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and ancient souvenirs. So that that which was rebellion at Versailles was legal resistance at Grenoble.

Claude Perier took great pains to enforce on the minds of his sons, then growing up into life, what he considered a great fact, and an important truth, that Dauphiny was not France, in the ordinary acceptation of the term, but that Dauphiny had certain rights and privileges similar in principle, though not in nature, to those for which the Basques are now contending in their provinces. This sentiment still exists to a certain extent, and we have frequently heard the inhabitants of Dauphiny declare, "We are not Frenchmen, we are Dauphinois."

At the juncture of which we have been speaking, a great change took place in the Opposition" to the monarchical government, which had up to that time been unanimous. The Ad ministration under Brienne had encountered the resistance of all the bodies of the state, because, in their opinion, it had wished to oppress them. It incurred under Necker the resistance of these same bodies, who were wishing to secure the power for themselves, and oppression for the people. From being despotic, it had become national, and still they had opposed it. The Parliament had maintained a contest of authority, and not of public good; the noblesse had reunited themselves to the tiers-état, rather against the Government than in behalf of the people. Each of these bodies had demanded the States-General, the Parliament in the hope of ruling them, as they had done in 1614, and the noblesse of resuming their lost power. Thus the magistracy proposed as the model for the States General of 1789 their form in 1614; and opinion abandoned it; the noblesse refused to consent to the double representation of the Commons, and a division sprang up between these two orders. This led to the convocation of the Notables by Necker. The family of Perier took a deep interest in all these events, but it by no means joined the ultraopposition. It thought well of Necker, and confided in the King, but yet its great anxiety was for the triumph of the "tiers-état." There can, we think, be no doubt of one fact, and that is, that the political events of the early life of Casimir Perier, and the political

education he received, contributed to inspire him with that respect for the law, which regulated all his conduct, as well as member of the Opposition, as when Prime Minister; and which marked his political character with an ineffaceable stamp of independency, firmness, and moderation. It was his love of the law, the triumph of the law, the domination and rights of the law, which led him to ask those who invited him to join them in an "illegal" opposition to the "illegal" ordinances of Charles X., "Who gave you the mission to set yourselves up illegally against an illegal measure? No! we will petition the King-appeal to the Chambers-resort to the Tribunalsand have recourse to all legal measures

but remember, the King is King, and we are his subjects." If Casimir Perier had at that moment hastened to the King-confided in his Sovereign-and gained access to his person-he might have prevailed on that Monarch to withdraw the fatal ordinances.

Casimir Perier received his education at the college of the Oratoire at Lyons, where his three brothers, Augustine, Alexander, and Scipio, alike studied, with their friends Camille Jordan and Degerando. This college resembled those of the same order at that time; it was animated by at once an austere and free spirit, which distinguished a great religious school, but which exists no longer. The young Periers received there an education quite in harmony with their natural characters, as well as with their family habits. Casimir, the youngest of the four, never completed his studies. His character was too impressionable and agitated, and the events which were transpiring in the political world occupied his mind much more than his classical pursuits. This was much to be regretted, and Casimir Perier frequently deplored it in his after-life. He laboured hard in maturer years to regain his lost time, and would frequently say, 66 a page at fifteen is worth a volume at thirty." He was, when young, more active than laborious-indolence he could not tolerate, but regular and continuous labour did not suit him. His mind seized quickly that which was presented to it-applied little-and yet was never satisfied with its attainments. He observed more than he learned by

heart. His passionate and ardent character from fifteen to twenty, was only kept in bounds by the habit of order and dignity which he had acquired under paternal discipline. At sixteen years of age, the beauty of his countenance, his fine figure, the remarkable expression of his face, his benevolent and gracious manners, his caressing and playful habits when his pride was not wounded or his suspicions excited, interested all who knew him in his favour, and gained the suffrages of those who had only known him previously by his apparent frivolity, or for his want of application to serious pursuits. He was an amiable young man, not naturally gay, but ardent, quick, impetuous, and yet thoughtful, though but few predicted that he would ever become a man of note and eminence in the world. The gifts of nature appeared lost upon him, for he had no fixedness of purpose, no patience, no method. But yet those who understood best the character of man, and the contending or opposing qualifications and defects of the mind, did not hesitate to pronounce that he had a powerful nature, and an instinctive superiority and authority which were felt, though not admitted, by his elder brothers. Though their acquirements were greater, they regarded him as their equal, and in all political_arguments, even when young, they yielded him the palm. In his most juvenile years he was a lover of order, and defended on all occasions the authority of his father. During the bad times of the Revolution, Claude Perier had fixed his residence at Paris, having some of his sons with him, leaving his wife with his other children at Grenoble, to watch over the precious remains of a great fortune engulfed in the general deluge. He kept his family in a state of ultra-discipline, and the severity of the father had not always an agreeable or beneficial effect on the mind of Casimir. The assassination of Louis XVI. was a subject of deep regret and confusion of mind and spirit to Claude Perier and his sons. They had taken a deep and personal interest in the first events of the French Revolution, and had identified themselves with the rise of the middling classes. But they loathed the excesses of the canaille-abhorred the injustice of the mob-groaned beneath the despotism of democracy

