A POLITICAL SURVEY.*

THERE are very few men indeed in England who will not be the wiser for the careful perusal of this book. It is choked with knowledge, and with knowledge used by its owner to make others know. It is difficult to estimate an author who is also a politician without reference to his speeches, and judging by them, most persons will fancy that a " survey " by Mr. Grant Duff must be a very clever, slightly acrid, and exceedingly definite pamphlet on foreign affairs. That opinion will be entirely incorrect. There are very few men in the world so incapable of a prejudice as the Member for Elgin, or so anxious to give every fact its due place in his mind, to consider fairly even those appearances of fact, those lies with a verisimilitude which have so terrible an influence on European public opinion. When speaking he is apt to put his convictions into an epigrammatic form, which of necessity irritates his opponents, inasmuch as an epigram must always express the general result without the needful qualifica- tions; but the pen once in his hands, the real bent of his mind, to concentrate white light on the subject of thought, becomes at once apparent. There is not an example, that we have detected, at all events, of prejudice in this book, or one of vanity. If the author does not know, he says so, if another man does, he quotes his words as they stand, instead of absorbing him into his own personality. In one or two instances there is, we fancy, a defect of imagination, as, for example, in all the chapters on the African countries of the Mediterranean. Mr. Grant Duff does not, we think, perceive the value of these vast regions, the enormous " may-be " they involve, their direct and singular relation to Europe,—ideas which are never absent • A Political Survey. By Grant Duff. Edinburgh : Edmonston and Douglas. from politicians like the Emperor of the French ; writes about Morocco as if Morocco were Papua, and apparently does not see that Morocco in European hands might as well

become a great State as Spain ; that the Southern border of the Mediterranean lacks only men, that Southern Europe, should it ever increase in population like Northern Europe,—a point on which a reforming Pope might issue a decree modifying all the future,—would find in Mediterranean Africa an outlet much nearer, much more tempting, much more natural than the South American prairies, to which the Italians have for some years con- tinued to betake themselves. About Egypt even his chapter is decidedly poor, though we suspect this arises from caution rather

than poverty either of ideas or of material ; and the wonderful potentialities of the country, its power, for instance, of paying Arab

armies sufficient to conquer and civilize North-Eastern Africa down to the Lakes, never appear to have struck Mr. Grant Duff. But there is no prejudice, no effort to conceal a fact, no mental annoyance at the admission of a fact, no sign however slight that the author is anxious to diffuse any opinion whatever, except that whieh

ascertained facts render inevitable. To judge from his Surrey, he is no more anxious that one country should win than another, sympathizes with France as with Germany, with Russia as with

Austria, cares mainly about them all to arrive at truths obscured by the mists of prejudice. There is no subject, for example, upon which opinion is more divided than our policy with regard to Russia in Asia. Well, Mr. Grant Duff sees clearly the whole facts, rejects quietly the extreme view, and pens as a mere remark the following most suggestive paragraph :—

" Then, again, if Russia, from being one of the most military of Powers, became one of the most peaceful, wo should have in her a natural ally. Will any one say that that is impossible? He must be a rash man who will deny that a people may, conceivably, some day follow its own instincts. Tho Russian proper, the inhabitant of that vast region which is the true centre of the empire, is by nature the most peaceable of mankind. Ho has faults enough and to spare, but an appetite for military glory is not one of them. The object—the almost avowed object—of the party at this moment dominant in Russia, is to create a vast social level, with the imperial power rising above it,—' to build a tower on a steppe,' as one of themselves neatly put it. Now, certainly, to my mind it is not clear that that is exactly the kind of social organization which will enable a government for an indefinitely long time to resist the pressure of a whole nation desiring to go its own way, not the way which happened to seem good to Peter the Groat and his successors."

One-half our readers probably will think that paragraph " dreamy," or " inaccurate," or " utopian," but let them after reading it talk to any Russian. They will find that, if an Imperialist, he will lament the check which the peaceable disposi- tion of his people puts upon great ideas ; that, if a merchant, he will sigh for the day when " Russian ideas" shall rule Russia ; that, if a Red, he will declare that the influence of a single German family now arrests the " natural " drift of Russian politics towards an extremely quiet happy Federation, which no man will dare to attack, and which will be too contented to attack anybody. Suppos- ing the Romanoffs still to bear rule, Mr. Grant Duff clearly believes

that their advance in Asia is natural and justifiable, and that our duty is to watch, to keep armed, and when the hour arrives to try first, an arrangement with Russia, or secondly, battle on a scale

to settle once for all whether we can or cannot occupy Asia in peace :-

"When we have taken every possible precaution the situation will still be a perilous one. But when has our situation in India been other than a perilous one ? India is a barrel of gunpowder, round which sparks are perpetually flying. The neighbourhood of Russia adds at the worst a few sparks more. Society in our Eastern Empire is stirred by forces as little understood as those which produce the earthquakes of the material world. I suppose no month passes in which, to say nothing of other alarming intelligence, tidings do not come to the Indian Viceroy of some new religious movement, which may be as harmless as possible, but which may blow everything into fragments. I wonder how many people have ever reflected how much trouble might at any moment be caused by a personage whose name is so little known out of Indian circles as the Akhoond of Swat ? But there is another way of looking at the whole matter. Is it quite so Bare that Russia must be always hostile to this country ? Is it not possible that there may come a time when we shall understand each other in Asia, and strengthen each other's hands ? Many a day must pass before Bokhara becomes a bed of roses for any Christian ruler; and if Russia can trouble us, we can assuredly return the compliment. It would be very premature to do anything at present ; but I cannot help thinking that the day may come when we may hear of a co-operative policy in Central Asia, as we have heard already of a co-operative policy at Pekin."

