NEWS OF THE WEEK.

• THE Russian Czar reached the suburbs of Moscow on Sunday by train, and on Tuesday made his state entry into his ancient -capital. He rode in on a white horse, preceded and followed by a procession miles long, including all the representatives of Europe, his subordinate Kings in Asia, his own family, the chief nobles of Russia, the great officials of the Empire, hundreds of Generals and other officers, and hundreds more of the servitors of the Court. The Empress sat with her little daughter in a large -carriage which looked like one mass of gold. The way was lined with soldiers, and guarded by great bodies of cavalry, cuirassiers, Uhlans, and Cossacks, and the scene was full of an original kind of pomp, half military, half Asiatic. No accident whatever occurred, except that a Court chamberlain was thrown and broke his head, and the reception by the people was most enthusiastic. The devotion, it is specially noted, extends to the Imperial Family, the Grand Duke Sergins in particular being followed everywhere by admiring crowds. The actual coronation will not take place till Sunday, after which the Emperor must ride unattended among his people ; but so far, nothing has been heard of the Nihilists, though the Police continue to make numerous arrests. The time of danger is now short, and it is most probable that the extreme precautions taken will prove successful, more especially as assassins are always affected by the popular mood. Nevertheless, the Ides of March are not yet passed.

It appears to be settled that Major Evelyn Baring, the Indian Chancellor of the Exchequer, shall succeed Sir E. Malet as Consul-General in Egypt, though as yet no official announcement has been made. Indeed, we are not sure that a vote will not be needed, as Major Baring is to receive special powers, and as he surrenders £8,000 a year in India, a special salary. He will, in fact, be Resident, and we hope will be marked by some special designation, such as " Envoy Extraordinary to the Porte resident in Egypt." That will give him the necessary rank. The selection is a very good one, as Major Baring has great experience, both of general political business and of Egyptian finance, thorough knowledge of Egyptian personages, and a strong will. He will be able not only to guide and support the Khedive, who is surrounded by rascals intent on peculation, but to neglect trifles, the great difficulty of a man in his position. Every European in Egypt thinks that his special affair is the pivot of the universe, and that the Resident who does not listen to him fails. Major Baring can be deaf when needful, a form of strength which is rapidly becoming more scarce.

The Italian Premier, having on Saturday obtained a direct and unqualified vote of confidence, by 348 to 29, on Sunday placed his resignation in the King's hands. His object in taking this step is to rid himself of certain members of his Cabinet, who consider his policy too Conservative, and resent his acceptance by the Right. He has, of course, been asked to form a new Ministry, and in spite of some hitches will, it is believed, retain all his colleagues except two, and replace them by two Conservativish men, who are not by party Conservatives. He is quite absolute in the present House, but believes that the Radicals are strong out of-doors, and will have a much stronger party at the next elections. As his intention is to govern with any majority obtainable, he does not wish to break with the Radicals more abruptly than he can help, and would gladly retain their more moderate men. No Minister in Europe occupies quite the same position, though it has analogies with that once occupied by Lord Palmerston. The difference is that the Italian Tories give S. Depretis open instead of secret support.

A great Liberal demonstration took place at Hengler's Circus, in Liverpool, yesterday week, the chief speakers being Mr. S. Smith, the Liberal Member for Liverpool elected last December, and Mr. John Morley, M.P. for Newcastle-on-Tyne. Mr. Smith made a very weighty and impressive speech on the great difficulty of the day,—the block of business in Parliament,—which he ascribed to three causes,—the immense multiplication of local business which ought to be dealt with in local bodies ; the loquacity of Members ; and the definite wish to obstruct. He did not believe that anything short of completely new rules limiting the time allotted not only to each speaker, but to each great debate, would adequately put down the loquacity and the obstruction. In speaking of the Affirmation Bill, which he eloquently defended from the religious point of view, Mr. Smith expressed his hearty confidence in the Government ; while, on the Irish question; he was disposed to adopt more or less Mr. Mitchell Henry's view of our duty to that country. He thought that we ought to develope Ireland as we develope India, by applying a considerable sum to the construction of public works.

