NEWS OF THE WEEK.

MDE NELIDOFF, the Russian Ambassador at Con- • stantinople, has announced to the Sultan, under circumstances detailed elsewhere, that Russia and the other Powers positively prohibit his Majesty from meddling with the securities hypothecated to his foreign credi- tors. Such a step, says the Note in so many words, might be " fatal " to the Empire. The Sultan has accordingly abandoned his intention of raising a loan, and will rely upon his Revenue, which, according to the official Budget, exceeds eighteen millions a year, with an expenditure of about a million in excess of that sum. Bertram Effendi, however, who understands the Treasury, disbelieves that statement so completely that he has refused on that ground an important financial poet, and Sir Edgar Vincent in his Report to the Porte on the finances hints throughout that Revenue stops in transit. The Sultan cannot obtain honest collectors by mere decree, and his only resource, in the absence of a loan, is to leave everybody out- side Constantinople unpaid, thus, in fact, authorising them to plunder. Even in the capital itself the distress for want of money is very great, for the garrison must be paid, the Palace, with its swarming parasites, must be kept con- tented, and heavy sums must be found, and are found, for the secret police, so that nothing remains for the adminis- tration. There is no remedy except the deposition of the Sultan, and this the Powers will not adopt, the Ambassadors still contenting themselves with "considering " detailed "reforms," which the Sultan will accept, decree, and evade as he always has done. There is not a sign as yet of real coercion, and the Sultan has recently exiled five thousand Soffits, or students of theology, for fear they should lead the discontented Mussulmans in a great entente.

Sir E. Vincent in his Report estimates the Turkish Revenue, after deducting payments for the Debt, and for some tributes not received, at £14,350,000, and the expenditure at 21,000,000 more. The causes of the deficit, he says, are the extravagance of the Military Department, which spends a proportion of the Revenue 24 per cent, greater than is spent in France, the enormous number of the employes, and fraud in the collec- tions, the unassigned Customs sinking one-third, while the assigned Revenues—which are in European bands—positively increase. The frauds in the Tobacco Department must be enormous, for twenty millions of Turks who smoke incessantly pay less than six millions of Egyptians. Sir E. Vincent recommends, therefore, military reductions, the extinction of fraud, regular payment of salaries, a reduction in the number of employes, and a certain increase in direct taxation, not one of which recommendations, except perhaps the last, will be adopted.

One-third of the French Senate was re-elected on Sunday, but the changes were not important. The Moderates lost nothing, except in losing M. Constans, who was defeated by M. de Remusat, also a Moderate, but six of their seats were captured by Radicals, though the party was recouped by six other seats gained from the Right. The latter is, in fact, diminished by eight seats, returning only twelve instead of twenty. The Radicals are jubilant, though they have only increased by two, and claim a moral victory ; but some of their seats have only been carried by abandoning the Income- tax and promising not to abolish the Senate. France, in fact, so far as it is represented by the " delegations " which elect Senators, and by the communal municipalities, is not anxious for any particular change. The mass vote is less conservative, but as a whole the country is thinking mainly of foreign politics and making money.

Sir Edward Clarke, addressing his constituents at the Plymouth Guildhall on Monday, gave a history of the financial relations of the United Kingdom with Ireland since the Union, and expressed his own opinion on the Report of the recent Commission. This history,—at least as reported,— omitted the steady approximation towards equality of personal taxation which has been going on for eighty years between Irishmen and Englishmen of the same means, and which Mr. Gladstone's own finance has done so much to promote, and laid a very exaggerated emphasis on the intrinsic justice of taxing the different parts of the Kingdom not on the principle of equal taxation for equal portions of individual wealth, but in proportion to the "taxable capacity" of great areas as wholes, a most impracticable and disinte- grating principle, which will go very far to set up quarrels in all parts of the Kingdom. Nevertheless, though that notion has been ignored ever since 1S17, and more and more completely ignored, Sir Edward Clarke accepted it as the true measure of justice to Ireland, and sug- gested that the United Kingdom should pay back to Ireland the difference between what Ireland actually pays and what, on the theory of taxable capacity, she ought to pay. He also echoed the unproved and, as we believe, unprovable assumption that our Free-trade has injured Ireland, apparently because Englishmen consume more in proportion of those foreign commodities which Free-trade brings us than Irishmen consume. But if Ireland had Home-rule and were to put protective duties on these goods, would she be more or less prosperous in consequence ? The new economic measure- ments are at once absurdly microscopic where they are wanted to prove a particular thesis, and far too careless and slovenly in ignoring the more general effects of Free-trade.

