Mr. Burke to the directory, is now, not merely digested into a regular system, but may actually be said to be in a course of execution; and to be proceeding with a steadiness and success, which must strike alarm into the most confident and unthinking. The world, in the opinion of all Frenchmen, is to be again subdued by the discipline and the arts of Rome. Folard's Polybius, Machiavel on Livy, and Montesquieu on the Grandeur et Declination, are more than ever "the manuals" from which they draw their lessons of perseverance and cunning. The reading classes of France have always been fond of historical research. Their republick made them passionate admirers, and enlightened imitators of antiquity; and their government, availing itself of this predilection for the victorious commonwealths of Greece and Rome, soon taught them to overlook altogether individual interests, and tastes, and enjoyments, both in their foreign politicks, and in the details of their internal economy. They admit "no balanced advantages, or diverging claims All the capacities, and energies, and habitudes of private life, are unrelentingly wrested to the production of force, for the subjugation of the globe, or, as coordinate with this object, for the aggrandizement of the reigning family. The changes of form in their government have occasioned no remission in this pursuit. It has always been spoken of among them with confidence and zeal. Events have recently brought it more into notice; and nothing now remains but to achieve the ultimate object, "la grande pensée," as it is emphatically styled in the cotéries of Paris.

وو

That our readers may the better understand our abstract of the laws on the conscription, it is proper to premise, that France is divided into about 30 military governments, subject to a general of division and his staff, to which commissaries are attached as executive officers. The civil division consists of 122 departments; 24 of which have been acquired since the overthrow of the monarchy, exclusive of Tuscany, not included in any part of this statement. The departments are divided into districts or arrondissements, from 3 to 5 in number; the arrondissements into cantons, and the cantons into municipalities, amounting to about 55,000. Each department is governed by a prefect and his council, composed of a commissary of police, a mayor, and certain inspectors, denominated counsellors of prefecture. The district or arrondissement, by a subprefect and his council, of a similar formation. The cantons and municipalities are under the supervision of an administration, composed of the civil authorities, with a president at their head. A mayor, a commissary of police, and two officers of the government, styled adjuncts, are allotted to every division having a population above 5000 souls. These several authorities are in strict subordination to each other, and at the control of the prefects and subprefects; who, themselves, are charged with a weighty and inflexible responsibility as to the military levies.

The conscription was first published in the form of a general law by the council of ancients in the year 1798, and has since undergone some slight modifications. The directorial plan is attributed to Carnot, who, in the revolutionary language, is said "to have organized victory in the French armies." Its author, who was enthusiastically devoted to the forms of antiquity and still preserves, within the rays of the imperial purple, all the simplicity of ancient manners, found his model in the constitution of the Roman republick, which made every citizen a soldier before the age of forty-six, in their annual levies, which admitted of no exception-and in the peremptory orders issued by their consuls to the magistrates of Italy, specifying the number of troops required, and the place of assemblage.

By the law of the directory, all Frenchmen are pronounced soldiers; and when the country is declared in danger, are liable to be summoned to its defence. In any other conjuncture, "the wants of the army are relieved by the conscription ;" and the requisite number of conscripts is determined by the senate or legislative body, at the suggestion of the executive government. The law which limits the whole number, regulates, at the same time, the contingent of each department, proportionally to its population. Within eight days after publication, the prefect distributes this contingent among the districts, by the same rule; and the subprefect among the cantons and municipalities. All Frenchmen between the full age of twenty and twentyfive complete, are liable to the conscription. They are each year thrown into five classes; the first of which, consists of those who have completed their twentieth year on the 1st Vendemaire, or 16th September preceding; the second of those who, at the same period, have terminated their twenty. first year, and so on, in the order of seniority. Thus, the conscript, who has attained the full age of twenty-five, remains liable, until the month and day just mentioned. The municipal administrations are bound to prepare lists framed from the registers of births, and from common notoriety, which particularize the name, domicile, stature, &c. of all the individuals subject to the conscription, within their jurisdiction. The same individuals are also bound to enrol themselves, with a similar specification, at the office of the municipality, as soon as the law is published. Both lists are then trans mitted to the prefects, who are responsible for their accuracy, and who immediately consign them over to the minister of war.

Eight days are allotted to the preparation of the lists. The conscripts* are then assembled in each canton, and examined by the administration, or by a special commission, created ad hoc by the prefect. The merits of all pleas of exemption are scrutinized at these meetings. Such as plead infirmities, if able to attend, are examined on the spot; and if not, are visited at their dwellings by "the inspectors" and health officers. The latter, gene. rally physicians in the army, are not selected until the moment of examina tion; and, to obviate collusion, must belong to a district different from that of the conscript. The final decision of all cases of exemption is referred to a commission of higher resort, composed of the prefect, the general offi cers and commissaries of the department. When these claims are disposed of, lists are formed of those who are adjudged competent to serve, whether present or absent; and the subprefect then proceeds to the "drawing," or designation by lot, of such as are to constitute the quota of the district. Tickets regularly numbered, to the amount of the names on the list, are publickly deposited in an urn, and indiscriminately drawn out by the conscripts or their friends. The lot falls upon those who draw the numbers below the amount of the quota. The higher numbers drawn by the rest are annexed to their names, in order that they may be forthcoming in their or der, should any casualty disable their predecessors. Absentees not presenting themselves within a month after the drawing, are declared refractory, proclaimed throughout the empire, and pursued as deserters.

