NEWS OF THE WEEK.

THE week has been full of sensations, which apparently our people enjoy without much reflection on the results to which, if well founded, they would tend,—bread at is. a loaf being only the first of them. It was gravely .cated daring the week that we must fight Russia for Manchuria, and France for West Africa, and America for a post in Alaska, and Germany for being hostile, all at once. Very grave men, indeed, talked of the" blackness" of the look-out; there was a heavy fall on 'Change, and murmurs were heard that Lord Salisbury, with influenza hanging about him, ought not to keep the Foreign Office There is no doubt that the world is disturbed, that everybody is inclined to " grab " everything, and that our own people display a kind of hankering to use their wonderful Fleet which is not customary ; but on the other hind, the nearness of danger is steadying those who are respon- sible. There is nothing in the Chinese affair, as we have tried to explain elsewhere, to make war necessary ; Germany would like a war best in which she did not engage, seeing her way in China if other Powers were occupied ; and the French Army, though eager for distinction, wants it for Generals and not for Admirals. The chance of war, therefore, is reduced to the chance of a collision in West Africa caused by M. Hanotaux's illusion as to Lord. Salisbury's weakness, and though that chance is serious, it may possibly not occur. We feel inclined on some days to wish that evening newspapers did not exist ; but, after all, the electors cannot supersede Parliament, and Peers and Members are as grave and cautious as American Senators when asked to make things actually ready for war.

The country was startled on Tuesday by an intimation that the Queen, whose departure for Southern France had been fixed. for Wednesday, would postpone her journey owing to "indisposition." As Baron de Courcel and Sir Thomas San- d2rson bad dined at Windsor Castle on Monday, it was at once s ispected that the true cause of delay was political, and Funds fell on all the Bourses of Europe. The momentary panic was succeeded by fear for her Majesty's health, there being a suspicion that the influenza, which is a spiteful peat, might have decided to threaten the most valuable life in the Empire. It turned, out, however, that the Queen, who is constitutionally insensible to cold, was only suffering from a bilious attack, and on Thursday afternoon she started for Cimiez, with the inten- tion, it is said, of meeting President Faure on the way. The Queen's health and contentment are both of high interest to her subjects, but we cannot think her Majesty has been well counselled in this matter. The greatest difficulty between London and Paris is that M. Hanotaux does not believe us to 1).. in earnest, and it is simply impossible to make him believe that if Lord Salisbury had resolved to fight rather than yield he would permit the Qaeen to spend her holiday on French territory. Such an incident would be a little too historical. Even in the event of a declaration of war, M. Faure would not venture to arrest a lady so reverenced in Germany and Russia, as well as at home ; but there is popular emotion to be reckoned with, and the situation would be one of extreme embarrassment.

The Times' correspondent in Pekin, who is evidently informed either by Li Hung Chang or a group within the Tsungli Yamen, published on Monday a statement that Russia has demanded a lease of Port Arthur and Talienwan on the same conditions as those conceded to Germany for Kiao-chow. Moreover, Russia is to be permitted to extend her Trans-Asiatic Railway down the Liau-tung Peninsula to Port Arthur. China, it was added, would yield, and indeed, according to Berlin authorities, has yielded, having authorised her Minister in Pekin to sign the necessary treaty. Mr. Curzon in the House of Commons denies this statement, but admits the substantial accuracy of the information, which on Tuesday produced a sort of rattle on the Stock Exchange, where all prices, especially those of first-class securities, are at least 5 per cent, higher than they would be if war broke out anywhere. We have no doubt of the accuracy of the accounts, but do not quite understand the fuss made over them. Everybody who understands the situation at all knows that unless China suddenly throws up a strong man able to call her fighting tribes to her rescue—there are at least ten millions of them in Mongolia, South Yunnan, Hunan, and Thibet—or can purchase the aid of the Ghoorka. army—which in Chinese theory is Chinese—the Russians must have Manchuria, and the French Hainan. There is no help for it, and no particular evil in it, as it will not pay to close the trades, and the Russians, if they can expand in Northern China, will not threaten either India or Persia. Our Jingoes are worse than the Americans. They are not only burning for war, but they want war with everybody at once.