Those seem to us the ideas of a statesman, even though Mr. Grant Duff, misled by Anglo-Indian talk, does make t4e mistake of

thinking the Central Asian trade of considerable value. It is not worth our own trade with Ceylon or the Mauritius, and in all human probability it never will be. Six months of war would

cost more money than the trade will yield in five centuries. It must be remembered, too, that these ideas are based upon a survey of facts which even Indians may read with profit, a survey so thorough that it has enabled Mr. Duff to boil down the facts of the Central Asian question into three or four octavo pages.

On Turkey Mr. Grant Duff expresses himself with a caution not perhaps remarkable when the date of is book is considered, but not calculated to increase its interest. On the whole, we take it, he is hostile both to the Greek idea and the Roumanian idea, without any very strong belief in the Ottoman. He believes that the Ottoman is tolerant, which is, as far as regards the Government, true, though not quite so true of the people, and also believes that it might be dangerous in Asia to push him to extremities :—

" The most bitter enemies of Turkis'i domination in Europe are con- tent to leave Western Asia in the hands of its present rulers, and some- times, I think, in their zeal for cutting by war a knot which time alone can unravel, forget what might be the result to Christians in the neigh- bouring continent of pressing too hard on Mussulmans on the western side of the Hellespont. Mr. Sandison, our Consul at Brussa, makes, in a report to Lord Lyons, dated Brussa, April 18th, 1867, the following very judicious remarks upon this subject :—' A Turkish functionary of some rank from Constantinople, lately speaking to me on the subject, observed, "If things come to that pass that we aro to be attacked with the design of driving us out of Europe, we shall certainly make a hard fight for it, and may ho beforehand with our domestic enemies among the Christians." The same feeling pervades, no doubt, the mass of his people, though some of them avow a desire for any change of masters in the hope it may better their condition.' "

That is one of the hundred dangers of the Eastern question which it is so easy to forget, but which if forgotten may produce a frightful catastrophe, a catastrophe leading to that most dreadful of calamities, a prolonged religious war. It could end only in one way, Christendom having invented the Snider, not Islam ; but the duty of statesmen is, as Mr. Grant Duff hints, not to let it begin. On the whole, the author takes, as we gather, the sensible view that there is nothing in Turkey, whether Imperialist or insurrec- tionary, about which a well-informed man can be enthusiastic, and that it is better to watch events than to interfere, even so far as to allow Western opinion to develop into definite sympathies.

We have naturally confined our notice of the Survey mainly to Asia, and we must conclude by a quotation curiously illustrative of the author's mind. He has no literary vanity, distinctly prefers giving his authority in his own words to composing any text of his own, and constantly quotes those opinions and narra- tives which leave on the mind the more favourable and there- fore truer opinion of each race he criticizes. This paragraph, for instance, extracted from The Ever Victorious el rmy, is at this moment wonderfully suggestive :-

"' Every one who has dwelt much among the Chinese, as I have done and especially in their villages, will bear me out in saying that there i., common to them all a certain simple ideal of life, which they regard as constituting the highest human happiness, which they claim as their right, which they hold usually existed from the earliest times, and which is intimately connected with the doctrines of their sages and with their historical beliefs. Unlike the Hindu, the Chinaman lives in an ordered and somewhat prosaic ideal world. He beholds, indeed, against his Turanian historical dawn, the gigantic figures of Yaon and Shun, and the great Yu overshadowing the long valley of centuries ; and the great sages, such as Confucius and Mencius, correcting the errors of their times, and dropping words of invaluable wisdom ; but, although all these are grand to him, they are so, not so much in themselves, as in their useful relationship to the knowable and the attainable—to the great primary wants of his race. The determination of the seasons, the building embankments against devastating floods, or the harmonizing of land and water, the overthrowing of unjust kings, wise and kind action in family relationships, and the expression of moral doctrines in an intelligible, impressive way—these are the claims to reverence of the heroes of the Chinese Pantheon. The (miscalled) Celestial is a narrow-minded, but exceeding practical, sort of being. He wants an ordered world, but ono ordered only in a certain kind of way. Before his rapt Celestial vision lie the fruitful plains of the Great Flowery Land, lively and bright with the normal life of China, guarded on the north by snowy deserts which are happily far away from hint, and on the south by stormy seas with great winds and waves which he does not tempt. His ideal is a happy family life, with age benignant, youth reverential, three or four generations living con- tentedly under the same roof ; the fish-pond in front well stocked ; grain abundant ; tea fragrant ; tho village harmonized ; the school well taught ; the young Confucius of the family preparing for competitive examinations ; the ancestral tablets going far back, and recording honoured names ; the ancestral hall well gilded, and a fit meeting-place for the wise elders ; the spirits of deceased ancestors comforted with offer- ings and loving remembrances, not left to wander friendless in the air ; the holidays cheerful, with bright silks and abundance of savoury dishes ; the emperor benevolent; the people obedient ; foreign devils far away or reverential ; evil appearing only in the form of impossible demons, and hideous, wicked emperors, painted on the walls of his house as a warning to foolish youth ; no change in old customs to perplex the mind; the sacred books reverentially read and remembered ; the present definitely arranged ; the fruitage of the past stored ; behind, sages and emperors ; around, happy families ; beyond, a darkness with which he little concerns himself, but into which his spirit may occasion- ally float a short way on some Buddhist or Tauist idea.'"