The response from Europe on the Suez-Canal affair is becoming
still more clear. Constantinople is alarmed, but silent, and unable
to interfere. Berlin and Vienna are surprised, but, on the whole, pleased. Paris, though acquiescent, is seriously annoyed, so annoyed that she would almost aid St. Petersburg to resist, and St. Petersburg is completely out of temper. The Moscow Gazetto which is usually allowed to express the true Russian opinion, de- clares that the purchase is a most important event, that England is beginning to exercise arbitrary power in Egypt, that she has pocketed the key to Southern Europe, that a coup de main has been carried out with consummate skill, that France might as well seize Belgium, Germany Rolland, and Russia Constantinople ; that England is perfectly sure by degrees to control the finances of Egypt, but that the Powers must interfere before that time. All this means that Russia perceives, what is no doubt the truth, that England separates the case of Egypt from the case of the Turkish Empire. Russia is therefore anxious, if she can, to find in Mr. Disraeli's action a new excuse for aggrandisement for herself. That is not unnatural, and the feeling displayed does not alter the situation very much. Russia hates England in a moderate and diplomatic way already, and would not hate her more were she already seated at Cairo.
