NEWS OF THE WEEK.
THERE have been rumours this week, which do not seem to have much foundation, of an approaching collision between the United States and England in the Behring Sea, on the seal- fishery question. The better account seems to be that Mr. Blaine is disposed to withdraw from his untenable position, and to refer the dispute to arbitration, but is now standing out for his own view of what the terms of the reference should 'be. The United States Navy is not yet armoured, and an =armoured Navy would never provoke a collision with the most powerful Navy on the globe. Canada, again, can never '1.)e persuaded into joining the United States by any sort of menace or violence, least of all just now, when Canada is to some extent reaping the advantage of the absurd McKinley Tariff, and supplying other countries with many of the pro- 'ducts which the high prices caused by the McKinley Tariff no longer permit the United States to export. The threat of war with England is, indeed, anything but a popular cry in America. The farmers do not want to make bad worse by such a policy as that. The "cheap money" cry fascinates them because they do not grasp its meaning. But war on a trivial and worse than trivial pretence they would understand well enough, and it would complete and aggravate the fiasco of the rash experiment in Protective finance.
