[8] M. Rouvier had obtained a law obliging every one without exception who distilled anything to pay the usual tax on alcohol. This law was made and repealed by the same Parliament, so that now every one who has a peach or a plum tree can manufacture any kind of alcohol of poor quality, and retail it in the _buvettes_ or drink-stands which are found at every step almost; in every little vegetable and grocery shop, even in Government tobacco stores where stamps are sold. These _buvettes_ are the curse of France to-day. They have caused far greater ravages than the Franco-Prussian war. [9] “We do not wish to see the secular arm placed at the service of free-thought,” said a deputy of the “bloc” not long since. “Meanwhile the secular arm in the service of free-thought has closed all our schools and colleges,” retorted a deputy of the Right. [10] On November 17th, 1906, the Bishop of Nancy wrote as follows to M. Briand, Minister of Cults, regarding the sad plight of the Sisters du Saint Cœur de Marie at Nancy: “In 1902, 56 of them were huddled together in a small house situated at the extremity of their grounds.... Their spacious chapel was razed to the ground and in its place three private houses have been built. The property was sold for 527,000 francs. The liquidator promised that in conformity with the law the sisters should receive pensions. Out of the 56 there remain to-day but 44. Of these 10 are over seventy, and 22 of them are over sixty.... In these last four years they have received out of the 527,000 francs only 12,000 in three instalments.... They owe 17,800 to their baker, butcher, etc., and are threatened with starvation if further credit be denied them.... Are these aged women, who have devoted their lives to the instruction of the poor, to die of cold and hunger, M. le Ministre?” And these things happen in the twentieth century under a Government that proclaims the rights of man and of the poor! [11] There is no such thing as proportional representation in France, and the whole electoral machinery is manipulated to give the Government a majority. [12] Recently in the Chambers (November 13th, 1906), M. Lassies criticized that part of M. Clemenceau’s declaration in which he referred to the Holy See “as a foreigner subject to foreign influences.” “Foreign influences,” said M. Lassies, turning pointedly to M. Delcassé, “we find them here in the person of the ex-Minister of Foreign Affairs, who fell from power without our knowing why. Whence came the gust which caused his fall? From which frontier?” [13] The Bill was adopted by the French Senate early in December. [14] Everything except the _encyclique_ of August 15th, 1906.