Prince Bismarck has replied to the revelations of General Le
Flo by publishing some despatches from Prince Reuss, who was German Ambassador in St. Petersburg at the time (May, 1875). They only show that the Emperor Alexander, when talking to the German Ambassador, discredited General Le Flo's alarms, and expressed warm feeling about the German Crown Prince, who then held the reins of government. In January, 1876, moreover, the Czar expressed the highest confidence in Prince Bismarck, stating that he had himself begged him to remain in office as a necessity of the German Empire. The Czar added, however, that everybody did not trust the Prince as implicitly as he did, a fact which was the fault of the German Press. That means, of course, that, the war scare being over, the Czar felt it his interest to be especially civil. Prince Bismarck, in addition to publishing these papers, categorically denies a charge advanced by General Le Flo, that he had sent Herr von Radowitz to St. Petersburg to offer any terms for permission to attack France. Herr von Radowitz returned from St. Petersburg before the war scare, which was got up, Prince Bismarck affirms, between some French agents and Prince Gortschakoff. Berlin has yet to explain how it happened that the British Court fully believed in a coming war, and exerted itself strongly to prevent one.
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