ontailed upon us duties, duties to ourselves | he could have renewed with us ten times over and our present interest, to our race and the struggle for maritime superiority. Suppast name, to Europe, and to the world? pose Russia in that position, and Greeks and To be a first-rate nation, and yet profess in- Sclavonians would then have no choice but to difference to the balance and distribution of adopt the Russian uniform. The wild races on power, or indifference to the fate of such na- either side of the Straits demand but a great tions as are emerging from barbarism and military power which will give them pay and struggling for independence, this, we repeat, a fair chance of success. Mahommedanism, is as impossible for a proud and a just nation, humbled in the person of the Prophet's deas it is impolitic for a prudent and foreseeing scendant and in the fall of his empire, would enlist its remaining energies in the service of the Russian Sultan. And we should soon find England, its colonial possessions, and worldwide trade, not only menaced and interrupted throughout Asia and Africa, but its naval power disputed on the Mediterranean.

one.

Such a view of our duties as a first-rate power is not the less just, because a sense of such duties may have been so strained on former occasions as to fling the country into a war of principles. The great struggle between France and England occupied a quarter of a century, and exhausted both the countries that were foremost in civilization. It was this that created opportunities for countries the youngest and least advanced of the European race to step forth before their time, and assume an ascendency which now menaces even to thrust back civilization itself. Our mistake was to have quarrelled for mere opinion with a country that stood beside us in the foremost ranks, and which, so closely our equal, maintained an almost interminable struggle.

But the result of such augmented might on the part of Russia, of the swelling of her armed masses from hundreds of thousands to tens of hundreds of thousands, would be even more fatal to the continent of Europe than to the maritime powers. As it is, the Sclavonians and Germans groan under her impending weight, which forbids to every remant of the races either nationality or representative institutions; and jeopardized as we already find the latter in France, we could scarcely hope other than to see them utterly extinguished on the continent of Europe, if Russian influence should be able now to strengthen and extend itself.

It is, indeed, needless to dilate on such a theme, or to depict the too manifest consequences of a Russian occupation of Constantinople. That war would be obviated by allowing the Russians unresisted to establish themselves on the Bosphorus is an argument too absurd for even a Peace Society. Such an event would not only necessitate war in order to extricate ourselves, our trade, shipping, the sea, India and Europe, from a yoke more universal than Napoleon ever dreamed of imposing, but would involve a quarter of a century's war of the civilized and industrious West against the despotic and military East, in order to get back a full emancipation.

The duty now imposed, and the interests appealing to England and to France together for protection, involve no mere preferences of opinion. Considerations of democracy or despotism have nothing to do with them. It is the great material question whether one power shall be allowed to become so preponderant on the confines of Europe and Asia, as virtually, if it succeeds, to dominate the two continents. It is a question, not merely of government or its principles, but of self-conservation, of national existence. Whatever forbearance we may suppose to mark the politics of Russia, or whatever fabulous magnanimity we may impute to its Emperor, we can judge by his present tone and demands, while the Pruth yet bounds his empire, what would be his requirements and his policy were his eagles hoisted upon Saint The Russians, however, it will be said, do Sophia. The Czar now, from his stronghold not mean to advance on Constantinople. The at the extremity of the Black Sea, ordains the Czar in his very manifesto disclaims terriclosing of the Dardanelles against us an torial aggrandizement. He merely insists on order, forsooth, which our marvellously pru- a kind of suzerainty over all men professing dent statesmen think it advisable already to obey. Enthrone the Czar at Constantinople, and could he do less than close the straits of Gibraltar? The stretch of authority would really not be greater than its proportion to his advanced empire and improved position.

The possession of Constantinople, we well know, confers on him who grasps it the first maritime position in the world, an inexpugnable position, behind which navies to any extent could be prepared and manned. Had Napoleon, crushed as his naval strength was, possessed such a resource as Constantinople,

the Greek faith, which history, it is declared, has given to Russia, and which is now to be maintained by arms. But what is such dominion, if not over the soil, at least over the races that occupy it, save a sovereignty far more efficient than if extended over the soil itself, and rendering the latter facile of completion at any time? The doctrine of the Czar plainly establishes two kinds of allegiance, the political and the religious. And the religious allegiance which he claims from the political subjects of Turkey, he claims openly not as a duty of charity or protection,

but as a source and prerogative of material | mistaken.

power.

