Chapter V: Part 5

These military critics are very positive in their statements. The _Revue hebdomadaire_, M. Veuglaire in the _Revue encyclopédique_, Captain Gilbert (G. G.) in the _Nouvelle Revue_, support each other in these statements. The former, in an article on the instruction of the officers, says that this instruction is very badly conducted; the special editor of the _Nouvelle Revue_, after having demonstrated that the competitions, the methods, the programmes, considered individually, are characterized by grave defects, proceeds to show that, taken together, there is a complete absence of co-ordination. "No general view," he exclaims, "no common impulse, presides over the functioning of our establishments of military education. Saint-Cyr, the École Polytechnique, the École d'application, the École de guerre, are so many entities absolutely independent; have distinct inspections, comités de surveillance having no relations with each other; admitting only one common attachment,--the Minister of War. Now, our ministers have a too precarious and too brief existence to exercise any regulating influence upon the schools." The administration varies according to the personal qualities of the successive directors; sometimes it is the physical exercises which are cultivated at the expense of the intellectual, and sometimes the reverse. The general commanding at Saint-Cyr two or three years ago, a former colonel of Zouaves, was, above all, a man of action, and that which he exercised upon the school "was bad;" he was succeeded by one of the most brilliant professors of tactics at the École de guerre, who gave to the oral instruction an importance which it had never had before, the evolutions, the perfectioning of the manual of arms, the manoeuvring in the field, the blacking of the shoes, and the proper alignment of the beds in the caserne.

"At the École de Versailles, where are formed the future officers of artillery and of engineers, there is to be found the same incoherence. The changes brought about each year in the '_coefficients de majoration_' demonstrate with how little spirit of consecutiveness these affairs are managed. Having attributed more importance to the general information than to the qualities of manoeuvring, you are quite stupefied to see admitted novices, bachelors who have failed, more or less, and very mediocre subaltern officers, whilst excellent _maréchaux des logis_, intelligent, vigorous, industrious, are refused, because the blackboard intimidates them, because they design in but a mediocre fashion, and have, concerning the rivers of Asia, only vague ideas and perhaps erroneous ones," etc. Captain Gilbert has proposed, in order to do away with the inconveniences attending this anarchic régime, to institute, as in Germany, an inspector-general of all the schools, a sort of high master of the military University. "In any case, it is necessary to adopt some method that will put an end to a situation that is truly dangerous."

The greatest danger of all, of course, lies "in the fault of the French mothers, who do not give to the army soldiers enough," says another writer, M. Armand Latour, "and, alas! it is to be foreseen that they will be, in this respect, less and less generous in the future."

Of these military schools, the oldest is the _École superieure de guerre_ at the _École militaire_, founded by Louis XV in 1751, under the name of the _École royale militaire_. It was the king's intention to devote this institution to the education of five hundred young gentlemen, born without property, and, in preference, those who, having lost their fathers in battle, had become the children of the State. In addition to the five hundred young gentlemen, the hôtel was to be grand and spacious enough to receive the officers of the troops to whom the command was to be confided, the learned professors of every species who were to be proposed for the instruction and exercise of all those who would take any part in the spiritual and temporal administration of this household. The architect Gabriel commenced the construction of the buildings in the following year on what was then a portion of the plain of Grenelle, and in the meanwhile the school was opened provisorily in the Château de Vincennes. The architect was soon arrested by want of funds; but the king applied to these expenses the proceeds of a tax on playing-cards, those of a lottery,--the favorite method of raising funds at this period,--and the revenues of the Abbaie de Laon, which was then vacant. The first stone of the chapel, blessed by the Archbishop of Paris, was not laid by the king, till 1769. The pupils were admitted in 1756, divided into eight classes; at the age of eighteen or twenty years, they were graduated, and passed into the royal troops, receiving a pension of two hundred livres on the funds of the school.

In the month of August, 1760, the king issued a long statement setting forth the motives which had actuated him in drawing up the code of regulations; in the following February, the Archbishop of Paris published an equally long manifesto defining the functions and exercises spiritual which the pupils were to practise. All this did not prevent the king from modifying the organization of the school, in 1764; recognizing the truth that a strictly military education was not the best adapted to the wants of youth, and establishing the Collège de la Flèche for a preparatory educational institution; in 1776, Louis XVI suppressed the École, and distributed the pupils among various colleges whose graduates were gentlemen cadets for the various royal regiments. In 1778, the school was re-established, and the king granted it an endowment of fifteen millions; a decree of March 26, 1790, abolished the restriction of titles of nobility for all applicants, and threw the entrance open to all sons of officers of the land and sea forces. The Convention, by a decree of 13th of June, 1793, ordered the sale of all the property from which the revenues of the school were drawn, and converted the buildings into cavalry barracks and a depot for flour. Under the Empire, Napoleon installed his Guard in the École Militaire; in 1815, under the Restoration, the Garde Royale was lodged there; under Louis Napoleon, the Imperial Guard again,--very important demolitions and reconstructions having been found necessary between 1856 and 1865.

The aim of the school, as at present conducted, is to develop the highest military studies, and to form officers for the service of the general staff. Captains and lieutenants of all arms of the two branches of the service, having served a certain number of years, and being acceptable to their superiors, are admitted to compete. Three failures to pass the examination disqualify the aspirant.

