tem of fortification then adopted was to be put
to the severest test known to modern warfare,
the assailing power of artillery having been
vastly increased since the time that the Pa-
risian forts had been constructed. The defense
would have to be carried on by citizen soldiery,
as the greater part of the regular army had been
destroyed in battle, or captured, or was shut up
in fortified places. The Parisians showed great
firmness and a determination to defend their
city, and reinforcements arrived from various
parts of France. Large supplies of food were
stored; but the government was guilty of the
folly of allowing the population to remain in the
town, so that the number of persons there was
supposed to be 2,000,000, including armed men
of all kinds-soldiers, marines, sailors, Sedentary
National Guards, and Mobile Guards. This was
to do half the work inside the place of the Ger-
mans besieging. Nor could it fairly be alleged
that it would be cruel to remove most of the
non-combatant population, as that population
would be sure to suffer less from expulsion than
from hunger and bombardment.
The provi-
sional government sought to treat for peace,
but found the Prussian minister too exacting
in his demands to admit of any thing being
done; while the victors expressed the not
unreasonable belief that that government had
not the power to bind France. Meantime the
fallen Emperor had been sent to the magnificent
palace of Wilhelmshöhe, in Germany, which had
been built by an elector of Hesse-Cassel, and
paid for out of the price of blood he had re-
ceived from the British government for fur-
nishing it with mercenaries to be employed to
butcher Americans. He was treated with great
kindness, and even consideration, by the Prus-
sian monarch, who had been much affected at
the interview he had with his prisoner at Sedan.
The Empress fled to England, where she was
joined by the Prince Imperial; Prince Napo-
leon and the Princesse Clotilde went to Italy;
and the Princesse Mathilde fled to Flanders;
while ex-Queen Isabella took up her residence
in Switzerland, near Geneva, thus making neigh-
bors of those whom she would not have allowed
to worship God openly in her late kingdom.

shuddering, insisted upon leading his army. In one respect the French force was very strong it was well armed, the Chassepôt being a better infantry weapon than the needle-gun, while the mitrailleuse was admirably adapted to the work of war. Unfortunately for France her soldiers had not been trained to a knowledge of these weapons. The soldiers did not know how to use them with effect; and so the less efficient weapons of the Germans, because well employed by men who had been trained to their use, told with prodigious effect on the event of almost every battle. The French army, too, showed a total want of discipline, such as would have been disgraceful in a raw militia force, but which was in keeping with much of their old military history. But, in spite of these many disadvantages, something might have been accomplished by the French had they not lost much time at the beginning of the war, and had they been promptly prepared for action, for the Germans were not for some days ready for their work. It was owing to the Emperor that the French were kept idle, as he did not leave Paris for almost a fortnight after war had been resolved upon. The French Emperor, after joining his army, did nothing-with the single exception of the ridiculous affair of Saarbrück; and while the world was wondering at such forbearance in him the Germans took the initiative, beginning on the 2d of August that extraordinary series of movements that were completed exactly one month later at Sedan, where and when Napoleon III. and his greatest army became prisoners to the Prussians. That month must be set down as the bloodiest known to our half of the nineteenth century, because of the number and magnitude of the actions that occurred in it. Perhaps the only bloodier month of the century was the October of 1813, when war was raging over a great part of the world, and in course of which was fought the battle of Leipsic. The result was to shut up one large French army in Metz, commanded by Marshal Bazaine, which was watched by the army of Prince Frederick Charles, while the surrender of the army of Marshal M'Mahon, at Sedan, left the road to Paris open to the main German army, commanded by the Crown Prince of Prussia. As The invaders of France arrived before Paris the earlier defeats of the French had led to the about the middle of September, and the beginfall of the constitutional ministry of M. Ollivier, ning of the siege of the "capital of civilization" and to the formation of an imperialist ministry, is ordinarily dated the 15th of that month. It headed by Count Palikao, Minister of War, so is understood that the movement that closed did the catastrophe of Sedan cause the down- with the wholesale surrender at Sedan was enfall of the whole imperial government. The peo- tered upon for the purpose of withdrawing the ple of Paris took matters into their own hands, invaders from the vicinity of the capital; and and the empire disappeared even more sud- there can be no doubt that, had it been well denly than the kingdom of the Restoration had managed, it must have delayed their arrival disappeared forty years before, or the Orleans at Paris for some weeks, perhaps have premonarchy in 1848. A provisional government vented it altogether; but it was so badly conwas formed, at the head of which stood Jules ducted that it did not gain above ten days for Favre, as Minister of Foreign Affairs, while the work of Parisian preparation for defense; General Trochu, in whom much confidence was and those days were gained at the price of an reposed, was at the head of a Committee of De- army of 150,000 men, and of an incalculable fense. Paris had been prepared for resistance number and amount of the weapons and main the last years of Louis Philippe, and the sys-terial of war. It is asserted that Marshal

