THE LATE CZAR.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3098, 2 June 1881, Page 3

THE LATE CZAR.

"We aye only beginning to recover from the sensation caused by the news of the assassination of the Czar. "He wore the expression of a hunted man. If he surpassed his contemporary sovereigns in the absoluteness of his power, he surpassed them also in the supremeness of his misery. He knew that some day or other, perhaps when he least expected it, the end would come." And it came. The World's epitaph, from which t quoted these woi'ds, is the truest that has appeared. A friend of mine, who has often seen the Czar during his hunted years, informs me that all the photographs of him which are in circulation are false. Only an untouched sun-picture could have given an idea of that haggard, hopeless face, and without the help of color, that idea would have fallen far short of the truth. England's opinion of tbe late Czar , was not expressed by the Jingoes. The emancipation of 23, C 00.000 of serfs might be a sham—as certain wild Nihi'ists in New York have since described the act —but we have given the author of it a place in history alongside those lofty ones occupied by Wilberforce and Abraham Lincoln. His love for his daughter, and her affection for him, was bound to go a considerable way in a land where a reverence for domestic ties amounts to a religion, towards making him popular. As to his marital disagreements, well, were there not faults on both sides ? It is disheartening, and makes one despair of the future of Russia, to think that the best Czar that ever wielded a sceptre died by the hand of an assassin. What next ? It is no business of mine to judge the political aspect of things ; but I may be permited to remark that the idea of Germany's having to fight Russia is again revived. For years the prospect of a war with Russia has been a subject of discussion amongst a ll classes 0? society in Germany. For years Germany-in-London has debated the same topic. Now that one great barrier to such a war has been removed, its discussion has undergone vigorous renewal. The Teuton here seems to regard such a war as inevitable. And our friend the Teuton is quite aware that the new Czar regards the Fatherland, which is the result, of Bismarck's unscrupulous manipulation, with feelings the reverse of those that were cherished by his predecessor. It is, of course, only decent that the Court should go into mourning for the Czar, and that the festivities of the superior classes should he postponed. It was seemly, also for the Houses of Parliament to give expression to their feelings. In -\ lew of these manifestations one cannot help wondering why the Empress of Austria goes on hunting as though nothing had happened to render present indulgence in that or any other kind of sport unbecoming. The speeches in both Houses were worthy of the occasion. Mr Gladstone's was of course the noblest, and Lord Beaconsfield's the most autocratic and artificial. His lordship spoke as though he and he alone held a brief from Queen Victoria on behalf of her daughter-in-law the Duchess of Edinburgh. The pompous deliverance reads like a page from one of his own novels.—English paper.