The American Congress has this week unanimously and without discussion voted £10,000,000 to be devoted to pre- parations for war. We have discussed elsewhere the gravity of this event, and pointed out that it cannot be regarded as one of those acts of preparation which as a rule tend to pre- vent war.

There has been another bad riot in Bombay. The Plague there is killing an average of nearly fifteen hundred persons a week—the last official record is 1,283 persons—and those two-thirds of the people who have not fled have got their nerves on edge. Hindoos and Massulmans alike insist that the Plague inspectors are tyrants for segregating plague- stricken patients, for sending sick women to hospital, and for insisting that registration shall precede interment or crema- tion. A case or two of exhumation, necessary to prevent fraudulent concealment of the cause of death, has recently worked them up to frenzy, and on Wednesday they rescued a Mussulman woman who was being taken from her house. A Parsee Magistrate ordered the police to charge, which they did, killing four persons, whereupon mobs all over the city began attacking Europeans. Two soldiers in par- ticular were clubbed to death, and fifteen Europeans were seriously injured. The Government immediately sum- moned cavalry from Poona, the Volunteers were called out, and artillery was even stationed in one street, almost an unprecedented occurrence. The city is now quieter, but it is obvious that the population is seething with discontent and with excitement at the notion that its religious beliefs and ideas of social propriety are being disregarded for some occult purpose. A similar scene has repeatedly occurred in Italy, but the special strength of such a movement in India is that it is not produced by fear, but by fervour. The Austrian Emperor has changed his Cisleithan Ministry, in tne hope of obtaining a Premier who will maintain order at all hazards. Baron Gantsch has "re- signed," apparently at a moment's notice, and Count Franz Thtm, formerly Stadtholder of Bohemia, said to be a most determined man, has taken his place. He will, it is believed, make one more effort to govern with this Parliament, and that failing, will declare the Constitu- tion unworkable, and revive the old one, under which the Central Parliament was elected by the Diets. If there is any popular demonstration against this plan, which, however, is not expected, he will rely upon the Army, which, whatever its feelings on the question of race, prefers the Emperor to any Parliament.

On Saturday last Sir Alfred Milner, High Commissioner in South Africa, made a significant speech at the ban- quet given to him at Graaf Reinet on the opening of the railway. At present the Dutch in the Colony, though not really disloyal, were uneasy because they believed that Great Britain was seeking to destroy the independence of the Transvaal. Great Britain had no such intention. She only wanted the minimum of control as regards external relations, "distinctly reserved solely in the interests of the future tranquillity of South Africa." "It is not the aggres- siveness of the Imperial Government which is keeping up the spirit of unrest in Africa. It is the unprogressiveness, not to say the retrogressiveness, of the Transvaal, and its deep suspicion of Great Britain, which makes it devote attention to imaginary external dangers, when every impartial observer can see perfectly well that the real dangers are internal." All that, of course, is in essence absolutely true ; but we can- not help thinking that it would have had far more effect had Sir Alfred Milner at the same time said something in con- demnation of the Rhodesian policy, which is certainly not one of non-intervention. We may note here that there has been some talk lately of the Transvaal not being under British suzerainty. That is an entire error. We are as much legally the suzerains of the Transvaal Republic as we are of the Nizam of Hyderabad. Let any one who doubts the fact read a most able opinion written a few weeks ago by Mr. Mack;.,rness.