Mr. Leonard Courtney made a very good speech at Liskeard on Wednesday, in which he rejected the notion that any serious injustice is done to Ireland by subjecting Irishmen and British subjects of equal means to equal taxation, and he firmly resisted the doctrine that if there was any injustice it could be rectified by taking the excess paid by Irishmen,— chiefly the whisky - drinkers,—and giving it back to the country at large, to supply the great towns (suppose) with an adequate water-supply by way of poetical justice for the overtaxed whisky. If there were any injustice it was done to the Irish whisky-drinkers who might be overtaxed ; but you did not rectify a wrong by taking the drinking Paddy's money and paying it back to the sober Paddy. if there were to be restitution made to Ireland at all, it should be to the overtaxed consumers of whisky, not to those who had not paid the overtax. On the whole, Mr. Courtney thought that there was no appreciable injustice done, and that equality of taxation for individuals of equal means was the right ideal, not a taxation proportioned to the "taxable capacity" of different State areas.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, speaking at Bristol on Thursday night, took a very cheerful view of the commercial prospects of the country; and while saying in the strongest way that it is essential for a country which depends so much upon its commerce to extend its territory largely into the unsettled parts of the world, deprecated anything like naval competition with France, though he fully admitted the necessity of keeping the command of the sea. On the moot question of the financial relations of England and Ireland he declined to speak till he could express his view fully and clearly in the House of Commons, but he both blamed the contemptuous and irritating tone in which many English critics speak of the Irish financial claims, and, on the other hand, warned Irish- men that the Report of this last Commission, gratifying as it must seem to them, must not be taken without reference to the Reports of two other Royal Commissions which had adopted a very different view. Parliament should try to do justice not to Ireland only, or England only, but to the whole United Kingdom.

Dr. O'Dwyer, the Catholic Bishop of Limerick, has written a very good, and as we think, a most opportune, letter to Wednesday's Times, pressing the strong claims of the Irish Catholics to have a Catholic University of their own, which in regard to endowments, library, and all other appurten- ances of a great University, should be placed on an equal footing with the University of Dublin. Ever since the failure of Mr. Gladstone's Irish University Bill in 1873, which indeed hardly fulfilled the conditions for which the Roman Catholics reasonably ask, the justice of the claim has been admitted by almost all reasonable men, and yet it has always been passed by. That is twenty-three years ago, and even if the Govern- ment should take it up this year, as we earnestly hope they will, it would be a quarter of a century after Mr. Gladstone's first great effort to do justice to Irish Roman Catholics before any such University could get to work. At a time when almost all the Irish Catholics, and almost all the Irish Protestants as well, are crying out,—very unreasonably as we hold,—on our financial injustice to Ireland, it would at least be opportune to show that it is no stinginess or deliberate selfishness on our part that prevents us from meeting liberally Irish claims which we recognise as just. As the Bishop of Limerick says, the vis inertia of the English Parliament is great. But a powerful Administration like this should be able to overcome even that rather formidable, though inert, resistance.

