A letter was published last Saturday from Mr. Balfour to
the Archbishop of Canterbury which is obviously intended as a manifesto to Europe of the policy to be adopted by Great Britain in regard to Macedonia. The Prime Minister ex- presses his entire agreement in the general horror it the scenes there enacted, and has no objection to public meetings to express it. But he maintains that there are "salient elements" in the situation which are forgotten, the first one being that, although the population of Macedonia is governed by "a corrupt and incapable administration," garrisoned by "an ill-paid and undisciplined soldiery," and liable to "a detestable system of taxation," it is still not homogeneous, but its rent into fragments bydifferences of race, aggravated by differences of creed. The natural instrument by which to secure a remedy was the Concert of Europe ; but that works slowly, and might where such differences exist work ineffectively. It was there- fore a matter of congratulation for Europe when &male and Austria proposed to press on the Porte a scheme of reform which, though a minimum scheme, might have produced a good result. That it did not was due to the fact that the Porte was "evasive and dilatory," and that the insurgents forced the Turks into further action, in the hope that if large bodies of troops were called out, outrages would be committed -which would force Europe . to intervene. That policy Mr. ',Balfour calls " immoraL"
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