NEWS OF THE WEEK.

THE German Government has formally denied any intention of exchanging Kiao-chow for Samsah or any other place in China, and appears indeed to have obtained all its demands from the Government of Pekin. The lease of a territory one hundred miles in depth by one hundred in breadth has been ceded by the Chinese Foreign Office, as well as preferential rights to build railways and work coal-mines throughout the province of Shantung. The German Emperor is still shipping Marines for China, their place at Kiel being taken by volunteers ; Prince Henry has started for his new command ; and certain classes, at all events, warmly approve the new departure. The merchants of Hamburg have voted an enthusiastic address to the Emperor, the "mighty protector" of their trading rights, and the Catholic Bishops are for- warding by telegraph blessings upon his undertaking. The Letter news is important, because it implies that the Catholic Centre, which holds the balance of power in the Reichstag, will feel compelled to vote for the Naval Bill, and because it suggests that Rome will warmly support an extension of German dominion in the Far East. The Russian Press remains visibly irritable and suspicions, but the Russian Government has as yet made no sign.

The final scene at Kiel during a banquet to Prince Henry was one which is comprehensible only on the theory on which we enlarge elsewhere, that the Emperor and his brother are full of a great, or even gigantic, scheme. "I am conscious," said the Emperor, "that it is my duty to extend and enlarge what my predecessors have bequeathed to me,"—a very grave kind of consciousness in the master of two millions of trained men. "In the stupendous development of its commercial interests the German Empire has gained for itself such a position that it is my duty to bestow on it the protection it can claim." "Imperial power means naval power, and naval power and Imperial power are implicitly dependent on each other." May "every one in those distant regions be aware that the German Michael has firmly planted his shield, with the device of the German Eagle, upon the soil" of China, "in order once for all to give his protection to all who ask for it." "Should any one essay to detract from our just rights or to injure us, then up and at him with your mailed fist." Some of our contemporaries satirise the Emperor because of the disproportion between his deeds and his language, but if his Majesty means what we believe him to mean, viz., the carving of an Indian Empire out of China, the disproportion disappears.

Prince Henry's speech in reply is an amazing performance. The Prince is said to be a man of sense, who inherits much of his wise father's spirit of moderation, but he indulged ia language which makes readers think that the very spirit

of China has entered into his soul. After addressing his brother as "Most august Emperor, most mighty King and Lord, illustrious brother," and reminding the world that he and the Emperor "grew up as children together," and thanking his Majesty for his confidence, he proceeded to declare :—" Of one thing I may assure your Majesty,—neither fame nor laurels have charms for me. One thing is the aim that draws me on,—it is to declare in foreign lands the gospel of your Majesty's hallowed person ((las Evangelium Earer Majestiit geheiligter Person jet Auslande zu Linden), to preach it to every one who will hear it, and also to those who will not hear it. This gospel I will have inscribed on my banner, and I will inscribe it whithersoever I go." And then he called upon his followers to "let the cry resound far over the world, most august, most mighty, beloved Emperor. King and Lord for ever and ever. Hoch ! Hoch ! Hoch !" Re- collect that by the unbending etiquette of every Court in Europe the Emperor himself must have read those words before they were uttered, and then believe, if you can, that the brothers are thinking of a petty expedition. We wonder if we shall be thought superstitious if we say that swelling words like these uttered before an enterprise has well begun will bring no good-fortune in their train. That would have been the Greek thought, and we are not sure that it is not the Christian one too.