M'Mahon was opposed to the movement, and advised the continuance of the retreat upon Paris, where, with his great army, aided by the local force and the fortifications, he felt confident of his power to keep the Germans at bay till France should have time to arm, and vindicate her character by assuming the offensive. In view of what happened from disregarding his advice, it is easy to say that he advised well; but as the Emperor would have been with the army, and virtually would have directed all its operations, it is by no means clear that Paris would not have been given up to the Germans quite as speedily as Sedan was placed in their possession.

those ten years are so great as were many of the events of earlier Russian history. The exception is the emancipation of the serfs, which dates from the opening weeks of the decade. The imperial manifesto providing for emancipation is dated February 19, 1861, and it was promulgated on the 17th of the following March. Thus it almost synchronizes with the famous emancipation proclamation of President Lincoln, whereby a death-blow was given to American slavery (September 22, 1862). Russian emancipation, like American emancipation, was the child of war; for, as our slaves were set at liberty because it was found impossible to overmaster their masters while they were allowed to hold men in full bondage, so were the Russian serfs elevated to manhood because the Russians had failed in the war of 1853–56, the incidents of which contest established the fact that serfs could not contend with success against men. Since 1860 Russia has been closely engaged in developing her material interests, and has kept herself remarkably free from European complications, Alexander II., apparently, being as much averse to meddling in the affairs of his neighbors as his father was fond of that unprofitable business. He does not think it wise to have

tries. Russia, as Rome was, is always at war, even in time of peace; warring against some of her half-savage subjects, warring against some of her half-civilized neighbors, or warring against some of the victims of her long series of spoliations. In the seventh decade she has had to wage hostilities in the Caucasus; and her mil

So

The fall of the imperial government was not without some ill effect on the French cause. The ministry of Count Palikao must be allowed to have exerted itself very skillfully and very industriously in bringing out the means of resistance possessed by France; and it was in the full tide of activity when the. revolution consequent on the disaster at Sedan destroyed it; and time was lost before the new government could take up the labors of its predecessor, and prosecute them with equal vigor. Besides, the imperialists had the support and confidence of the peasantry, which the republic-a "mission" to quell revolutions in other counans had not, and never have had, though much more deserving of both. The effect of this was to delay the development and organization of the abundant means of defense that France possessed at the beginning of September, before the Germans had obtained command of much of her soil, or of many of her towns. Another evil was the want of a respons-itary operations in Central Asia have been very ible government with which the victors could treat; and of this the invaders made the utmost use, pushing the advantage to extremes, and imposing upon the world the belief that the French government could not endure. The fighting that took place in France, down to the close of the fourth week of October, was generally unfavorable to the French, who could not recover from the depression that had followed from the terrible defeats of the imperial armies; and as the wrecks of those armies, outside of Metz, were utterly demoralized, they were in no state to renew the conflict with their conquerors. The Sedentary National Guards and Mobile Guards, though brave and patriotic, were destitute of experience, and often badly armed, and seldom otherwise than badly led. francs-tireurs, who aimed to be the guerrillas of France, were active, and occasionally successful; but the issue of no great war can ever be decided by the action of such warriors. It was a grave addition to the misfortunes of France that such places as Metz, Strasbourg, and Toul were forced to surrender to the Germans, Strasbourg after making a very heroic defense, the garrison being commanded by General Uhrich.

