fry, are just now engaged in an exchange of rather uncomplimentary truths, among which it is difficult to see where comes in the boasted reconciliation of last spring. Such, then, are the fruits of the system of 'splendid isolation,' so dear to the heart of Mr. Under-Secretary Curzon. It does not belong at all to my province to come and tell Englishmen: Take this or take that side in exchange for your so-called freedom.' What I mean to try and set before my readers is only the fact that England must choose, that she cannot remain in a status quo, which would not be a true one, since the change of everything outside could not but react on the position of the isolated kingdom itself. My next aim is simply to examine shortly under what conditions England, if she makes her choice, would be able to join the diplomatic combination in which France has got part and parcel. It is the business of Englishmen and of them alone to see if the periodical outburst of hate against their country in the German press is merely a childish symptom to be overlooked, or if it is a rather unamiable way of fishing for the friendship of England -in contempt of that popular saying according to which flies are not taken by vinegar-or if finally it is the weighty sign of a deepseated antagonism of temper and of interests, making, even against the will of the majority of the citizens of both lands, for a fatal struggle sooner or later; in which last case, the incidents of the present year would take, to the eyes of clear-headed, sagacious observers, something of the character of that Luxemburg scrape. which in 1867 nearly precipitated, three years before its time, the Franco-German War. Let us then suppose that England, after full and mature consideration, advisedly and with open eyes, resolves to feel her way to an understanding with the Franco-Russian combination. Even by this simple statement I have already pointed out one, and perhaps the most important, of the conditions antecedent to this happy consummation. It is not, it cannot be, a question of substituting one country for another in the intimacy of Russia, of wriggling or worming in another partner into the Tsar's friendship instead of France. No divorce is to precede this match. International marriages admit perfectly well of a third party. Notwithstanding the old saying that two are company and three are none,' there can be for England no association with Russia, if France has no part and lot in it. And, what is more, it is not to be fancied that France's friendship may be thrown into the bargain or got for the asking. The two partners are both equally to be met halfway, both equally to be wooed, in order to be both equally won. Such advice is not at all superfluous, to judge by the tone of too many of the papers which have advocated, after the visit of Nicholas the Second at Balmoral, an agreement with. Russia. Those among them which did not own a little cynically as: their purpose the substitution of England for France in the Russian friendship, have all along built on the supposed willingness of France to follow blindly her great ally, and to accept dutifully any new bedfellow. As a matter of fact, the negotiators of this beneficent understanding will have to deal with two partners at once. However, I must hasten to add that, in the majority of cases at any rate, what would satisfy the one would also satisfy the other. The crux of the whole matter is, before all, a matter of trust. The past is heavily handicapping the present. Everybody is beginning to see it in relation to the Armenian agitation. Thus Cyprus and Egypt stand in the way of the acknowledgment by Europe of the good intentions and disinterestedness of the forward policy. It is no less true that they bar the road to a fruitful understanding with France and Russia. This Armenian business is in some sense a symbolic exponent of the whole state of things. Here is a hideous nightmare of cruelty, vileness, and madness oppressing the whole of Europe, or rather of Christendom. Here is the old spectre of the Eastern question reappearing within a dark and bloody cloud before the conscience of the people and of the governments of the civilised world. The mere continuance of the status quo is a scandal, and holds up over the peace of our continent the gravest dangers. In the meanwhile the whole of the great Powers remain stricken as with palsy. Diplomacy is just strong enough to paralyse philanthropy; philanthropy is just strong enough to paralyse diplomacy. England has just seen such an outburst of right-minded indignation as in 1876, during the never to be forgotten campaign against the Bulgarian atrocities. Twenty years more on the hoary head of Mr. Gladstone have not prevented the old man eloquent from sounding from Land's End to John o' Groats the trumpet calls of his magnanimous anger. If the right honourable gentleman is no longer the member for Midlothian, he considers himself as the member for oppressed and martyred mankind, and he has nobly fulfilled his mandate. English opinion, without distinction of parties, has rallied around the grand leader of old days. A series of meetings, crowned by that in St. James's Hall, where bishops, peers of the realm, mayors of great cities, Anglican divines, Nonconformist ministers, professors, politicians have met on the same platform, have given loud expression to the mind of the country. I am not here just now discussing the policy so passionately proclaimed at these meetings. Much as I admire the moral inspiration of the movement, much as I am disposed to subscribe with my whole heart to the ends it has in view, I should have to enter my strongest protest against the childish and hot-headed scheme of a separate action of England and of the recall of Her Majesty's ambassador at Constantinople, as well as against the exaggerated, unjust, unfounded, and unchristian charges promiscuously hurled against the unfortunate heir of a deplorable system. For the nonce what I look for is the cause why this great agitation, instead of finding sympathy, not unmixed with criticism, among the nations of the continent, has loosened a perfect tornado of ill-will and bad words. Undoubtedly there is among too many of the inhabitants of other countries an unshakeable conviction that English feeling is hypocrisy. Nothing is more absurd than this impression. It is not necessary to be a very far-looking student of human psychology to know that the English temper is at once uncommonly practical with a kind of matter-of-fact hardness, and strangely emotional. There is in the English soul, under a superficial coat of proud reserve, of affected coldness, of pragmatical