NEWS OF THE WEEK.
N°THING is certain in Turkey except uncertainty, but the latest telegrams seem to show that the peace negotiations will really be concluded to-day. The Times' correspondent at Constantinople. telegraphing on Thursday, states that Tewfik Pasha has initialled five articles of the preliminaries, and that the settlement of the sixth and last, defining the method of evacuation, "is confidently expected at Saturday's meeting." If the negotiations are successful and peace is finally con- cluded, it is probable that the result will have been achieved not so much by the pressure of the Powers as by the Sultan's need for money. The impossibility in present circumstances of carrying out certain financial operations—i.e., a new loan —has made Turkey anxious for a settlement. The troops, too, are dying in Thessaly, and it is also feared that Bulgaria., Servia, and Montenegro may be going to make some move of importance. The Paris correspondent of the Daily Chronicle even hints that there is to be a general rising in European Turkey, and the Standard correspondent reports a rather ugly incident on the Servian frontier. The Albanians are said to have occupied four Servian blockhouses. The reports from Athens that the King would abdicate rather than accept inter- national financial control have been denied. Kings, even when they value their thrones comparatively little, as is probably the case with the Greek Sovereign, seldom really abdicate except under great internal ppssure.
The news from Crete is interesting and not altogether un- satisfactory. On Wednesday it was announced with a great flourish of trumpets that "a Turkish naval division" had sailed for Canes, and later, that "a second Turkish naval division" had left the Dardanelles for Crete. This was too much even for the Powers, and the Admirals "decided," to use Mr. Goschen's phrase in the House of Commons. that they would not permit the entry of Turkish warships into Canea Bay. "That action was not disapproved by her Majesty's Government." Evidently the Admirals were inclined to take the Turkish intentions seriously, for they patrolled the coasts of the island and ordered "drastic measures" in case the Turkish ships appeared and refused to be ordered off. They also asked for reinforcements, and European troops well supplied with ammunition were strongly posted at the village of Halepa. "In the event of hostile action," says a Reuter telegram, "the insurgents are prepared to join the troops and lend them assistance?' One cannot help wishing that such a wholesome form of joint action had taken place. It is need- less to say that these preparations prevented the appearance of the Turkish ships, and that the Porte explained that the squadron had only gone for a summer cruise off Mitylene. If the Admirals had taken action of this resolute kind before they would not now be burdened with the presence of Djevad Pasha. Meantime they have had the satisfaction of receiving from the Deputies of the principal provinces an official declaration accepting autonomy. "This document is the first submitted to the Powers giving unanimous expression to the views of the Cretans."
On Tuesday news was received from India that the column sent to relieve Chakdara had accomplished its purpose, and that Colonel Meiklejohn entered at about 9 o'clock on Monday. This prompt action proved to be highly necessary. After being foiled at Malakand, the enemy concentrated their attention on Chakdara. Six thousand men, says the Times' telegram, would have assaulted the fort on Monday, scaling parties being told off. The appearance of Colonel Meiklejohn's force caused their retirement. The defence of the fort was evidently well and bravely managed. What is most satisfactory about the whole affair is the proof it affords of the extreme mobility of the Indian Army. No power in the world can strike more swiftly and strongly than the Government of India. General Blood's expedition will make the whole frontier—not excluding the Ameer—understand that we mean to hold the border in peace and safety, and that those who break the peace will have short shrift.
On Saturday it was announced that the German Corn. mercial Treaty had beea "denounced" by the British Govern- ment, and would terminate, therefore, on July 30th, 1898. On Monday a similar announcement was made in regard to the Belgian Treaty. In a year's time, therefore, there will be nothing to prevent the Colonies shaping their tariffs with absolute freedom. Contrary to expectation, there has been no great outburst of ill-feeling in Germany. The more sensible papers, indeed, declare that England is far too good a customer to make it advisable to try a policy of reprisals. Probably in both cases new arrangements will be made which, while leaving the Colonies free, will not put any fresh obstacles in the way of our exports. In England the denunciation of the Treaties has been received with a chorus of approval by the organs of both political parties. It is clear that the general sense of the nation is in favour of giving the Colonies complete fiscal autonomy.