The advancement of such principles, the attempted assertion of such rights, is as bold an advance on the part of the Czar to substitute himself for the Sultan as if one of his armies had reached Adrianople. His determination to occupy the principalities until such claims be allowed, is moreover as violent a proceeding towards Turkey, and as defiant towards those powers which have promised to support its independence, as Russia could venture on. Nevertheless it is all the result of deliberate calculation. Russia is bidding for the sovereignty over the Christians of the East. It is acting so as to invite their adherence, their admiration, their trust. It is its counter-invitation to that of the other powers which have been suggesting to the Greek and Sclavonian Christians that the immunities of their religion might perhaps be better preserved by freedom and independence than by subservience to Russia. Greeks and Sclavonians are at this moment wavering between the two kinds of advice, and between the powers that proffer them. And their adherence, it is to be feared, will not be given to those who would flatter their hopes of dignity and independence, but to those who will at once secure them the steadiest and most efficient succor. If Russia comes forward with acts and armies, while the West merely advances with embassies and protests, or with navies sneaking for a few weeks without and around the entrances to Turkish ports, the Greek Christians can have no choice. They become the prey of the boldest. And in the future struggle for the freedom of the East, of the sea, and of Europe, we shall find the Greek Christians arrayed against civilization, not for it.

The question is to be decided now, and decided in a great measure by the attitude which the British government shall assume. We regard it as not doubtful that the two wealthiest, most populous, and most advanced countries in Europe are more than a match for the poorest, the most barbarous, and the least peopled. We do not believe that Russia will risk a war with us. We are convinced that at present what we see of boldness and decision on the part of Russia, of hesitation and doubt on the part of the maritime pow-. ers, has been owing altogether to the Russian Emperor's thorough acquaintance with our weak points; too natural in a constitutional government like ours, and which oftener enables enemies to take advantage of our weakness, than friends to put confidence in our strength. Russia, in fact, knows the carte du pays, and has marched across the Pruth solely because of the conviction that Lord Aberdeen would not resent it.

In this, however, the Czar may find himself

Great forbearance may not preclude resolute action at last. And if we may judge from the highly satisfactory remarks with which the Times followed up the highly unsatisfactory announcement on Monday that the passage of the Pruth would not be met by any immediate act of reprisal, we may perhaps hope that the hesitation and forbearance of the British cabinet have been exhausted, and that we may now expect from it a resistance more in accordance with dignity as well as good policy.

The Times hints its suspicion that the present occupation of the principalities by Russia, with all the plausible palaver put forth in excuse of it, may be merely a prelude to an advance of the Russian armies across the Danube in the approaching spring; the conquest of Constantinople in 1854 being facilitated by the manoeuvres of its diplomatists and soldiers in 1853. This may or may not be so. But, at all events, Russia is not a power to precipitate a movement that cannot be supported. She is always advancing towards her aim, from which her policy is never absolutely to recede. Years will give her numbers, resources, opportunities. She loses not by waiting, provided that in the waiting she does not lose character, or allow her antagonists to gain ground, in the affection and attachment of the Christian population of the Levant. Russia has of late years suffered two or three rebuffs at Constantinople, which, with the continued ascendency of Lord Stratford, ruinously diminished her prestige and affected her power. It is probably to undo this, rather than to make any movement this or next year on Constantinople, that she has now passed the Pruth. It remains for us either to enhance the success of her ambitious movement by acquiescing in it, or, by taking the fit steps to defeat its consequences, and bring the braggart to terms, to manifest that there are in Europe powers as much alive and energetic to work out the independence of the East, as there are powers but too eager for its permanent enslavement.

From the Examiner, 23d July.

