LETTER XX.

Paris, June 7.

THE chambers met on Saturday last. The peers at the Luxembourgh-the commons at the palace of the legislative body. The former chose two secretaries, Mess. Thibeaudeau and Valence, who, together with the president, Cambaceres, and the Counts Sieyes and Roederer, were named members of a commission for the internal regulation of the assembly. The representatives met at nine o'clock in the morning: the elder member took the chair, and two provisional secretaries were appointed, in order to proceed to the formation of the chamber, by naming certain commissions, and choosing what they call the bureau, that is, the president and vice-presidents, and secretaries, by ballot. A member proposed that this should be delayed beyond the next day, as the chamber, together with the electoral colleges, was invited by the Emperor to meet him at the Museum; but M. Regnault de St. Jean d'Angely made a motion, that the house should adjourn only until eight o'clock the next morning, adding, with a tone rather factious in a minister, that, on all accounts, the house should rather occupy itself in the election of a president than in a ceremony, especially as they would have many opportunities of enjoying his majesty's presence. The next day I was present at the discussion, being shown, without a ticket, into the galleries, in which I was surprised to find so few spectators at first, considering that this was the second day of meeting. I must say that the appearance of the assembly, entirely popular as it is, was highly creditable, and such as would not disgrace the floor of St. Stephen's. Most of the members were in evening dresses, and three or four generals in uniform. The deputies, in the king's time, wore a livery of fleurs de lys, which proclaimed their dependance in too striking manner to be imitated in this assembly. The company in the galleries was of a very inferior cast, in appearance, to that which frequents our house of commons, chiefly workmen (it seemed) between their hours of employ, a class of men which is not found in London, but which fills, at certain hours, half the coffee-houses and billiard-rooms at Paris. They did not, however, want either as good manners or as much sense as is to be found in any mixed audience of our capital. Two or three women were present, and the reporters sat in a box by themselves. It was not difficult to see at once the cast of character which the

new convention would assume; for, immediately after hearing the proceedings of the meeting of the day before, a Mr. Sibuet, deputy of the department of the Seine and Oise, rose in his place, and in a speech (which wanted none of the action of oratory) proposed that all titles should be dropped in that assembly, in which the most perfect equality ought to reign, and the president himself was to be only primus inter pares. He was declaiming, when a member interrupted him, by saying that he was speaking from a speech in his hat, which was contrary to that article of the constitution, forbidding expressly the reading of any written opinion in that assembly; on which Mr. Sibuet turned his vehemence from the nobility to this article of the constitution itself; but was silenced by being told, that these considerations should be deferred until the chamber was completely organized. Shortly afterward a message from the Emperor, sent by the minister of the interior, informed the house, in reply to its application to know the names of all the peers, before it proceeded to the choice of a president, in order to prevent their electing an individual designated for a member of the higher house," that the requisite list would be transmitted in due time, but not immediately." The message was received with murmurs of discontent. They proceeded to ballot for a president, which was done by each member putting his paper into an urn, with a minuteness that gave me an opportunity of seeing all the men of any note who have survived the revolution; for such, it seems, have been elected in this parliament, which is now confessed to be the most popularly chosen of any since the constituent assembly.

There was no little tumult in determining whether the votes given to Lafayette, without the designation of Lafayette the father, should be permitted to pass in favour of the elder or the younger, his son, of that name. There seemed considerable eagerness in some members that Lafayette should not be chosen ; and, after the election, when a member of the chamber informed me, on the steps of the palace, that Lanjuinais had been elected, and not Lafayette, he took me by the hand, though I knew him not, saying, "Wish us joy, sir; we have not got that man, but one of the right sort a bold, decisive man-no trimmer." One of the door-keepers, who overheard him, rejoined, "Yes, Mr. Lanjuinais is an honest and a bold man, as I can tell; for I was the man who brought him the first news, in 1793, of his being proscribed. I concealed him, and shall never forget the intrepidity of his conduct." Mr. Lanjuinais voted against the imperial title, and was one of the opposition in the late chamber of peers. He has been always distinguished as a true patriotfirm, but moderate-a supporter of all the first principles, but Dd

stained with none of the excesses, of the revolution. Four hundred and seventy-two members voted at the first ballotting : 189 were for Mr. Lanjuinais; 74 for Mr. Flauguergues (an eloquent person, and celebrated for his boldness in the legislative assembly in 1813, and his speech upon the court of cassation, in the chamber of deputies); 51 for Lafayette the father; 17 for Lafayette, without any designation; 41 for Count Merlin; 29 for Mr. Dupont-and a smaller number for some other members, of whom Regnault de St. Jean d'Angely was one. When the first vote was given for him, I recollect that my neighbours in the galleries burst into a laugh; and one said he must have put that vote in himself. We are mistaken in England, and unjust, in supposing that the French have no sense of morality. If capacity alone could insure respect, Mr. Regnault would not have a character too pronounced, in a certain way, to incapacitate him even for the chance of the presidency. Both Mr. Merlin and Mr. Bedoch would have had more supporters, had not one been a counsellor of state and solicitor-general of the court of cassation, and the other imperial solicitor and excounsellor extraordinary of the Emperor, in several departments. Any connexion with the court would be fatal to greater favourites than either of those two gentlemen, in being candidates for the president's chair: but Mr. Bedoch is elected a secretary. You have already seen that the support which the representatives may give to the government may be entirely independent of all considerations but those of duty to their constituents. You are, perhaps, not aware that the presidency of the French chamber does not answer exactly to the chair of the house of commons, at least not in our times, and that it is not only the organ, but, in some measure, the mirror of the assembly, whose general complexion may be judged from, and is also a little dependant upon, the character of the man of their choice. Mr. Lanjuinais could not be chosen for that dignity of manner or person so useful in our speaker; but for the known firmness and honesty which would render him a faithful and fit channel of communication between the representatives of the people and the monarch. The assembly has the same object in view, in the selection of the four vice-presidents, of whom Mr. Flauguergues was the first chosen, Mr. Dupont the second, Mr. Lafayette the third, and General Grenier the fourth; all of them men notorious for that independence of either court, of Louis or Napoleon, which recommended them to the representatives.