In the House of Commons on Saturday, after an attempt to defeat the Manoeuvres Bill, which, we are glad to see, passed its third reading, the Irish Members settled down to flout and impede the Irish Judicature Act. Mr. Dillon was extremely anxious about the precedence of the Lord Chief Baron and the unnecessary high pay of the Judges, which was, he declared, out of all proportion to their earnings at the Bar. The Government were bound to show they could not procure competent men at 22,000 a year. Mr. Davitt was indignant that the number of Irish Judges was not farther reduced. There would be seventeen for a population of a little over four millions. On the same scale England would have one hundred and forty Judges. After a good deal of wrangling the Bill was reported to the House, the Irish Members being evidently more anxious to make nasty speeches than to destroy the measure. For ourselves we would gladly have seen the number of Irish Judges re- duced to ten, or at the most twelve. The proposal to reduce their pay was, however, purely mischievous. Even if no barrister in Ireland made 21,000 a year the Judges ought to be well paid. The ultimate reason for paying Judges highly is to prevent the possibility of their being in any way influenced by pecuniary considerations. In the end low salaries mean, we will not say a corrupt Bench, but a Bench liable to external influences. That is the experience of all countries where Judges are paid at the rate of first-class stationmasters.
On Monday in the House of Lords Lord Salisbury had an amusing little passage of arms with Lord Farrer, who made a vigorous protest against the passage of the "Foreign Prison- made Goods Bill." After referring to the "really admirable Workmen's Compensation Bill," Lord Fairer told a striking story of Mr. Bright. He remembered speaking with Mr. Bright soon after the democratic Reform Bill had been passed, and he said :—" The people have now the power in their own hands. If those whose duty it is to speak to them speak the truth, all will be well. But if, instead of speaking the truth, they flatter their prejudices, God help them both ! " Lord Salisbury, after referring to Lcrd Ferrer as the advocate of an outworn doctrine standing preaching in the wilderness, proceeded to declare that Lord Farrer thought only of the consumer. "For him the producer does not exist." As to the Bill, said Lord Salisbury, he was confused with the con- flict of high principles, and could only deal with a little morsel of fact. All sides had agreed that goods made in English prisons should not be allowed to compete with ordinary labour. Therefore, it was only right to treat foreign prison-made goods on the same principle. We will not argue the prison-labour question, but if Lord Salisbury imagines that the doctrine of Free-trade is outworn, he is greatly mistaken. The mass of the people are as strong as ever they were in their desire to buy in the cheapest market.
On Wednesday in the Commons a debate on Colonial affairs was raised on the second reading of the Consolidated Fund Bill. It was, however, not important, except for a statement made by Mr. Chamberlain. After pointing out that his despatch to the Transvaal in regard to the Aliens Act had been justified by the yielding of that Government, and stating that the negotiations in regard to the notification of treaties were proceeding satisfactorily, he dealt with the demand for arbitration. It was not true that the late Government sub- mitted the terms of a Convention between the suzerain and the subordinate Power to the arbitration of a foreign Power. They merely submitted to the decision of the Chief Justice of the Free State certain details "by which effect should be given to the Convention." Mr. Chamberlain is, we believe, acting for the good of the Empire when he thus insists that the Transvaal must never be treated as if it were an independent foreign State quite outside the Empire. It is within the Empire, though endowed with the most full and complete powers of autonomy,—an autonomy to which, of course, the most scrupulous respect ought to be paid.
Parliament rose late on Friday. The last important act of the House of Commons was to vote the Indian Budget. Lord George Hamilton's statement was not par- ticularly lucid, but the main facts are sufficiently clear. For the year 1896-97 the Budget estimate showed a surplus of Rx.463,100. The revised estimate, however, showed a deficit of Rx.1,986,000,—a change entirely due to the Famine, in consequence of which the loss of revenue had been Rx.3,029,500 and the increase of expenditure Rx.3,045,600. To meet this, and also a loss on the opium revenue, there were, however, certain improvements. There was a benefit derived from the improvement in exchange amounting to Rx.1,728,600. There was also a reduction of ordinary expenditure of Rx.1,143,500, and there was an increase of ordinary revenue of Ex.1,498,200. Since these figures were compiled some further information had been received by telegraph which would make the total deficit work out at Rx.1,593,500.