Baron de Conrcel, the very able French Ambassador who has just resigned, has been interviewed by M. de Blowitz, and has given his views on the relations of Great Britain and France. They are rather lengthy views, bat, if epitomised, amount to this, that France and England are only divided now by the question of Egypt. France has special rights in Egypt and in the Egyptian Soudan which, in French judg- ment, have been roughly overridden by Great Britain. The latter Power should therefore always consult France before it takes any step, and, as a condominium is impossible, should retire, thus allowing Egypt to govern itself. We suppose the interview is important, for it occupies a column and a quarter of the Times of Friday, but we do not see that it carries us a step forwarder. Its obvious intention is to declare that the Egyptian question is a French and English question, and not a European one.

We greatly fear that a terrible year is coming for the Presidency of Bombay. There is no sign that the plague is abating in the capital, while there are many signs that the mortality is under-estimated, partly through the morbid dislike of the people to interference, and partly through the desire of the ruling classes to keep panic within limits. That panic, which we delight to perceive has not affected the Europeans, is producing ruinous effects. One-

third of the population are believed to have fled, and have thus not only disorganised industry, but have scattered the seeds of disease through all the villages and cities of Western India. If the plague really gets hold of the country population as it once got hold of the country population in the Sonthal Pergannahs; the mortality will be something frightful. Dr. Cleghorn, a competent expert, has been seat by the Government of India to report; but as yet we hear nothing of the decided sanitary measures which ought in future to protect Bombay.

All English charities must make up their minds this year- to a reduction of 25 per cent, upon their incomes. The Government of India and Lord George Hamilton, overborne by the newspapers, have agreed to sanction the raising, through the Lord Mayor, of a Charitable Fund, and there is no doubt that it will attain very large proportions. There can be no doubt that the distress in Northern India is very great, and will be worse, there being already more than six. hundred and fifty thousand persons upon the relief works. The winter rains, though they have relieved some districts,. have been quite insufficient; the export of grain, usually hundreds of thousands of tons when rice and wheat are taken together, has almost totally ceased, and in badly situated districts the price of grain may be taken to be equivalent to what is. 2d. a loaf would be in England. The very poor, in fact, are, in Yorkshire phrase, " °lemming," and with difficulty kept alive. The only point, therefore, is the method of relief, and for our parts we do not see clearly what private distributors can do that the Government of India cannot accomplish. The million raised here will only save the Indian Treasury a million. If it is wished to do that, or to exhibit the cordial goodwill of Englishmen towards the poorer classes of India, a Parliamentary grant would be quicker, more effective, and more really national. The Famine Fund will be subscribed, in substance, by five thousand families.

On Tuesday Mr. Rhodes, who left for England on Wednes- day, was entertained at a great banquet at Cape Town. Though so violent a storm was raging outside that the speakers were hardly audible, and though the electric light occasionally went out and the limelight apparatus burst with a loud explosion, Mr. Rhodes made a long speech, in which boldness and subtlety were characteristically blended. Mr. Rhodes—we quote from the report of the Central News, which is very much the fullest—began with a set of phrases which show that on occasion he can show himself a master of the art of "unctuous rectitude." "It was only the other day," said Mr. Rhodes, "that I was on the edge of the Zam- besi doing what work I could, and having to consider my return to my own country—because you must remember that we carry with us the instincts of our race—and though at times, and perhaps unjustly, we blame their expressions or their conduct toward ourselves, still the main fact remains with all of us,—and that is the love for our country." So Mr. Rhodes loves us in spite of our unctuousness and our rectitude. Mr. Rhodes went on to describe the one domi- nating idea of his life. "Having read the histories of other countries, he saw that expansion was everything, and that the world's surface being limited, the great object of present humanity should be to take as much of that world as it possibly could." Mr. Rhodes went on to describe how, having failed to get either Cape Colony or the Imperial Government to take the North, he was obliged to take it him- self, in order to forestall the foreigner. That is an assertion which Mr. Rhodes has often made, and may be true. We should like, however, to hear the opinion of the Foreign and Colonial Offices on the point.

