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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 83

Frontier of Events

Frontier of Events.

The telegraph places us in such immediate communication with the great nerve-centres of the world that correspondence is superseded.

In the London Budget, the narrow escape of the Cabinet is the page 78 prime item. Mr. Gladstone's retirement may be looked for. Perhaps Lord Hartington is the coming Premier. Neither Lord Salisbury, nor Sir Stafford Northcote, nor any Conservative leader, inspires personal confidence. Granville will never achieve the blue ribbon, except as a warming-pan. Churchill is too young to come to the fore as yet. Chamberlain will be Premier some day.

Bismarck's malice is apparent in the Russian advance upon Herat. "Shall I yield?" inquires De Giers. "No!" replies Bismarck. This Russian move means retaliation for the English Blue Book publications, in response to German Colonial annexation.

Bismarck said very bitter things of Lord Augustus Loftus, while Ambassador at Berlin. Lord Ampthill was more to his taste. Now he appears to have found a bugbear in Sir E. Malet. The Diplomatic Tension, as they call it, is over the Blue Book publication of an interview between Bismarck and Malet. A great deal depends on the tact of the British Ambassador at Berlin. Even the Russian invasion of India depends on it in no small degree.

General Lewal is the new French Minister of War. He replaces General Campenon, who followed General Thibaudin, an inveterate Republican of the Lannes and Augereau pattern. Campenon retired because he would not coincide in the aggressive Chinese measures proposed by the Ministry.

General Campenon has grasped this occasion to make political capital, by an expression of his opinions, as outspoken as that famous speech of General Skobeleff, in Paris, when he declared that war between Germany and Russia was inevitable. Campenon says that the French army must not be dissipated abroad, in view of its grand object and aim—the Revanche upon Germany. Of course M. Ferry is keenly annoyed.

A caricaturist depicts John Bull as an organ grinder, with Italy as his monkey.

There is nothing quite express to hand about the Geographical Congress at Berlin relative to the Congo and Africa in general, although it is not one of the most recent events. Mr. Stanley attended, but not purely as an English representative. Where is De Brazza? The Congress has arbitrarily chalked out the dominion on the Congo, somewhat to the disadvantage of England.

Bismarck's ultimate aim is to secure an alliance with England, his expressed view being that with the best army and the best navy, Germany and England ought to rule the world. He wants to overthrow Gladstone, who, with his Republican sympathies, clings to the French Alliance—as we do. It may be remembered that the Beaconsfield Government, just before its downfall, concluded an alliance with Germany and Austria, directed against Russia and France. Gladstone broke it down at once.