The terrible Convention wished to have a military school of its own, and by a decree of the 1st of June, 1793, it founded the École de Mars, in the plain of Sablons. The idea had originated with Carnot; the institution was intended to educate soldiers for the corps of artillery, the cavalry, and the infantry. The pupils, from sixteen to seventeen years of age, were there to receive a Revolutionary education, "all the acquirements and the manners and customs of a Revolutionary soldier." Their costume, at first, consisted of a blouse of white ticking and a police cap. But this uniform was considered to be not sufficiently military, and the painter, David, was commissioned to design another. Being then in the classic and impracticable mood of his career, he furnished, for these budding warriors, a tunic _à la polonaise_, decorated with knots, _d'hirondelle_, to serve as epaulettes, and with frogs, a waistcoat _à châle_, a fichu _à la Collin_, as a cravat; tight pantaloons, disappearing in half-gaiters of black canvas. Each of these articles was of a different color from all the others, the stuffs having been procured by requisitions made among the merchants of the Halles. The footman was armed with a Roman sword with a red scabbard, suspended across his body by a black scarf, on which might be read: _Liberté_, _Égalité_, over the image of a sword placed over a row of other swords. The horsemen carried the sabre of the chasseurs à cheval. The cartridge-box was in the Corsican shape. The pupils were all awakened at daybreak by the report of a thirty-six-pound gun, which indicated the hour of morning prayer; this prayer being the hymn that Méhul had set to music, and which began with the invocation:

"Sire of the Universe; intelligence supreme."

The École de Mars was abolished by a decree of the 23d of October, 1794.

Almost behind Saint-Étienne-du-Mont are the buildings of the famous École Polytechnique, which, "to our French families, so essentially _fonctionnaresques_, appears like the portals of the Administrative Paradise: all the mothers dream of it for their sons." To be a graduate of this institution is to have a certain title to distinction in the intellectual and scientific world. It was founded by a decree of the Convention, under the initiative of Monge, in March, 1794, and consequently celebrated its centennial in 1894, with great ceremony. It was instituted as a school of public works, a school of mines, maritime construction, bridges and highways, the marine, the artillery, etc. It was established in the Palais Bourbon, under the direction of Lamblardie; the pupils were to be admitted between the ages of sixteen and twenty, this limitation being afterward extended to the age of twenty-five. Their number was fixed at four hundred. By a decree of September 1, 1795, the name of the institution was changed to École Polytechnique. Within the next two years, the annual allowance from the State was fixed at three hundred thousand francs, and the number of pupils at three hundred. Napoleon, who took a great interest in this institution, entitling it his "hen with the golden eggs,"--and this hen has remained the emblem of the school,--changed its organization radically in 1804, and transferred its seat to the ancient college of Navarre, founded by Jeanne de Navarre, wife of Philippe le Bel, and De Boncourt. In 1840, in 1843, and 1844 the buildings were enlarged and improved; by a decree of November, 1852, the school was reorganized and made a dependency of the Ministry of War. Its general staff was composed of a general of brigade, _commandant supérieur_; of a colonel or lieutenant-colonel, _commandant en second_; of six captains and former pupils who had the title of _inspecteurs des études_, and of six adjutants, _sous-officiers_. Thirty-nine professors imparted instruction in analysis, mechanics, descriptive geometry, physics, chemistry, land-surveying, architecture, the military art, fortifications, plans, French composition, the German language and design.

After a drawing by Georges Scott.]

The pupils were admitted through an examination; they could not be less than sixteen nor more than twenty years of age, unless they had served two years under the flag; in that case, the limit of age was fixed at twenty-five. Since the re-establishment of the Republic, these regulations have been somewhat modified. The number of pupils admitted annually is now from two hundred and twenty to two hundred and fifty; it is, perhaps, worthy of notice that the number of applicants, after having reached its maximum, seventeen hundred and twenty-nine, in 1893, has since greatly declined,--sixteen hundred and seventy in 1894, fifteen hundred and twenty-six in 1895, and twelve hundred and ninety-nine in 1896. The institution is now designed especially to furnish trained men for the artillery, marine and land; for military engineering; for maritime engineering; for the national marine; the corps of hydrographic engineers; the commissariat of the marine; the bridges and highways; mines; State manufactures, in which are included tobacco, gunpowder, and saltpetre; and the telegraph. At its foundation, in 1794, the pupils were not lodged in barracks, but billeted upon private citizens, and they received an annual allowance of twelve hundred francs; at the present day, this allowance is reduced to a thousand francs, plus seven hundred for wardrobe and a hundred for outfit. To those pupils who are unable to meet the necessary expenses, an allowance, or _Bourse_, is accorded, provided the parents engage themselves to repay the cost of his education in case the ex-Boursier does not remain ten years in the service of the State. The duration of studies is two years.

At their close, the choice of the graduate's profession is determined by his standing in his class. Rather curiously, the civil professions are generally preferred,--mines, bridges, and highways, telegraphs, and manufacture of tobacco. The pupils admitted into the civil professions enter special schools, École des Mines, des Ponts et Chaussées, etc., with the title of Élève Ingénieur, and a brevet of sous-lieutenant de Réserve in the artillery or the Génie [Engineers]. The pupils who select the military career are appointed sous-lieutenants, and pass two years at the École d'Application of Fontainebleau.

A royal ordinance of May 6, 1818, created an École d'État-Major [General Staff], which was established in the old Hôtel de Sens, near the Place des Invalides. The school was destined to furnish officers to the general staff of the army; its organization was modified in 1826, and again in 1833. Under the Empire, it was designated as the École d'Application d'État-Major; it is to-day part of the École Supérieure de Guerre.

