separate company. On both sides was an office or "bureau" for enregistering goods of arrival or for departure. Lastly, beyond these sheds were three temporary "corps de garde, for the company's servants to take shelter in and rest when off duty. The above establishment for the reception and despatch of merchandise, works from six in the morning till eight at night. Whole waggon-loads of goods, each packed and covered with its cloth, leaving their wheels behind them, are despatched on trucks by rail to the nearest point of their destination, where, lifted and deposited upon other wheels, they proceed into the interior. In cases where the communication is partly by rail, partly by road, and then again by rail, spare wheels are carried. The height of these loaded waggons is, if necessary, tested by running them under an iron arch, of the exact height of the lowest bridge on the line. The merchandise arrival warehouse has been purposely placed on a spot which, happening exactly to be beyond the limits of Paris, relieves the government (the directors of the railway) of the botheration of the octroi, which must accordingly be paid by the owners of the goods on their arrival at the Barrières de Bercy or de Charenton, almost immediately adjoining. Outside the walls of the railway establishment there lay beneath us at a short distance the "Camionage," or establishment for transporting merchandise to and from their three platforms, and I was much interested in observing the ease with which loaded "camions," or vans, each drawn by three horses abreast, were to be seen trotting away in various directions. I happened at the moment to be surrounded by several of the company's servants, and as I was expressing to one of them how much obliged I felt to the "Ingénieur en chef" for the gratification he had afforded me, his comrade, standing beside me, exclaimed, evidently from his heart, “Ah, c'est la crême des hommes !"* From the very slight survey, which I had now concluded, of the metropolitan terminus of the Paris and Lyons railway, I am of opinion that, although the buildings, viewed separately, have been admirably planned, and in most cases very scientifically devised for their respective purposes, they just at * Ah, he is the cream of men! present straddle over too much ground, and, with reference to their existing traffic, would therefore be more valuable, if, like those at Euston and Camden stations, in London, they had been more compact. It must be remembered, however, that even in England the railway is but an infant of scarcely eighteen years' growth; that during that time its passenger and goods traffic have increased in a ratio infinitely greater than was expected; and that it is beyond the power of the human mind to foresee to what in future ages they will amount. In the meanwhile, the London and North-Western Railway Company, notwithstanding the foresight and admirable arrangements of its chairman, is beginning to feel that its termini in and near London are not big enough for its traffic; and as, in proportion to its success, buildings crowding around in all directions have increased the value of land which was before, from its price, almost unpurchasable, the time may arrive when the Paris and Lyons railway will derive inestimable advantages from the grand scale on which their metropolitan terminus has been purchased, constructed, and arranged. In the mean while, as compared with its trade, it resembles a fine healthy boy strutting about in "papa's boots." But among the facts and arrangements I had witnessed, there were others which I consider offered to those interested in the success of railways--and who among us is not?—a very important moral. Although in the establishment belonging to the terminus of the Chemin de Fer du Nord at "La Chapelle" were lately employed upwards of 2000 workmen, in all the ateliers (workshops) of the Paris and Lyons terminus there were working when I visited it only 120 men ! Now the reason of this appears to be as follows. With the purest desire to work the line in the most scientific and best manner possible, the French Government, like the English or any other government, are no sooner observed to possess the power of enriching any one than, at all points, they are assailed by the most ungenerous applications, so intricately connected with parliamentary interest, that it is really out of human power to unravel them. The only way of not offending all, or rather of giving to each the minimum of offence, is to divide as fairly as possible among all, that which each in dividually would wholly engross, either for himself or for his locality. Accordingly, instead of constructing the undermentioned articles by wholesale, on a space of ground a mile long, walled in and enriched with every description of workshop for the purpose, the French Government-I repeat, as the English or any other Government would, I believe, have done, had it undertaken the management of a great railway-has obtained what is necessary for the working of the line as follows:'The locomotives are made at Paris