POSTSCRIPT.
SATilltDAY. - The French Funds yesterday recovered in a great degree from the de- pression of Wednesday ; Three per Cents rising to 79f. 95c., and the Four-and-a-half per Cents to 105f. The favourable reception by the Corps Diplomatique of the Imperial marriage is the cause assigned !
The subjoined survey of the whole subject, from the Times of this morning, strengthens our own view upon added evidence and high au- thority.
" The true causes of the depression in the French Funds are, in our opin- ion, the unsound and even dishonest practices which have been resorted to, with the cognizance of many members of the Government, to give an arti- ficial stimulus to credit, and to create a transient and fictitious prosperity, not based on the legitimate production and increase of wealth. For more than six weeks the tendency of the market in France has been to depression, although the Government has notoriously employed all the means at its command to keep up prices. The Caisse des Consignations et Depats, which corresponds in some respects to the funds standing in the name of the Ac- countant-General, (except that this property is, in France, under the control of the Government,) and likewise the new company of Credit Mobilier., have been large and constant buyers, not, as may well be supposed, for then own financial advantage, but for the political purposes of the Government. We must presume from the abrupt fall of Wednesday that they were no longer in a condition to meet the amount of sales. At the same time, the excess of private speculation in various crude schemes has been unexampled, and the avowed object of the increased facilities of credit granted by the Bank of France and the joint-stock banks, under the sanction of the Government, was to encourage a spirit of adventure to the utmost. An immense number of lines of railroad have been conceded and commenced; public works of every kind are begun, with apparent indifference to the means of paying for them, although many of these undertakings had, from their magnitude and magnificence, been postponed by former Governments. "The Napoleon Docks at Paris—Algerian mining companies—a proposal for imitating the commercial grandeur of the East India Company in Northern Africa—a Crystal Palace in the Champs Elysees, and fifty other hasty schemes—have been negotiated on the Bourse in the last two or three months, not for their intrinsic worth, but for the profit or loss which the shares might be made to bear. Many of these jobbing companies have been brought out under the cover of the greatest names in the present official and governing society in France. Thus, the Duke de Bassano, Grand Chamberlain to his Imperial Majesty Napoleon III, figures in that part of the Stock Exchange at Paris which is not the post of honour, as chairman of an insolvent company of mines at Bona, in Algeria and it has been already intimated that by the rules of the Bourse Marshal St. Arnaud has been brought into a similar position. With these egregious examples before our eyes, we may readily imagine what the effeets of a commercial crisis in a general depression of marketable stock must be on that humbler class of persons who do not derive their information from the Cabinet or their re- sources from the State. We fear, too, that it will turn out that some of the mercantile houses in Paris which ought to have known better have been allured beyond the limits of prudence, partly by the hope of gain, but far more by the dread of offending the existing Oovernment. Throughout the political vicissitudes of the last few years we have been forcibly struck by the singular want of independent conduct and of foresight in the commercial classes abroad. They have passed abruptly from exaggerated apprehensions to unwarrantable confidence, and even in presence of innumerable warnings they have scarcely had courage to act upon the distrust they could not but feel. Their operations have been quite as often the result of political fear as of commercial judgment ; and though many of them affected to feel a degree of confidence in the present Government of France to which it has no reek-' claims, they will probably be the first to suffer from the discreditable exft- dients to which it has had recourse.
"It is characteristic of the present financial condition in that country, that although the accounts of the past year have closed, like those of every pre- ceding one, by a large deficit, the estimates of the expenditure for the cur- rent year are augmented by upwards of two millions sterling. There is an increase on almost every branch of expenditure; especially on the salaries and pensions of every class of public officers, including the whole Senate and Legislative Body, which are liberally paid for their functions; while the revenue of the hmperor and his family alone is an additional charge of 1,200,000/. But we have strong reasons for doubting whether this statement of the public expenditure is a faithful one ; and as the Legislative Body has now lost even the power of discussing the articles of the budget, it is impossible to verify the facts. At any rate, the acknowledged deficiency is a constant addition to the unfunded debt; and though we no longer place implicit reliance on the official figures of the French Treasury, it is certain that this amount of floating debt must weigh very heavily on the money- market at a time of general financial embarrassment. "Under these circumstances, and especially with reference to the com- mercial condition of the Continent, we entertain no doubt that the Bank of England has exercised a wise discretion in raising its rate of discount to 3 per cent. The state of credit and of affairs in this country is sound and active, but it is of the utmost importance that we should be protected as far as possible against the possibility of a drain from abroad, especially on securities which may prove imperfect. The rate of exchange on England had remained, both in France and Belgium, as low as 25f. 05c. for the pound sterling; and although the accumulation of cash and bullion in the 'kinks of England and of France has been for several months unusually large, it is certain that in the last two months the diminution of these stocks had become very rapid. As far as we can form an opinion in this country of the future course of affairs in Paris, it is probable that the causes which are already putting to the test the financial pretensions of the Empire will con- tinue to be felt. Their consequences may be aggravated by the efforts of those who are already entangled in the fall of prices; and the facts which it is our duty to record on this subject are precisely identical with the cus- tomary results of fallacious experiments and incorrect principles of public economy." It appears that the Empress-elect of the French is a cousin of the family of M. de Lesseps, a gallant but eccentric man ; known to England for his ultra-Gallican agitations in Spain, and his ultra-Democratic sin- °elides in Rome. The sister of Madame de Montijo married the father of M. de Lesseps. The correspondent of the Morning Chronicle "has learned that the 29th is definitively fixed on for the event" ; the marriage to be solem- nized by the Archbishop of Paris, at Notre Dame.
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