In the little village of Saint-Cyr, about three miles from Versailles, is the famous military school of the same name, which had existed at Fontainebleau since 1803, and which, in 1808, was transferred by Napoleon to the ancient buildings of the institution for the education of the female nobility founded by Madame de Maintenon, and for which Racine composed _Esther_ and _Athalie_. This institution was, naturally, abolished during the Revolution, and the buildings appropriated to the reception of wounded soldiers. Under the Restoration, the school was suppressed, but later reorganized, and definitely reorganized by the decree of January 18, 1882. Its object is to educate officers for the infantry, the cavalry, and the marine infantry. The number of pupils is generally from seven hundred and fifty to eight hundred, from seventeen to twenty-one years of age. The number of pupils admitted each year is determined by the Minister of War. The requirements of the examination for admission are sufficiently strict to make it somewhat difficult to secure this honor. Each pupil receives an allowance of a thousand francs, plus seven hundred francs for his outfit. Bourses and half-Bourses, outfits and half-outfits, are accorded by the Minister of War under certain conditions. Each pupil volunteers to do military service for the space of three years. The duration of studies is two years. The pupils graduate with the grade of sous-lieutenant, and select their corps and their garrison according to their standing in their class.

The pupils of this school, with their jaunty white plumes, add much to the liveliness of certain quarters of Paris on Sundays and fête-days. Permission for these outings is greatly appreciated, and, it seems, is by no means easy to obtain. Many formalities have to be complied with before _Cyrard_,--as these gay young men call themselves,--in his neat uniform, can set out for the conquest of Paris. From time to time,--but not too frequently,--the _Poireau_, the general commanding, put in a good humor by some event which has flattered his professional pride in the school, grants a general permission to all the pupils for an outing, a _sortie galette_, without any regard for _moyennes_ and punishments. This qualification of _galette_ derives its name from the fact that this general permission specially affects the pupils _fins_ or _fines galette_, whose ranking in their classes does not always attain the desired altitude. The _galettes_, as happens in other educational institutions, frequently make the best officers. One day, a good while ago, it is related, an unfortunate _melon_, wandering about in the great space of the cour Wagram of the school buildings, found himself in the midst of a group of the elder pupils. "Monsieur," said a corporal to him, haughtily, "what are you doing here? you have the appearance of a toad in a basket of strawberries!" The humble _saumâtre_ thought it better to reserve his reply to this mortifying comparison for a later date. A respectable number of years afterward, the President of the République, reviewing the garrison of Orléans, reined up his horse before an old colonel with a white beard, and said to him point-blank: "Well, colonel, have I still the appearance of a toad in a basket of strawberries!" The humble _saumâtre_ was now the Maréchal de Mac-Mahon.

Sometimes the President of the République, or the Minister of War, on the occasion of some solemnity, requests the _Poireau_ to grant a _sortie galette_. Sometimes a personage _croco_--that is to say, distinguished foreigner--visits the school; then the cry is: "_Calot, les hommes! calot! sortie galette!_"

On these great occasions, the pupils who have secured this coveted privilege of an outing assemble in the cour d'Austerlitz or the cour Wagram to be formally inspected by the captain of the week. "Oh! this inspection!" says an ex-élève; "I know nothing more terrible, more feared, and more to be feared. How many laborious efforts, how many cherished hopes, are made naught before this inflexible judge, who, for the slightest spot, the smallest grain of dust, transforms into bitter sadness the secret exultation of a heart which felt itself full of the joy of existence! One day, when I had painfully acquired my _petites moyennes_, the captain halted in front of me. I was confident; I felt myself to be irreproachable. 'Give me your promission!' said he, suddenly. And, before my eyes, sarcastically, he tore into fragments this talisman of my liberty;--it appeared that the contact of my cheek with the collar of my capote had left on the latter the almost imperceptible touch of a little rice-powder! There was nothing for me to do but to go back to my chamber, resume my working costume, and increase the number of _petits-cos_, prisoners."

Without going into the infinite details of the administration of justice in the capital, it may suffice to indicate briefly the different attributes and functions of the four great courts of Paris. These are: Cour de Cassation, which sits in the Palais de Justice; the Cour des Comptes, at the Palais-Royal; the Cour d'Appel, at the Palais de Justice; and the Cour d'Assises, at the Palais de Justice. The duties of the first of these--at the present moment occupying so large a share of the attention of the civilized world--are briefly stated to be "to maintain the sound and uniform application of the laws." This court sits in judgment on all demands for the quashing of judgment and decrees rendered by courts of the last resort; it decides upon the demands for transferral from one court to another, in case of legitimate suspicion or for the benefit of the public security, conflicts of jurisdiction, and decisions of judges. It has the power of annulling all procedures in which the legal forms have been violated, and all judgments which are in direct contradiction with the text of the law. It can take cognizance only of questions of law, and not of those of facts and material details; after having quashed a judgment, it sends the case back to another court of the same order as that of which the decision has just been annulled. This new decision may be again attacked and set aside, but to prevent the endless repetition of this process, the tribunal or the court to which the case is referred after a second reversal must conform on the point of law with the decision of the Cour de Cassation.

It can pronounce upon the decisions of all the tribunals of the judiciary, properly so called, but cannot take cognizance of any decision of administrative justice. The decisions of the military tribunals can be brought before it only by non-military persons appealing against the incompetence of the military jurisdiction in their case. It can quash the decisions of Juges de Paix only when they exceed their power. It cannot determine upon the decisions of voluntary arbitrators, who are not considered as legal tribunals, nor upon judgments which are not definitive and conclusive, or which have acquired the authority of the famous _chose jugée_,--decision rendered.

