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Personal and Political 0 WESTMINSTER'S NOTES OF OF THE WEEK. jngfancf and France-The Eastern Scare! -G.O.M. in Retirement -The Opium Commission. The English have surely become a. Ciomj emotional people than the French. Coming up to London on Wednesday from a quiet seaside town, where the course of life ran very smoothly, I learnt to my astonishment from the even- ing papers that the Chinese Empire had bean broken to pieces, that wa,r wa.s about to be declared between France and England, &a<i tha-t there had been a panic on the Stock Exchange. While people in London thus .bt their heads the French took matters quite coolly, and made a good deal of money by purchasing the securities which English Iwlders were foolishly eager to sell. This rwKcttlous scare was entirely due to the keen competition of the rival news agencies, from which the press now so largely draws its supplies of information, and to which etfitcrs of even the greatest papers appear content to surrender their right of inde- pendent judgment. These agencies are tterved by quick-witted gentlemen, who look tt the most insignificant incidents through me of Sam Welter's "patent double million Magnifying gas microscopes of hextra power," and make it their busi- ness to transform every molehill into a mountain and every thistle into a forest tree. Unfortunately, it is the case that for many yea.rs past France has been simmering with discontent against England, and! the ostentatious proceedings of last year in connection with the Franco-Russian alliance were evidently directed ratlier against this country than against Germany. There are, too, many outstanding differences between the two countries which require careful diplo- matic handling, but nothing is more impro- bable than that Lord Rosebery's Govern- ment, which gave way to France in regard to the important matters of the dismem- berment of Siam and the agreement with the Congo State, would be prepared to pick a quarrel with our neighbours over the impal- pable rights cf British subjects in Mada- gascar. I see that much stress is laid on the mistake Lord Salisbury is supposed to have made in acknowledging four years ago the claims of France to an exclusive pro- tectorate in Madagascar. But Lord Salis- bury got his quid pro quo. His hands were tiled by a previous agreement, made many years ago, and for which he was in no way responsible, admitting France to a share in I deciding the fate of Zanzibar. Lord Salis- bury rightly considered that the possession of Zanzibar was of more value to us than a Tight of intervention in Madagascar, and, fcering above all things a practical statesman, he 1 made a bargain with France that we should be allowed to do what we liked with the former island on the condition that the French Governmeat shculd enjoy a similar privilege in the latter island. No doubt Madagascar in the hands of an enemy maght become in time of war a base of operations intended to cripple British com- merce but Mauritius is close by, the great naval establishments of Bombay and the Cape are on either hand, and, unless we lost the command of the sea, a strong British squadron would soon make an end of the French power in Madagascar. In the great war at the beginning of the century the -French had ait first a number of naval -stations in the Eastern seas, and their cruisers did much damage to our Indian rtrade, but when once our predominance bad been firmly established at sea Pondi- eberry, Mauritius, end Bourbon became so many rat-traps in which the French garri- sons were caught without hope of ever pting away. The same thing ought to Jxappen again unless we are defeated in a great battle at sea, and in that, case it is not the sovereignty of Madagascar only that we should lose, but that of India and Africa likewise. Meanwhile, the Government deserve to be commended for having taken practical steps to protect British subjects and British trade hi Chma. Our commercial and political interests in that part of the world are of overwhelming magnitude, for the masters of (india may well be disquieted at the thought of what might be the consequences of the chitting of rolitical power that would be Caused by the collapse of that Chinese Empire on which British policy lias greatly relied of late years to counteract the aggres- sive designs of France and Russia. But are not the newspapers in too great a hurry to assume that China is already completely vanquished? There is much murmuring ■among the people at the mismanagement or the war. aaid tiis display of ill-feeling against foreigners is a danger against which precautious must be taken; but where are the signs of the general debacle which many imaginative persons declare has set in? China has passed safely through much worse perils than she i.s now confronted with. The victories won by the Japanese have been praised' in the most extravagant terms. Ping-Yang has been called a Sedan or a Waterloo, and the action at sea off the Yalu ORiver an Actium or a Trafalgar. Yet it is cow clear that the Chinese had a com- paratively small force