Taking the last two years and the coming year together the following was the net result. We had a surplus in the first of Rx.1,534,000, a deficit in the second of Rx.1,593.000, and an estimated deficit in the third of Rx.2,164,000, making a total excess of expenditure over income for the three years of Rx.2,223,000. Probably the charges for the coming year would be increased by an extra expenditure on famine and war of Rx.1,460,000, but against this must be put the good harvest and the rise in exchange, and it was to be hoped, therefore, that the Budget estimate would not be exceeded. Never had so many troubles, said Lord George Hamilton in conclusion, been packed together in so short a time; but Lord Elgin was equal to the task, and had achieved an unbroken success. The debate which followed was of a rather futile description, except for a speech from Sir Henry Fowler, which was quite admirable. It showed svm-
pathy, knowledge, courage, and discretion in a high degree, and was worthy of the very best traditions of Anglo-Indian statesmanship.
The King of Siam arrived on board his yacht at Spithead on Friday, July 30th, and after various ceremonies, including luncheon, proceeded to Buckingham Palace. Since then, and in spite of the heat, which has tried most Orientals now in London as much as Englishmen, the King, under the guidance of Lord Harris, has been as busy sight-seeing as a country cousin. He has seen the Queen, Harrow, the Tower, Westminster Abbey, and plenty of other show places, and he has never ceased asking eager and intelligent questions. There is clearly very little of "the brooding East" about the King of Siam.
On Tuesday the Bishops attending the Lambeth Con- ference visited Glastonbury,—a place necessarily of immense interest to the Anglican Church, since there English Christianity can claim a continuous succession from the primitive British Church. After the Bishops had walked from the parish church to the Abbey in a procession, which contained a thousand people, and after a service held amid what is one of the most beautiful, though by no means one of the largest, ruins in England, the Bishop-designate of Bristol—late the Bishop of Stepney—preached a very striking sermon. (The reports are somewhat meagre, but sufficient to show how wise was the choice made for this great occasion.) After dealing with certain grave errors "contained in the document issued by Cardinal Vaughan and all the Roman Catholic Bishops in England in 1893, in which they claimed that England was dedicated in early times to St. Peter," the Bishop declared that "the usurped authority of the Pope was thrown off, and the monasteries were destroyed, by a King and people of the unreformed faith ; that the Pope himself guaranteed to his own followers the undisturbed possession of the plunder of the Abbeys ; and that the
Roman Catholic' Sovereign, Queen Mary, passed a stringent Act securing to those who had got it, not the plunder of Abbeys alone, but of vicarages, rectories, bishoprics, and arch- bishoprics." The Bishop ended his sermon by a touching reference to the personal results of the Conference. "We go, forth to our various tasks, drawn together in a way that I could not have conceived a month ago."
Sir Wilfrid Laurier's speech made in Paris on Monday last was so able and so adroit that it deserves special notice. French Canada loved France and never more than when she was unfortunate; "but the bonds uniting it with Great Britain were imposed not by force but by gratitude and affection, gratitude to the great nation which protected not only its liberties, but its interests ; for two days ago that pro- tection of its interests had gone to the point of denouncing commercial treaties." There had been no animosity of race in Canada, and never had it appealed in vain to the noble and generous English race. But though the political relations of France and Canada had been for ever separated, their com- mercial relations were capable of immense development. "Quebec might supply France with timber, hides, and the raw material of paper." In a word, Sir Wilfrid contrived to be sentimental, loyal, and do a little business all in one breath. It is curious to think that French Canada would fight to the last man rather than become a French colony and be ruled from Paris.
