The probability of that is increased by the reports of
the negotiations conducted by M. Potemkin, the Vice-Com- missar for Foreign Affairs, in the course of his journey to Ankara, Bucarest, Sofia and Warsaw, whence he returned to Moscow on Thursday. A firm agreement for joint defence against aggression is understood to have been reached between Turkey on the one side and Great Britain and France on the other, and only the steps necessary to relate it to the probable Russo-British and Russo-French agreements remain to be taken. After M. Potemkin's talks at Ankara that should raise no difficulty. Turkey and Russia, moreover, can exercise between them considerable suasion at Bucarest, where M. Gafencu, fresh from his contacts with the leading statesmen of Europe, enjoys much enhanced influence, and at Sofia, where serious difficulties have still to be sur- mounted. The appointment of a Russian Minister at War- saw and the promise of a similar appointment at Bucarest are welcome evidences of a new solidarity in Eastern Europe, for both posts have been long—and designedly—vacant. When all allowance is made for the prevalence of uncertainty and the frequency of disappointment there are good grounds for the belief that the negotiations of the past month are about to yield valuable results in Eastern Europe.
