One of the chief features of the week abroad has
been the "hunt of obloquy" which has broken out in Germany over Mr. Chamberlain's perfectly fair and courteously ex- pressed statement as to German military action in the war of 1870. In effect, Mr. Chamberlain declared that if we had to adopt severer measures towards the Boers, we could find precedents in the action of those nations who now criticise our "barbarity and cruelty," including the precedents of the Franco-German War. Yet for saying this Mr. Chamberlain is accused of having insulted the German nation and Army. We confess to thinking that the British Press has made rather too much of an agitation which is to some extent due to Boer intrigue, and still more to the-restlessness and irritation caused by the German industrial depression—the Germans are uncomfortable, and so want to swear at some one—but still the phenomenon is not pleasant. Probably the German Government regrets the agitation, though it does little or nothing to stem it, for it is obvious that the result will be to push England in the direction of Russia and France, and away from Germany. We cannot honestly say that we should ourselves regret such a result, but do the Germans want. it P It is true that French public opinion is also hostile, but for some reason or other French criticism, even when very strong, does not awake anything approaching the feeling produced by German hostility.