Sir William Lockhart has forced his way from Tirah to Bara, where he is in touch with Peshawur and will keep his troops till the spring. The Afridis evidently accepted his march as a retreat, and for the last three days there was almost continuous fighting, or rather the British had to fight all the evening, and then endure to be "sniped," that is, shot at, nearly all night. On the last days, while traversing the Bara Valley, the men had constantly to pass through icy-cold water, and were pressed by the enemy with relentless courage, the assailants coming up almost to the bayonets. In one place General Westmacott and his brigade were in imminent danger, the firing being close and continuous, and the march hampered by the wounded and by the number of baggage. animals. The men, however, Borderers, Sikhs, and Ghoorkas, though only four hundred and fifty in all, most of them foot. sore and all weary and half-frozen, fought most gallantly, and finally drove off the Afridis, as it is believed, with heavy loss. An effort will now be made to clear the Khyber Pass, but with that exception nothing will be done till the spring, when, as General Lockhart has told the Afridis in a proclama- tion, he will return to their country if they do not submit. They are, he says, but flies attacking a lion,—rather an unlucky simile, as the lion can do nothing to the flies, and the flies, if they attack his eyes, may worry him into flight. For the time being, however, the army of the frontier, in the old military phrase, "goes into winter quarters."

We can only hope it will not leave them again. As we have argued elsewhere, the soldiers have done as much as the conditions allowed, and there is absolutely nothing to be gained by renewing the campaign. We have no means of killing the mountaineers on a large scale, and they care little about the destruction of their villages, they, in fact, looking upon the whole business not as a war, but as a foot- ball match of exciting interest. We can give a most in- teresting evidence of this feeling. We have it on the evidence of competent eye-witnesses that the very men who are fighting us so savagely have sent numbers of their women and children into Peshawur for protection, where they are petted by the doctors and the ladies. That is, we think, an incident without a parallel in the history of war, and we find it difficult to believe that wild clansmen who have so accurately gauged the British charaoter, and believe in it so entirely, can be beyond the reach of an

arrangement. We are told, too, that the Afridis in our own service freely discuss the campaign with British officers, and though they openly exalt in the prowess of their tribesmen, display no malice and no desire to desert. It is a great game, in fact, that they are looking on at, with lives for stakes, and though they take sides, they feel no hate.

It is intended, we have reason to believe, to lighten the burden of the Frontier War to the Indian Government by making over to it rather a large slice of the surplus of the year. The money, of course, will be most grateful to the Indian Treasury, which is only trying to believe that the expenditure will not be more than two and a half millions. Simla, is, in fact, afraid of the financial consequences of its blunder, and whistles estimates to keep its courage up. A good big grant will be a benevolence, but it had better be given in relief of the Famine outlay than in aid of the Frontier War. Acts of God do not constitute precedents, and any State may be helped when visited with famine. If we lift the outlay on the frontier off the consciences of the soldiers and financiers in India, we shall take away the beat, indeed the only, guarantee for their moderation in pursuing a Forward policy. The men who govern India are among the best in- tentioned in the world, but they are fanatics as to British rule, and if anybody would give them the money they would conquer Asia without a scruple. They think they could do it too. It is really the fact that men in high office in Simla expected the Afridi country to be subjugated in a fortnight, and would like to " wig " Sir William Lockhart because he has taken a little longer time.

The Spanish Government is believed to be in danger from a cause which in this country has almost escaped attention. The leading military officers are profoundly irritated at the insults which President McKinley has, as they conceive, poured upon the Army of Spain in alleging publicly that it makes war in Cuba in a way contrary to the civilised code, and calculated to shock the consciences of mankind. Twenty Generals have, it is said, demanded that the Government should issue a public protest, either in the form of a despatch, to be transmitted to Washington, or of a manifesto to the nation. These officers all support General Weyler ; and the fear is that they will head a military revolt, intended either to make him the head of the Administration, or to dethrone the child-King in favour of Don Carlos. There can be little doubt that the pride of the nation has been cruelly wounded by the language used at Washington ; and the Sagasta Government, seriously alarmed, has issued a weak notification that the accusations made against it are libels, and that foreigners should believe nothing unless countersigned either from Havana or Madrid. It is not probable that Spain is prepared for a Carlist Revolution, but it is quite possible that the army in Cuba may make a pronunciamento, or that the Ministry may think the only road out of the situation is through a defiance to the United States. In either case war may be much nearer than is generally supposed, especially if the American Senate, after an excited debate, passes a resolu- tion favouring the immediate recognition of "a state of war in Cuba."