THE EASTERN QUESTION. ALL well-informed people both in London and Paris appear to entertain the belief that the Eastern quarrel is either arranged, or in a fair way to be so. They rely on the fact that Austria, and even Prussia, are at length in full accord with England and France, to urge upon Russia, now that its emperor has been gratified by a forthpouring of his legions to the Danube, to pursue no further a quarrel by which every country in Europe has been awakened, and in which every European government, not to speak of that of the United States, will be

bound to take a part. The sine quâ non of the four powers is that Russia should fix a period for the evacuation of the principalities. Without this, nothing would be achieved. As to the note, declaration, or convention, relative to the Christians in Turkey, there are a hundred ways of drawing it up, a hundred modes of interpreting it, and a hundred modes of sanction. The strength and stringency of the convention are of little moment, however, provided the other powers insist on making themselves parties to it as well as Russia. Less than this can surely not be insisted on; and yet, little as this may seem to us, there must be so much that is galling to Russia in a forced retreat behind the Pruth, redeemed by no plain or decisive diplomatic victory, that we cannot but still withhold our adherence to the general confidence which prevails.

support in popular opinion, and stand right with it. The despotic rulers of both Russia and France have forwarded no despatch, have drawn up no remonstrance, which they have not communicated to the public of their respective countries, as well as to the court for which it was intended. Russians have been indulged with a knowledge of all the reasons and motives for war felt by the Czar. The French have been made to participate in a knowledge of every act of the government, as well as of its reasons for so acting, with a fulness and a frankness unusual even to constitutional countries. The only cabinet which has appeared desirous to act apart from national opinion, and quite independently of it, is the cabinet of Great Britain..

irascible. To avoid every possibility of adding to the excitement of this redoubtable personage is perhaps prudent. The only question is whether such prudence may not be carried too far. Louis Napoleon, however bound to be also prudent and circumspect, has not shrunk from ordering his minister to speak out. He has not shrunk from inviting the public of France to form a judgment upon his reasons, his declarations, his acts. No doubt we have our motives for forbearance which the French Emperor has not. We have a greater interest in not making Nicholas less zealous in the defence of the status quo of Europe in the West as well as East. But in aiming at too many things, we may chance to miss all. Going half and half between Russia and France, trusting or conciliating neither, yet awakening prejudice and suspicion in both, we may possibly end by making both our enemies.

No doubt there have been reasons for this, and reasons by no means implying any wish The Czar has in truth so precipitated mat- to shake off the control of Parliament or people. ters, and indulged his imporial humor in such One of the difficulties in the way of bringing high-sounding language and pretensions, that the present quarrel to a peaceful determinahe has placed himself and his brother ruler tion has consisted in the fact that it was of Turkey in the same predicament. Both chiefly caused by the personal feeling of the will now find it equally difficult to satisfy Emperor Nicholas, by a temper which has their zealots. How is the great Russian become with years more susceptible and mission to dominate the universe? How is the descendant of the Prophet to be always able and prepared for the religious duty of battling with the infidel? Undoubtedly it would be the Sultan's interest at this moment to provoke war. The fate of his empire, he must know, will in no very distant time be decided by arms; and never could the two sides proceed to the struggle, with so much of right on the Turkish side, and so much of wrong on that of Russia. Never can England and France be more united in principle, in policy, and in honor, to support Turkey. Never could the Sultan, in fact, hope for so favorable an opportunity; and that this is felt by Abdul Medjid, as well as by certain old politicians of Constantinople, is quite evident. Wherever there is mischief, one may be sure to find Riza Pacha at the bottom of it; and this personage has, it seems, been with the Sultan last week, and has even received the promise of being summoned to the council as the representative of the war party, the only minister who would satisfy Turkish fanaticism. In case of war, indeed, it is not Redschid Pacha or the present Grand Vizier who would be selected to carry it on. Nor can we hold war to be other than probable, even now. The Russian people have marched on to the Turkish verge of the principalities, as if their object were provocation; and this object will undoubtedly be fulfilled unless the Czar can be brought to such terms, and to such instant guarantees to their fulfilment, as may inspire Turkey with a just confidence in peace.

One peculiarity of the present quarrel has been the anxiety of each government to find

Much of this uncertain and vacillating attitude, so likely to be misconstrued, would have been avoided by letting Parliament earlier into a participation with the government policy, and making use of its unmistakable opinion as an expression of the national will, which it was not in the power of ministers either to elude or to gainsay. However desirable peace may be, it would be a much more solid and more respectable peace if Parliament were a party to the making of it, and if the country were made to feel that neither honor, nor interest, nor even an English love of frankness and truth, have been

sacrificed to it.

