Mr. Bancroft to Mr. Fish
Sir: To the inquiry when diplomatic relations with France will be resumed, the Foreign Office still answers that the time is not yet definitively known. I shall telegraph to you, according to your directions, as soon as it can be done. I have written to Mr. Washburne, but as yet have received from him no answer.
The German estimate of the number of lives lost in the city of Paris, since the beginning of the French bombardment, including men, women, and children, is fifty thousand. Bodies lie unburied in the streets, and there is no orderly provision for the wounded.
The finances of France occupy public attention. By the treaty of peace Germany is to receive, thirty days after the restoration of order in Paris, five hundred millions of francs, and in the course of the year a milliard more. I am told that an association of European bankers, is disposed to provide for the first payment, receiving French 3 per cent. rentes at 50 per cent., and a commission of 4 per cent. Subscriptions to the loan, at the rate of 50 per cent., are to be opened in all parts of France, and the bankers are to make good the deficiency in the subscription, but to receive the commission of 4 per cent. on the whole; and they are further to have a six months’ option of taking the milliard on the same conditions.
The debt of France before the war was about thirteen milliards; add to this the debt incurred by Napoleon in the early part of the war; the debt incurred by Gambetta; the debt incurred by the Versailles government in subduing the insurrection in Paris, and now the five milliards that are promised to Germany, and the aggregate seems more than even a state so wealthy as France can bear. Moreover, the cities and departments of France have large debts of their own. The prospect is very sad for a people which in habits of order and powers of generalization and analysis excelled all others in Europe. I hear from the most intelligent men of Germany ardent wishes for the recovery of France, and the acknowledgment that its peculiar office in the civilization of Europe cannot be made good by any other nation.
I remain, &c., &c.,