The

The Russian empire has borne a prominent part in the history of the seventh decade, though, with one exception, none of the incidents in

Great

extensive, particularly against Bokhara.
large has been the extension of her power in
that quarter that fears have been expressed
that her armies would find themselves danger-
ously near to British India; but thus far no-
thing has happened to show that the forces
of the two great empires early can come into
collision in that remote part of the world.
Russia has had much trouble with her Polish
subjects, victims of that great wrong which is
on the eve of completing its first century of
baneful life-the partition of Poland.
cruelties have been perpetrated by her pro-
consuls on the Poles, and thus the evil that
was planned and executed by Catherine II.
annoys her great-grandson, and threatens to
annoy his descendants and successors. The
Pan-Slavonic movement, in which Russia is
so deeply interested, made much advance in
the last decade, and not improbably the world
will hear loudly from it before the close of the
present decade. The establishment of Ger-
manic ascendency over Europe, with a strong
reflection therefrom in America, can not be
pleasing to the Slavonian peoples. Between
the two races a bitter conflict scarcely can fail
to occur, in which the Slavonic race would have
the sympathies of all Celtic communities, and
the active and efficient aid of some of their num-
ber. France, in which the Celtic element is

strong, and also the Latin element, could not | warrants her expectations of success, she is, it fail to side boldly with any movement that should be hostile to her enemies, the Germans. Russia has made useful treaties with Japan and China; and her advances in Siberia have been important. Her acquisition of the Amoor River country will be attended with results of no common order. An incident in her recent history comes home to Americans. Our government, moved by Secretary Seward's enterprising spirit, purchased of Russia all her American possessions, commonly known as Alaska, paying therefor $7,000,000.

is all but certain, about to resume in the East the eminent and eminently dangerous position she held in the reign of Nicholas. Egypt has increased in importance, and the Pacha is supposed to aspire to independence; and his aspirations are assumed to be favored by Russia. The kingdom of Greece was on the verge of war with Turkey two years since, in consequence of the aid it had given to the Cretans; but the labors of a European conference preserved peace. The Bavarian dynasty that was provided for the Greeks by the European pow

dynasty, destined, most likely, to a short and exciting career. In 1870 the matter of Grecian brigandage rose to the dignity of a European question, in consequence of the murder by brigands of a number of travelers of the "higher classes" (English and Italian), who had been

The Scandinavian kingdoms have been ofers fell, and is succeeded by a Germano-Danish more account in the decade than it could have been expected they would be, but the smaller of the two has created much the larger interest. The revival of the Schleswig-Holstein question seven years since, in consequence of the death of Frederick VII. and the accession of Christian IX. to the throne, brought about a renew-captured while visiting Marathon. The most al of the Schleswig-Holstein war; and Denmark was worsted in the fighting that followed with Germany, which Austria and Prussia took it upon themselves to monopolize.

The kingdom of the Netherlands, and Belgium, have been very prominent of late years, because of the belief that France and Prussia had designs upon them. So far as France is concerned they have nothing to apprehend for the present; but it is far from certain that they are safe from the side of Germany, which is ambitious of completing the great work of unity by uniting itself with the sea. The addition of the two little kingdoms, and particularly Holland, to the rapidly extending dominions of the house of Hohenzollern, would go far toward reducing to fact one of the old dreams of that aspiring family, which is power on the ocean--that power without which no modern nation can be considered great, and its position

secure.

Portugal has had no very conspicuous place in the history of the decade; and yet, though its later annals are tiresome, its people can not be pronounced happy. Internal disturbances have not been unknown; and there has been something said—and a slight attempt made to give the idea form-about a union of the lesser Peninsular nation with its great neighbor; but thus far it has come to nothing.