We must end, as we began, by confessing that we entertain great fears of its being in

the power of either Russia or Turkey to draw completely back from their respective attitudes of hostility. It will not do for the Czar to act the part of the emperor who marched up the hill and then marched down again. He must have some profit to show, some advantage to allege; and we do not see what diplomacy has in this respect to give him.

From the Economist, 16 July.

And, first and foremost, the quarrel is a just one. The Porte has offered to continue and to guarantee to all her Christian subjects perfect toleration and all their ancient privileges. She has merely refused to constitute the Czar the official guardian of those privileges-a demand that she could not concede without forever forfeiting her claim to the character of an independent power. language and proceedings of Russia have

The

ENGLAND'S INTEREST IN THE EASTERN throughout been insolent and peremptory to a

QUESTION.

THE REASON WHY.

degree which is rare indeed in modern diplomacy, and which argues a profound contempt, not only for her immediate adversary, but for THE Russian army has crossed the Pruth the usual courtesies and decencies which govand occupied the trans-Danubian Principali-ern the intercourse of civilized nations. Were ties. The English and French fleets, on their Turkey to yield to such demands, so presented side, have cast anchor in the Dardanelles. and so enforced, she must sink into a condiThe Sultan has rejected the last ultimatum oftion of ignominious vassalage to a covetous and the Emperor, and the Emperor has issued a imperious master. second manifesto to Europe and a stirring proclamation to his own subjects, neither of which indicate any retrograde intentions. We still hope that the last extremities may be escaped-it is so much the general interest that peace should be preserved; it is so much the general belief that it will be presorved. But if war is to be averted, it must be averted by retractations on the part of Russia-not by concessions on the part of Turkey or her allies. Russia has assumed a false position, from which it will be difficult to recede without loss and mortification; England has taken up a righteous position, from which it will be impossible to recede without dishonor and defeat. It will not be supposed by any one that we can be advocates for war; we have too often denounced its folly, stigmatized its guilt, laid bare its flimsy pretexts, expounded the misery and ruin which it brings on all concerned in it; we have more than once had to depict its destruction to commerce, its interruption to prosperity, its blighting influence on all the higher interests of morality and civilization; but we have never concealed our opinion that cases may arise few and rare as undoubtedly they are- when peace can only be preserved by sacrifices which make it both precarious and worthless; and that wicked, foolish, and ruinous as war too generally is, there may yet be iniquities fur darker, follies still insaner, ruin incalculably deeper, sadder, and more irreparable. War or at least the willingness to encounter it may be a necessity, a safety, a wisdom, a virtue. We deliberately believe that a war with Russia to sustain Turkey in her present righteous quarrel would be such a case; and we will state in a few words why we think that England's interest and duty combine to urge her to maintain a resolute and unreceding attitude, at all hazards, and in full view of all the consequences.

Secondly. England has a direct concern in this dispute. She has not thrust herself into the quarrel; she has been dragged into it, as Nicholas well knew that she must be. Not only is she bound by a strict alliance with the Ottoman Porte to assist it in all cases of unjust aggression, but the maintenance of Turkish independence or at least the repression of Russian encroachments in the direction of Constantinople—is to her a matter of vital and immediate concern. This we have more than once pointed out. The safety of our Eastern Empire the security of our Indian communications-depends on Constantinople and Egypt being in the hands of a neutral, friendly, and unambitious power. We have shown in another part of our paper how pertinaciously Russia has been pressing forward to the possession, or at least the control, of Roumelia, and how completely this would give her the command of the Levant. At present we can hold her effectively in check by shutting up her fleets in the Baltic or the Gulf of Finland: let her once be fairly seated on the shores of the Egean, and we should have at once to double our naval force in the Mediterranean, and should be exposed to the risk of daily collisions; and, in case of war in India, to serious impediments to the transmission of orders and troops. Without dwelling further on this point, it must be obvious to every one, that if any object except the safety of our own shores can be worth a war, that object assuredly is the prevention of Russia from either destroying the independence or seizing on the territories of Turkey.