These are the conscripts of "the active service." But besides these, the law requires an equal number, to form what is termed, in contradistinction, the conscription "of the reserve." The members of the reserve are nominated, with the same formalities, to march only in cases of emergency; are regularly organized, and carefully disciplined, within their own department,

* Two brigades of Gendarmerie usually attend. This is a body of military, having the same functions as our constables, and about 16,000 in number.-Peuchet.

from which they are not suffered to absent themselves. A third body is then created, of supplemental conscripts, equal in number to one fourth of the whole contingent, and destined to fill up the vacancies which may be occasioned before junction at head quarters, by death, desertion, or other causes. If the supplement should not be adequate to this purpose, the reserve supplies its place; and at all events no deficiency is permitted, as each canton is accountable for its full assessment. No Frenchman under the age of thirty can travel through the empire, or hold any situation under government, or serve in any publick office, unless he can produce a certificate, duly authenticated, attesting that he has discharged his liability to the conscription.

All the authorities are bound in solidum, and under the severest sanctions, to observe that the conscripts are assembled, reviewed and dismissed to their destination without delay. They are marched under an escort of gendarmérie, and in bodies strictly limited to the number of one hundred, to various quarters or depôts throughout the empire, and there first supplied with arms and clothing. They are never permitted to exist in separate battalions, but are individually (nominativement) draughted into, or scattered through, distinct corps of the preexisting army, to which they are marched in exceedingly small detachments, and sometimes from an astonishing distance. Dispensations are given by the higher military tribunal of the prefect; and are provisional or definitive, according to the nature of the disability pleaded. For all diseases pronounced curable, the discharge is but temporary. The infirmities which tend to disqualify, are discriminated with the nicest care, and accompanied by copious scientifick explanations. The minister of war reviews the decisions of this tribunal; and if a suspicion of partiality arise, orders the medical inquiry to be renewed. The party released pays an indemnity to the government, the amount of which is proportioned, by the prefect, to his taxes, or those of his parents. No exceptions were originally allowed to the law "of active service;" but at this moment, the eldest brother of an orphan family, the only son of a widow, or of a labourer above the age of seventy, or one who has a brother in the active service, may, on soliciting the indulgence, be transferred to the reserve. The same privilege is accorded to those who have taken the order of subdeacon in the ecclesiastical seminaries. Parents continue responsible for their absent children, until they can produce an official attestation of their death.*

The directory admitted of no substitution; but the severity of this principle is now relaxed in favour of such as are adjudged "incapable of sustaining the fatigues of war," or, "whose labours and studies are deemed more useful to the state than their military services." Proxies are there

* We find, on the subject of dispensation, two decrees which should be noted. One, p. 100, of the year ninety-nine, by which all workmen engaged in the manufac ture of arms and gunpowder, or employed in the national magazines of saltpetre, &c. are exempted; and another, p. 104, of the year 1802, enacting, that congés equal in number to the one fourth of the whole body of soldiers and subalterns in the army, should be given to such as had served irreproachably during the whole war, or du ring five campaigns, as soon as they could be replaced by new recruits. The inspector charged with the distribution of these congés, is enjoined, however, to remind the soldiers how much they are in the wrong to abandon the first of professions (le premier des etats). In the year ninety-eight, the law was repealed which exempted married persons from the conscription. Depere, and with him Malthus, attributes the increased proportion of births in the country, anteriour to that period, to premature marriages, to avoid the military levies. (Malthus, b. 2. c. 6.) "Les mariages prematurés et multipliés par la crainte des loix militaires," are particularly noticed in the statistical reports of the prefects for the year eight.

fore received only ad libitum; not as a matter of right; and never without a special mandate from the minister of war. The conscript furnishes a sum of about 5. (100 francs) for the equipment of his substitute, who must be between the age of twenty-five and forty, of the middle size at least, of a robust constitution, of a good character certified by his municipality, and himself beyond the reach of the conscription laws. He bears the surname of his principal, in order that the latter may be known and compelled to march, should his proxy desert, or be lost from any other cause than death, or wounds received in battle within the term of two years.

All the enacting clauses of this system are fortified by heavy denuncia tions against publick functionaries, parents, or others who contribute to defeat or retard its operation. Any health officer or other functionary convicted of furnishing a false certificate of infirmity, &c. is subjected to five years imprisonment in irons. All civil and military officers, even of the highest rank, convicted of favouring the escape. or concealing the retreat of a fugitive, are exposed to excessive fines. Conscripts detected in counterfeiting infirmities, or mutilating themselves, are placed "at the disposition of the government" for five years, to be employed in such publick labours as may be judged most useful to the state. The absentees or refractory conscripts, whose apprehension is secured by the most minute and efficient precautions, besides undergoing the corporal punishment entailed on their offence, are amerced in a sum of fifteen hundred francs, equivalent, from the comparative value of money in the two countries, to about one hundred and twenty pounds sterling. This sum, together with the expenses incurred in the pursuit, is levied inexorably on the real property of the father or mother, should the fugitive possess none in his own right.*

2d and 7th.