Mr. John Morley's speech was less social and more political in its drift. He defended the Affirmation Bill, on the ground. that all opinions on religious questions—whether they might be called religious or irreligious—should be treated as wholly outside politics; nay, he went further, and said the same of all social opinions. Now, surely there are social opinions which it ought to be penal to propagate. A teacher who should be found inculcating on his pupils, even out of school, contempt for the sacredness of marriage, ought to be ineligible as a teacher in State schools; and we can see no reason why the House of Commons has not a perfect right to take notice of a book propagating immoral doctrines, and written by any of its Members, if it should think that course wise and expedient. Mr. Morley expressed very frankly his belief that Ireland would never be pacified till there was much greater freedom of local self-organisation in Ireland, and much more regard paid to Irish opinion on Irish topics in the House of Commons, than there is at present. And on what is called "non-intervention " he expressed very sweeping views indeed, which go far beyond any in which we can concur. Nevertheless, his speech was full of manly and vigorous Liberalism,—Liberalism partly, perhaps, of the past, mostly of the future.

The Liberal meeting at Wolverhampton yesterday week was important, as showing that the Liberal party in the country have seen the importance to be attached to Sir Stafford Northcote's "Thermopylae" speech, and have interpreted it just as we interpreted it on the day after it was spoken, as meaning that the Tory party are prepared to force triennial dissolutions on the country, by obstructing to the last point of their ability measures cordially accepted by the constituencies only three years ago. Mr. H. Fowler, the junior Member for Wolverhampton, insisted that triennial Parliaments might now be regarded as part of the programme of Tory democracy, and urged the Government, on the reassembling of Parliament this week, to appropriate Tuesdays and Fridays for pressing forward the Government measures now before Parliament. Mr. Osborne Morgan made some caustic remarks on the new Tory Elisha,

and his attacks on the " honourable " Tadpoles by whom, in that prophetic person's opinion, the Tories of the House of Commons are now lel ; and also upon Sir Stafford Northcote's attempt to immortalise the tactics of Mr. Warton as akin to those of the Spartan King Leonidas. It is clear enough that the Wolverhampton Liberals understand precisely the exact issue now before the country, and are determined to fight it out on the true lines, "though it take," as General Grant said, "all the summer."

Mr. Stanhope's speech at King's Lynn on Monday shows either a curious dullness of financial mind, or else a very unfair desire to mislead his audience as to the actual expenditure of the last and the present Government. He actually asserted that " since 1880 the expenditure of the country had gone on increasing every year," and also that the expenditure of the Liberals in India "is £3,500,000 in excess of that of the Conservatives." Mr. Stanhope ought to know that both assertions are absolutely unfounded, unless the incurring of Debt and the repayment of Debt,—which last is, in fact, saving,—are not to be counted. In India, the last Government heaped up Debt for the most mischievous and disgraceful of wars, and in England they borrowed what Mr. Gladstone has ever since been painfully paying back. Mr. Stanhope also took much pains to convince the farmers that the present Government are hostile to their interests, but had the candour frankly to admit that the principle of the Bill for compensating tenants for nnexhausted improvements is quite sound.

Mr. D. Planket, in his speech at Chelsea on Tuesday, was still more wild in his hitting than Mr. Stanhope had been at King's Lynn. He remarked, in relation to South Africa, that "it was plain that all the old respect for the dignity, the power, the permanent policy, and the resistless will of the English people, which had so long dominated the wild people in Africa, had vanished away." How "old" is the respect to which Mr. Plunket refeis ? Is it older than 1879 2 In that year certainly, when Cetewayo fell upon the British forces at Isaudlana, there was not much sign of " respe3t for the dignity, the power, the permanent policy, and the resistless will of the English people." Mr. Plunket went on to refer to the condition of domestic questions, and spoke of the present House of Commons as a patient whose fine constitution had been much " knocked about by the hard life and drastic remedies of the doctors who took it in hand." " They had tried the caucus, they had tried the cloture, they had tried a devolution, and they had tried permeation, and he knew not what other quack Radical remedies they might yet apply." Mr. Plunket mistakes. The caucus was not a remedy for the troubles in the House, but a device to get at the true view of the constituencies which was completely successful; and the closure has never been actually tried at all, but only adopted for future trial. Devolution seems to be succeeding fairly well, and ‘permeation" is no more a specific remedy than the diffusion of gases or any other natural process which no one set of persons can either retard or hasten, is a specific remedy. The " drastic" medicines have not been applied to the House of Commons by Liberals, but by the Irish and the Tories ; and of these, Mr. Warton's quack remedy of obstruction is by far the most remarkable, especially since it has been consecrated by the approbation of Sir Stafford Northcote.