and not unfrequently even regretted the Parliament of Vizille. All this was at once natural and praiseworthy. They desired freedom, but the freedom of the law-they loved libertybut they loved justice and humanity

more.

In the year seven of the republic, (1798), Casimir Perier was drawn by the CONSCRIPTION; and he had to take up arms for a cause with which he sympathized but little. He had seen with distrust the rising powers of Napoleon Bonaparte, his expedition to Egypt, and the democratic elections of the year six. He had rejoiced at the annulling of those elections by the directorial party, and viewed this blow aimed at the ultra-republicans with delight. And yet he could not sympathize with the Directory, for it was neither a constitutional nor an impartial Government. It displayed great activity, but it was of a narrow and bustling kind, and Merlin and Treilhaud, who had succeeded Carnot and Barthelemy, were only two political pettifoggers. But to Barras, the young Casimir was especially averse. He saw that Barras continued his dissolute course of life, and his directorial regency; he knew that his palace was the resort of gamesters, women of intrigue, and stock-jobbers of every kind.

Hostilities had at this moment commenced in Italy, and upon the Rhine; two French plenipotentiaries had been wickedly assassinated, at some distance from Rastadt, by Austrian hussars ; the Directory, apprized of the march of the Russian troops, and suspecting Austria, obtained from the Councils a law, empowering them to raise recruits; and the military conscription placed 200,000 young men at the disposition of the Republic. Casimir Perier was one of the number. At this moment the troops belonging to the most impatient powers, and who formed the vanguard of the coalition, had commenced the attack. The King of Naples had advanced upon Rome, and the King of Sardinia had levied troops and threatened the Ligurian Republic. Casimir left, much against his will, as " adjoint du genie," and in this capacity made the campaign of Italy from 1799 to 1801. He distinguished himself under the walls of Mantua at the combat of Santo-Giulio; but he always looked on this period of his life as the least interesting, as well as

the least useful. In 1801, after the death of his father, he abandoned the military career to become a merchant, and to carry with him into the commercial and middling classes those principles of order, obedience, and energy, which had distinguished him during the first forty-four years of his life.

The dispersion of the Council of Five Hundred by the bayonets of Napoleon had given Casimir Perier a distaste for political life. This was to him a violation of law, a final blow against liberty, and the precursor of the dominion of brute force. The 18th Brumaire killed the first Revolution. The Ministry of Casimir Perier destroyed the second. Napoleon caused the death of the first by illegal means. Casimir Perier ensured the overthrow of the second by relying solely on the laws and the Charta. But the victory of Marengo was followed by a general peace, by the treaty of Luneville, and Casimir Perier returned to his hearth and his home. He hailed the treaty of Amiens with rapture; and when Bonaparte directed all his attention to the internal prosperity of the republic, Casimir Perier hoped for better days for his country; and the act of amnesty in favour of the emigrants won for Napoleon the hearts of the Perier family. His father had left to his children not only a handsome fortune, but the yet greater advantage of his name and his credit. He was a man of no ordinary capacity, who formed fine and vast establishments, and took part in nearly all the commercial institutions and measures which were created and adopted in France, after the Revolution, to raise the commerce and industry of the country. He was one of the founders of the Bank of France. His ten children, in dividing equally among them his fortune for the laws of the Revolution had abolished the last vestiges of the rights of eldest children drew yet closer the family together, and formed between them that union which has always subsisted, and which has kept the family in a state of independence and elevation in times of difficulty, and under circumstances of commercial embarrassment. Three brothers, who are now no more, were then the chiefs of the family. M. Augustin Perier joined to an enlightened and cultivated mind the solid virtues

