The Italians are unintelligibly angry with England for send- ing
an expedition to Egypt. Their interests are not interfered with,—are rather promoted, like those of all other civilised States ; but for weeks the Italian Press has been abusing this country, decrying the Expedition, and circulating absurd false- hoods, as, for example, that 2,000 bloodhounds had been sent to Alexandria, to assist in tracking Arabi's followers. Even the Ministry lent itself to this feeling, and S. Depretis is said, perhaps falsely, to have told the Chamber that the Italian Fleet was too well organised to fear hostilities with Great Britain. Recently a change has occurred, and the journals repudiate hostility to England ; but the burst of passing temper remains unexplained. It was due, we imagine, partly to the annoyance of Italians at our quiescence in the Tunis affair, which has left an incurable impression in Italy, but chiefly to alarm at the sudden revela- tion of the terrible force which Great Britain can exert in the Mediterranean. Italians, though they have no quarrel with England, and are never likely to have any, feel as if they were less safe in joining alliances against France. The same emo- tion of fear must influence the Spaniards, who have not even a colony in Egypt ; but in both countries, as in France, the feeling is in great part journalistic. Throughout Southern Europe, including France, the journalists are much more in- clined to chauvinism than the people are,—a phenomenon not infrequent nearer home.
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