Thirdly. The war would be a safe one, and success, unless there be awful misman-agement, absolutely certain. Few persons, we believe, estimate aright the relative forces. of the two parties in the present contest. In the first place, the Turkish regular army is numerous, in good condition, and in high

cers.

spirits. It amounts to about 120,000 men, | present war-if ever begun-would be a well supplied with artillery and engineer offi- war in defence of their faith and their indeBut the irregular troops, which would pendence; and so strong and universal is be especially formidable to an invading army, this feeling that we greatly doubt whether it and which are rapidly brought together, would be safe for the Sultan now, even were would, in a popular war like the present, he so disposed, to make any concessions to soon reach 400,000, of which a very large his antagonist, or even to show any very proportion would be cavalry. However infe- anxious desire to preserve the peace. rior they might be to the Russians in a pitched Nor, if the Czar should penetrate into the battle (which their generals would of course provinces south of the Danube, would he find avoid), they would be of inestimable service in himself among a friendly people. It is true harassing the enemy, cutting off his supplies, that the great majority of them belong, like and wearing him out by perpetual attacks himself, to the Greek Church though and surprises. Then, since the English and scarcely to the same section of it; it is true French fleets could effectually prevent the that a considerable proportion are allied to Czar from landing his troops on any part of the Russians as a branch of the same great the coast of the Black Sea, he could only ad- Sclavonic race; -but they are well aware vance on Constantinople by crossing first the that they enjoy under the Ottoman dominion Danube and secondly the Balkan. A few a degree of substantial freedom and toleration steamers plying up the river might destroy any which they could scarcely hope to retain bridge of boats as fast as it was constructed under the iron sceptre of the Emperor. and indeed the Turkish army alone would Their municipal privileges are respected; probably be able to prevent the enemy from their religion is not interfered with; their crossing in any force; while the Balkan individual liberty is little curtailed; in all (the eastern portion at least) is universally respects their condition is immeasurably supeadmitted to be impassable if defended with rior to that of the mass of the Russian peasanything like ordinary skill and resolution.antry. Then they have their own dreams of And when we call to mind for how many years the future, their own hopes of greatness, their the Circassians -a small tribe in a scanty own plans of a powerful nationality; and territory have set at defiance the whole force they know that subjugation by Russia would of the Russian Empire, and have destroyed be forever fatal to all these bright and sanguine army after army which has been sent against projects. They want nothing that Russia can them, and are still as far as ever from being bestow; and they have everything to fear subjugated-we cannot but suppose that the from her supremacy. Turks, fighting like the Circassians for their independence, and aided by the advice and experience to say nothing of the maritime assistance and warlike stores-of France and England, will be able easily and permanently to beat off their assailants.

Fourthly. To a peaceful and commercial nation war in any quarter of the world can scarcely fail to be a nuisance and a loss; but it would be scarcely possible to conceive a war-in Europe at least - from which England would suffer as little inconvenience The Emperor, it is true, has issued a proc- and derangement, as from one against Russia, lamation but too well calculated to rouse the on a Turkish question, and in alliance with fanaticism of his own nation, and delude France. We had occasion a few weeks ago them into the persuasion that they are en- to contrast the prohibitive Russian with the gaged in a religious crusade, and are going liberal Turkish tariff, and to show how rapid forth to fight for the defence and propagation had been the increase of our trade with the of the Orthodox Faith. But, on the other latter, and how signal the falling off of our hand, the fanaticism of the Moslems is aroused trade with the former country. Our exports also, and we believe it to be of a far more to Turkey have increased in the last ten years fierce, energetic, and devoted kind than that from 1,500,000l. to 3,500,0007.; while those of the Muscovite Greeks. They have long to Russia have diminished in the same period been mortified and indignant at the conces-from 1,600,000l. to 1,370,000l. Further sions and the yielding temper of the Sultan's the war would be carried on at a distance government; they are burning for an oppor- from our own shores; and it would employ tunity to show that neither their valor nor their zeal has evaporated since the old days of Islamism; when they were ordered to retire from the Montenegrin campaign, the indignation alike of officers and soldiers was both loud and deep :- "Of what use is it," they asked, "for our Sultan to maintain armies if they are never allowed fairly to fight out their quarrels ?" They have no doubt of success; they are aware that the

only our navy, which, when once manned, might almost as well be occupied as idle. Again, it would be a war entered into in alliance and cordial cooperation with France; it would cement our friendship with that power, which, after all, and in spite of temporary difficulties and occasional coolness, ought, in the interests of civilization, to be our truest and most permanent ally; -in the course of a struggle in which the two nations fought