
character; he was the James the Second of
France; conservative, bigoted, and obstinate;
he hated the theories set afloat by the Revolution.
His one dream during his short reign
was to gag the press, and to set things upon the
footing of bygone days. In pursuance of this
scheme he restored the office of the censorship
in 1828, and two years later, encouraged by the
counsels of his prime minister, Polignac, signed
the famous ordinances of July. The press was,
however, prepared for this attack upon its
liberties. Rumours of an impending coup
d'état had long been current, and the liberals
answered this audacious folly as it deserved.
On the morning of the 27th of July, 1830, all
the newspaper editors of Paris met at the house
of the deputy, Casimir Perrier, and voted
resistance; the resolution was at once spread,
the people took up arms, and in three days the
Bourbons were definitively driven from the
throne of France, and replaced by a proved
liberal in the person of the Duke of Orleans.

By the charter drawn up by the representatives
of the people, and sworn to by the new
king, Louis Philippe, the press was once more
gifted with liberty; but it was enacted that the
founders of political newspapers should deposit
forty-eight thousand francs into the Treasury as
caution money for their respectability, and that
journalists should, moreover, be made amenable
to the common law for offences of a treasonable
character, and for articles of a seditious or
immoral tendency.

These restrictions were, however, found too
lax, and in 1835, after the attempt of Fieschi
upon the king's life, M. Thiers, then Minister
of the Interior, passed the laws known as the
"Lois de Septembre," which raised the caution-
money to be paid on the foundation of a paper
from forty-eight thousand francs to one
hundred thousand francs, and forbade all
discussion of the fundamental principles of the
constitution.

The latter clause of this law, we may
remark, was never observed at all; the Paris
papers discussed and wrangled with as great
freedom as those of London, and the good-
natured juries before whom press-offenders
were tried almost invariably pronounced an
acquittal.

But the leniency of Louis Philippe's rule may
be conceived by one fact more eloquent than
volumes of other proof: the present Emperor of
the French, whilst confined in the Castle of
Ham, after his attempt at revolution at
Boulogne, was allowed to write articles of criticism
upon the state of France and the acts of the
ministers, and to publish them, unhindered, in
the newspapers of the Pas de Calais. We have
never heard of such latitude having been
granted, in any other land or under any other
reign, to a political prisoner.

Louis Philippe's reign lasted, as it is known,
but eighteen years, and the adversaries of freedom
have always railed at the French press
for having made no better use of its liberty
than to assail, and finally to overthrow, one
of the best of kings (this is said without
party spirit) that ever occupied a throne. In
our country especially, where it is very common
to say that the French are not worthy of being
free, a great many people—and sensible people
too—point to the Paris papers of 1847 and
1848, and exclaim that the only government
suited to France is that of a rod of iron. How
much truth there may be in this belief remains for
time and events to show; meanwhile, and without
expressing an opinion upon the matter
ourselves, we must note the steady progress made
during the last few years by the French
towards the regaining of their political liberties.
To assure ourselves of this, we have only to
compare the press laws of 1852 with those passed
by the Imperial government in the last November
session of the Corps Législatif.

By the law of February, 1852, no person, or
persons, could found a political newspaper (i.e.
a paper giving political news) without the
special authorisation of the Minister of the
Interior. The minister could give or refuse the
license as he pleased, without alleging his
reasons.

If leave were given, the proprietors were
obliged to pay fifty thousand francs into the
Treasury as surety for the fines the newspaper
might incur.

Every political paper was subjected to a tax
of six centimes per copy and per sheet of sixty
centimètres square. This made it impossible
to sell a political newspaper for less than fifteen
centimes, or three halfpence English, although
French newspapers are but half the size of our
London daily journals. The duty upon a paper
like the Standard, the Star, or the Telegraph
would be twelve centimes, or one penny
three farthings; what is sold in our country
for a penny would therefore cost threepence in
France. As for the Times, with its colossal
advertisement sheet, it would be taxed at threepence
a copy; and granting that the circulation
of the paper would be reduced in consequence
to twenty thousand copies a day, the company
at Printing-house-square would pay a duty of
two hundred and fifty pounds per diem, or
seventy-seven thousand five hundred pounds a
year!

For attacks against the sovereign, the
ministers, the clergy, magistrates, or against any
one in office—for false news—for too sharp
criticisms of any official act—for anything, in
short, displeasing to the Minister of the Interior,
a newspaper was liable to an "admonition"
(avertissement); after two admonitions it
became amenable to a suspension of two months,
and after that to arbitrary suppression. There
was no appeal in such cases; the minister's will