Mr. Bourke, Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs under the late Government,
delivered himself on Thursday, at King's Lynn, of a very fierce speech. He declared that the Treaty of Berlin was only a substitute for the Treaty of San Stefano, and by no means a Treaty in accordance with justice or sound policy. That is from Tories a new view, and Mr. Bourke evidently propounds it to justify the attack on Mr. Gladstone for carrying out a Tory Treaty. The Continent, he continued, was bewildered at Mr. Gladstone's accession to power, and at his wanton and unmerited insult to Austria, and we had yet to see the result of the pompous appeal to the Courts of Europe to coerce Turkey. Mr. Gladstone's proposal to ascend the Boyana Riyer was a " paltry, piratical proposal, against a friendly Power," while the subsequent proposition to seques- trate Smyrna was " the act of a thief or a pirate." " War it was to be, and it was to be the war of a brigand." " Hostes, hi aunt qui nobis ant quibus nos publice helium decrevimus. Caeteri, latrones et praedones mint." The great Naval Demonstration is the greatest failure on record. Did Mr. Bourke's Government declare war on Afghanistan, before it entered the country, seized its capital, deported its King, and threatened military execution to all who resisted P If not, by his own argument,—latrones et praedones sunt. Mr. Bourke evi- dently was so exacerbated by the necessity of defending Lord Beaconsfield's policy and Lord Salisbury's statements in the last Parliament, that he has not yet recovered himself, and sees men as trees walking. How often in India have we carried out a treaty byJ sending troops into the defeated State to ensure the due• fulfilment of the compact P How else do we take possession of ceded colonies P
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