The case of Gungadhur Tilak, charged with seditious incitement, came before the Police-court at Bombay on Saturday last and on Monday. The leading members of the European• Bar having refused to accept briefs on behalf of the prisoner—a decision to be regretted, unless there was some reason not prinui fade apparent— the prisoner was defended by a Parsee barrister, Mr. Davur. The case excited the keenest interest among all classes, and the green outside the Court was crowded. Among other printed incitements adduced by the prosecution was a poem in which Sivajee, the founder of the Mahratta Power, awakes from sleep and laments the degradation of the people under British rule. The poem, after ingeniously bringing in the cow-killing grievance—" She whom I wor- shipped as my mother and protected more than my life is taken daily to the slaughter-house and ruthlessly butchered—" adds. "He himself (the butcher) came running
, 'exactly ,within the line of fire of my gun, and I thought him to be a bear." Then follows a passage as to the alleged ill-treatment of women, with a curious reminiscence of Burke's speech on Marie Antoinette. The poem infers that in former days "a thousand sharp swords would have leaped from their scabbards." The prisoner was com- mitted for trial on September 16th. On Tuesday Mr. Justice Tyebjee admitted the prisoner to bail, himself in 50,000 rupees -and two sureties in 25,000 rupees each.
The Daily Telegraph of Monday, gives prominence to the fact that at the recent conference between Mr. Chamberlain and the Colonial Premiers the latter strongly urged the -claim of the Colonial stocks to be included in the list of trustee investments,—i.e., to rank as stocks in which ttastees may ingest unless specially forbidden to do so by the trust deed. The objections to such an enlargement of the existing statute are obvious. Parliament, to begin with, has no control over Colonial loans, and though the Colonial funds are now perfectly sound, any Colony might, by entering upon a policy -of wild borrowing, reduce its stocks far below the level of safety. Again, the easy terms on which the Colonies would get money were their loans made trust securities might make them borrow too rapidly and too much. If, however, some automatic check could be placed on Colonial borrowings, these objections would disappear, and both the Colonies and the cestui que trustent would greatly benefit. Our solution of the problem is to enact that Colonial stocks shall be Trustee stocks when the indebtedness does not amount to more than say, £60 per head of the white population. Under such a scheme no Colony could increase its indebtedness unless its prosperity had also increased, for in the Colonies population is a certain test of prosperity. The advantage of the scheme would be its automatic character. If a Colony over-borrowed, its stocks would drop out just as do the debentures of a rail- way company if it passes a dividend. The Colonies might also meet a legal objection that is sometimes raised by making their Treasuries act on the decrees of our Courts in the same way as does the Bank of England.
Mr. Gladstone made a very pleasant little speech at the annual prize-giving of the Hawarden and Brockley Horti- cultural Society on Monday. He read with pride a letter he had received from a farmer who had acted on his advice, and devoted a portion of his land to the growth of fruit and lowers. By doing so he had been able to supply fruit to the dwellers in large towns at a 50 per cent, reduction on former prices, to increase his labourers' wages by 20 per cent., and to make a very substantial profit for himself. Mr. Gladstone went on to rejoice that the products of the whole world could some without let or hindrance to the tables of our labouring people, and he trusted that no delusions and no quackery would ever be allowed to interfere with these benefits. "Yet if any of these products can be better raised at home, I delight in it." It would be a very good thing if some five or six hundred million of the twelve hundred million eggs imported from abroad could be laid at home. "You may depend upon this, that the nearer an egg is laid to the place where it is con- sumed, the better it will be." That is delightfully character- istic. Mr. Gladstone never fails to find a broad general principle to support the cause he advocates. It is sound sense, too. Our neglect of the poultry industry is 'deplorable.