Mr. Rhodes ended his speech by declaring that he had no desire to create race hatred, but just the reverse. "The situation has been dimmed and misrepresented on the basis. of a race issue which does not exist, and I speak on that delicate question because that is the accusation against myself. You cannot conceal your feelings for fourteen years of political life or carry out your social relations on the basia of a humbug, and so I throw down the challenge on that point of race feeling." Mr. Rhodes, .in replying to the toast of his health, said that all men must work. "Some great men culti- vated orchids. Others pursued Masonry. His object, rightly or wrongly, had always been the expansion and at the same time the union, of his country." We note with great regret that though the toast of Lord Rosmead's health was acknow- (edged by the company standing, it was received "in absolute silence." After such an exhibition we wonder that Mr. Rhodes, who owes so much to Lord Rosmead, did not enter a protest against any ill-feeling being shown to his old friend and patron. But perhaps we shall find from the fall reports that he did.

Bad news, as usual, from South Africa. The dread of the rinderpest has extended to British Bechuanaland, and the natives, irritated by their cattle being shot to prevent the -spread of the pestilence, are murdering the outlying British farmers. A small force of volunteers has started from Vryburg to avenge a murder of the kind ; but it is believed t.hat the movement is spreading, and that more formidable tribes than the Bechuanas, who are essentially unwarlike, will speedily be reported in revolt. What seems to be wanted is a trained and mounted police; but if it is composed of white men it costs too much, and the farmers are prejudiced against all others. They could be fully protected by Sikh volunteers; but they not only will not engage them, but they protest angrily against the admission of any natives of India. In Natal, where the settlers are almost entirely British, they have just risen to prevent the landing of two ship-loads of Hindoos, and have compelled the local Government to pro- mise a prohibitory Act. We have discussed this subject elsewhere, and may mention here that the feeling is just as violent at the Cape, though in Cape Town itself nearly half the working population is composed of Malays, who occupy a suburb all to themselves. Neither time, nor nsuage, nor permanent peace appears to mitigate in any degree the jealousy of the colours.

The value of which the Sikhs might be to the Empire has again been illustrated by the news from Nyassaland. A chief named Chikusi, at the head of some thousands of Angoni 'Zulus, had, it will be remembered, raided the mission-stations and murdered many of the converts. Captain Stewart accordingly started to punish him with fifty-eight Sikhs and two hundred blacks, and on October 21st, 1896, reached his chief kraal. The Zulus turned out in force, but the Sikhs, acting, as they always do, as spear-head to the native force, charged in grand style, and by their heavy firing dispersed the enemy. Chikusi himself was taken, was tried for murder, and was hanged, probably to the great relief of his district. Almost at the same time Odete, a chief who had rebelled without apparently murdering anybody, was attacked in his stone fort by Captain Manning with twenty-four Sikhs and eighty-four natives. Odete thought himself secure behind his masonry on the top of a hill 2,000 ft. high ; but the Sikhs made a tremendous night march, and though threatened from their rear, attacked and captured the fort, the rebels, who displayed much courage, being wholly unable to resist their fire. Odete surrendered, and as he had not committed murders, was kindly treated, though his fortified position was destroyed. The planters of the Cape could obtain any number of Sikh police, who at the present moment are fretting with desire for excitement and adventure; but the settlers, English as well as Dutch, will none of them.

The controversy in regard to the rebuilding of the west front of Peterborough Cathedral is still occupying a great deal of public attention. We have not the slightest sympathy with those who have attempted to browbeat the Dean and Chapter into a particular line of action, nor do we believe for a moment that the officials of a public Department would prove better guardians of the Cathedrals. The Dean and Chapter of Peterborough have a great responsibility to endure as trustees for the nation, and they are perfectly right to say that their duty is to act as they think right, and not as Borne one else thinks right. At the same time, we should experience a feeling of relief if we were to hear that the Dean and Chapter had granted the prayer for time which has been made to them. The Dean and Chapter are, we do not doubt, quite as ready to admit as their loud-voiced critics the immense superiority of repair to demolition and rebuild- ing, and we think they might reasonably run a certain risk of damage while yet another investigation was made. Why should not the Dean and Chapter call in the most distinguished practical engineer they can find and ask him to judge between the conflicting architects? Of one thing we

are clear, the Dean and Chapter will suffer no loss of dignity- in doing this, or in yielding if the final report is against the necessity for rebuilding.

