We mentioned last week the alarm excited both in Germany
and Austria-Hungary by the military demands for money, and this week that alarm has been accentuated. The Austrian Minister of War, in a moment of over- confidence, informed the Delegations that to raise the Army of the Empire to its full strength would cost £12,000,000 a year more than is now expended, but that they must go on till either a catastrophe or a disarma- ment had arrived. The speaker said probably more than he meant ; but the words have created great agitation, both Austrians and Hungarians declaring that they cannot and will not bear taxation so heavy. " They are half-ruined already." The Government has had to explain that General Bauer spoke only of certain contingencies, and the Delegations will vote the three millions a year now demanded ; but the feeling of alarm remains, and it is feared that the speech will greatly diminish the reluctance of the two Parliaments to go to war. They do not see their way to annual loans, and they know that their constituents will dismiss them rather than bear additional taxation. As we have so repeatedly pointed out, it already presses on their low incomes with a severity which has hardly ever been felt in England, except perhaps in 1816, when every one is believed to have been paying a third of all he earned to the Treasury.
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