FRENCH FEUILLETONISTES UPON LONDON.

The leading Parisian journals have correspondents in London during the Great Exhibition, and as the corps of Parisian feuilletonistes comprises much of the richest and rarest talent of the great French metropolis, there is a piquancy and brilliance in these daguerreotypes of London life and the impressions of English character, which is very entertaining. No traveller who remembers dining at any of the recherché cafés upon the Boulevards with a Frenchman, and chatting with him of England and London, can forget the cold chill that curled through the Parisian's conversation, as if he were a Pole, gossipping of Siberia, or the glances of intense satisfaction and pride which he cast upon the lively and lovely groups in the street, inly thanking God that he was not born a child of perfide Albion.

But these gentlemen talk not alone of the Exhibition, but of the "town" in general. Their articles wear the air of the journals of heroic adventurers who have penetrated into barbarous lands. They are clearly home-sick, these sybarites. We extract the following from a translation in the London Literary Gazette, prefaced with a few editorial remarks. Speaking of the variety of their topics the reviewer says: "Thus the great Jules Janin, in the Journal des Débats, notwithstanding the interest of portions of his article, some of which have been translated into our journals, makes the infamy of French republicans, and his own fervent love and devotedness to the royal family of Orleans, the burden of his lucubrations. M. Blanqui, the historian of political economy, and translator of Adam Smith, faithful as becomes an economist to his idée fixe, bewails in the Presse the folly of France in rejecting the doctrines of free trade, and clamors loudly for an immediate reform of French tariffs. M. Jules de Prémary fills column after column in the Patrie with descriptions of English manners, customs, and peculiarities; and yet he admits that he knows nothing of our language, and has only resided amongst us for a few days. Parisian littérateurs pride themselves on being men of imagination, poets, penseurs fantasistes; and it is clear that it would be as reasonable to chain an eagle to a dog-cart, as to expect them to deal with a plain, practical, matter-of-fact thing in the methodical business-like way of the English journalist. Of these, the lines of Miss Fanny Fudge are strikingly true:

But though our worthy confrères of the Parisian press have thus let their wits go a wool-gathering, and left the poor Exhibition in the lurch, it is but just to state that one and all display on the whole a most friendly feeling towards the English; and even in quizzing us, as most of them do, display great good nature. They feel, perhaps, a little sore at having been outstripped by us in the establishment of the first great Universal Exhibition; but this was only natural, and they console themselves by stating that it was in France that the idea was first conceived, and by solemnly promising that France will some day prendre sa revanche. The most amusing of the feuilletonistes is unquestionably M. Jules de Prémary, of the Patrie; and we have thought it worth while to translate a portion of his last letter, as a specimen of what an intelligent man of letters feels on visiting us for the first time, and before he becomes well acquainted with us:

"One of the principal causes of surprise to me in walking along the streets of London, has been to see myself all at once become a curious animal. I did not think that I had any of the qualities necessary for such a thing, being neither humpbacked nor club-footed, neither a giant nor a dwarf. Thus, then, on the day of my arrival I went along Regent Street, and heard the exclamations and laughter of the crowd on seeing me, I examined myself from head to foot, to ascertain the cause of the unhoped-for success which I obtained in England. I even felt all up my back, thinking that perhaps some facetious boy might have transformed me into a walking placard. There was nothing, however; but I had moustachios and a foreign air! A foreign air! That is one of the little miseries on which you do not count, O simple and inexperienced travellers!

