Christianity put an end to these sacrifices, and horse-flesh then went out of fashion. _La France_ thus speaks of the last despatch of Gambetta:--"At length we have received official news from Tours. We read the despatch feverishly, then we read it a second time with respect, with admiration, with enthusiasm. We are asked our opinion respecting it. Before answering, we feel an irresistible impulse to take off our hat and to cry 'Vive la France.'" The _Electeur Libre_ is still more enraptured with the situation. It particularly admires the petroleum lamp, so different, it says, to those orgies of light, which under the tyrant, in the form of gas, gave a fictitious vitality to Paris. The _Combat_ points out that no fires have broken out since September 4--a coincidence which is ascribed to the existence since that date of a Republican form of government. I recommend this curious phenomenon to insurance companies. The newspapers, one and all, are furious, because they hear that the Prussians contest our two victories at Villiers. "How singular," observes the _Figaro_, with plaintive morality, "is this rage, this necessity for lying." It is notorious that, having gained two glorious victories, we returned into Paris to repose on our laurels, and I must beg the Prussians not to be so mean as to contest the fact. _December 23rd._ Since Wednesday the troops--Line, Mobiles, and marching battalions of the National Guard--have remained outside the enceinte. There has been a certain amount of spade work at Drancy, but beyond this absolutely nothing. The cold is very severe. This afternoon I was outside in the direction of Le Bourget. The soldiers had lit large fires to warm themselves. Some of them were lodged in empty houses, but most of them had only their little _tentes d'abri_ to shelter them. The sentinels were stamping their feet in the almost vain endeavour to keep their blood in circulation. There have been numerous frost-bitten cases. When it is considered that almost all of these troops might, without either danger to the defence, or without compromising the offensive operations, have been marched back into Paris, and quartered in the barracks which have been erected along the outer line of Boulevards, it seems monstrous cruelty to keep them freezing outside. The operations, however, on Wednesday are regarded as very far short of a success. General Trochu does not venture, in the state of public opinion, to bring the troops back into Paris, and thus confess a failure. The ambulances are ordered out to-morrow morning; but I cannot help thinking that the series of operations which were with great beating of drums announced to have commenced on Wednesday, will be allowed gradually to die out, without anything further taking place. The National Guards are camped in the neighbourhood of Bondy and Rosny. They have again, greatly to the disgust of the Mobiles and Line, been congratulated in a general order upon their valorous bearing.