* It will not be impertinent to exemplify, here, the immoderate rigour exercised on the points now before us, by a few paragraphs taken at random from the journals of the country. The following is from the Mercure de France of August 1807. "Jean Vidal senior, of the commune of Orbon, in order to enfranchise his son from the conscription, had employed a false document, knowing it to be false. This document was the record of his birth, in which it was stated that he was born in 1734, although the real period of his birth was 1744. His object was to be considered as having attained the age of 71, and therefore entitied to claim for his son the indulgence of the law. The special court of criminal justice has, by a decree of the 21st July, condemned this person to eight years labour in irons, to be branded with a hot iron on the left shoulder, to an exposition of six hours, and to the expenses of the prosecution, and of 400 copies of the decree." The two following are from the Journal de L'Empire of August "The tribunal of corrective police (police correctionelle) of Paris, finished yesterday the trial of seven persons charged with extortion from conscripts,Escroquerie en matiere de conscription." Tessiaire, a surgeon's apprentice, was accused of having blown into the eyes of a multitude of conscripts, a powder calculated to excite inflammation, and of having received from their friends, for this service, various sums between two and three thousand livres, somewhat more than 2001. from each. Six other persons were accused of making him known to different conscripts, and of sharing in his profits. While one of these, a goldsmith, called Lugot, the father of three children, took his place at the bar, his wife was carried to the grave, having died of fright, when she was told that her husband had been summoned to appear before the tribunal to answer to a charge connected with the conscription. This melancholy catastrophe induced the tribunal to mitigate his punishment. The rest, and among them a woman of some respectability, suffered the utmost rigours of the law." The second case is not a little singular. "The military commission of Turin (department of the Po) decided, in the course of last July, a new case of delinquency with regard to the conscription. Two inhabitants of Turin were convicted, by this commission, of having forestalled (accaparé) a great number of substitutes for the department, by maintaining them at their own expense in houses appropriated to this object, and then selling them out at an advanced price to the conscripts who wished to

Nine garrison towns are designated, throughout the empire, as dépôts for the refractory conscripts. They are lodged in the citadels, subjected to a most rigid discipline, and made to work in the arsenals, or on the roads, clad in a particular uniform, with their heads closely shaved. Five years constitute the term allotted to this confinement; but it is added, "that they are to be gradually drafted into the army, as they give tokens of docility and reformation!" Every conscript absenting himself for twenty-four hours from his dépôt, is punished as a deserter. A special council of war is assembled to decide upon cases of desertion. The penal sanctions are, 1st, death; 2d, the punishment of the ball (la peine du boulet) and, 3d, publick, or hard labour.

The nature of the 2d, the punishment of the ball, merits notice An iron ball of 8lb. weight, and fastened to an iron chain of seven feet in length, is attached to the leg of the deserter. He, in the first instance, hears his sentence read, on his knees, and is condemned to hard labour during ten hours daily, and, in the interval of rest, to be chained in solitary confinement. This sentence is rigorously executed, and embittered by all the external marks of ignominy in dress and appearance. The duration of this punishment, which is ten years, is prolonged, and an additional ball fettered to the leg, in cases of contumacy or serious disobedience. We have remarked a curious provision connected with this double delinquency. The party is solemnly interdicted, under pain of two years imprisonment in irons, from fixing himself, after he is set at liberty, within twenty leagues of the seat of government! The third class of punishment (les travaux publics) is exempt from the iron ball; and, in other respects, only differs from the preceding in the length of the term, which is but three years. A fine of 1500 francs is inseparable from all cases of desertion. Death is inflicted on the deserter to the enemy, and on him who, in deserting from the punishment of the ball, carries off his own arms or those of his comrades. The punishment of the ball is adjudged to such as escape into the interiour of the empire with their uniform, or with the effects of another; or from the publick labours which are inflicted upon those who are guilty of simple desertion into the interiour. In time of war, every officer or soldier, absenting himself for forty-eight hours from his corps, without permission, is reputed a deserter. The laws on the subject of desertion are read to the whole French army on the first Sunday of every month.

We have thus given a brief abstract of the law of the conscription, collected from the code itself. We shall now proceed to state the nature and effects of its execution, as represented to us by an observer, who, with the best opportunities, has witnessed them, in almost every part of France, during the progress of three levies.

The grand characteristick of the present administration of France, is relentless inflexibility. A host of informers secures the fidelity of the executive officers. Cases of the most signal and barbarous rigour, of which we have already given a few examples, crowd all the daily gazettes of the empire, and even the journals of Paris, into which they are compulsively and awkwardly thrust, in order that the quickening impulse of fear may be propagated through the entire mass of servitude. The columns now before us might nearly warrant the inference, that those tribunals which the weakness and depravity of our nature have rendered indispensable to all civilized

have proxies. This traffick," says the Moniteur, "by which the substitute receives but a small sum, while the broker receives a very large one, must always prove injurious to the lower classes."