"At home you may have the dignity and nobleness of the Cid—you may be another Talma: but pass the Channel—show yourself to the English, and in spite of yourself you will become as comic as Arnal. Arnal! do I say? why, he would not make them laugh so much as you do; and they would consider our inimitable comedians Levassor and Hoffmann as serious personages. Do not be angry, then, or cry with Alceste,—

They would only laugh the more. In this respect the English are wanting in good taste and indulgence. Their astonishment is silly and their mockery puerile. The sight of a pair of moustachios makes them roar with laughter, and they are in an ecstasy of fun at the sight of a rather broad-brimmed hat. A people must be very much bored to seize such occasions for amusing themselves. However, all the travers, like all the qualities of the English, arise from the national spirit carried to exaggeration. They consider themselves the beau ideal of human kind. Their stiffness of bearing, their pale faces, their hair, their whiskers cut into the shape of mutton chops, the excessive height of their shirt collars, and the inelegant cut of their coats—all that makes them as proud as Trafalgar and Waterloo.

"In our theatres we laugh at them as they laugh at us, and on that score we are quits. But in our great towns they are much better and more seriously received than we Frenchmen are in England.

"At Paris now-a-days nobody laughs at an Englishman; but at London every body laughs at a Frenchman. We do not make this remark from any feeling of ill-will; in fact, we think that to cause a smile on the thin and pinched-up lips of old England is not a small triumph for our beards and moustachios. After all, too, the astonishment which the Englishman manifests at the sight of a newly disembarked Frenchman (an astonishment which appears singular when we call to mind the frequent communications between the two nations), is less inexplicable than may be thought. Geographically speaking, France and England touch each other—morally, they are at an immeasurable distance. Nothing is done at Calais as at Dover, nothing at London as at Paris. There is as much difference between the two races as between white and black. In France, the Englishman conforms willingly to our customs, and quickly adopts our manner of acting; but in England we are like a stain on a harmonious picture.

"Our fashion of sauntering along the streets, smiling at the pretty girls we meet, looking at the shops, or stopping to chat with a friend, fills the English with stupefaction. They always walk straight before them like mad dogs. In conversation there is the same difference. In England it is always solemn. Left alone after dinner, the men adopt a subject of conversation, which never varies during all the rest of the evening. Each one is allowed to develop his argument without interruption. Perhaps he is not understood, but he is listened to. When he has ended, it becomes the turn of another, who is heard with the same respect. The thing resembles a quiet sitting of the Parliament. But in France, conversation is a veritable mélée—it is the contrary excess. A subject is left and taken up twenty times, amidst joyous and unforeseen interruptions. We throw words at each other's heads without doing ourselves any harm; smart sallies break forth, and bon mots roll under the table. In short, the Englishman reflects before speaking; the Frenchman speaks first and reflects afterwards—if he has time. The Frenchman converses, the Englishman talks: and it is the same with respect to pleasure. Place a Frenchman, who feels ennui, by the side of an Englishman who amuses himself, and it will be the former who will have the gayest air. From love, the Englishman only demands its brutal joys; whereas the Frenchman pays court to a woman. The Englishman, at table, drinks to repletion; the Frenchman never exceeds intoxication.

"A difference equally striking exists between the females of the two countries. I do not now speak of the beauty of the type of the one, or the elegance and good taste of the others; but I will notice one or two great contrasts. In France, a young girl is reserved, is timid, and as it were hidden under the shade of the family: but the married woman has every liberty, and many husbands can tell you that she does not always use it with extreme moderation! In England, you are surprised at the confident bearing of young girls, and the chaste reserve of married women. The former not only willingly listen to gallant compliments, but even excite them; whilst the latter, by the simple propriety of their bearing, impose on the boldest.

"The boldness of young girls in England was explained to me by the great emigration of young men—in other words, by the scarcity of husbands. The French girl who wants a husband is ordinarily rather disdainful; the English girl is by no means difficult.

"A Frenchwoman walks negligently leaning on our arm, and we regulate our steps by the timidity and uncertainty of hers: the Englishwoman walks with the head erect, and takes large strides like a soldier charging. An accident made me acquainted with the secret of the strange way of walking which Englishwomen have. I was lately on a visit to the family of a merchant, whose three daughters are receiving a costly education. The French master, the drawing master, and the music master had each given his lesson, when I saw a sergeant of the grenadiers of the guard arrive. He went into the garden, and was followed by the young ladies.

