_Friday, October 28th._--In the afternoon Moltke sent the Chief a telegram which reported that the capitulation of Metz was signed to-day at 12.45 P.M. The French army thus made prisoners number in all 173,000 men, including 16,000 sick and wounded. Bennigsen, Friedenthal, and Von Blankenburg, a friend of the Chancellor’s in his youth, joined us at dinner. From the French officers captured at Metz and their approaching transportation to Germany, the conversation turned upon General Ducrot and his disgraceful escape from Pont à Mousson. The Minister said: “He has written me a long letter explaining that there is no foundation for the charge of breach of faith we have brought against him, but he has not materially modified my view of the case.” The Chief then related that recently an “intermediary of Gambetta’s” had called upon him, and that towards the close of the conversation he asked whether we would recognise the Republic. “I replied,” continued the Chief, “certainly, without any doubt or hesitation. Not only the Republic, but, if you like, a Gambetta dynasty; only it must secure us the advantages of a safe peace.” “Or for the matter of that any dynasty, whether it be a Bleichröder or a Rothschild one.” The _Nouvelliste_ is to be stopped, and to be replaced by a journal of larger size bearing the title, _Moniteur Officiel de Seine et Oise_, which will be published at the expense of the Government. _Saturday, October 29th._--At dinner our great success at Metz was discussed. “That exactly doubles the number of our prisoners,” said the Minister--“no, it does more. We now have in Germany the army which Napoleon had in the field at the time of the battles of Weissenburg, Wörth, and Saarbrücken, with the exception of those whom we killed. The troops which the French now have were afterwards brought from Algiers and Rome, and newly recruited, together with a few thousand men under Vinoy who made off before Sedan. We have also nearly all their generals.” The Chief then said Napoleon had requested that Marshals Bazaine, Lebœuf, and Canrobert, who had been taken at Metz, should be sent to him at Wilhelmshöhe. The Minister added: “That would make a whist party. I have no objection, and shall recommend the King to do so.” He then went on to say that so many extraordinary events which no one could have imagined previously were now of daily occurrence that one might regard the most wonderful as being within the range of possibility. “Amongst other things it might well happen that we should hold a German Reichstag in Versailles, while Napoleon might summon the Legislative Chamber and the Senate to Cassel to consider the terms of peace. Napoleon is convinced that the former representative body is still legally in existence, an opinion against which there is little to be said, and that he could summon it to meet wherever he liked--of course, however, only in France. Cassel would be a debatable question.”