The Paris correspondent of the Times, in a letter published
on Monday, contributes an important detail to modern history. Some of our readers may remember a rumour which spread about in 1875, that another war between Germany and France was imminent, and that it had been averted by Russia and Great Britain. The rumour was tree, the danger having been admitted by Prince Hohenlohe, the German Ambassador in Paris, to the correspondent in order that he might help to avert it. The military party in Germany had persuaded the Emperor William that France was in- creasing its army for offensive purposes, and that another invasion was indispensable. The orders were on the point of being issued when Prince Hohenlohe, obviously under secret instructions from Bismarck, revealed the plot to the Times, and by thus warning the Czar and Queen Victoria averted the coming catastrophe. But for their intervention France, which was by no means ready, might have been crashed and reduced into a second-class State. We believe that account
to be in the main accurate, and it reveals one of the dangers of European politics. There is a party anxious for "action," which means war, in every European State, and it sometimes obtains a momentary ascendency over the men, seldom soldiers, who can set armies in motion.
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