AMERICA AND THE CONTINENT. A MERICANS should read with careful attention
the article from the Listok, of Odessa, translated in the Times of Monday, May 14th. They do not usually count Russia among their foes, but that article, which is evidently written by a thoughtful Russian, probably a diplomatist, and which has passed the Censor, will show them that the dislike and suspicion of their policy is now nearly universal on the Continent. That dislike has been growing among the peoples for years, envy being among all but the English- speaking races the master-passion, and it has now extended to the Governments. The main cause of it no doubt is fear, a positive dread of the enormous resources of the United States, and of the willingness of their people, revealed, as the Listok affirms, in the Spanish War, to use them for the forcible expansion of their trade and territory. The statesmen of Europe, themselves devoted to the enrichment of their States through transmarine acquisitions, do not know exactly what course America will pursue in her new greatness, and. besides recognising clearly that she is stronger than any single State of the Continent, doubt in their hearts whether, if all who speak English stood together, it would be possible for any coalition, even if it covered all other civilised States, to raise up any sufficient obstacles to American designs. They cannot conceive that such a mass of power can be used for any but selfish ends, and are therefore genuinely alarmed. France cannot forget the terrible blow recently given to a Latin people of whom she thinks herself pro- tectress ; Germany sees the pathway to the great colonies of which she dreams blocked by the Monroe doctrine ; Italy is always raging at the treatment of her Neapolitan emigrants; the Vatican, which counts among the Powers, is furious at the overthrow of Spain; and Russia most seriously dreads, as the Listok admits, interference with her great plans for controlling China and seating herself for ever on the shore of the North Pacific. Those plans, which are really able, and which will convert the vast Asiatic dominions of the Czar, now only a burden on the Empire, into most valuable possessions, have taken as strong a hold of the governing classes of Russia as their old dream of inherit- ing Turkey, and, they watch both America and England, as potential obstacles in the Far East, with a jealousy and. spite which renders it difficult to obtain a hearing in St. Petersburg for the wisest plans of compromise. The Listok, as Americans will see, actually speaks of a com- bination of Europe—that is, of the Continent, for our interest is identical with that of America—to resist them in China alone, and every new assertion by Washington of its right to protect its interests everywhere deepens the latent hostility. There is a note of positive anger, as well as surprise, that the Union should "venture to threaten a European Power" like Turkey in order to enforce a pecuniary obligation, and a menace is addressed to her which, if England joined in it, would be of the gravest kind, but which, as England does not join in it, only betrays the bitterest annoyance. "It is highly improb- able," says the Listok, "that the thing will go so far as a naval demonstration, for there are Powers in Europe, with Russia in the van, who will lose no time in remind- ing the 'United States that the European Concert has in the past made sacrifices on far too extensive a scale in the settlement of the question of free passage through the Straits to think of allowing the United States now to nullify at a stroke agreements which have cost so much blood in working out." That menace has at least the merit of definiteness. However much Turkey may wrong the United States, American ships are not to pass the Straits in order to exact redress from Constantinople, under penalty of being blown by Russian, German, and Austrian ships out of the water.
The disturbance of the European Governments is in- creased by two causes of which Americans are naturally only partially aware. One is the newness of the American " intrusion " into world-wide politics. European statesmen might, one would think, have foreseen that a State with world-wide interests would have a world-wide action ; but it is difficult to get rid of a prepossession, and they were prepossessed with the notion that as America professed indifference to every thing outside the Western Hemisphere, she would under all circumstances leave the Eastern one alone. "With words," says Disraeli, "we govern men," and certainly words do sometimes seem to have all the force of realities. That illusion has been dispelled, a new world-Power insists on recognition, and just to begin with, without much effort strikes an ancient European Monarchy to its knees. To men embedded in traditions that event is most disturbing. The Con- tinental Governments have many arrangements among themselves—some still secret—to meet various contin- gencies, and with this new ship drifting in they are not sure of their anchors. America in the Philippines, America in China, America in Turkey,—what does it all mean, and how are our combinations affected ? The Governments feel as the managers of a great Trust feel when another Trust invades their peculium, and they have not thought out either the means of resistance or of bargaining. They grow quite savage, and may perhaps in the end commit themselves to some imprudent line of action. They are not quite sure of the obstinacy of the intruder, though they fear it is very great ; they are not quite certain that she has strong backing, and they may fancy that the case is one for trying a little bluff, and so produce a very serious situation indeed. This is the more probable from the second of the two causes which Americans scarcely perceive. The profes- sional diplomatists of the Continent hate the representa- tives of the Union, and would like any opportunity of giving them a sharp set-down. They detest the American habit—which is no doubt sometimes inconvenient—of using amateurs as Ambassadors and Ministers, men who use a. non-professional phraseology, who never know how to distinguish between feint and earnest, and who press any demands they are sent to make with a sort of con- viction that they must in the end be granted. "You see, our people," remarks an American, quits unconscious that his attitude is that of a master, "will not have your tariff." The frankness of the American agents strikes the old aristocrats of European Chancelleries as boorish- ness, their lawyer-like arguments as pettifogging, and their cool persistence as distinctly overbearing. American agents, we fancy, do sometimes use final arguments, the word " unfriendly " for instance, a little too soon, and their interlocutors get as angry a 8 Palmerston was when he rebuked Wale wski for using the word war, "a word which should never be employed between diplomatists." They do not think Americans respectful enough in their mention of the great, they fret at their ignorance of comparative rank, and they are as shocked as great solicitors at their impatience of long delays. Every trained diplomatist has in him a trace of the great ecclesiastic, who thinks that, as time is nothing to God, it should be nothing to the Church either. Altogether, they find the American diplomatists an irritating element in the family, and would like very much an opportunity of displaying their real sentiments towards them. We do not know that this temper in ordinary times matters much, but when grave issues are at stake the hostile humour of an entire pro- fession does not tend to pacification. When one's lawyers feel hurt by their adversary's lawyers, negotiations are very apt to end in Court instead of in a compromise. Anyhow, the Americans will do well to think over the arguments from the Listok, and decide in their own minds whether they think they indicate Continental love or not.
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