of a most generous heart. His ambition was modest-his soul was filled with the most tender affections. He remembered that his father always intended him to sustain in Dauphiny the name he had left behind himand there he therefore fixed-and there divided his time between the commerce of Grenoble and the manufactory of Vizille, where he created one of those positions of influence and of patronage which are so rare in that country. The French are not essentially a commercial people. With the exception of Lyons, Grenoble, Alsace, Normandy, St Quentin, Lille, and Paris, there are no manufactories in France. The manufactories of Lyons are undoubtedly very considerable-and the muslins and printed goods of Messrs Kæchlin at Malhausen, have acquired universal fame. But when the manufactories of France are compared with those of England, or even with those of Belgium, their comparatively insignificant character is rendered visible. The first French Revolution, in destroying large fortunes, in overthrowing public credit, and in equalizing the properties of the upper and middling classes, rendered it wholly impossible for France to compete with Great Britain for a long series of years, unless similar disasters should befall the latter country. Large fortunes are indispensable to the establishment of such manufactories as those of Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds, and Sheffield. They are national manufactories, though conducted by individual enterprise, individual labour, and individual capital. The French have felt this so much ever since the first Revolution, that various national and public encouragements have been given to different French manufactures with the view of rendering them permanent; and the tapestry manufactories of Beauvais and of the Gobelins, as well as the porcelain manufactory of Sevres are even conducted by the Government itself. The French have endeavoured to combat with the default of capital by uniting together five or six moderate fortunes to make one large trading capital-but in almost all cases the partners have quarrelled amongst themselves, and the large establishments have been cut up into half-a-dozen small ones. Continuing to feel the evil of this state

of things, the French, at the very moment we are writing, are uniting together in the commercial world to establish joint-stock companies, or partnerships by shares, for the accomplishment of objects which no individual fortunes they possess would enable them otherwise to effect. But if we examine the prospectuses of a vast number of these associations, what do we see? Why, actually companies formed with capitals of FOUR, six, or EIGHT THOUSAND POUNDS!!! The shares are L.4 each in many, many cases-and whereas a banking or commercial house at Bristol, Manchester, Liverpool, or London would sign a cheque for ten times the amount as an ordinary affair, if it were a good one, and promised well, taking upon itself the whole of the operation, without even dreaming of a partner or a share, the French will publish prospectuses, advertisements, and make appeals and calls from Bayonne to Boulogne, and from Perpignan to St Valley, to obtain the paltry sums of four, six, or eight thousand pounds! And yet the shareholders in these chandler shop societies expect to make fortunes are quite astonished that they do not yield large revenues-and point to England and her vast commercial enterprises-just as if any real comparison could be instituted between the colossal character of the one and the mole-hill littleness of the other. The incomes, as well as the insignificant "capitals," as they are called, of these associations are absorbed by the rent, taxes, salaries, and even "stationery" consumed in the manufactory, and the French have found, and will find, that all these Lilliputian attempts to vie with the fortunes and manufactories of Great Britain will ever fail. The credit, fortunes, enterprises, and confidence of a country are not created in years, but in ages-and when once destroyed, ages must again elapse before they again exist. Look, for instance, at the present state of the question of iron railways in France. In France there is iron-but the iron mines are not worked. And why? Because there is no spare capital to work them on such a scale as to make them profitable. In France there is coal-and in abundance-recent experiments and soundings have proved this to demonstration-but the col

lieries are not worked-and why? For the same reason-there is not capital enough to work them on a large scale; and even when they are worked, as is now more the case than formerly, there are no railroads down to river navigation, and river navigation is stopped up. There are no canals-or the canals are unfinished or blocked up. The price of French pig-iron is dearer than that of British pig-iron in the French market, notwithstanding all the protection afforded to the products of France by a heavy duty on imported iron, and notwithstanding the expenses of freight and tonnage, port duties, and other French shipping charges. And what is the consequence of this state of things? Why, that to make French railroads, British rails must be used, as to make French hardwares, British coals and Belgian coals are consumed. The French have recently been making the experiments of feeding their furnaces and manufactories with French and Belgian coals-but the supply was not sufficient-and the duty on British coals was obliged to be lowered, to meet the demand for that article-or the French manufac tories making use of coals must have been altogether stopped.