"'Ah! mon Dieu!" I cried to the father, 'these young ladies are surely not going to learn the military exercise!'

"'No,' said he, with a smile.

"'What, then, has this professor in a red coat come for?'

"'He is the master of grace."

"'What! that grenadier, who is as long as the column in Trafalgar-square?'

"'Yes, or rather he is the walking master.'

"I looked out of the window, and saw the three young ladies drawn up and immovable as soldiers, and presently they began to march to the step of the grenadier. They formed a charming platoon, and trod the military step with a precision worthy of admiration. I asked for an explanation of such a strange thing.

"'We in England,' said my host, 'understand better the duty of women than you Frenchmen do. We cannot regulate our manner of walking on that of a being subjected to us. Our dignity forbids it. It is the woman's duty to follow us. Consequently she must walk as we do,—we can't walk as she does.'

"'Ma foi!' said I, 'I must admit that in progress you are decidedly our masters. In France the law, it is true, commands the wife to follow her husband; but it does not, I confess, say that she must do so at the rate of a quick march!'

"The contrasts between the two countries are in truth inexhaustible. Indeed I defy the most patient observer, to find any point of resemblance between them. In France, houses are gay in appearance; in London, with the exception of some streets in the centre, such as Regent-street or Oxford-street, they are as dark and dismal as prisons. Our windows open from the left to the right; windows in England open from top to bottom. At Paris, to ring or knock too loud is vulgar and ill-bred; at London, if you don't execute a tattoo with the knocker or a symphony with the bell, you are considered a poor wretch, and are left an hour at the door. Our hack cabs take their stand on one side of the street; in England they occupy the middle. Our coachmen get up in front of their vehicles; in England they go behind. In Paris, Englishmen are charming; at home they are—Englishmen. One thing astonishes me greatly—that the English don't walk on their hands, since we walk on our feet."

But the French gentlemen do not have it all their own way. The London Leader attacks them pleasantly in a similar spirit, yet it is always tinged, upon both sides, with a shade of caustic feeling: "Jules Janin, who has fallen in love with our fog and kindliness, announces to all France the joyful news that there will be no Waterloo banquet this June: the flag of France floating over the Crystal Palace suggests to the Duke that the banquet would be a breach of hospitality, because it would recall such "cruel souvenirs!" Janin believes that report; or at least prints it, which is to give journalistic credence to it. We are sorry to think how "cruelly" France will be disappointed; and we are amused at the excessive pre-occupation of Frenchmen with this said battle of Waterloo. It is the ineradicable belief of every Frenchman that we in England are in a perpetual self-swagger about Waterloo. We are prodigal of the word upon omnibus, shop, street, and road, because we wish to humble France at every corner. Waterloo-house is an insult! Waterloo-bridge a defiance! Wellington boots an outrage! Every step you take you trample on the national pride of France, for with "insular arrogance" you walk in boots named of Wellington or of Blucher! We are intoxicated with our success at having beaten the French—never having drubbed them before, from the times of Cressy, Poictiers, and Agincourt, down to the Peninsular Campaign! This one success of Waterloo—(which, after all, was not a success, as France clearly gained the battle, only she quitted the field in disgust!)—we cannot forget; we cherish it, we riot in it; we blazon the name everywhere to flatter our national pride and humiliate the foreigner. And, curious enough, the foreigner is humiliated! He turns his head away as he passes Waterloo-house; he declines crossing Waterloo-bridge, or crosses it in a passion; and even his national dread of rain cannot induce him to ride in a Waterloo omnibus. Of all the many profound misconceptions of English society current in France, none, we venture to say, is more completely baseless than the belief in the English feeling about Waterloo. Though it would be impossible to persuade a Frenchman that omnibus proprietors, hotel keepers, and builders were guilty of no national swagger in using the offending word "Waterloo.""