has his partisans, and each seems to be of opinion that he himself is a mighty man of war, and all the others fools. Both Vinoy and Ducrot declined to attend the Council of War which sat before the late sortie. They were generals of division, they said, and they would obey orders, but they would accept no further responsibilities. Ducrot, who was the _fidus Achates_ of Trochu, is no longer in his good graces. The _Reveil_ of this afternoon, which is usually well-informed on all matters which concern our Mayors, gives the following account of the meeting of yesterday: "At three o'clock the meeting took place in the presence of all the members of the Government. M. Trochu declared formally that he would fight no more. M. Favre said that the Government was 'disappearing.' M. Favre proposed that the Government should give up its power to the Mayors. The Mayors refused. The discussion was very violent. Several propositions, one more absurd than another, were brought forward by some of the members of the Government. They were not discussed. As usual, the meeting broke up without any result." The best man they have is Vinoy; he is honest, disinterested, and determined. It is to be hoped that if Trochu resigns, he will take his place. _January 22nd._ So poor Jonah has gone over, and been swallowed up by the whale. He still remains the head of the civil government, but it only is as a figure-head. He is an upright man; but as a military chief he has proved himself a complete failure. He was a man of plans, and never could alter the details of these plans to suit a change of circumstances. What his grand plan was, by which Paris was to be saved, no one now, I presume, ever will know. The plans of his sorties were always elaborately drawn up; each divisional commander was told in the minutest details what he was to do. Unfortunately, General Moltke usually interfered with the proper development of these details--a proceeding which always surprised poor Trochu--and in the account the next day of his operations, he would dwell upon the fact as a reason for his want of success. That batteries should be opened upon his troops, and that reinforcements should be brought up against them, were trifles--probable as they might seem to most persons--which filled him with an indignant astonishment. At the last sortie Ducrot excuses himself for being late at La Malmaison because he found the road by which he had been ordered to advance occupied by a long line of artillery, also there by Trochu's orders. General Vinoy, who has replaced him, is a hale old soldier about seventy years old. He has risen from the ranks, and in the Crimea was a very intimate friend of Lord Clyde. When the latter came, a few years before his death, to Paris, the English Ambassador had prepared a grand breakfast for him, and had gone to the station to meet him. On the platform was also Vinoy, who also had prepared breakfast for his old