A vast amount of money has been laid out in equipping the National Guard.
Their pay alone amounts to above 20,000fr.

per diem, and, as far as the defence of Paris is concerned, they might as well have remained quietly by their own firesides.

There are, no doubt, brave men among them, but as their battalions insist upon being regarded as citizens even when under arms, they have no discipline, and are little better than an armed mob.

The following extract from an article in the last number of the _Revue des Deux Mondes_ gives some interesting details respecting their habits when on duty behind that most useless of all works of defence, the line of the Paris fortifications:--"On the arrival of a battalion, the chief of the post arranges the hours during which each man is to be on active duty.

After this, the men occupy themselves as they please.
Some play at interminable games of _bouchon_; others, notwithstanding orders to the contrary, turn their attention to ecarte and piquet; others gossip over the news of the day with the artillerymen, who are keeping guard by the side of their cannon.