The Eastern world has experienced but little of change since 1860. More than once has the existence of the Turkish empire seemed in danger, and wars there have appeared to be imminent; but, if we except the contest in Crete, there has not been much hard fighting in that part of the world. Frequent have been the predictions of rebellions of the Christian subjects of the Porte, but no great rising has justified the words of the prophets. Russia is considered as a cloud that overhangs Turkey, as she has been ever since the early part of the reign of Catherine II. (1762-96); and as she is expected to demand the revision of the treaty of Paris (1856), and as the condition of Europe

interesting event in recent Levantine history is the completion of the great and long-entertained project of the canalization of the Isthmus of Suez, which dates from November, 1869, and for which the world is indebted to the spirit, enterprise, and perseverance of M. De Lesseps. This is only one, though the chief, of many undertakings having for their object the improvement of the ways and modes of commerce and travel in the East, prominent among which is the revival of the ancient scheme of cutting through the Isthmus of Corinth.

In the remoter East the decade almost agrees with the new government of British India, which began twelve years since, and by which that extensive and various dependency became part of the British empire under the sovereign, the rule of the East India Company ceasing in 1858.

The Chinese empire has been brought into very intimate relations with the Christian world since 1867. The government of that empire made Mr. Burlingame, formerly American minister at Pekin, its envoy to the principal governments of Europe and America, with the intention of instituting the most intimate relations with them. He was very successful in his remarkable undertaking, and would have prosecuted it to completion had he not died very suddenly at St. Petersburg, in the early part of 1870. At the beginning of last summer there were outbreaks in China against Catholic missionaries, many of whom were murdered. Other outbreaks followed, and appear to have been directed against all Christians in that country. The reaction against the liberal policy of Prince Kung seems to be complete. A similar reaction appears to be going on in Japan; and an alliance between Japan and China, the object of which is to put down the foreigners, who are becoming so powerful in those countries, is mentioned in recent advices.

Australia has made a wonderful advance in ten years, and the value of its exports in the last of those years was not, it is fair to assume

from such facts as we possess, much short of | to her a gain. The slave-trade on the western $200,000,000. The last native Tasmanian died in 1869. New Zealand has made progress, though that colony has been the scene of much bitter and bloody warfare with the natives, who are in course of being civilized into their graves -"polished off" for a better world.

THE ANCIENT "LADY OF SORROW.”

[The worship of the Madonna, or Mater Dolorosa-"Our Lady of Sorrow"-is not confined to the Roman Catholic faith; it was an important feature in all the ancient Pagan systems of religion, even the most primitive. In the Sacred Mysteries of Egypt and of Greece her worship was the distinctive and prominent element. In the latter her name was Achtheia, or Sorrow. Under the name of Demeter, by which she was generally known among the Greeks, she, like the Egyptian Isis, typifying the Earth, was represented as sympathizing with the sorrowing children of Earth, both as a bountiful mother, bestowing upon them her fruits and golden harvests, and in her more gloomy aspects-as in autumnal decay, in tempests, and wintry desolation-as sighing over human frailty, and over the wintry deserts of the human heart. The worship connected with this fradition was vague and symbolical, having no well-defined body of doctrine as to sin, salvation, or a future life. Day and Night, Summer and Winter, Birth and Death, as shown in Nature, were seized upon as symbols of vaguely understood truths.]

Editor's Easy Chair.

HEN Sir Philip Sidney was making the large lorgnettes, and then said, "Ah, you should

to Vienna, where he studied horsemanship with The Easy Chair resolved not to betray that Pagliano, who, says Sir Philip, in praise of the kind of senility at least, and indeed it found no horse, became such a poet "that, if I had not difficulty whatever in being as young as on that been a piece of a logician before I came to him, deeply-in-heart-forever-to-be-cherished day long he would have persuaded me to wish myself a ago in Berlin, when the little door opened at the horse." In like manner those of us who hear side of the platform, and the diva of to-day apdelightful singers, and are fascinated, are like to peared. The impression of that appearance is be persuaded by them to wish ourselves nightin- universal. It is not in the least that of the porgales. But it is curious and amusing to observe trait which has been exhibited in the windows. that this effect is never perfectly produced but It is not a half-shy, dreamy girl, with head inonce. We admire many singers, but there is al-clined; it is a young woman in full and conscious ways in our fancy one queen, who bears no rival possession of every power, who, richly and exnear the throne. When the superb Grisi was re-quisitely attired, moves to the front, and with a called in Paris thirteen times after singing Son vergine vezzosa, every body who is familiar with such occasions knows that there were elderly gentlemen in the house who nodded approvingly, and said kindly that it was very well indeed, but that they remembered Catalani. So on one never-tobe-forgotten and deeply-in-heart-forever-to-becherished day long ago, in Berlin, the Easy Chair sat in the Thiergarten listening to the band of the elder Strauss, and left that enchantment to go to the opera to see Jenny Lind in the "Somnambula." It afterward expressed the fervor of its feeling and its admiration to Ole Bull. "Yes," said the master; "but I saw Malibran in the same part."