Mr. B. Pickard, Member for Normanton, delivered OR Tuesday at Leicester an address to the Miners' Federation which deserves attention. It was marked throughout by au extreme readiness to rely upon the State as supreme arbiter in all labour questions. Mr. Pickard apparently despairs at Trade-Unionism, and insists that only the State can secure to miners an eight-hour day. He asked for a Mines Regula- tion Bill of the most far-reaching character, one of its clauses forbidding any man over eighteen not bred a miner from ever becoming one, and another increasing largely the number of inspectors, while he is prepared, if we understand aright his reference to Belgian and Melbourne precedents, to support a, measure which would fix by statute a minimum rate of wages. Needless to say, he objects to any contracting-out clause in the Bill for defining employers' liability. We are not alto- gether displeased to witness the disappearance of that unreasoning jealousy of the State which formerly so greatly hampered both philanthropists and devotees of education, but the recoil is singularly violent. If Mr. Pickard's ideas were accepted, the miners would find themselves regimented under inspectors as soldiers are under officers, with no competition to raise wages, no freedom to strike, and no power above Parliament, which would, in fact, be their employer, to which they could submit their grievances. They would not like the position at all, which would be that of the Sappers and Miners, with these aggravations, that they would have no glory, no chances, and no pensions.

The Daily Chronicle of Thursday gives a very interesting account of General Booth's call on Mr. Gladstone at Hawarden Castle on the shortest day of last year. Very naturally and inevitably the General seems to have been much fascinated by his host, who was as genial, keen, and sympathetic with the head of the Salvation Army as he would have been with one of his own circle of friends. Mr. Glad- stone elicited that the various lieutenants of General Booth sent abroad every year from this country number between two and three hundred, that the total annual income of the whole Army is over a million sterling, and that the head of the Army is to nominate his successor. There is also a scheme under consideration, not yet fully matured, for rectifying any omission on the part of the General of the Army to make his nomination. Mr. Gladstone seemed, perhaps, a trifle shocked that there was no provision for the election of the head of the Army by any semi-constitutional process,—even a Pope, as Mr. Gladstone remarked, is elected by the College of Cardinals. Other points of interest were,— the admission that Roman Catholics often come to the penitent-forms of the Army, and yet go regularly to Con- fession, a reminiscence of General Booth's that the late Cardinal Manning had once professed his full belief that the Spirit of God was with the Salvation Army, and the final expression of General Booth's own belief (not communicated, of course, to Mr. Gladstone) that the latter is a great talker, and that he " ought " to talk, because he soon wins his way to the very heart of a subject, and lights it up with happy and vivifying expressions.

Mr. Herbert Spencer has received a gratifying request from a considerable number of very eminent men, some of them of very different schools of thought from his own, to allow them to have a portrait painted of him and placed in one of the national collections. Among the signatures are those of Mr. Arthur Balfour, Dr. Martineau, Sir Edward Fry, Sir M. E. Grant Duff, Professor Knight, Mr. Lecky, Sir John Lubbock, and a number of other distinguished men. We have never agreed in the lines of Mr. Spencer's psychology, though we greatly admire the acuteness and closeness of his reasoning, as we do also the great simplicity, dignity, and consistency of his private life, but it is certainly desirable that a thinker who has influenced English thought so much, and American .thought still more, should be portrayed for the nation with all the force and insight of a great painter.

Bank Rate, 4 per cent.

New Consols (273,) were on Friday, 1111. •