3 SEPTEMBER 1910, Page 16

THE EMS TELEGRAM.

[To ma Emma Or TUE "Smcraroa.") Sra,—The controversial discussion in your columns of the affair of "The Ems Telegram" has been conducted with great ingenuity, but, unless I err, without complete recognition of the ascertained facts of that famous Bismarckian incident. Of the French historical writers of the time none is more accurate than that admirable representative of the anti- Dryasdust school, M. Seignobos, whose "Political History of Contemporary Europe" gives an exhaustive estimate of the attitude of the Duo de Gramont, Benedetti, and Bismarck in the affair. In a final paragraph the Parisian

scholar says Bismarck having boasted lately of having modified the terms of the Note to make war inevitable, the German Socialists reproached him with having falsified the Ems despatch, and the French Press has repeated the accusation. It is enough to compare the two texts to show that there was no falsification. . . . . The Note published by Bismarck adds nothing which is not in the despatch ; it simply abbreviates it " ; adding that the champions in the lists would do well to study the French text now quoted—I am, Sir, &c., Wimbledon. G. S., Diplomatist rucle-donatus.