Mr. Rhodes, in the course of an interview with a reporter of the Cape Times, announced his return to Cape politics as leader of the Progressive and Anti-Bond party. "To-day," he said, "the Bond is against progress, unity, and equality, and is ruled by the Continental gang at Pretoria." Personally, office at the Cape had no more to offer him. At Cape Town, declared Mr. Rhodes, " all is talking, while in the north it is doing, creating, realising the dream of the ancients. The Cape, Natal, and Rhodesia are all absorbed in localism." Former unifying plans had been rained by the mistakes of President Kruger, Dr. Leyds, and himself, but he hoped to do better in the future. Mr. Rhodes added, "I admit my mistake."—" Do you repent it ? " asked his interviewer.— " That is my business," he replied. "I know my own motives." We confess that we have little curiosity as to these, and are inclined to say, like the man in the play, "Oh, damn your motives ! " Good motives are the commonest things in the world and the most ineffectual. What we do want to know about are Mr. Rhodes's actions, and whether these are likely to be less futile, inept, and disingenuous in the future than in the past.

The polling to fill the vacancy at Stepney took place on Wednesday, and resulted in the return of the Home-ruler, Mr. Steadman, by a majority of 20. Mr. W. C. Steadman polled 2,492 votes, and his Unionist opponent, Major Evans- Gordon, 2,472. At the last three elections the Unionists carried the seat, and in 1895 by a, majority of 472. We can never attach much importance to by-elections, but it is impossible to deny that the capture of a seat always has a certain effect on the House of Commons, for Members of Parliament are absurdly sensitive on all questions of polling. Mr. Steadman is the Secretary of the Bargebnilders' Union and an active Trade-Unionist. He was last week returned to the County Council for the same constituency. It is terrible to consider the amount of talking he must have gone through in the last month. Sydney Smith said of a bad clergyman that he deserved to be preached to death by wild curates. Some day our criminals will be condemned to be speechified to death by M.P.'s and County Councillors.

The Navy Estimates for the coming year were issued on Tuesday. Their total amount is £23,778,000, an increase of over £1,440,000. Owing to the lock-out, a large amount of the sum voted last year was not expended, but there has been no reduction on account of this. The most important and significant of the sixteen headings under which the money is to be spent is that for men, for it shows that the Admiralty is keeping its promise to increase the men, pan i pas= with the ships. The total increase in men and officers is 6,340, made up of 111 commissioned officers, 39 subordinate officers, 50 warrant officers, 2,400 seamen, 100 artisans, 1,984 engine-room ratings, 356 miscellaneous ratings, 300 boys, and 1,000 Marines. This will place the numbers of officers and men under the Admiralty at 106,390. Last year it was 100,050. The shipbuilding programme for next year includes the laying down of three battleships, four cruisers, and four sloops, all in the dockyards. Another fact of interest is the adoption of a new 6 in. quick-firing gun, which does not require the heavy and expensive brass cartridges. The new system will save money, space, and weight. On the who]e, the Estimates are satisfactory, and show that the Govern- ment means to act on Mr. Goschen's excellent principle of maintaining the balance of power at sea. The delays caused by the strike are greatly to be regretted, but it is ridiculous to say that they could have been avoided if Mr. Goschen had not "sided" with the masters. He did of course nothing of the kind, but remained strictly neutral.

Lord Roberts delivered on Monday in the House of Lords a speech of unusual value. It was, considering its subject matter and its importance, a brief speech; it was entirely free from bewildering details—the pit into which most experts fall—and it was by far the most reasonable defence of the Forward policy that has yet been delivered in this country. We cannot hope to ondense such pemmican, but its drift was that we are bound by treaty and by policy to defend Afghanistan against Russia, that we cannot do this while two hundred thousand arm-bearing tribesmen are able to resist our transit to Afghanistan, and that we are bound, therefore, to " subjugate " those tribesmen. The way to do this is to follow the " Sandeman pulicy " in Beluchistan, that is, to appoint a general ruler of the frontier, to make arrangements cith each separate tribe, to establish a great central cantonment among the tribes, pre- sumably at Tira,h, to govern them with as little interference as possible but to govern them, and to admit large numbers of them into our own Army. That done, whenever Russia turned southward we could carry on the railway to Candahar, and protect Afghanistan without danger of the tribes rising behind us. We had not, Lord Roberts contended, the option of reverting to the Backward policy, and were, in fact, driven forward step by step by events which in a great degree were beyond our own control. The speech made a deep impression on the Lords, and the official answer from Lord Lansdowne was really only the argument of opportuneness. He also would govern the tribes, and particularly would clear the shortest and best pass, the " Gomal," but he would not be in a hurry about it. The policy of Lord G. Hamilton's despatch would do for the present.