The reason for all this is clear. The French have no fortunes. They cannot afford to wait, they cannot af ford to sink capital upon capital in mines and in forges, and to sink shafts, and to drain mines, and to pump out by steam-engines whole rivers of water. They must have the ready return of the penny. They have not a sufficiency of gold, silver, or credit, to wait for years before an enterprise shall be successful. They will find their L.4 or their L.20 for shares in an "omnibus" or a "cabriolet establishment," because it is a ready money concern the returns are immediate

dividends of some sort or other are at once paid-and the "pot au feu" of the poor renter is kept boiling. Nothing has so much astonished the French-no, not even the successes of their own Napoleon-as the perseverance of the shareholders of the Thames Tunnel in their gigantic work, notwithstanding the repeated invasion of the hoary-headed father into the works below. In France such an undertaking might have been conceived, and might have been commenced-but if the Seine had twice

poured its streams into the works, the old stones and bricks would have been sold "aux enchères," and the shareholders would have divided amongst them the remnant of the funds and the produce. And let not this be ascribed to the wrong cause. The French do not want either patience or perseverance-but they want capital. It is for this reason that their banks and bankers are often embarrassed to discount £4000; that their manufacturers and manufactories are at a stand instead of being in activity; that the Government is obliged to propose to take in hand all great works itself; and that at the very moment we are writing these lines, appeals are being made in the public journals of London, Brussels, and Amsterdam, to the English, the Belgians, and the Dutch, to come forward to take shares in the companies proposed to be formed for the establishment of various railroads in France. When similar projects are started in England, are appeals made to the French, the Dutch, and the Belgians there? No-English capital is sufficient for English enterprises -but this is not the case in Francefor her merchants have neither the precious metals, nor the paper, nor the credit sufficient to enable them alone to carry the objects they propose into effect. Look at the subscription-list for the shares in the railroad company from Paris to Brussels, and we see that though months have elapsed since it was begun, the sum required cannot be raised, though only one-fifth is required as a deposit. And when we thus write, it is not reproachfully, or spitefully, or vauntingly, and with haughtiness; but when we thus write, it is to assert a great fact, that the Revolution of 1789, or rather of 1793 in France, destroyed national credit, private capital, and the means of rendering France a powerful commercial country. We know well that we shall be told that the division of property into small fortunes is the developement of thegreatest happiness principle"and Doctor Bowring, who has laboured so long and so unsuccessfully in France in endeavouring to obtain equal justice for British commerce, and British merchants, will prate to us about his Jeremy Benthamism, and about the comfort and happiness

of the lower orders in France, with their perch of land and their pig upon it. But we also have visited France, in the length and in the breadth thereof and we have no hesitation in saying, that the situation both of the manufacturing and the agricultural poor is far, very far superior in England, Scotland, and Wales, to the peasantry or manufacturing workmen of France. They are more healthy, cleanly, comfortable, better fed, clothed, housed, and are more moral, and more religious. We have purposely made this dissertation, because, though the family of Perier did all they could do, with comparatively large capital, for the commerce and industry of their country-yet, after all, their resources were very small indeed, when compared with those of a Manchester manufacturer.

The next son, M. Scipion Perier, was a man of profound scientific knowledge, deep and unaffected piety -was so virtuous as to be even scrupulous to a failing-and was uniformly calm and dignified in the midst of an impassioned and animated family. But Scipion was really a man of lively imagination, and even passionate soul -but he was, during his whole life, making one constant effort to repress his ardour, and maintain an external dignity and serenity.

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Casimir Perier, with a character less equable, much more susceptible, and with a mind much less adorned, but possessing that coup d'œil which seizes and perceives truth, which correctly estimates the possible, and assures success, associated with Scipion, and founded together at Faris Banking House, known and respected throughout all Europe. Their speculations, however, were of a very different nature from those of a London banker. They engaged in all sorts of mercantile transactions, and the bank alone was only the means of enabling them to carry on their industry with greater advantage. M. Casimir Perier displayed much penetration, prudence, and judgment-but he was never assiduous in the minute details of business. had a prudent and enlightened mind, the talents of an administrator, the love of the details of business, and the spirit of daily application, he yet often hesitated as to the course to be

Whilst Scipion

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