The Cour de Cassation consists of a first President, three Presidents of Chambers, forty-five Conseillers divided among the three chambers (of Requêtes, Civil and Criminal), a Procureur général, six Avocats généraux, a Greffier en chef, and four Greffiers. The Chambre des Requêtes sits in judgment in all civil matters not excepted by some law, if the appeal is admissible. In this case, it sends back, by a decision the grounds of which are not given, the case to the Chambre Civile. Otherwise, it rejects the appeal by a decree the grounds of which are given. It renders judgment in electoral matters, and, within certain limits, in various special affairs.

The Chambre Civile decides definitely upon all appeals received and sent to it by the Chambre des Requêtes, it takes cognizance directly of appeals in questions of expropriation for the public utility, of appeals brought, in questions of law only, in civil matters, by the _procès gallican_ before the Cour de Cassation; of appeals, when there are grounds, in disciplinary matters.

The Chambre Criminelle decides directly upon appeals in affairs criminal, _correctionnelle_, and of the police, upon demands for revision in judicial decisions and transferrals from one tribunal to another, in cases in which the legal powers have been exceeded and the decisions are annulled under proceedings instituted by order of the Minister of Justice. In certain cases, determined by the law, the three Chambres are united in a solemn audience to sit as the Conseil Supérieur de la Magistrature.

Since 1883, the Cour de Cassation has constituted the Conseil Supérieur de la Magistrature and has been in possession of all disciplinary powers with regard to those magistrates who cannot be removed from their offices, of the Cour de Cassation, of the Cours d'Appel, Tribunaux de Première Instance, and Juges de Paix. The Conseil Supérieur determines, the three Chambres being reunited, upon the requisitions of the Procureur général; representing the government. No irremovable magistrate of the courts and tribunals can be displaced excepting upon the decision of the Conseil Supérieur. This removal does not entail any change of functions nor diminution of position or income. The magistrates can be placed upon the retired list, for grave and permanent infirmities, by the decision of the Conseil Supérieur.

It may be interesting to know that the salary of the first President is thirty thousand francs; of the Presidents of Chambres, twenty-five thousand francs each; of the Conseillers, eighteen thousand francs each; of the Procureur général, thirty thousand francs; of the Avocats généraux, eighteen thousand francs each; of the Greffier en chef and the four commis-Greffiers, together, thirty thousand francs.

It is before the Chambre Criminelle of this court that the inquiry into the case of Captain Dreyfus has been conducted; and one of the many frantic appeals of the anti-revisionists, anxious to prevent another trial at any cost, has been to have the case transferred before the full Cour de Cassation,--which has been finally granted by the government.

The Palais de Justice, in which this august tribunal sits, shelters also the Cour d'Assises, the buildings of the Cour d'Appel, the prisons of the Conciergerie and of the Dépôt, the apartments devoted to the service of the Parquet, of the Juges d'Instruction, the smaller ones belonging to the library and to the Salle du Conseil des Avocats, etc., and encloses jealously the beautiful Sainte-Chapelle, the slender spire of which and the great angel rise so incongruously over these secular buildings devoted to windy and dusty Law.

Through the great gilded gates which from the Boulevard du Palais lead into the Cour du Mai the visitor enters this ancient building, now almost completely rebuilt by the restorations which have been going on since 1840. Turning to the right, he passes into the great Salle des Pas-Perdus, and from that into the long Galerie des Prisonniers, which traverses the whole length of the Palais from east to west, and which was originally constructed by Philippe le Bel. This gallery gives access to the halls of audiences of the three Chambres of the Cour de Cassation and the Galerie Saint-Louis. A curious detail of municipal administration is connected with this supreme court. Though from an architectural point of view it is undoubtedly an integral part of the Palais de Justice, it is considered from an administrative point of view as a separate construction, appertaining to the direction of civil edifices, having its separate budget for construction and maintenance and its special architect. This variety of budgets and services extends throughout the building, the different institutions and tribunals under its roofs being considered as belonging to different branches of the administration. The State alone has charge of that portion of the building occupied by the Cour de Cassation; that occupied by the Cour d'Appel comes under the authority of the Minister of the Interior, since the costs of the maintenance of this court are supplied by a group of the departments of the nation. The department of the Seine and the City of Paris have each their portion in the costs of construction and of maintenance of the building, that of the city being by no means the lightest. The Galerie des Prisonniers, for example, on the ground-floor appertains both to the City of Paris and to the State, since on one side it communicates with the Cour de Cassation; the basement, which is a dependency of the Dépôt and of the Conciergerie, belongs both to the city and to the department of the Seine, and the upper story is equally divided in its allegiance. So that, if there is a question of replacing a tile in the pavement, of repairing a ceiling, or of repainting a wall, the architect is obliged to divide the cost, to a centime, between the State, the Minister of the Interior, the City of Paris, and the department of the Seine, each in its due and exact proportion.

The Cour de Cassation is very handsomely lodged, as is its due, the Salle des Délibérations, with its heavy ceiling of carved and gilded wood, being one of the most important and luxurious in the Palais, and the Chambre d'Audience having for its plafond the celebrated _Glorification de la Loi_ of Paul Baudry. The literal and realistic magistrate who doffs his cap in the midst of all these pretty allegories, at the pedestal of the Law, wears the gown of the President of the Cour de Cassation.