The day following the choice of the president I was again in the galleries, when a scene arose which has decided the character of the assembly. The provisional president announced that he had informed the Emperor of their choice of Mr. Lanjui

nais, and had received for answer, that his majesty would communicate with them by a chamberlain. The most violent murmurs instantly burst out on all sides; many members rose at once; some spoke from their places-others struggled to reach the tribune. At last a member declared a chamberlain to be a very unfit channel of official correspondence between the Emperor and the representatives of the people; and this sentiment was repeated by the patriotic Dumolard, one of the opposition in the late chamber of deputies, who added, that the president could hardly have heard his majesty's answer distinctly. Mr. Regnault de St. Jean d'Angely agreed with Dumolard, and left the chamber, which adjourned its sitting, to wait for the Emperor's reply. Mr. Regnault returned not long after, with the approval at the bottom of the message, transmitted by the provisional president, simply in these words" I approve.-Napoleon." Lanjuinais made a short speech, and ascended to the chair amidst the shouts of the assembly.

It was the representation of Mr. Regnault which occasioned this change in the decision of Napoleon; and his conformity with the wishes of the representatives was shewn in another instance, the same day, by the same minister bringing down to the house the list of the chamber of peers, which had been refused the day before. An excuse was made the next day for the intimation given respecting the chamberlain, by M. Boullay de la Meurthe, counsellor of state, who informed the chamber that his majesty, on receiving the provisional president, testified his regret that he had not been before informed of his presence in the antichamber. The Emperor has seen Mr. Lanjuinais, and has addressed him, as the story goes, to this purport: “ Mr. L., some tell me that you are a Bourbonist-others that you are my personal enemy-others that you are a true lover of your country: you will conclude which of the three I believe when I congratulate you and the chamber on the choice it has made of such a president."

Neither the quick impatient tone of the president, nor his bell, is able, at all times, to command silence in the assembly, which occasionally breaks out into the tumults incident to a popular body in its first meetings.

The imperial session takes place to-morrow, and Napoleon will then open his two houses in form, at the palace of the legislative body. There was some noisy discussion this morning, relative to the method in which the members of the imperial family should be received, and two or three indignant hints were thrown out, deprecatory of all such renewal of formal ceremonies; which, however, the president very prudently discouraged, by stating that the matter, being a mere form, was unworthy

the suspicion, and consequently the reflection, of the free representatives of the people. A more serious attempt was made to convince the Emperor that he must expect no sort of subjection, either in form or reality, from this new parliament; for a Mr, Dupin objected, in a set speech, to the oath to be taken at the imperial session, which he asserted should not be in virtue of a decree, but only by a law made by the whole legislature. He demurred also to the inference which might be drawn from that oath, in favour of the immutability of the constitution. However, this opinion was overruled by Mr. Dumolard, who nobly observed, "that if they had to choose between their country and their Emperor, he should not hesitate an instant; but that the case was not so, since, in the critical circumstances in which they were placed, the nation was to be saved by and with the Emperor:" he protested, therefore, against affording ground for suspicion of distrust and disunion to the open and the secret enemies of France-and moved the order of the day. The speech of Mr. Dumolard had an unexpected effect in inducing General Sebastiani not only to object to Mr. Dupin, but to make use of his proposition, by grounding upon it a pointed declaration of the chamber in favour of the oath to be taken to-morrow, of obedience to the constitutions of the empire, and fidelity to the Emperor. The resolution was passed, and was followed up by a proposal from General Carnot, to declare the army to be national, and to have merited well of the country; which would have been adopted, had not Mr. Regnault suggested that it would be better to reserve that measure for an act of both houses and the Emperor. I should mention that M. Boullay de la Meurthe, in declaring for the oath, stated expressly that, in so doing, he judged that the house reserved the right of ameliorating the constitution. You will agree with him and M. Dumolard, in thinking the objections of M. Dupin to be groundless; but will see in these objections, as well as in the whole course of proceeding in the chamber, how false are all the assertions of your Bourbonist partisans, relative to the subserviency of the pretended representatives of the people to the will of the Emperor. According to the present system of representation, it is calculated that only a seven-hundredth part of the people of France enjoy the elective franchise, and that the mass of citizens have only the privilege of choosing, once in twenty-five or thirty years, an elector, who is to vote once in five years for a deputy. Many objections may be made to the present formation of the electoral colleges, which is contrary to the decision of the constituent assembly, that determined the number of electors by the number of citizens; but if the present chamber shall display, as it appears will be the case, a spirit of liberty and mode