476 



FRANCE. 



artisans were conciliated by the abundance of 

 employment furnished by the great changes 

 making in the cities, by the increased rate of 

 wages, and by the regulation, by imperial au- 

 thority, of the price of provisions. The bour- 

 geoisie found, in his vigorous administration, 

 the strong government they had desired, and 

 order and quiet being established, they had full 

 opportunity to pursue their gainful traffic, and 

 their speculative disposition was stimulated to 

 the utmost by the emperor. The peasant class, 

 assured of the possession of their little home- 

 steads, and having the opportunity to invest 

 their small hoardings in government securities, 

 which they could not previously do, became 

 the strong friends of the government. At 

 times, indeed, floods, short crops, and financial 

 panics brought distress, and occasioned some 

 grumblings of discontent with the government, 

 but the " empire was peace " to its inhabitants, 

 and furnished them protection, while it ruled 

 them with a strong arm ; and none knew better 

 than the emperor that the surest panacea for 

 discontent at home was a foreign war. Hence, 

 the conflict with Russia was rather sought than 

 shunned ; hence, Austria was menaced and 

 driven into war ; hence, Italian unity was de- 

 layed, that Europe might see that Napoleon III 

 was the arbiter of its destinies ; hence, too, the 

 Syrian occupation, the war with China, the 

 conquests in Anam, the attack on Mexico, the 

 proffered mediation between the Northern and 

 Southern States of the United States. 



Other enterprises, also, home and foreign, 

 tending to occupy and amuse the minds of the 

 people, were undertaken. The building of rail- 

 roads was stimulated ; the construction of sub- 

 stantial highways aided ; emigration to, and de- 

 velopment in, Algeria encouraged ; the great 

 Suez canal project taken up and vigorously 

 prosecuted, and considerable tracts of territory, 

 on both the eastern and western coasts .of Af- 

 rica, secured. 



These measures of policy were attended with 

 some inconveniences which were rather for- 

 midable. The debt of France, which at the be- 

 ginning was large for the resources of the coun- 

 try, has been constantly increasing at the rate 

 of about 75 millions of dollars a year, and now 

 amounts to $1,902,923,400, and the current an- 

 nual expenditure, now $413,853,291, has been 

 annually from 60 to 80 millions in excess of 

 the ordinary revenue, while the extraordinary 

 credits opened, at the pleasure of the emperor, 

 for such purposes as he deemed desirable, have 

 produced the utmost confusion in the finances 

 of the statei The material prosperity of the 

 citizen was the great aim and end of the gov- 

 ernment ; the press was not only not free, but 

 was under the control of a most rigid censorship ; 

 intellectual progress, except in the few direc- 

 tions which could not be considered as trench- 

 ing upon the imperial prerogative, was tram- 

 melled and almost prohibited. Glory and ter- 

 ritorial conquests abroad, wealth and the power 

 that money brings at home, were the aims and 



ends to which the hearts of the French people 

 were directed. 



In the Annual Cyclopaedia for 1861, the posi- 

 tion of the empire with reference to the impor- 

 tant questions of external and internal policy, 

 Avhich pressed upon it during that year, is 

 briefly stated, and a similar review with refer- 

 ence to 1862 will be in place here. 



The relations of France to Great Britain have 

 been, on the whole, tolerably cordial. Its in- 

 dustrial progress was well represented in the 

 great International Exhibition at London, and 

 though some complaints were made at the 

 withdrawal of that power from the Mexican 

 expedition, and at its refusal when urgently 

 solicited to concur in proffering a mediation 

 between the United States and the Southern 

 Confederacy, and at its demonstrations in re- 

 gard to Syria, Greece, and the Suez canal, and 

 a semi-official encouragement given to Spain to 

 urge the surrender to her of Gibraltar, yet there 

 were no serious disturbances of the comity ob- 

 served for many years between the two powers. 



Elsewhere on the Continent the policy of 

 France has generally been peaceful. The Swiss 

 difficulties have been settled ; the personal in- 

 terview between the emperor and William I, 

 king of Prussia, led to a. more cordial feeling 

 between the two Governments ; indications 

 were not wanting of a Franco-Russian alliance, 

 which, however, the sympathy of France for 

 Poland in insurrection at the beginning of the 

 present year may not impossibly prevent ; the 

 Austrian emperor has found nothing to complain 

 of in the policy of France, and the manoeuvres for 

 taking possession of any portion of the Turkish 

 empire have been, from the necessity of the 

 case, postponed to a more convenient season. 

 The imperial wishes have been thwarted in 

 Greece, but the emperor has succeeded in de- 

 feating the desires of the British Cabinet also ; 

 in Italy, the expectant policy has, in the main, 

 been pursued, and in the Ratazzi Cabinet (see 

 ITALY) Napoleon III found willing tools for 

 his purpose ; but the defeat of Garibaldi, and 

 the suppression of his movements upon Rome, 

 which the emperor compelled Victor Emmanuel 

 II to undertake, opened the eyes of the Italian 

 Parliament and people to the selfishness of the 

 French policy, and lost the emperor his former 

 prestige in that country. In Egypt, his rela- 

 tions with the late viceroy, Said Pasha, were 

 very cordial ; the pasha visited France during 

 the summer of 1862, furnished some black 

 troops for the Mexican expedition, and gave 

 his assistance liberally to the Suez canal. (See 

 AFRICA.) Under the head of Africa are also 

 detailed his operations elsewhere in Africa, 

 Madagascar, Senegal, &c. In Asia, the year 

 witnessed a number of severe battles between 

 the allied French and English troops and the 

 Taepings in China (see TAEPING REBELLION), 

 and in the spring by a short but vigorous cam- 

 paign the French became masters of three 

 provinces in Cochin China, besides securing the 

 opening of several of the Anamese ports to 



