A PROPHETIC PICTURE.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 722, 11 October 1870, Page 3

A PROPHETIC PICTURE.

Cornelius O'Dowd, in a paper in Blackwood of May last, nearly two months before the declaration of war, has the following sentences : —" The most careless reader of his newspaper cannot fail to see that the present condition of Europe is far from settled; :hat the vast changes called into existence by late wars have not yet resolved themselves into finality; and if we are not at this moment spectators of a great war on the continent, it is simply because thoy, who should stand out as adversaries, haye not been able to consolidate the alliance on which they might rely in the day of a reverse. France and Prussia are angling with the same bait; and, even up to this, Russia and Austria, and even Italy, are reluctant to pledge themselves with either. Now so linked are the fortunes of each state of Europe with the other, that no movement can take ijlace in one without corresponding thanges elsewhere. The uprising of France will threaten the independence of Belgium, the safety of Northern Germany, the Ehine border and the small state contiguous to it—not to speak of Italy, which may become either ally or enemy, as the French determine by their occupation of, or departure from, Eome. The movement of Eussia implies the re-opening of the Eastern Question —that is, the actual existence of Turkey." We can only hope that the picture may not come true in all its details.