The most serious answer to Lord Roberts was not made by any Peer. It is that there is no evidence that by subjugating the tribes we increase their loyalty to us. On the contrary, they may hate us all the more. It is not certain that Sir R. Sandeman's policy in Beluchista,n will succeed as a permanent method ; while it is certain that the first condition of that policy, the existence in each tribe of a recognised chief whom we can convince, or coerce, or bribe, does not extend to the Himalaya. Is it worth while, then, to waste our resources on an effort which, even if it succeeded, will secure us nothing / The tribes will not aid Russia, or if they do, they will, when out of their own mountains, only treble her difficulty in securing supplies, of which Colonel Hanna, in his pamphlet on the sub- ject, makes so much. To arrest the progress of India for the sake of preparing against a Russian invasion which may never come seems rather wild policy, more especially as, if it did come, our real defence would be not a frontier war in Central Asia, but a descent on the Caucasus, Odessa, and Port Arthur. The whole debate, in which Lord Northbrook, Lord Ripon, the Duke of Devonshire, and Lord Kimberley joined, .should be carefully read, with this recollection in mind, that Lord Roberts point blank refused to touch the financial side of the question. We rather fancy he knows the truth,—viz., that the Forward policy must be carried out, if at all, by the British, and not the Indian, taxpayer, and did not want to say so.

On Thursday Mr. Goschen introduced the Navy Esti- mates, described above, in a speech which it is hardly too much to say was the most significant announcement made of late. If one reads between the lines, one sees a gravity of tone and a seriousness which would be anxious if it were not so steady and so resolute, which shows that the Government takes a most serious view of the present situation. In carefully measured words Mr. Goschen described bow our ships are distributed. On the distribu- tion of those ships depends our power as a nation. The Channel Squadron is the most powerful we have ever had in commission ; and the Channel Squadron is not confined to that area which its name would imply. The Channel Squadron was a few days ago off the western shores of the Mediterranean. "The Channel Squadron has an offensive as well as a defensive intention in time of war, and the closer defence of our shores and the seas around these islands in time of war will be intrusted to reserve ships we keep in commission ; therefore it must not be supposed that the Channel Squadron is simply to patrol the Channel." Then we have the Mediterranean Squadron, a squadron on the North American Station, on the South American Station, on the western shores of the American Continent. We do not deem it necessary to dwell further upon the significance of these words as to the duties and present position of the Channel Squadron.

Mr. Goschen went on to mention a fact of great import- ance which is often ignored. When we have to reinforce or relieve our foreign squadrons we do not send out men in freightships or troopships. We send out a fully commis- sioned, fully manned man-of-war, so that at all times, besides our squadrons at the stations, we 1 ave traversing the seas a certain number of ships in commission ready for action at any moment if war should arise. We cannot dwell upon all the significant remarks in this most i.ble and momentous speech, but we must notice Mr. Goschen's appeal to the House to protect him from being pushed with questions which might lead to dangerous disclosuret. It was sometimes con- sidered, said Mr. Goschen, that we act without system at the Admiralty, that we have no system in our combina- tions, in the number of our ships in the different classes we con- struct, and that we have no strategic plane if war should break out. "I do not know on what facts such a view is founded, except the fact that we do not much talk about our schemes and the system we are following; and there, again, I hope it may not be necessary for me to say more."

The criticisms made upon what Lord Charles Bereeford declared was the most frank and honest speech he had ever heard from a First Lord, were directed to the fact that we were falling behind in the matter of construction. Lord Charles called the speech heartbreaking in this respect. He was very anxious that we should at once buy all the ships building in this country for foreign Powers. Lord Charles Bereeford was also very anxious that we should seize Chusan and make it a naval base. Mr. Goschen in his reply pointed out the difficulties which lie in the way of buying ships under construction for foreign Powers, but though he stated these apparently insuperable objections, his reference to the fact that these ships con- stituted a kind of reserve showed that in a great emergency recourse would be had to purchase. On the whole, the debate, while it emphasised the difficulties of the situation, brought out as its central fact our great present strength at sea. The doubts displayed were all in futuro pessimism.