M. Henri Rochefort affects to know the true story of the Dreyfus affair. Captain Dreyfus, he says, irritated by his slight prospect, as a Jew, of serious promotion, offered to become a German subject on condition that he should receive equivalent rank in the German Army. The Emperor, pleased by this adhesion from an Alsatian, accepted the offer, and in an autograph letter to Captain Dreyfus directed him to remain in Paris as he could serve Germany more efficiently there. Eight letters, including the Emperor's, were stolen from the house of the German Ambassador and sold to the French Foreign Office, but the German Ambassador, suspecting the truth, reclaimed them under a threat of his immediate departure. The French accordingly surrendered them, but kept photographs, which M. Rochefort or his informant has seen. The French Government in the most explicit manner denies the truth of the story, as does the Government of Germany ; but Paris, accustomed to official denials, remains suspicions, and so full of libels that the Ministry publicly threatens to bring in a Bill limiting the freedom of political slander. The Rochefort story looks like an invention intended to compel Government to publish the truth, and as the agitation does not die away, they may yet be compelled to take this course. They have, however, it should be remarked, the support of both Chambers and of the Army.

Mr. Asquith made an interesting speech at Stockton on Wednesday evening. It was, he declared, in the interest of all (1) that the employer, who provided the capital and super- intendence, should have a free hand in the management of his business; (2) that the individual workman should have the protection which he could get only from union with his fellows. That is the problem in a nutshell. As to female suffrage the oracle was dumb, though Mr. Asquith affirmed that the only body which had authority to declare the policy of the Liberal party was the Liberal party itself,—a remark which, while it will not please the National Liberal Federa- tion, leaves us in doubt as to what the party is. Mr. Asquith cannot mean that it is merely the Liberal Members of Parlia- ment. As to the House of Lords, Mr. Asquith made a most important statement, and one which appears to show that he is not so hostile to the Referendum as most of his colleagues. There were, he declared, only two possible solutions to the question. The first was to make the veto of the House of Lords suspensory and not definitive,—either limited in point of time, or inoperative as against a second or a third declara- tion of the will of the House of Commons. The other was to enable either Howe, when there was an irreconcilable difference of opinion between them, to refer the specific issue to the judgment of the nation. Mr. Asquith did not declare for either solution. The fact, however, that he admits the possibility of the Referendum solution is a great advance.

Lord Wolseley, speaking at the distribution of prizes to the members of the 2nd Volunteer Battalion Royal Fusiliers at the St. James's Hall on Tuesday, declared that it was not trite to say that there was no career open to men in the Army. There were at the present moment serving in the Army 875 commissioned officers who had risen from the ranks, 950 warrant officers, and 14,479 sergeants, making a total of over 16,000 men, "who at the present were very well provided for, and all of whom were entitled to pensions. Besides that, there were 12,000 corporals; who also received very fair pensions." That is a very interesting statement, and proves that there are a good many openings in the Army for the specially good men. It does not, however, meet the contention that under present circum- stances the Army does not offer a career to the ordinary and average soldier, as it does to the ordinary and average officer, and as the Navy practically does to the ordinary and average Marine. The soldiers who have not the ability to rise, and they are 90 per cent., cannot make a career out the Army.

On Tuesday Lord Rosebery, in presenting Sir John Hutton, ex-Chairman of the London County Council, with his portrait, made one of his graceful and thoughtful speeches. Though not so amusing as that to the Gimcrack Club, it was also fall of humour. The chief point of the speech was a eulogium —and one which we believe is well deserved—on the unseen work of the Council in its Committees. If men wanted to get on in the Council, it must be by honest hard work in the Committees, and not by eloquent speeches at odd moments in the afternoon. At one time the Council might, perhaps, have broken a little loose in the matter of abstract discussion, but now it confined itself to municipal business. That is, perhaps, only claiming for the Council that it does its strict duty; but after all that is a claim which will always deserve recognition. It is interesting to note how proud Lord Rosebery remains of his connection with the Council.