engaged in the battle on land, and that their main army is still intact. Were this not so, we should long ago have heard of a rapid advance of the Japanese forces into Chinese territory. The 'Japanese are evidently better soldiers than their antagonists, but the progress of the wax is very slow, and every day's delay tells in favour of China. As for the sea-fight, the commotion it has excited is out of all proportion to its real value. But in these days everybody prattles about ships, guns, and armour, strategy, tactics, and sea power; and it is anrusdng to observe what a rush there has been of critics, qualified and unqualified, to moralise upon the results of an action as to which little-or nothing is known beyond the fact that it was indecisive. Of course, every "expert" has mounted his hoboy. and ridden it triumphantly round the .-tage, exclaiming, "I told you so." and proving entirely to his own satisfaction that the ships destroyed in the action were lost through neglect of the rules he had laid down for the building of battleships and cruisers and the conduct of naval warfare. It may be said that Sir Edward Reed, at all events, should be exempted from this censure, as that ingenious gentleman, with charactei istic modesty, ha.s not claimed for himself that lie foresaw exactly what took place at Yalu. It. was his friend the German Emperor, he toys, who described the whole affair by anticipation. Sly Sir Edward. How well he can play the courtier. A wicked wit invented the story that Lord Beaconsfield ingratiated himself with the Queen by assuring her that wherever lie went he took with him three book-;—"the Bible, Stiakspeare, and your Majesty's Diary of Your Life in the Highlands. Sir Edward Reed seems bent on "going one better" than Lord Beaconstield; and, as monarchs like to have their flattery laid on thick, no doubt the member for Cardiff will soon get another invitation to Berlin. ]ji;t what was the proof of transcendent fore- sight given by this God-gifted Emperor? He actually wrote below the portrait lie gave to Sir Edward Reed these words:—"I-n a modern battleship the distribution of necessitates a compromise between. armour and artillery. Give her a full all-round belt, and, after that, you must always decide in favour of the artillery. Now, as the Emperor delivered this oracular judgment after having gone through a course of lec- tures under a certain eminent naval con- structor, he can lay no claim to originality in the matter, but only acted like a clever boy who wishes to show how well he has learnt his lesson. Whatever credit, therefore, belongs to the Emperor, his teacher, Sit Edward Reed, must shine with a reflected glory. But the words quoted only embody a truism. To say that you must make a battleship as strong as you can for purposes of both defence and offence seems as obvious as to say that two and two make four. If the Emperor had only added that you must also have regard to speed, and to so training the crews as to make them excellent sailors and gunners, lie would have n.imed all the conditions required to secure naval efficiency. Unfortunately, the mere enumera- tion of these conditions does not carry us any furth*r. The problem of carrying L-Iieni all into effect raises many differences of opinion, which are represented in the various types of vessels comprising the British Navy. Most of these are necessarily experi- mental, but it may fairly be claimed for the Admiralty now, whatever may h.ve been the casein days gone by, that no obstruc- tion is offered to new ideas or to wholesome criticism, and that every improvement sug- gested is discussed by the most competent men in the country and gets a fair trial. As for the lessons of the Yalu action, the experts have mostly failed to gnijp tne fact that neither China. nor Japan had a repre- sentative fleet, according to the fiuropean notion of how squadrons should be composed. In the naval manoeuvres of England and France the big men-of-war are invariably accompanied with a proper complement of cruisers and gunboats, and it would be impos- sible in a naval action between fleets of these two Powers for a few cruisers to s-vil in a. circle at a safe distance round the more slow- moving battleships, as the Japanese are reported to have done, without encountering adversaries of their own calibre. The Japanese have shown that courage, dash, and good gunnery are more important ^actors now, as they have always been, in deciding a victory than the designs of ships or the weight of the armour they carry and anyone who reads the speech made recently by Lord Armstrong, in which lie described the per- fectly marvellous precision of the practice made by the Royal Sovereign with her big guns at sea, will rest satisfied that as gunners the men of our own Navy need fear no rivalry. Mr. Gladstone's restlessness in his enforced retirement betrays a feeling that he has not been treated fairly by his old colleagues and followers. I_ suspect that, when the secret hwtoiy of his resignation is made known, it will turn out that during his absence at Biarritz the Radicals laid a plot to supplant