After an interregnum lasting for nearly a week, M. Goblet,
the anti-clerical Minister of Instruction, has agreed to form a Ministry. He is a second-rate advocate, a good administrator, and tolerably conservative on every point except the Church, upon which he is in theory an Extremist. He has induced M. Dauphin, a good financier, to accept the Financial Ministry, and will, it is reported, place the Baron de Conrcel, formerly Ambassador to Berlin, in the Foreign Office. The Interior will be directed as before, by M. Sarrien, and General Boulanger and Admiral Aube have agreed to accept the Departments of War and Marine, though upon ominous conditions. Three separate correspondents report that they insist on their large budgets, and that General Boulanger, in addition, has demanded a credit for an extra twelve millions sterling, to be expended in perfecting the war materiel. M. Goblet has conceded this, as well as Admiral Aribe's five millions for swift steel cruisers. These demands, made at a time when economy is nominally in the ascendant, indicate that the Government expects war ; but, of course, they have still to be accepted by the Chamber. M. Goblet, however, would not have agreed to endorse them unless he had hoped for a majority.
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