no-nonsense-ness, a rich vein of true sensibility, of humanitarian eagerness, of an even aggressive philanthropy. Only we must not forget that the human mind is not without its contradictions or its phases; that Englishmen, if they have their vigils of holy and crusading zeal, have their morrows of practical reaction; and that history-I mean the most contemporary history-teaches us to fear a little the swingings of the humanitarian pendulum. How could we forget the tears we or our fathers mingled twenty years ago with those of the generous champions of Bulgaria, but how could we, too, obliterate the memory of that painful awaking from the noble dreams of 1876, when a Semitic statesman knew how to confiscate for the purposes of his egoistical policy the powerful movement initiated by Mr. Gladstone, and how to intoxicate with jingoism, imperialism, and hate of Russia, the selfsame masses which had cheered to the echo, on Blackheath Common, the burning words of the great Liberal leader? We had witnessed an indisputable philanthropic crusade ; but an Eastern magician had brandished his wand, and, hey presto! the whole scene had changed, the holy war had degenerated into a political rivalry, and Cyprus was the only monument which remained of this great upheaval of conscience! Since that time we have seen Egypt occupied under a wholly disinterested pretext; we have heard the solemn promises of a short stay and a prompt evacuation given by Mr. Gladstone, ratified and reiterated by every successive Government; and we see now the Nile Valley incorporated in fact with the British Empire, the reconquest of the Soudan undertaken against the advice of Lord Cromer, in order to put back to the Greek calends the execution of engagements which the principal organs of the press and a whole school of politicians begin to treat as null and void. Verily an instructive lesson about the value of self-denying ordinances ! Such then is the past which weighs so heavily upon the present. It is a very encouraging sign of the times to find a growing number of public men openly advocating the only means of retrieving these mistakes. A letter like that of the Right Hon. Leonard Courtney to the Times is not only a new proof of the unequalled and incomparable independence of this hero sans peur et sans reproche of true freedom of thought: it is an evidence, among many others, of the progress of sounder views on the questions jingoism has so long succeeded in confusing and entangling. This way lies the hope of a renewal of the entente cordiale of former times. This way, too, lies the chance of an agreement with Russia. If England begins to tread the road of conciliation in Africa, the chances are for her following the same impulse in Asia. Thus would be made easy the new triple alliance which alone, as we are told by those who know best, is able to resolve by pacific means this Eastern question so dreadfully weighing on the conscience of mankind. After all, there is no mischief in trying to fancy what would be the results of the conclusion of an understanding, without which it seems there is no motive power sufficient to put into activity the European concert and to set it towards the right ends. As for the general prospects opened by such a consummation, imagination reels before their vastness. Once more I do not presume to answer for England the questions I have brought before my readers. My aim has been all along simply to expound not what England ought to do, but what she ought to do if she wanted one of the two solutions I indicated at the beginning of this article. It is for the English people, and only for them, to make their choice. It is for them to say once for all if they share yet the feeling so eloquently expressed by Shakespeare in his Henry the Sixth : Hastings. Why, knows not Montague that of itself Montague. But the safer when 'tis backed with France. They may equally try the Triple Alliance and give as epilogue to the Homeric exchange of amiabilities with the German press the acceptance of German hegemony. One thing only is out of their power, and that is to remain as they are, without either an accession or a loss of strength, in a world which has completed the work of consolidation and where two great systems are henceforth to attract in their orbit or to repulse out of their sphere of influence the few remaining isolated bodies. FRANCIS DE PRESSENSÉ. 1896 LA TURQUIE ET SON SOUVERAIN LA CRISE ACTUELLE, SEs origines, SA SOLUTION QUELQUES semaines après l'avénement au trône du Sultan Abd-ulHamid, lorsqu'on se préparait à célébrer la cérémonie de Kilidj-Alayi (prise de possession par le nouveau souverain de l'épée du fondateur de la dynastie, qui équivaut en Turquie au couronnement des souverains d'Europe), le grand-vizir Mehmed Ruchdi pacha, écœuré des intrigues qui commençaient à se fomenter, avait offert sa démission. Le Sultan, mal assis sur le trône qu'un double changement venait de mettre à sa disposition, désirait s'entourer de ceux qui avaient été les auteurs de ces changements et dont l'énergie et la popularité seules pouvaient lui assurer le règne. Mehmed Ruchdi pacha était une force sur laquelle on pouvait s'appuyer et le Sultan désirait particulièrement le garder au pouvoir pour montrer à ses sujets, imbus d'idées de liberté en ce temps, qu'il marchait d'accord avec le parti de réformes; aussi envoyait-il émissaire sur émissaire auprès du grand-vizir pour le persuader à retirer sa démission; mais le vieux Sadrazam restait inébranlable; las enfin de l'insistance qu'on mettait à l'inviter à rester au pouvoir, Ruchdi pacha a fait à un ami, homme d'honneur et de confiance, les déclarations suivantes : Il m'avait fallu dix ans pour connaître à fond le caractère d'Abd-ul-Aziz; dix jours m'ont suffi pour pénétrer celui d'Abd-ul-Hamid; depuis la fondation de l'Empire, un homme si atrocement dangereux n'était jamais monté sur le trône; les calamités qui vont fondre sur la Turquie durant ce règne, dépasseront de beaucoup tout ce que l'histoire de ce pays a enregistré; n'insistez pas sur le retrait de ma démission; je ne veux pas mêler mon nom à l'histoire du démolissement de ce grand empire. Il avait bien prévu, le malheureux grand-vizir, l'avenir que la nature perverse d'Abd-ul-Hamid préparait au pays; et il a bien eu sa part dans le malheur, puisqu'il est allé finir sa vie, faite de travail et d'honnêteté, dans l'exil! Jamais l'Empire ottoman ne s'est senti si près de l'abîme et tout le monde est d'accord pour rejeter la responsabilité de cette catastrophe personnellement sur le souverain. Comment cet état de choses a-t-il été créé ? quel état d'âme a conduit le Sultan à saper de ses mains, |