The motion on Tuesday for adjourning over the Derby Day was moved by Sir Heron Maxwell, in a very dull speech, in which, of coarse, he appealed to the authority of Lord Palmerston and his regard for the Derby ; and was seconded by Mr. Heneage, who relied simply on the love of holidays, and asked for a whole holiday, just as school-boys ask for the same indulgence. Sir Wilfrid Lawson resisted the motion, on the very sound principle that the majority who want to take a holiday should have some respect for the more hard-working minority who do not. "A great public entertainment, under the auspices of the Blue Ribbon Army, would win his hearty approval ; but if any one were to propose the adjournment of the House in connection with that entertainment, he should say, ' No,—let us respect the feelings of the drunkards.' " Last year, the House did not adjourn over the Derby Day, and no one was any the worse for it ; and legislative lassitude could certainly not be pleaded this year, since they had only just returned to their labours from their holiday. Finally, there was an ecclesiastical measure down for Wednesday, which he was sure Mr. BeresfordHope would much rather discuss than go to the Grand Stand at Epsom. Mr. Labouchere, however, took up the cause of cakes and ale, and regarded it apparently as a moral duty to adjourn over the Derby Day, in order not to appear unsympathetic towards the popular pleasure taken in our great democratic picnic. That is very weak ground, and would, as we have elsewhere remarked, apply much better to an adjournment over the August Bank holiday, which is a universal national picnic, than to one over the merely Cockney festival of the Derby. Bat, in point of fact, Mr. Labouchere only wanted an opportunity to attack the severe puritanic Radicals of whom we do not think Sir Wilfrid Lawson a very happy specimen for Mr. Labonchere's purpose. However,. laziness always wins the day. Sir Heron Maxwell's motion was. carried by a majority of 100 (185 against 85).

Mr. Cowen, Lord Randolph Churchill, Mr. Gorst, Sir H.. Wolff, Mr. Newdegate, Mr. O'Brien, and lastly Sir Stafford:. Northcote, baited Lord E. Fitzmaurice and Mr. Gladstone on Thursday night with all sorts of questions as to Mr. Erring-ton's connection with the late Papal letter to the Irish Bishops, while most of them gave noticethat they would: repeat their questions on future occasions. They only elicited that Mr. Errington, having been regarded by the Government as a man conversant with Irish affairs, and a thoroughly honourable man, had been represented in this light to the. Papal See some time ago, but that he had received no official' commission of any kind, either then or now, and had received• no new recommendation this year; that the Pope had donewhat he had done, without any urging from the British Government ; and that Mr. Errington had done what he had done,. without any official suggestion, and, therefore, had received no official thanks. All this, of course, is just as Lord E. Fitzmaurice and Mr. Gladstone state it to have been, though if it had been otherwise,—if Mr. Errington had had an official mis sion,—we, for our parts, should have seen nothing but commonsense in the appointment of such a mission. However, as it is

not so, it is hardly decent to affect to disbelieve everything the Ministers say in the matter. There is nothing creditable in supposing that great officials are always acting as Jesuit negotiators are supposed to act,—with the wisdom of the serpent, but without the innocence of the dove, or, indeed, innocence of any sort or kind.

Archbishop Croke has come back to Ireland, and has tried to make the beat of his position as a prelate whose political action has been virtually censured by the Holy See. He has state& that he was listened to both by the Cardinal Prefect of the Propaganda and by the Pope himself with the greatest interest and patience, and that on taking his leave the Pope gave him his blessing and good. wishes,—which, of course, is true enough.. He added that the Pope is a true friend of Ireland,—he might have said a much truer friend than Archbishop Croke,—an& ended his speech at Thurles thus :—" It is needless for me to say that any mandate issuing from the Holy See shall ever be receive& with filial reverence and obedience by the Bishops and Priests of Ireland, and by none of them more than by myself. I shall say no more." That is equivalent to a submission to the Pope's letter,. though a somewhat sulky submission. Archbishop Croke does not admit that he did wrong before, but he does virtually admit that he is not going to do again what he thought it right before to do.