truly radiant and dazzling smile, a smile not of tender appeal, but of proud, conscious self-assertion, conquers the audience before she begins. No woman ever stood upon a stage with more perfect knowledge of all her powers, nor with a finer instinct of their use. Her face lights the moment it strikes the audience. She magnetizes that audience with a glance. She plays with the crowd as with a single lover. She speaks to it with her eyes, with every movement of her head and hands. She is, first of all and in no poor sense, coquette. The voice, the singing, are but parts of her spell.

She sang first that evening the Ave Maria of Schubert. Holding the notes, she turned them with a grace and significance that were bewitching, but which sacrificed the simplicity and depth of the feeling. The voice was beautiful-sweet, clear, true, and very uniform. It rose effortless into the long cadence of entreaty, and overflowed

As the words were uttered the Easy Chair wondered if the day would come when some youth would turn to it with beaming eyes and beating heart before a later enchantment; and when it would say, with the complacent courtesy which it recalls in those elder critics, that it was certain-it with tender pathos. There was a lingering, ly very sweet and pleasant, but that it remem- beseeching sweetness, full of suggestions of the bered Jenny Lind! When Steinway Hall was twilight, and of peaceful religious trust. Ave rapidly filling to hear Nilsson, and the soft mur- Maria! Ave Maria!-it was the gentle heart's mur and odor and brilliancy of the audience pure prayer. It was sung without an ornament, which always salutes a great prima donna be as simply as it is written. She bowed, and the came perceptible, the Easy Chair confesses that silence broke up into a glad roar of acclamation. the preliminary minutes were lost in a vivid rev- She smiled, and drawing it with her smiling, witherie of the wonderful charm of that other Swede, drew. It beat against the little door by which the Swedish nightingale" of a certain-very she disappeared. After a moment the little door limited number of years ago. There were very opened, and she came, nodding her head at the many of the same familiar faces looking toward audience, brilliantly smiling, and chiding with the platform then which were present at the Nils-half-raised finger; then again disappeared. Only son concert. And what a vision they beheld!-louder was the demand, and once more, beaming a young, blooming, fair-haired woman, whose like the morning, and with proud archness yieldearnest, honest, comely face looked frankly, and ing to the proof of her own power, she came to with bright good-humor, at the audience; who the front, whispering to a friend upon the floor moved rapidly to the front of the platform, and below, and her lovely voice rippled into the airy stood calm and erect, with one hand resting quiet-warble of a waltz. ly over the other before her. Then, when the There was not a trace of effort in any thing she prelude was ended, she sang, with a fullness, a had done. Her voice seemed neither tried nor richness, a simplicity, a power and expression, tired, but was as fresh and even as if she had which were wholly satisfactory. The impression never taxed it. Somebody said that it was was that of the purest artist. The soul of the "thin." It would have been as wise to call it singer was rapt in the song, and, as she bowed thick. The art of the woman was much too perto the storm of applause, it was with the same fect to permit her any attempt at effect. self-possessed cordiality, as if she were delighted son less sure of herself would have made a dash, that the audience enjoyed with her and through would have "spurted," as the rowers say; but her the exquisite music. So fresh, so buoyant, Nilsson evidently no more doubted what she so composed, so superior, yet so sympathetic and should do than Juliet would have doubted her magnificent, it was impossible not to feel the sway of Romeo. Of course the Easy Chair remost inexpressible pity for the elderly cavaliers membered Jenny Lind, but it held its tongue. in expansive waistcoats, who looked at her through | Of course it knew how Jenny Lind would have

A per