and Rouen: The tenders at St. Etienne and Le Creusôt: The first-class carriages at the Messageries Nationales de Paris: The second and third class carriages at Arras, Lille, Alsace, and Munich: Coke from Valenciennes, Alsace, D'Anzin, &c. &c. &c. Again, from narrowminded but irresistible political pressure from without, the government railway has been forced, by lining, padding, and stuffing second-class carriages (a luxury which no railway company in France has allowed), to make them and the third-class carriages so comfortable, that, by attractions of their own creation, they have actually desolated the first-class carriages. The comparative receipts, in English money, of all the principal French railways (namely, the Northern, Rouen, Havre. Orleans, Bordeaux, Vierzon, Boulogne, Nantes, Strasburg, Bâle, Montreau, Marseilles, Lyons, Chartres), and the receipts, for the same periods, of the single British London and North-Western Railway, have been as follows:: For the middle week of May, 1851:— Per Week. Per Day. £66,130 £9,447 6,863 Receipts of the French Railways above enumerated, For the week ending 10th of August, 1851:— Just beyond the barrière of Charenton, the limits of Paris, I observed, outside a butcher's shop tied to an iron ring in the wall, a fat ox, over whose ruminating head was inscribed "Durham." Why," said I to his lord and master, who was standing at the door," have you decked his horns with laurel leaves, coloured ribands, and with those two tricoloured flags ?" "Monsieur," he replied with great gravity and pride, "c'est pour lui faire honneur." Which, I suppose, said I to myself, in plain English means to turn him into beef. REVIEW. UNDER the old-fashioned monarchical institutions of Europe there has long existed, and there still exists, a time-honoured series of forms of invitation, gradually descending by a flight of steps, each very accurately measured, from "I am commanded to invite you," down to "Come along and dine with us!" In the Republic of France a penultimate step has been adopted, and, accordingly, the printed form of invitation to dine at the palace of the Elysée runs as follows: Présidence de la République. Le Président de la République prie M de venir dîner chez lui Le à 7 heures.* N. LEPIC. Having had the honour to receive a card of this description, on the day and at the hour appointed I drove to the Elysée, where, after having been received in the entrance-hall by the well-appointed arrangements I have previously describ * Presidency of the Republic. The President of the Republic requests come and dine with him on at 7 o'clock. N. LEPIC. to ed. I slowly walked through two or three handsome rooms en suite, full of interesting pictures, into a drawing-room, in which I found assembled, in about equal proportions, about fifty well-dressed ladies and gentlemen, the latter being principally officers, whose countenances, not less clearly than the decorations on their breasts, announced them to be persons of distinction. The long sofas and chairs, as if they had only just come out—or rather, as if they had just come up from the country to come out had arranged themselves so very formally, and altogether behaved so very awkwardly, that it was almost impossible for the company assembled to appear as much at their ease as, from their position, education, and manners, they really were ; and accordingly, biassed by the furniture, they kept moving, and bowing, and curtsying, and "sotto-voce " talking, until they got into a parallelogram, in the centre of which stood, distinguished by a broad riband and by a mild, thoughtful, benevolent countenance, Prince Louis Napoleon, whose gentle and gentleman-like bearing to every person who approached him entitled him to that monarchical homage in which the majority evidently delighted, but which it was alike his policy as well as his inclination at all events to appear—to suppress; and accordingly the parallelogram, which, generally speaking, was at the point of congelation, sometimes and of its own accord froze into the formality of a court, and then all of a sudden appeared to recollect that the "Prince was the President," and that the whole party had assembled to enjoy liberté, fraternité, and égalité. As I was observing the various phases that one after another presented themselves to view, the principal officer of the household came up to me, and, in a quiet and appropriate tone of voice, requested me to do two things, one of which appeared to me to be rather easy, and the other-or rather to do both-extremely difficult. By an inclination of his forehead he pointed to two ladies of rank, whose names he mentioned to me, but with whom I was perfectly unacquainted, seated on the sofas at different points of the parallelogram. "When dinner is announced, you will be so good," he said, "as to offer your arm (the one)," and to seat yourself next to other). Of course, I silently bowed assent; but while the officer who had spoken to me was giving similar instructions to other gentlemen, I own I felt a little nervous lest, during the polite to (the |