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114 WORKMEN ABROAD.

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keep the working men of Paris and the large towns
in good humour. For them it was that the capital
was almost rebuilt. To win them, repeated changes
were made in the laws by which they were particu-
larly affected. Mr. Malet, Secretary to the British |
Embassy at Paris, writing within nine months before
the downfall of the Empire, thus spoke of Napoleon’s
efforts, and the people in whose behalf he made
them :—‘ The Parisian proper is distinguished when
at work in the provinces by his frivolity, his gaiety,
and his constant desire for amusement; but at
Paris itself these distinguishing signs are less
marked in the general propensity of all workmen,
from whatever quarter, to fail in with the useless
life which the Paris air seems to engender. Paris
workmen are more sociable than others, more frank,
and less narrow-minded. They are generous in
assisting one another, and are tolerant. These are
their good qualities. On the other hand, they have
an irresistible Jove of pleasure and dissipation, and
above all are constantly on the look-out for change ;
any circumstance causing a change in the ordinary
routine of their existence is sure to be hailed with
delight. They rushed to the barricades in 1848
with the same impetuosity that they press in eager
expectation at the closed doors of a theatre, glad
of any thing to vary the monotony of life, and
tterly reckless of consequences. Their tolerance
and their friendliness cease when their employers’

interests are concerned. No private indulgence, no |
healthier than many which could be found else-

public legislation, can eradicate from their minds
the idea that the capitalist is a vampire feeding
upon their blood. In the workshop the discipline
may be complete ; beyond it the employer is treated
without respect, and his word is without influence.
His efforts to make little arrangements which may
be useful or agreeable to them are treated not as
boons, but as devices to bribe them to additional
labour. . ... Keep these characteristics in view,
and turn to what has been going on for the last
twenty years, and the present attitude of the indus-
trial classes. The Emperor has been steadily bent
upon the enfranchisement of the industrial classes
from the special laws restricting their actions in the
prosecution of their calling. One by one the laws
which they quoted in proof of their subjection
have been either removed, or modified so as to bear
equally on.employers and employed. They are
now no longer a nation apart, with a special legis-

lation to reduce them to obedience. This year
(1869), previous to the general election, the Em-
peror announced that the last shackle should be
stricken from their limbs. A law abolishing the
livret was submitted to the chamber. At the same
time that they have acquired liberty, means have
been afforded them of providing against want by a
small amount of thrift . . . Thus the Empire ap- |
pears to have done its best to gain the affections of

| teachers of revolution.
| institutes and working men’s clubs, where they

| protection is still professed and duties are still

|eyen if the liquor they imbibed did not seriously |
ec Aas : . >
‘injure them. In fact, if the English middle and |

= = sors

the working classes, and the return is the election
of men bitterly hostile to the Empire, in every eir- |
eumseription in Paris.”

Mr. Malet goes on to say that no indulgence
appears to the Parisian workman in the light of a |
spontaneous act. They say again and again, “ Yt is
only a part of what is due to us.” Many of them
are young men fresh from the country, and at an
age when they are peculiarly impressionable, and |
open to the seductive doctrines of Socialism. They
become ready listeners to the fluent and clever
The want of mechanics’

could spend a quiet evening in talk, leaves thousands
of idlers too glad to listen to any thing, in order to
pass the time. “It is the natural soil for the Socialist
to cultivate. He has sown and reaped at the elec- |
tions.” Eyen Mr. Malet’s keen and almost pro-
phetie eye could not foresee how abundant that)
harvest would be, a harvest of blood and fire, wel!
nigh worthy of the great day of doom. |

But it is not only with the Frenchman that the
Dutchman contrasts thus favourably. He will com-
pare with the British workman and carry offthe prize.
The Hollander gets lower wages than the English-|
man, very rarely tastes meat, lives in a country where |

high, where the necessities of life are about as|
dear as they are in England, and the luxuries
dearer, and yet his home is happier and his family

where. “ Spending less on himself,” adds Mr. Locock,,
“he has more left for his children, and what he
saves in beer he spends in bread.” That fact alone
is quite sufficient to account for the difference. hy
England working men seldom spend less than
twenty-five per cent. of their earnings on alcoholic
drinks, a proportion sufficient to impoverish them, |

upper classes were to spend upon their cellar and |
their cigar the same proportion of their income as
the working classes spend upon their pot and their |
pipe, the prosperity of the upper and middle classes
would speedily be destroyed. With regard to the |
question of temperance, there seems to be a remark- |
able difference in the condition of two states now |
adjacent, and which only forty years ago formed |
part of one kingdom. ‘The Belgians are far below |
the Dutch in this virtue. Mr. Pakenham says, |
that in many of the trades Monday is kept as a|
day of idleness, and that there are on an average |
but 236 days of the year on which work is done. |
No wonder that he comes to the conclusion that in |
Belgium, “the inferior hand is unable to live on |
his wages, he is badly fed and clothed, ill housed, |
and that he eares for little beyond his periodical |
orgies.” The Prussian artisans are underpaid, but |