"If, in the middle of the afternoon, you should issue from the Salle des Pas-Perdus, your ears buzzing with the incessant hubbub which fills it for three hours every day, deafened by the shrill ringing of the bell which calls the attorneys in different directions, and after having followed the long Gallery _des Prisonniers_, you should penetrate into the passages of the Cour de Cassation, you would be astonished at the extraordinary contrast presented by these two portions of the Palais, such near neighbors. Over there, the noise and the tumult of the crowd of lawyers, the arguing of cases and the spectators; here, the dull silence of deserted edifices.

"It would seem that Jurisprudence, a magician with somnolent powers, had steeped in lethargic slumber his faithful servitors, and the old councillors who nod their heads, during the hearing, in their majestic seats, wearing the toque of black velvet the peculiar form of which has procured for them the disrespectful appellation of 'lancers,' the occasional attendants who pass silently through the long corridors, the solitary soldier of the Garde Municipale seated on a bench in the gallery Saint-Louis, frightened almost at the solemnity of the place, all seem but sorrowful shadows guarding the sanctuary of the Supreme Court. Even the spectators complete the impression of profound ennui which disengages itself from the very walls; here are none of the ardent or tedious pleadings, the passionate or cheerful discussions, which keep alive the attention of counsellors and judges in the Cour d'Appel and the Tribunal. Facts, actions, with their complications and their peculiar interests, with their infinite variety, are here banished from the argument. The Law here takes an ample revenge; here are discussed only matters of pure legislation, profound decrees of the supreme court, or the interminable argumentations of authors who have produced sapient dissertations upon the uttermost juridical disputation.--It is the triumph of the ancient classic controversy, for discussions are still held in the supreme court _pro et contrà_, to conclude in _baralipton_, in the same manner as in the ancient Sorbonne;--Latin alone is wanting to the festival.

"Pleadings, indeed, have but little importance before the Cour de Cassation: it is the _mémoire_, laboriously and lengthily composed by the avocat, which is the _pièce de résistance_ in every case, because it sets forth a complete exposé of the affair and the minute discussion of each one of the juridical problems which it brings up, with infinite divisions and subdivisions. The monotonous reading of the Conseiller-rapporteur being finished, the avocat proceeds to develop his mémoire, and the Avocat général states his conclusions; then, if the question present only mediocre juridical interest, the conseillers gather in a circle in the centre of the Salle d'Audience to discuss, adopt, or reject the judgment prepared in advance by the Rapporteur;--this is what is called _faire le rondeau_. And there may be seen, in the unshaded light of the hall, under the ceiling in gilded oak of the Chambre Civile, these gray or white heads agitating themselves, and Passion (passion inspired by abstract law!) reappears. The apathy, the somnolence of a few minutes ago, have disappeared, and these hoary old men find again, for the moment, an ardor which seemed to have been forever laid to sleep....

After the painting by Maurice Orange.

The Médaille de Sainte-Hélène was, by a decree, in 1857, a special distinction awarded to all survivors of the wars of 1792 to 1815.]

"Silence, a silence which is scarcely troubled by the sound of the discreet footfalls of the rare promenaders, an icy chill, are the inalienable characteristics of the locality in which sits the first court of the justice of France. Respect it, do as do those who frequent it willingly or because of the necessities of the daily task, and issue from these deserted galleries, speaking in an undertone, and with the finger upon the lips, in order not to trouble the repose of its inhabitants."

The Cour des Comptes, which sits in the Palais-Royal, ranks immediately after the Cour de Cassation, and enjoys the same prerogatives. It is the modern representative of the Chambres des Comptes of the old monarchy and of the Commission de Comptabilité Nationale which replaced these Chambres at the period of the Revolution. It was created by a law of September 16, 1807, and constitutes at once an administrative tribunal charged with the verification and examination of certain financial accounts of the administration and an institution of the body-politic intended, by its control over the financial measures of the administration and other administrative accounts which it is not called upon to examine, to advise the executive and legislative powers. It may therefore be considered as the superintendent of the public fortune and of its financial measures.

It consists of a first President, three Presidents of Chambres, eighteen Conseillers Maîtres, twenty-four Conseillers Référendaires of the first class, sixty of the second class, a Procureur général, fifteen Auditeurs of the first class, ten of the second class, a Greffier en chef, etc. The salaries of these officials are about the same as those of the Cour de Cassation. The first President has the supreme direction of all the deliberations of the court, as well as of the police and general surveillance. The court is divided into three Chambres, having each a President and six Conseillers Maîtres who alone have a voice in the deliberations and constitute, themselves, the members of the administrative tribunal sitting in judgment. The deliberations are not public. The Presidents and Conseillers cannot be removed, and are placed on the retired list, the Presidents and Maîtres at seventy-five years of age, and the Référendaires at seventy years. The court addresses an annual report to the chief of the State, in which it sets forth those matters which, in the course of its examinations, have seemed to it worthy of the attention of the government, and advocates those reforms and ameliorations in the administration of the public finances which have been suggested to it by its consideration of the various facts and enactments.

The Cour d'Appel, at the Palais de Justice, includes in its jurisdiction the departments of the Aube, Eure-et-Loir, Marne, Seine-et-Marne, Seine-et-Oise, Yonne-et-Seine. In all cases, the decrees are rendered by the magistrates deliberating, in groups of some odd number,--at least five, including the President. In all civil and commercial cases, appeal can be made from all decisions rendered by the tribunals of the arrondissements or of commerce, by referees, judicial reports upon cases in litigation in which the amount involved exceeds fifteen hundred francs of injury to the person or to personal property, or sixty francs of revenue from real estate.

