NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THE event of the week has been the publication of a letter from Mr. Gladstone to Count Karolyi, explaining the former's position towards the Austrian Empire. Mr. Gladstone, on May 4th, informs the Austrian Ambassador that he thanks him for his letter and report of their conversations, and that for himself, he had resolved, as a Minister," not to repeat, or even to defend in argument, polemical language in regard to more than one -foreign Power " which he had used" when in a position of greater -freedom and less responsibility." He regrets that he "should even have seemed to impute to his Imperial Majesty language which he did not use," the Emperor having only "regretted Mr. Gladstone's hostile disposition towards Austria." Mr. Gladstone, however, has no such disposition towards any country what- ever, and has a cordial respect for the efforts of the Emperor to consolidate his empire. With respect to the general point, Mr. Gladstone says that "grave apprehensions had been excited in his mind lest Austria should play a part in the Balkan penin- sula hostile to the freedom of the emancipated populations, and to the reasonable and warranted hopes of the sub- jects of the Sultan." Count Karolyi, however, had assured him that the Austrian Government had "no desire whatever to extend or add to the rights it had acquired under the Treaty of Berlin, and that any such extension would be actually pre- judicial to Austria-Hungary ;" and he therefore, in presence of that assurance, withdrew the terms of censure he had employed, 4‘ which he could now wholly banish from his mind."