The French Government, if we may trust the Times, has extricated itself in great part from the financial abyss into M. de Frevcinet's desire for grand public works had plunged it. He had committed the State to spend some three hundred millions on a network of additional railways. The demand for these works burdened the Treasury beyond endurance, and on the suggestion of M. Leon Say, a compromise has been made with the great Railways. Each will complete the system which belongs to it, paying over to the State four-fifths of any profitbeyond three per cent. The effect of this is to disburden the State, and to postpone, probably for a long time, the State purchase of the Railways, of which the Railway interest has long been afraid. The State, we fear, will suffer ; but the Railway Companies have not been exacting, and the people will get their local Railways, which they greatly want. M. de Freycinet, though he over-rated the resources of the French Treasury, was right there. Nothing is easier in France than to send produce on a railway line, and nothing so difficult as to get it across the large spaces where no line exists. We have tho same trouble here, but distances are greater in France.

The French have commenced operations against Madagascar. According to a telegram from the French Consul at Zanzibar, confirmed by another from the English Consul, Admiral Pierre on the 16th inst. bombarded the port of Maynnga. The Hove loss was considerable, the French none, and the place was occupied by marines. The Admiral reports that he shall levy all -customs on French account, that he has caused all Hove, forts in the Sakalava territory to " disappear," and that he has assumed the protectorate of that tribe. This is annexation, and the Hovas will, no doubt, act on their preconcerted plan of surrounding the French posts and keeping up incessant attacks, until the French either retire, or send troops sufficient for an advance into the interior. Should this policy be adopted, there will be a smouldering war most injurious to Madagascar, and of no benefit to France. M. Jules Perry, with Tunis and Tonquin on his hands, has not -5,000 colonial troops at his disposal, and it would be folly to advance on Antananarivo without 10,000. The Government most, therefore, either call on the Line, which will at once awaken the Chamber, or go on with a murderous kind of pottering, which can create nothing but mischief, and may cause anarchy in the interior.

It is announced officially that Lord Lorne will be succeeded in the Governor-Generalship of the Canadian Dominion by the Marquis of Lansdowne. There is no objection, that we know -of, to that appointment. The Marquis, though in English _political parlance he is called a " young " man, is thirty-eight years old, has been trained to politics, and has strong hereditary -claims upon the Liberals. He is reputed able, and though an -occasional deserter from his party, Irish Peers are not expected to be faithful when Land Acts are proposed. He will do as well as another, while his rank will make him acceptable in Canada. It is curious to see, while Democracy advances, how the nobles keep the great appointments. It was so also in Rome, where, though the Ctesar represented the Democracy, the great civil appointments were most frequently filled by members of the Senatorial Houses. Men have never been philosophic about ,pedigree, and the great families were liked.

Mr. Forster, on Wednesday, made a powerful speech to the Aborigines Protection Society, on the wrongS of the Bechuana -Chiefs. He said that the Missionaries had tamed and civilised -them, that they were on our side during the war, and that they were now harried and despoiled. The spoilers were English and Dutch freebooters from the Cape, Natal, and the Transvaal, egged -on, as appeared from the Blue-books, by the Transvaal Government. They appealed to us for protection, and we were bound to give protection, not, indeed, by any treaty with them, but toypledges to protect the Natives given in the face of the -whole world. Mr. Gladstone himself at -Leeds, in 1881, stated that the Government "would recollect and faithfully .maintain the interests of the numerous and extended native populations." All that is clear enough, but does Mr. Forster mean to say that the Government left itself no choice of the method through which it would carry out its policy ? Was it really bound to declare war whenever the Boers impinged on motive rights ? Would it not be at least as true to say that the 4lovernment gave no pledges, but declared a policy, that this policy is subject to the will of Parliament, and that it is useless to ask Parliament to declare war for Bechuanaland ? That the -chiefs can be defended by less than war, by the direct conquest of the Transvaal, and its subsequent military occupation, we -cannot, in the face of the facts, believe.