On Friday, December 10th, Mr. Balfour spoke at the opening of a Conservative club at High Wycombe. Ile began the "operative" part of his speech by contrasting Mr. Morley's attitude on the House of Lords question with that of the National Liberal Federation. Mr. Morley said they must not attack the Lords till the Lords gave them an oppor- tunity by throwing out some great popular measure. The National Liberal Federation were for patting the destruction of the House of Lords in the very forefront of their pro- gramme. No doubt Mr. Morley's plan was the better tactics, but where were they going to find this legislative proposal which would bring the House of Lords and the people into collision? "Are we to find it in Home-rule ? Are we to find fi in Local Veto? Are we to find it in the alteration of the laws of registration ? Can any human being conceive that iche masses of this country and the House of Commons are going to rise because the House of Lords maintain their .constitutional privilege in regard to those measures P" The thing is absurd. Mr. Morley will have to wait till Doomsday if he is not to touch the Lords till they deprive the people of something they really want, for that the House of Lords is much too wise, or, if you like, too timid, ever to do. Mr. Balfour's speech, though not a great one in any sense, was interesting because so characteristic. It was equally com- pounded of good sense and good feeling, and without a touch 1. egotism or of irascibility, the ordinary politician's chief pitfalls when he comes to speech-making.

, It is not often our good fortune to abstract a speech so packed with sound sense and public wisdom as Sir Robert Giffen's speech on Free-trade to the North Staffordshire Chamber of Commerce at Stoke. But just because the speech was so admirable we despair of giving our readers any true idea of its contents. Sir Robert Giffen showed, in effect, that Protection does not protect, and that though there is so much talk of the decay of Free-trade, Free-trade has been winning all along the line. "A third to half the world is for Free-trade." Dealing with the British Empire, Sir Robert Giffen practically states (though he does not use the phrase) what we have always held,—namely, that there is no real protection, but only a certain number of local Octrois on an imposing scale. Victoria is supposed to be the great Protectionist Colony, and yet even there the whole manufacturing population—i.e., the population which is pro- tectable—is not more than fifty thousand, and a large part of these are engaged in the manufacture of mineral waters and other things which must by their nature be produced locally. In the United States it is doubtful "whether even 5 per cent. of the producers receive any protection from the Tariff of any sort or kind." Protection, too, declares Sir Robert Giffen, is played out in the United States. In most parts of the Continent a stage of development will soon be reached which, as happened here, will make it no longer possible to tax food and raw material. But when protection for these goes, so will protection for manufactures. That is, we believe, an entirely sound view, though owing to the hatred of all foieigners for direct taxation, tariffs for revenue pur- poses—i.e., an Imperial Octroi—will be kept up by all the chief Continental States.

On Monday last the vote was taken in the Engineering Trade-Union, with the result that the men practically unanimously refused the masters' terms. We think they were wrong from the point of view of their own and the country's interests, but for all that we cannot help admiring the men for their pluck and for their loyalty in standing by their leaders. When the vote was communicated to the masters an effort was made to reopen the Conference, and in the middle of the week it seemed as if things might still be adjusted with satisfaction to both sides. As we write, however, the symptoms seem less favourable, and we fear that a compromise will not be agreed on. If that happens, the men will enter upon a struggle which must mean great personal misery, the loss of their savings, and at the end of it all a return to work on the masters' terms, with a weak and shattered Union. At present we fear temper on both sides is prejudicing the issues. On one point, however, we feel convinced. The masters' terms are not meant to, and do not, destroy the right of collective bargaining.

