man was rewarded for his cleverness by an
acquittal, and, since that time, by an implied convention, a rude sketch
of a pear is understood to allude to the King. The fruit abounds in a
manner altogether unusual for the season, and, at this moment, I make
little doubt, that some thousands of pears are drawn in chalk, coal, or
other substances, on the walls of the capital. During the carnival,
masquers appeared as pears, with pears for caps, and carrying pears, and
all this with a boldness and point that must go far to convince the King
that the extreme license he has affected hitherto to allow, cannot very
well accord with his secret intentions to bring France back to a
government of coercion. The discrepancies that necessarily exist in the
present system will, sooner or later, destroy it.

Little can be said in favour of caricatures. They address themselves to
a faculty of the mind that is the farthest removed from reason, and, by
consequence, from the right; and it is a prostitution of the term to
suppose that they are either cause or effect, as connected with liberty.
Such things may certainly have their effect, as means, but every good
cause is so much the purer for abstaining from the use of questionable
agencies. _Au reste_, there is really a fatality of feature and
expression common to the public men of this country that is a strong
provocative to caricature. The revolution and empire appear to have
given rise to a state of feeling that has broken out with marked
sympathy, in the countenance. The French, as a nation, are far from
handsome, though brilliant exceptions exist; and it strikes me that they
who appear in public life are just among the ugliest of the whole
people.

Not long since I dined at the table of Mr. de ----, in company with Mr.
B. of New York. The company consisted of some twenty men, all of whom
had played conspicuous parts in the course of the last thirty years. I
pointed out the peculiarity just mentioned to my companion, and asked
him if there was a single face at table which had the placid, dignified,
and contented look which denotes the consciousness of right motives, a
frank independence, and a mind at peace with itself. We could not
discover one! I have little doubt that national physiognomy is affected
by national character.

You may form some idea, on the other hand, of the perfect simplicity and
good taste that prevails in French society, by a little occurrence on
the day just ment