The plan of the Ultras is to save Paris by Paris; to make continual sorties, and, every now and then, one in such force that it will be a battle.

I am inclined to think that theoretically the Government plan is the best, but it ignores the material it has to do with, and it will find itself obliged either to adopt the policy of the Ultras, or to allow them to elect a "Commune," which would soon absorb all power.

The position appears to me to be a false one, owing to the attempt to rule France from Paris through an occasional despatch by balloon.

What ought to have been done was to remove the seat of Government to another town before the siege commenced, and to have left either Trochu or some other military man here to defend Paris, as Uhrich defended Strasburg.

But the Government consisted of the deputies of Paris; and had they moved the seat of Government, they would have lost their _locus standi_.