This court is composed of a first President, nine Presidents of Chambres, and sixty-two Conseillers, divided among nine Chambres, of which seven decide upon civil and commercial appeals, one upon appeals _Correctionnels_, and the ninth is the Chambre des Mises en Accusation, before which are brought criminal cases after they have passed the stage of preliminary examination. The Parquet connected with the Cour d'Appel consists of the Procureur général, seven Avocats généraux, and eleven Substituts of the Procureur général. The Cour d'Appel sits in judgment as a court of first and last resort in all cases of misdemeanors, involving a legal penalty, committed by the magistrates of the Cour de Cassation, of the Cour d'Appel, of the Tribunal de Première Instance, by the Juges de Paix, the Préfets, the Grand Officers of the Legion of Honor, generals, archbishops, bishops, presidents of Consistoires in the Protestant and Jewish organizations.

In each department of France there is a Cour d'Assises to try those individuals who are sent before it by the Chambre des Mises en Accusation of the Cour d'Appel. In the departments generally these courts sit every three months, and more frequently if occasion requires. The Cour d'Assises of the department of the Seine holds its sittings every day, in the Palais de Justice. This court consists, first, of three Conseillers of the Cour d'Appel, the first sitting as President, the two others as Assesseurs, designated every three months, the President by the Garde des Sceaux, the Assesseurs by the first President; second, of a representative of the Ministère Public, selected among the Avocats généraux or the Substitutes of the Procureur général; third, of a Greffier; fourth, of a jury composed of twelve citizens selected by lot by the President from the list of thirty-six _jures_ designated for the session. After the examination of the accused, the depositions of the witnesses, the Réquisitoire of the Ministère Public and the presentation of the defence, the jury retires to deliberate upon the probable guilt of the prisoner and the extenuating circumstances. When the jurors have agreed upon their verdict, the President causes the prisoner to be brought back into court, the Greffier reads to him the conclusion of the jury, and the court pronounces his acquittal, or sentences him to the penalty due the crime of which he has just been convicted, even when this penalty is only a matter of police regulation.

The decision of the jury is supposed to be final, but when a prisoner is found guilty and the court is convinced that the jury is entirely in error, it may set the judgment aside and postpone the case to another session. Against the sentence of the court, appeal may be made to the Cour de Cassation. The Cour d'Assises exercises full jurisdiction in all cases criminal, _correctionnelle_, or of the _Simple Police_, excepting in the case of some special law. It takes cognizance, moreover, of actions qualified as crimes, of actions qualified as misdemeanors which a special law places under its jurisdiction,--misdemeanors committed during its sessions, political misdemeanors and those of the press, excepting offences against the public morality and slander, or insults offered to individuals, which all come before the Tribunal Correctionnel.

After a drawing by Pierre Vidal.]

One of the oldest and most characteristic features of the French administration of justice, the _juge d'instruction_, has but recently disappeared. The very extensive powers of this magistrate, but vaguely defined by law and custom, lent themselves readily to the abuses which undoubtedly constituted a grave defect in the criminal jurisprudence of the nation. To him were confided all the details of the preliminary investigation of a crime and the detection of the criminal, the seeking for clues, the right of search, of arrest of any suspected characters, of summoning witnesses and experts, of interrogating the accused, and--but too generally--of wresting a confession from him by any means that might present themselves. One of the methods employed was the ostentatious consultation before him of a blank memorandum which, the accused was given to understand, contained the complete avowal of a confederate. In the famous _affaire Wilson_ of a few years ago, concerning the alleged sale of decorations of the Legion of Honor, M. Vigneau, the official charged with this investigation, telephoned to one of these purchasers of red ribbons in the assumed character of M. Wilson. These irregular practices, however, it is asserted, were mostly practised by younger and more inexperienced Juges d'Instruction, and were greatly disapproved by the graver and older magistrates. The accused--who not infrequently would declare subsequently that the statements which he was reported to have made by the _curieux_, in thieves' slang, were but a distorted version of his words--was considered to have an additional security in the presence of the magistrate's _greffier_, or clerk, who took down his testimony, and in the fact that he himself need not sign this statement if he considered it inexact.

It was recognized that the qualities, physical, moral, and mental, possessed by a truly able and upright Juge d'Instruction were necessarily exceptional. He should have a very extensive judicial knowledge and experience, he should be gifted with powers of precision, of observation, of decision, of activity, of patience, and of evenness of temper. He should be affected by nothing, surprised by nothing. His bodily health should be sound, his brain cool, and his digestion excellent. He was liable to be summoned from his bed at any hour of the night to investigate a new crime; and when he entered his cabinet tranquilly at one o'clock in the afternoon, it was possible that a minute afterward he would be leaving it hastily on the trail of a fresh offence against justice. In Paris, these magistrates, twenty-eight in number,--with the exception of two who sat in the Petit Parquet,--occupied the three upper stories of the Palais; in the antechamber of each, under the eye of an attendant, or _garçon de bureau_, might be found waiting, more or less impatiently, a number of witnesses and persons interested, from all classes of society. In the inner room, before the magistrate seated at his desk, and flanked by his greffier, the prisoner or the suspected criminal, guarded by two soldiers of the Garde Municipale, would be undergoing his examination,--badgered, bullied, cross-examined, threatened, matching his dull and unaccustomed wits against the keener, trained, and experienced ones of the judge, outmatched at every point, and but too frequently failing to demonstrate his innocence which it should have been as much the care of his examiner as his own to demonstrate.

After a water-color by Pierre Vidal.]