It was definitely announced on Saturday last that the famous 'collection of pictures, armour, and other works of art left to the nation by Lady Wallace will be vested in a special body of trustees. Besides Mr. John Murray Scott, designated in the will as trustee, this body includes Lord Rosebery and Mr. Alfred de Rothschild. Mr. Claude Phillips is appointed keeper of the collection. The Government, as we think, most wisely, have decided to buy the freehold of Hertford House, and to make the alterations necessary for displaying the collections, at the cost of 280,000. This was, we think, a far better plan than purchasing a new site and building thereon. Our art collections suffer from too much centralisa- tion. Instead, every quarter of London should, if possible, have its collection of pictures and beautiful things. Besides, Hertford House will, in a hundred years, be very interesting as an example of a private palace of the Victorian epoch. The collection will not be open to the public for some months. When it is, they will realise what they hardly do now,—i.e., that they have received the most valuable gift ever made by an individual to a nation. At a moderate estimate the art treasures of Hertford House are said to be worth 24,000,000,
"A correspondent," evidently well informed, gives in Mon. day's Times an account of the Klondike gold diggings which will certainly not tend to stop the gold-rush. He dwells very strongly upon the dangers and difficulties to be encountered, but adds that the ground now being worked "yields from $1 to $10 per pan on an average." The Dominion surveyor reckons that a miner washes one thousand pans a day, but others think eight hundred a more conservative estimate. "Even $800 (2160) a day per man is enough to account for a gold-rush, but the richer dirt, yielding 21,920 for a day's work, is sufficient to entice even staid fathers of families to risk the terrors of an Arctic winter." He goes on to describe the lot of the miner who is lucky enough to reach the Yukon without disaster as follows : — " Eight months of semi- darkness in a tent with a sheet-iron stove, and a temperature from 60 deg. to 80 deg. below zero, thawing out the pay-dirt with fires and piling it up to be washed in the summer, is the lot of the industrious gold-seeker, who may add to his com- fort by building a log-hut if he feels disposed." The price of food at the diggings is, of course, appalling. Flour is 1:10 per sack of 100 lb. when it is fairly plentiful; when it is not it goes to the highest bidder, and those who cannot bid high must starve. The gold-belt is three hundred miles long. The width is said to be indefinite. The Times' correspondent estimates that there will be thirty thousand miners on the headwaters of the Klondike before winter. How many will return depends upon whether or no the Canadian Govern- ment facilitate the supply of food.
On Monday the papers published a communication to the Liberal Associations throughout the country, issued by Mr. Labouchere and his colleagues on the Political Committee of the National Liberal Club, which illustrates the curious con- dition of the Opposition, which we deal with elsewhere. The Liberal Associations have a regular official Federation of their own whose business it is to deal with matters of policy. It was this body which issued the famous Newcastle Pro- gramme. Mr. Labouchere and his friends ignore the Federation completely, and ask the Associations to contribute towards "more energetic and definite efforts in the common cause," as if they had no recognised means of expressing their opinions. Mr. Labouchere, however, is perfectly correct when he infers, as he does by the whole tone of his paper, that no one knows what are the party's views on current questions. Accordingly, Mr. Labouchere asks the Associa- tions to suggest a series of views. In case, however, they should be at a loss, he supplies, with his usual helpfulness, a set of his own,—an action not unlike that of the enterprising author who forwards a ready-made review along with his book. Mr. Labouchere asks, in effect, "How would this do for a pro- gramme "P—(1) "Home-rule all round," but the integrity of the House of Commons to be strictly preserved, (2) the House of Lords to be allowed one veto per measure as the dog is allowed his first bite, (3) Land-law reform, (4) Poor-law reform, (5) Fiscal reform, (6) more State action. After this Mr. Labouchere solemnly declares that it would be a mistake to overload the issues. Outsiders will find Mr. Labouchere's last move not a little amusing, but not unnaturally the National Liberal Federation is much annoyed.
The charges made by Professor Gokhlee have ended in an abject apology,—there is no other expression possible. Sir William Wedderbarn has also apologised for having helped to give those accusations currency. It is difficult to under- stand how Sir William Wedderburn could have listened for a moment to charges which, if he had reflected, he must have known were almost certain to prove unfounded. If, as was apparently alleged, British soldiers had outraged Indian women before credible witnesses, it is certain that the matter would have at once been brought before the Courts. The fact that no proceedings took place, as well as the inherent improbability of the charge, ought to have prevented Sir William Wedderburn's patronage of these falsehoods even before they were exposed and with. drawn.
Bank Rate, 2 per cent.
New Consols (21) were on Friday, 1131.
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