Herr Lasker, for many years leader of the German Liberals, intends, it is said, to quit political life. He is wearied out and -disheartened, as well he may be. There may be much in store for a German Parliament, but for the present, the popular element is distinctly weaker than it was when it was first created. The Liberals have lost the Catholics, and a large section of the workmen, who have drifted over to Socialism, and have not in-creased their hold over the peasantry. They have been unable to contend against Protectionist proposals, have not been able to affect Prince Bismarck's general policy, and have, in fact, re• tamed only a veto upon his taxing Bills. Above all, they have -failed to make their leaders of importance. No orator is in the position of a statesman with whom the Government must carefully reckon. This is not altogether their own fault, but still it is so in part. No party can ensure a supply of first-class men, but it can by rigid discipline ninka second-class men formidable. The Catholics have known this. We do not see in Herr Windthorst any signs either of genius or of very lofty capacity ; but his party follow him with such zeal, that he constantly holds the balance of power, and cecnres, if not victory, at least a position from which to negotiate.

The reported illness of the Comte de Chambord has given rise to a quantity of speculation in French circles, amidst which a very old story has cropped up again. Modern Frenchmen and Englishmen have always held that in reckoning succession to the old French throne, the House of Orleans ranked as the first cadet branch of the Bourbon stock. Therefore, as the direct Bourbon line ends with the Comte de Chambord, who is great-great-grandson of Louis XV., the Comte de Paris, as head of the Orleans family, is legitimate King of France. That belief is correct, but correct only because the Spanish Bourbons were, by the Treaty securing them the throne, struck out of the succession in France. Louis XIV.'s second grandson, when in 1700 be set out for Madrid to reign, renounced even his Dukedom of Anjou, and every other right as Prince of the Blood, for himself and his descendants. The object, of course, was to prevent the crowns of France and Spain falling to the same individual. That arrangement has lasted 183 years, and has never been challenged ; but is it binding, now that the "legitimate Spanish Bourbon has lost the throne of Spain" P If it is not, Don Carlos is heir to all Bourbon claims in France, the throne included, and the Orleans family are shut out. The argument seems almost farcical to Englishmen ; but there are men round " Henri Cinq " who urge him to believe it, and to declare Don Jaime, son of Don Carlos, legitimate heir of France. The Comte de Chambord is not likely to yield, and so violate his word to the Comte de Paris ; but if he did, he might, after his death, break the Legitimist party in two.

. Professor Bonamy Price makes, in Thursday's Times, a very good suggestion as to the best mode of compensating tenants who do not wish to leave their holdings, for their improvements. He says, let them hold on at the same rent, but let the increase of rent which could have been obtained from any other tenants be estimated, and capitalised so as to become a deduction from the compensation to which—when they ultimately leave the holding,—they would be entitled. In that way they will gain all the advantage of their own improvements while they stay without any increase of rent being charged for those improvements ; and if they should go, they would then be compensated only so far as they had not already been adequately compensated by the extra yield due to their improvements. That seems to us really to meet the difficulty.

The Sunday Closing Movement gains strength rapidly. It is completely triumphant in Ireland, Wales, and Scotland ; and on Thursday, Sir W. Harcourt received deputations from Northumberland, Durham, Yorkshire, Monmouthshire, Ccrnwall, and the Isle of Wight, all praying for the same thing. He promised to bring the views of the deputations before the Cabinet, and added :—" It is no use preaching to a man who is already converted. I was not always of this opinion, but I do not require to be converted now."• The union of the teetotallers, the saving workmen, and the people who hold the odd view that it is more wrong to be drunk on Sunday than on Monday, is too strong for resistance. We do not know why it should be resisted; but if the movement becomes universal, all eating-shops and coffee-shops ought to be permitted to stay open throughout Sunday. The people will have nowhere to go, and the streets will be filled with crowds which will soon find walking ennuyant, and take to horse-play.

There were some sad blunders in our article of last week on British millionaires. We missed, under a false impression, all whose wealth was exactly a million. Counting them as they were counted in the register of the previous decade, we find the total number of millionaires seventeen, an increase of seventy per cent., very nearly the increase we had deemed most probable. That five persons should have possessed precisely a million out of seventeen, ranging from that figure up to 22,500,000, is curious, and points either to some neexplained method of computation, or to a fancy in the millionaires for keeping their personalty at the round figure. We under-rated also the num. ber of Peers in the list. It should have been twenty,