him and put Sir William Harcourt in his place, and that he turned the tables on them by recommending Lord Roseberv to the Queen as his successor. Certainly, his letter on Local Option might have been written by Sir William Harcourt's most malicious foe, since it cuts the ground from under his feet by declaring that. "as a remedy" for drun- kenness, "Local Option is little better than an imposture." No commentary, however plausible, can explain away this damning statement, and it has provoked Sir William Harcourt to declare open war against his late revered leader in a letter in which he says he adheres to his own and Mr. Glad- stone's statements of 1893 in favour of Local Option, and intends to persevere with the I Bill drawn up by the Government. Sir Wilfrid La.wson, also, speaking at Birken- head last night, ca-sfc ridicule on the Gothen- burg system, which Mr. Gladstone has now favoured, and said it would not fulfil the desire of the teetotalers. It seems to me that Sir Wilfrid is right. A man will be able to get drunk under the Gothenburg system just as easily as he can now; and the transfer of the public-houses to the State will only, from the teetotaler's point of view, make the State an accomplice in and patron of the sin now laid to the charge of the private trader. In fact, the State would be placed, if Mr. Chamberlain's views were adopted, in the same position with regard to the drink traffic which English Puritans consider so objectionable with regard to the opium traffic in India. Mr. Gladstone has. then, succeeded in casting one more firebrand into the midst of the Ministerial party, which will set them quarrelling with one another even more vehemently than thev have done before. I should doubt if Sir Wilfrid Lawson's support will do the Radical candidate, Mr. L'ver, much good at Birkenhead. Mr. Elliott L- is a brirrht and can able young politician, and has made a most favourable impression upon the constituency, and there is no reasonable doubt that ht> will succeed in holding the seat hv a. good majority. I see some remarks have been made in the papers on Mr. Lees's w——n« h- IIII—< 39 abandonment of Taunton. But I know that he only consented to stand for Taunton because it was understood that Mr. Percy Allsopp, the present Conservative member, was jeing to retire within a few months, and when Mr. Allsopp changed his mind and determined to remain in Parliament till the general election Mr. Lees was set free from his engagement. The statements which have been published that the report of the Opium Commission will be issued before the end of the year are quite conjectural. No draft of the report has I yet been prepared. Lord Brassey, the chair- man of the Commission, has gone off to America; and, as he is a man who dreads giving offence to anybody, aDd avoids as long as he can making up his mind on any question, the chances are that he will delay writing the report to the latest possible moment. All Royal Commissions seem to end in much the same way. After nearly interminable postponements and discussions, they at last, in sheer weariness, make up their minds to do something. The members remain as divided in opinion as they were at the beginning. The public are presented with a majority report and a minority report, and left to take their choice between them. As a rule, the public take the sensible course of paying no attention to either report, and everything goes on as it did before the Com- el mission was appointed. This will do no harm so far as the Opium Commission is concerned, for what is most to be desired is that the state of things now' existing should remain unchanged. One reason why the opponents of Sir Joseph Renals's election to the office of Lord Mayor fa,iled in their tactics was that they were a little too clever. Over-estimating their own strength, fjiey nominated Sir David Evan- as well as Mr. Phillips, in the belief that the names of these two gentlemen would be placed at the head of the poll for sub- mission to the Court of Aldermen, and that Sir J. Renals would be excluded. This divi- sion of forces ensured the triumph of Sir Joseph. If Sir D. Evans's 800 votes had been given to Mr. Phillips, lie would have been placed at the head of the poll by such a majority that the Court of Aldermen must have elected him. I have the pleasure of know- ing Sir Joseph Renals well. He is a straight- forward. upright, and genial man, and I am very glad he has defeated his intriguing opponents. Mr. Phillips was. oerhaps, prompted in his opposition by the fear that by the time his regular turn of office comes the Lord Mayor of London will be chosen hv a larger and more representative body of citizens than the small clique that now dis- poses of this great office. J.

MISS OLIVE TALBOT DEAD.

[No title]

The "Insult" to Wales

WELSH TIN PLATERS.

CARDIFF VESSEL'S QUICK PASSAGE.

[No title]

Pars About Football,

The Squire's Love Letter I

RESULT OF LARKING,

THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC.

RAILWAYMEN MEET.

[No title]

WANT TO BE CIVIL SERVANTS.

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