On Tuesday the House of Lords gave judgment on one of the most important points ever raised before them. In reversing the decisions of the Courts below, as they did in .Allen o. Flood," they decided that no action will lie against A for going to B and stating that if he continues to employ C he (A) will no longer continue to work for B, there being of course no contract binding B to continue employing C. The Lord Chancellor, Lord Ashbonrne, and Lord Morris held that an action would lie ; but Lords Watson, Herschell, Davey, Shand, Macnaghten, and James of Hereford decided that no legal wrong had been committed. That the majority were right in law we have no doubt, and it is clear that they were right in policy, for if the previous decision had stood, a

principle would have been admitted which would have most seriously interfered with liberty of individual action. As it is, the House of Lords has in effect declared that for civil wrongs, at any rate, you cannot manufacture an illegal act out of a series of acts which, taken by themselves, are legal. The judgment also leaves it clear that in civil wrongs you must not inquire into motives. That is sound sense as well as sound law. The present case may be a hard one, but imagine the result of allowing a discharged servant to bring an action against a third party for maliciously inducing hia master to give him notice. The decision is regarded as a Trade-Union victory, and so in a sense it is ; but it is a great protection also to the Masters' Federations, who but for it might have been liable to very harassing prosecutions. In truth, it is a right and reasonable decision, and so fair to both sides.

M. Alphonse Daudet, the well-known French novelist, died in Paris on Thursday evening at about 8 o'clock. He was at the dinner-table with his family, and seemed in the best of spirits, when he was suddenly seized with an attack of syncope. He never rallied, but died soon after in the pre- sence of his wife and children, and of the cure of the Church of St. Clothilde, who had been summoned to administer the last rites of the Church. Whether his regular novels will live is a, difficult question. Without doubt many of them are very touching and full of human interest, but they have not the flesh-and-blood qualities of Dickens's work nor the deep insight of Balzac,—the insight which allowed him to unmask the actors in the human comedy. Daudet's position as a humourist is much more assured. The three delightful books devoted to Tartarin will surely live. They have the spirit of Don Quixote without any material imitation. Tartarin is a real living man, and in spite of the ropeoutting incident one loves him and his mock heroisms. Tartarin will live, even if "Le Nabab," a really great novel in its way, does not.

A great sensation has been caused in London this week by the cruel murder of a favourite actor, Mr. William Lewin, of the Adelphi, whose stage-name was Terries. He was letting himself into the theatre by the stage-door in Maiden Lane on Thursday evening when a man rushed at him end stabbed him with a long butcher's knife. The knife reached the aorta, and though assistance was at once rendered, in a few minutes he expired. He was only forty- eight. His assailant, who made no effort to escape, was at once arrested, and proved to be a supernumerary named William Archer, who had latterly found little employment, and had been repeatedly relieved by Mr. Terries. He had, however, at last been sent to the Actors' Benevolent Society, but after considering his case they refused their assistance. It is supposed that Archer, who was known to be irritated by Mr. Terries's great success on the stage, attributed the refusal to him, and sought revenge by killing his benefactor. The facts leave little doubt as to the guilt of the man., arrested, but there is some as to his state of mind. The murder of an actor is, considering the jealousies and hatreds inseparable from stage-life, a curiously rare event. The unreality of the stage seems to affect even the passions it produces.

• Connected with the murder of Mr. Terries is a. very curious story of prevision. Mr. Frederick Lane, Mr. Terriss's under- study, declares that on the night before the murder he dreamt he saw Mr. Terries lying on the landing surrounded by a crowd, and that he was raving. The story is a very curious one, and might be used to illustrate the article on "The New Trend of Psychical Research" which appears in another part of our issue. Yet, even granted that the dream was not a mere coincidence, it does not prove positively a prevision of the future. Suppose, as is quite possible, that Mr. Terriss's mind was occupied with the thought, hope that mad fellow I had to refuse any further help to will not take it into his head to revenge himself by murdering me.' If that thought did occur, there is no reason, under the theory of thought- transference, why it should not have been transferred from Mr. Terriss's to Mr. Lane's mind.

Bank Rate, 3 per cent.

New Consols (2,t) were on Friday, 112i.