These receptions, however, have strengthened M. Thiess' deter- mination to
support the Republic. His private secretary, M. Barthelemy St. Hilaire, an intimate personal friend, has addressed a letter to the President of the Council-General of the Meurthe and Moselle, in which be repeats M. Thiess' determination to support the Republic as a form of government which secures all that France desires, and more especially order. This letter has exasperated the Monarchists, who consider it a breach of the compact of Bordeaux, but has delighted the Left, who eagerly support M. Lefranc's Bill, a proposal enabling the Govern- ment to suppress any journal it pleases. The Monarchists say they will resist this Bill, but it is understood that it will pass, and that the Republic will, for the time at least, be discussed only in the Assembly. The rumours of a Bonapartist coup de'tat are as fre- quent as ever, bat so are the statements that Marshal MacMahon intends for his part to obey the majority of the Assembly.
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