NOTES OF THE MONTH.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 326, 29 June 1875, Page 4

NOTES OF THE MONTH.

(From the Spectator.')

Either the European peace is in danger, or Prince Bismarck is anxious it should be thought in danger, for all manner of dangerous rumours are current in Berlin, The Ministerial Post of that city even warns its readers to awake, for “ war is coming on.” It declares that the majority in the French Assembly and Marshal MacMahon and the French Princes are anxious for war, lest the Republic should establish itself, and that they look to an Austro-Italian Alliance for aid, which, however, has not yet been secured. Italy is not unwilling, as she desires to make of the Pope a tool to spread Italian influence all over the world, but in Austria the Andrassy Government is *oot yet turned out. All this seems very dreamy, and the Post acknowledges there may be delay ; but the Beilin correspondent of the Times thinks the article important enough to send by telegraph, and it would hardly have been published without some serious object. That object may be to hint to Austria that the Emperor’s visit to Italy has displeased the German Government, or it may be to create an impression in Germany that Austria as she exists is a standing danger to the United Empire. In any case, it deserves to be noted, more especially as France, which desires only peace, is so directly accused of troubling the waters.

The recent German correspondence with Belgium on the sul of the Belgian remissness in putting down the fomenters of disturbances in Germany, has partially come out on April 10th, and is certainly of an ominous character. Germany made her complaint of three matters, —of certain Episcopal addresses of sympathy to the German Bishops, now rather stale; of an inadequate prosecution of the alleged plot to assassinate Prince Bismarck, of all the steps of which the Belgians say that the German Minister was cognisant, and that at the time he made no complaint; and of a recent address by a “ Society of Pontifical Works” to the Bishop of Paderborn. “A fetate,” says the German note, “ which enjoys the privilege of neutrality seems to be for this very reason pledged in a high degree to watch that its territory does not become the theatre of enterprises directed against the peace of neighbouring States, or against the security of their inhabitants. The most powerful empires have regulated their legislation on this basis, and have completed it, when necessity for such a course has arisen,” To this Belgium replied—“ Belgium, independent and neutral, has never lost sight of its international obligations, and it will continue to fulfil them in all their extent. To perform this task it will find the surest support in its institutions, which sprang, if the term may be used, from the vitals of its past, and suited to the character of the country, have undergone for nearly half a century the proof of events, and have become conditions indispensable to its existence." That is grave and significant language on both sides, and would seem to involve a still more serious stage of the same controversy. Can Germany wish to convey to one and all of the neutral States of Europe that, for the future, neutrality must imply a Teutonic bias—like the bias of Switzerland, whose example she expressly extols—or else—disappear ? There has been another illustration of the imperious character of the prevailing mood in Germany. Dr Sigl, the editor of a Bavarian Ultramontane paper—the Vaterland—which had attacked Prince Bismarck, was found guilty, and condemned by a Munich Court of Justice to ten months’ imprisonment ; but either by connivance or otherwise, got out of Bavaria into Austria before the imprisonment commenced. The German Government instantly applied to the Austrian to arrest the fugitive, and it was said that he actually was arrested at Salzburg, and is to be handed over immediately to the Gover ment of Berlin, That is a curious act of subserviency on the part of Austria Even Turkey refused to give up to Austria, in the old days of the Hungarian war, the political offenders for whose extradition Austria asked. But what Turkey then refused to do, Austria, it appears, now cheerfully does.

Prince Bismarck was sixty on the Ist of April, and received a perfect deluge of congratulations on that event, most of them, like that from Leipsic, specially congratu lating him on his courage in encountering the Papacy. This address asserted that Germany, “honestly vindicating a creed based upon the laws of logic and the results of science, presents a phalanx that cannot be broken through.” We suspect the “ laws of logic and the results of science ” taken alone would present a very poor resistance indeed to any real faith, however simple. Germany under Luther made a far more formidable

stand against the Papacy than Germany under Bismarck and Buchner is likely to do We do not, of course, intend to imply that Bismarck himself accepts or values the alliance of the scientific Materialists, but unquestionably he owes much of his popularity to their enthusiasm for his methods, — and equally unquestionably those methods smack of true materialism, though it be the materialism of statesmanship. The farmers are declaring everywhere against the Tenant-right Bill, which they say is worse than useless. In Cheshire, Lancashire, Devonshire, Leicestershire, Gloucestershire, and several other counties they have resolved that the clauses which maintain freedom of contract, and therefore destroy the Bill, must be struck out, and that any Bill which affects the present system must confer a new and general security. In Cheshire the scene was a striking one, as the Duke of Westminster himself presided at the meeting, and the room was full of Leighs, Egertons, Tollcmaches, and members of other old county families. They endeavoured at first to support the Bill, am then to prevent a division, but it was all of no use. The farmers were thoroughly roused, insisted on a division, and led by Mr Latham, a Liberal Landowner, thoroughly defeated their own landlords. It is a regular revolt, and it is quite possible, that the Tenantright Bill, if it comes down from the Lords, may prove the most important measure of the session. The omission of the contract clauses is sure to be proposed, and the County Members may be driven to the alternative of walking out of the House or losing their seats at the next election. In either case, their confidence in Mr Disraeli is likely to be reduced to a measureable quantity. Mr Fawcett attended a meeting of the Farmers’ Club, and warned those present that the clauses of the Tenant-right Bill giving landlords power to interfere with cultivation were much stronger than those giving compensation to tenants. Leases are often drawn with stringent provisos, but they are left dead letters, whereas the provisos under an Act will probably be carried out. Strong opinions were expressed in favor of free cultivation, and Lord Leicester’s lease was mentioned as best calculated to secure it. Under this system the farmer has a lease of twenty years, and for the first sixteen of them has no restrictions. During the last four there are no restrictions either, if the lease is to be renewed, but if not, the farmer must farm upon the four course shift. Lord Leicester retains power, however, in extreme cases of deterioration, to compel cultivation according to the custom of the neighbourhood. This was described as a “ magnificent lease,” but it must be remembered that the Holkham estates are farmed by men with capital, and that in some districts sixteen years would be a long time to trust a hundred-acre farmer.

Mr Forsyth moved on April 7th, the second reading of the Bill for removing the political disabilities of women, in a speeca in which he repudiated the intention of enabling married women to vote, and ridiculed the notion that women could ever become members of Parliament—in short, in a speech intended to show that the wedge was not any thicker at the other end than it is at this. Mr Leatham resisted the Bill in a vivacious ’ speech, basing his opposition on women’s want of reasoning faculties, —a dangerously sweeping objection, when we look at such exhibitions of masculine reasoning faculties as that of the mobs which support the Claimant. Mr Leatham touched stronger ground when he pointed out the indifference, nay, the dislike of the majority of women to the measure, and when he maintained that women are really tetter represented by their husbands and brothers—however imperfectly that may be—than they ever would be by the results of their own votes. Mr Smollett took the coarse jocose line against the Bill, touching, of course, and very rudely, on the agitation against the Contagious Diseases Act, and quoting with rather more point Lord Byron’s description of women—

“ Men with their heads reflect on this or that, But women set their hearts on God knows what.” —and remarking that if the poet had lived till our time, he would have known that they —or rather, we suspect, a very small handful of them, —now set their hearts on the lodger franchise,