Lowest in the scale of the courts of justice of the capital, but by far the most industrious, is the Tribunal de Simple Police. Before it appear the minor offenders against the law, those whose penalties, when convicted, attain a maximum of fifteen francs, or at the very worst, five days of prison. Usually, however, they range from about a fine of three francs if the culprit appear before the court, to five francs if he be condemned by default. The difference is not sufficiently great, usually, to compensate him for the expenditure of time and trouble in appearing, and he permits Justice to take her course without protest. These offenders are usually hotel-keepers, shopkeepers, cab-drivers, concierges, small proprietors, etc.; their crimes consist in neglecting the proper sweeping of their sidewalks, in shaking a carpet out of a window, in watering a window-plant too copiously, in putting up the shop-shutters too late, in permitting the family dog to go about without collar and muzzle,--crimes usually committed in honest ignorance of the police regulations thus violated. As there exists but one Tribunal de Police for the twenty arrondissements of Paris, we are not surprised to learn that this court is the busiest one in France. The number of offenders who appear before it annually averages from forty-three to forty-five thousand.

But, as it does not sit on Sundays, Mondays, fête-days, and but three days a week during the vacation, the total number of hearings amounts to two hundred and forty annually. This makes nearly two hundred cases for each sitting, and as the sittings last from an hour and a half to three hours, the court has about one minute to devote to each case. To enable it to dispose of them with this rapidity, it classifies the offenders, and tries all those accused of the same offence at once. The Ministère Public announces: "Are accused of violation of the ordinance of police regulating public cabs: Pierre, Paul, Jacques," etc. From time to time, a voice from the audience answers to one of these names: "Present!" This roll-call finished, the Juge de Paix, who has marked on his list the names of the absentees, reads these names again and condemns them all by default to the maximum penalty. Then there is a second roll-call of those who are present. The Ministère Public calls on all those who have anything to say to come forward; two or three of the offenders advance, stammer out some excuses which are scarcely listened to, and this second list is condemned in a lump to the regulation minimum penalty. By this simple process, the forty-five thousand cases are tried in the course of the year.

The Tribunal de Simple Police is provided with apartments on the ground-floor, almost in the basement, of the Palais de Justice, under the stone arches that date from Saint-Louis, and where the atmosphere is always damp, chilly, and sombre. The Juges de Paix, in addition to their civil functions, are charged with sitting in judgment upon these petty misdemeanors, and they take their places in the Tribunal alternately, a week at a time. In addition to the Juges de Paix, the court is composed of three Commissaires de Police, delegated by the Procureur général, who fulfil the functions of the Ministère Public, one as Chef de Service, the two others as Substituts, and of a Greffier en chef and of four commis-Greffiers.

A grade higher in the judiciary scale is the Tribunal Correctionnel, which sits in the wing of the Palais on the south side of the court of the Sainte-Chapelle, and which occupies itself with what may be called the bourgeois of crime and poverty. The sittings of this court draw so many spectators that the visitor is frequently stopped at the entrance by the Garde Municipal, who says: "_C'est complet!_" like an omnibus conductor when his vehicle is full. Four Chambers are devoted to the sittings of this court, two on the first floor, and two on the second; on each of these stories is a Salle des Pas-Perdu. All these halls of justice are thronged by such a compact and democratic crowd that one of the attributes of the magistrates is a little flask of vinegar or smelling-salts placed on the bench, by the side of the Code, before each of the three judges of the Tribunal and before the Substitut. The avocats do not enjoy this privilege, nor the Greffiers unless they have been very long in the service of the court. Here, also, the pressure of affairs is so great that the judges leave the bench, saying to their consciences: "Well! those who are innocent can appeal!" The terror and ennui of the law are, however, so great that but very few of those condemned do thus appeal. One of the characteristics of this tribunal of the Police Correctionnelle is the number of _avocats raccrocheurs_ who infest it in the search for clients of any degree, and who seem to bear a close resemblance to that unsavory class known in New York as "Tombs lawyers," or "shysters."

In the rear of the Palais, looking out on the Place Dauphine, is the Chambre des Appels de Police Correctionelle. The Salle d'Audience is a vast, chilly, and cheerless hall in which the appellant follows anxiously the retrial of his case in the formal and dispassionate résumé of the magistrates. The president begins by interrogating him courteously on his age, profession, etc.; then he says, with equal civility, turning toward one of his colleagues: "We will now hear Monsieur le Conseiller-rapporteur." One of the group of seven counsellors thereupon proceeds to read a strictly legal and impartial summing-up of the whole case, quite devoid of literary ornament or of personal observation; when he has finished, the president, turning again to the appellant, directs him to arise and interrogates him summarily on the principal points of his affair. During this examination, the counsellors, for the first time, turn their attention upon the appellant, but very briefly, and then, like magistrates whose judgment is quickly enlightened, resume the various occupations in which they have been engaged. Then the president calls upon the counsel for the defence; to him replies M. l'Avocat général. After these two orations, pro and con, the president announces that "the court will now deliberate;" all the counsellors rise, and, after some moments of consultation in a circle behind the arm-chair of the president, retire in procession into the Chambre du Conseil. This journey indicates that there is a question of law to be considered. Otherwise, the decision would have been rendered immediately, upon the spot.

After a photograph.]

The poor _prévenu_ draws favorable auguries from this solemn deliberation. But his hopes are generally dashed; the court, usually, retires into the Chambre du Conseil only to correct the law, while affirming the decree, of the lower court. The president re-enters, the _dossier_ of the case under his arm, and followed by his six counsellors; he proceeds to read the decision of the court, setting forth that, while the reasonings of the lower court are entirely erroneous, its conclusions are, nevertheless, irrefutable. Sometimes, however, this court, called the "Chamber of Bishops" by Henri Rochefort, demonstrates its judicial independence by overturning the decisions brought before it, even though they may be sustained by the popular verdict,--as it did in the case of M. Wilson.

