RUSSIA AND INDIA.

Manawatu Standard, Volume IX, Issue 98, 28 March 1885, Page 2

RUSSIA AND INDIA.

, One of the :< leading Indian newspapers 1 iateiy" had' a leading article Vn' the ) subject ' ofttbe advance' of Russia towards India. In it the,. { writer ad-, mite that this advance although a distinct menace, and meanc to be spch, against British powei 1 , m India, yet the bbjei.r to be attained is to compel the British to mainiain a large", nuinlier of troops m India and beyond ; the Indus, to resist an attack which will never be delivered, or at all events not until her sucess is proclaimed elsewhere, and thai real intention is a descent on" Corir'staniinople and Syria. The writer thus concludes : — " The outlook is dark, .before us. With France.ad'.vttneing her pretensions to power m Egypt, which power she voluntarily threw up two years ago; with Russia bordering on Afghanistan ; and ; with :

the troubles, in the Soudan, m. the Ti ausvaal, • arid m Ireland, England has enough to do. That these troubles have cpiiie iinon her through ; want of decision aritl nerve on the ' pa.rtrqf the, present Cabinet, adds to the difficulty. But when Russia advances thrpngh Armenia pn Syi'ia, ,an. advance \yhich we niay expeci shortly, and when I Fra/ice aids her m tHat enterprise, England will. have to stand at bay for her veiy existence.. No Englishman iWould wisli to be at * war with France if it could possibly be averted, but better.. .that that should come than that we shoxild sink lower m humiliation. The Eastern Question is on the verge of -being re-opened!, ; this jiimo to be settled once for ever. It will ,enri. the hollow friendship . between' France and it will Jforce us .into Syria, and wl^en the great war that looms so near has been ifought out round the shores" of the JVjeditierrHnean, aud the, countries; adjacent:,; Eiigland. will come putof it iaintij ''yet victorious,'*