There is nothing which Members of the House of Commons enjoy so much as a kind of solid and solemn buffoonery. On Friday week the vote on Account (213,900.000 for the Civil Service and Revenue Departments) gave a rare opportunity for a display of this special form of humour. Sir John Leng's proposal to take away the grille in front of the Ladies' Gallery was resisted by Mr. Bowles, who, however, and in spite of his jocularities, contrived to talk very good sense. Gentle- men who came down to the House and wished to make speeches under the direct gaze of their lady's eye would no doubt, he said, feel inspired if there were boxes round the House open to the view in which they might behold the bashful maiden's side- long look of love, but that did not conduce to business. The whole of the businesslike capacity of the House depended upon the spectators in the gallery, and even the ladies, being so disposed that hon. Members could forget that they were present. "As soon as they had rows of boxes round the House filled with persons of various descriptions, male and female, so soon would Members begin to speak to the gallery, and not to their fellow-Members in the House." That is absolutely true. When Members look for external applause and encouragement, the influence of the House of Commons as a deliberative assembly will cease. But they will look for such applause if the public element in debate is emphasised and encouraged.

The Westminster Gazette of Monday last quotes from the New York Journal what purports to be an interview with the Archbishop of Canterbury, on the subject of a Catholic University. Judging by internal evidence, we should say that the remarks made by the Archbishop were really his, for they show boldness, sincerity, common-sense, and the love of justice,—all qualities which belong to Dr. Temple. The Archbishop declares, and as we believe, truly, that the majority of English Churchmen are strongly in favour of doing justice to the Irish Roman Catholics in the matter of Irish University education. His words are worth quoting textually. "I am very much in earnest," he said, "when I say that I would like to see a Roman Catholic University established by the Government in Ireland, and what I say for myself represents what almost every Bishop of the Church of England thinks on this subject. We must not allow Ireland to separate from us. We imist on maintaining the union between the two peoples, and it is only just that we should recognise such differences as exist and deal with them fairly. I think it is far better that the rising generation of Roman Catholics in Ireland should have the advantages of a higher education than that they should be compelled to deny themselves a University course rather than do violence to their consciences. This is only justice. It is not only right, but it would be the means of taking the edge off Ireland's poignant grievances." This is, we believe, the attitude of all fair-minded Unionists on the subject. We wish the Archbishop could raise the matter in the House of Lords, and try to bring to the test of argument the views of those who oppose the establishment of a University in Ireland that Roman Catholics will think a suitable place to which to send their sons.

The public is so rich that it does not know what to do with its money. Trustees and the banks snap up all the Consols available, all gilt-edged securities have been forced up nearly to Congo' prices, and the immense mass of investors are turning to every industrial undertaking with a promising appearance. This week, for instance, Sir T. J. Lipton, the " King " of the tea and bacon trades, has offered his very large business for 22,500,000 sterling. It seems a large sum, but the public scented fair interest, it forgets that every industrial business depends first of all upon personal skill and energy, and, according to the Daily Telegraph, it "wrote for" the Lipton shares to an amount exceeding fifty millions. The oddest thing is that with all this plethora of money held by men eager to invest, there has as yet been no symptom of a mania. There have been a good many " wild-cat " speculations in mines, and some clever frauds, but the public has always wanted to see some- thing tangible for its money. Properly speaking, it ought to be ready to invest a hundred millions or so in railways across the Atlantic, or a canal across North America, but it looks askance at anything too big. In particular it will not look at anything Indian, owing to a fixed belief that even if it makes profits there it will only receive them in some debased cur- rency or other. Like its forbears, in fact, it refuses "brass money," even when its value is fixed by law.

Bank Rate, 3 per cent.

New Consols (21) were on Friday, Mi. •