The French Government is not in a very stable condition.
'The Chamber of Representatives has twice defeated the Government within a few days of the end of the Session. On Thursday week, the Chamber refused by 286 to 203 votes to postpone a discussion, for the postponement of which the
Foreign Minister, M. Ribot, asked, on the asserted German refusal of passports to French commercial travellers,—M. Lanr, who had raised the question, getting a miscellaneous phalanx of Conservatives, Boulangists, and Radicals to support him. It is true that the vote was reversed on Friday, when, on the demand of M. Ribot, the discussion was adjourned sine die by 319 votes to 103; but even on Saturday, the day on which the Session was closed, a vote of £24,000 to enlarge the Polytechnic School, for which the Government had asked, was refused by the Chamber, and M. de Freycinet is said to have contemplated a resignation even then, though he was overpersuaded by his colleagues not to cheat them of their holidays, just on the very eve of their commencement, for so trivial a matter. ,It is obvious that the Chamber enjoys inflicting small morfifications on the Government, and especially on M. Ribot, the Foreign Minister, who is all the more unpopular just now on account of the hearty good-will between Germany and England which was manifested in the Emperor's recent visit to this country. The political grudge of France against England does not grow less eager or less visible.
