The Times correspondent at Vienna states that negotiations are proceeding
for an alliance between Servia and Montenegro, such as preceded the Turkish War in 1876. The object of the Russian Government in promoting this alliance is, it is believed in the Balkans, to employ the two Powers for an attack on Bulgaria, which, if successful, would break down the resistance of Sofia to Russian plans. So serious is Bulgarian belief in this scheme, that the Premier, M. Stam- bouloff, recently asked the Ottoman Commissioner at Sofia whether Bulgaria might rely, if attacked, even by Russia, on the assistance of the Ottoman Army, now reorganised under a German Chief of the Staff. The reply, after a consultation with Constantinople, was in the affirmative, and as we have pointed out elsewhere, is of the last importance. It makes of Bulgaria a strong State for military purposes, lying right across the Russian road to Constantinople. It is probably a perception of the meaning of these facts which has induced alarmists to multiply rumours of an approaching coup de main against Armenia. That might be possible if the French elec- tions went in favour of the Republic; but it would mean that the Czar had, for the time, given up all idea of interference in the West.
