The privy council in France, as in England, as sembles only occasionally by order of the King, and for the dispatch of special business. It is composed of the members of the cabinet, and of a more nume • rous body of public men styled Ministres d'Etat, a title implying not that the persons who bear it are actually in office, but of such reputation, either in a civil or military capacity, as to have merited at the hands of the King this high honour, and the pension which accompanies it ; their number at present is about thirty, almost all peers; the aggre gate of the pensions L.10,000 a year.
The conseillers d'etat and maitres des requites are two classes of men of limited property but good education, who have devoted themselves to govern ment business as a profession or occupation for life. The persons who bear these designations, without duty or salary, amount to several hundreds, but there are regularly en adivite de service 30 Cos seillers d'Etat and 40 »mitres des requites. They form five permanent committees, each acting under the direction of a minister. Thus, the committee of the home department prepares bills to be submit ted to Parliament, or regulations to be adopted in regard to various matters belonging to that minis try ; the committees for finance, for legislation, and for the navy, discharge a correspondent duty each in its respective department ; while a committee of a more ambiguous title, " du contentieux," takes cog nizance of misunderstandings and disputes between the public and the different administrative bodies throughout the kingdom.
The royal household, like other public depart.. ments in France, exhibits a long list of high sound ing appellations ; here are a grand aumonier, grand chambellan, grand ecuyer, grand maitre des ceremo nies, grand maitre de la garde robe, followed by the intendant du tresor ; intendant des fortis ; intend ant des menus ploisirs du Roi, &c. Establishments, also on a large scale, are appropriated to the princes, the whole attended with a very considerable ex pence, and evincing, on the part of the court, an unconsciousness that the Revolution has dispelled some ancient illusions, and that the attachment of the more valuable part of the French nation is to be acquired by other means than the display of page antry.
The plan of provincial administration is uniform throughout all France. Each department has at its head a Prefet or civil officer, who acts as the medium between it and government, maintaining a daily cor respondence with Paris, receiving the orders of the minister of the home department, and reporting from time to time on their execution, as well as on all local transactions of interest ; whether relating to the collection of taxes, the levy of recruits, the expendi. tore for roads, or the state of political feeling. The only similar office in England is that of lord-lieu tenant; but the duties of a prefet are much more la borious. Another material distinction is that the latter, for the sake, doubtless, of securing his impar tiality, is never almost appointed to a department in which he has property or family connections. Each prefet is aided by a Conseil de Prefecture, consisting of three, four, or five members, whose duty consists in taking the detail of business off his hands. The departemental council (Conseil General de Departe ment) is much more numerous, comprising sixteen, eighteen, twenty, or more members ; but they meet only a few weeks in the year, nor are they of much use, except to share, as a collective body, the respon sibility attendant on the distribution of taxes, or other similar measures.
A Sous Prefet is an officer much inferior to the prefet. There is one to each of the districts called Arrondissement, and he is aided in his labours by a council, unnecessarily numerous, of eleven mem bers.
Lastly come the communes, the smallest of the offi cial divisions of the French territory, and of which there are above $8,000 in the kingdom. The coun try communes are little else than parishes; but the distinguishing characteristic of a commune consists in having, not a church and clergyman, but a mayor and municipal council. A city, however populous, as Lyons, Marseilles, Bordeaux, forms only one commune ; and, on the other hand, when, as very often happens, the population of a commune is at or below 2000, it has still its mayor and council. The mayors, however, have salaries only in the large towns, where their occupations are considerable; comprising the management of the town funds, whe ther arising from dividends, rents, or octrois, and the disbursement for all public works. The property in land and houses belonging formerly to the towns was, in many cases, lost in the Revolution.