The jury system of France resembles, in a general way, in its alleged safeguarding of the public liberties, and in its injustices, inequalities, and obstinate bringing to the service of Themis the uncertain aid of Chance and of Prejudice, that of the United States. Each year, in each canton of France, these generally unwilling aids in the administration of justice are selected among the respectable citizens by a council composed of Maires, Juges de Paix, and Conseillers généraux. Their names, forwarded to the central judicial authority, are subjected to a second revision, by a commission sitting in the chief town or the capital. In this manner is obtained the "general list of the jury;" from this is drawn by lot, every three months, and in Paris every fortnight, the jury of each criminal session, composed of thirty-six titular jurors and four supplementary. All citizens, having the required qualifications, between the ages of thirty and seventy, are obliged to serve, under a penalty of five hundred francs. The juror receives a very small sum for travelling expenses if the court is at a distance from his residence, but nothing at all if it be in his neighborhood. Consequently, these arbitrary summonses in the name of Justice are viewed, generally, with as much disfavor by the recipients thereof as in other countries, with the exception of the members of some such leisure class as retired officers on half-pay. The tendencies of certain classes of jurors are well recognized, the law and the evidence being as they may;--thus, before a jury of peasants and farmers, the young girls guilty of infanticide are nearly always acquitted, the rural economy entertaining a natural aversion to illegitimate children, reared at the public cost to become vagabonds at the age of fifteen. On the contrary, incendiaries, counterfeiters, and those accused of assaults upon young children in the fields, receive no mercy at the hands of these honest countrymen. The severity of the juries of Versailles is well known. Composed of market-gardeners, ex-officers, and retired shopkeepers and employés, living in small cottages in the suburbs, and exposed night and day to the incursions of the Parisian marauders, they give always to the prosecution the verdict which it demands, and sometimes even more. There was a case, a few years ago, of three young rascals who set out from Paris to assassinate an old innkeeper of Argenteuil; the Ministère Public claimed one of them for the guillotine, but the Versailles jury gave him all three.

As to the Parisian jury, its composition is naturally more complex, but its results are said to be equally unreliable. Its deliberations are not affected by any spirit of caste or class, since these distinctions are not sharply enough defined; "but it is at the mercy of a fine talker. This will not be the avocat, rarely listened to, nor even the Avocat général, offensive in the eyes of the Parisian _frondeur_ as the representative of authority. No; it is among its own members that the jury will select this veritable chief, some reasoner with abundant and facile speech, discovering in everything concealed meanings, hidden allusions, and all the more dangerous for the good sense of his colleagues that he has an elegant talent for paradoxes."

The Parisian jury is also, it appears, peculiarly under the influence of the fashions and customs of the day, no matter what they may be. For several years it was almost impossible to secure a verdict of conviction in the so-called "passionate dramas;" the heroines of vitriol and the revolver passed with impunity before these complaisant juries. The Parquet was obliged to withdraw most of these cases from trial by jury and send them to one of the Chambres of the Tribunal Correctionnel, which did not fail to do them justice. The notoriety, the celebrity, of a case have also a great effect upon these citizen jurors. If a crime has been committed on some fête-day, or in the midst of a ministerial crisis, the twelve jurors take into favorable consideration all the extenuating circumstances and render a verdict of acquittal. If, on the contrary, the crime has attracted much popular attention, been exploited in the daily papers, with portraits of the accused, of his victim, etc., then is the condemnation to death inevitable. "The Parisian jury is nothing but a great child whom it is necessary to keep in leading-strings and to watch very closely."

One of the most picturesque and characteristic features in the train of justice, one in which the French themselves have always taken a lively, though a professedly disparaging, interest,--as befits a military nation,--is the black-robed multitude of _avocats_, the attorneys, the lawyers. The nature of their profession, their professional costumes, certain peculiarities of whisker and absence of moustache, all those qualities which, in all countries, offer cheap handles to easy wit at the expense of the members of this judicial order, all these unite to lend them an interest, of various kinds, as a class somewhat apart. Their intelligent, shrewd, generally unimaginative heads, under their cylindrical black caps, offer endless studies to the physiognomists and the caricaturists. Their services are indispensable for all those who seek the aid of the law. At Paris, the avocats alone have the right to plead for litigants, before all the Cours d'Appel and the Tribunaux Civils. They can also plead before the military, commercial, and administrative tribunals and the Conseils de Prud'hommes. The only exceptions are the Conseil d'État and the Cour de Cassation.

The Ordre des Avocats, with its monopoly of this privilege, claims to date back to the year 518 A.D., and to have had for sponsor an uncle of the Emperor Justinian. It was restored by Charlemagne and continued under various names: _Causidici_, _Avantparliers_, _Plaidoux_, and _Chevaliers de la loi_, and was constituted the Ordre des Avocats in the time of Saint-Louis to distinguish it from the various confraternities of artisans which were then being organized. A decree of the Assemblée Constituante dated September 2, 1790, announced that "the men of the law, formerly called _avocats_, shall not form any order or corporation, nor shall they wear any peculiar costume in the exercise of their functions." This eclipse, however, was not of long duration. The former avocats had drawn up a list of the recognized members of their profession in good standing, this list became the official one, and the roll of the Ordre des Avocats was reconstituted by the law of the 22d Ventôse, year XII, reorganizing the law schools, the Écoles de Droit.