The suspicion that Prince Bismarck intends Austria to acquire provinces
in the Balkan has received this week a noteworthy -though small confirmation. A Bulgarian paper, not known -to be inspired, but possibly in relations with Prince Alexander, recommended that the States of the Balkan should confederate themselves, in order to protect "European Turkey" against the great military Powers. This advice, probably because it is so practical, roused the anger of Prince Bismarck, and the -Narth-Gerinan Gazette roundly tells the Balkan States that they must devote themselves to their internal affairs. If they attempt to pursue an " adventurous" foreign policy—that is, a combined foreign policy of any kind—the Great Powers would raise the question whether it was not unwise to create these minor States. Servia, Roumania, Bulgaria, Roumelia, Monte- negro, and Greece are, in fact, all informed with brutal plainness
that they exist by sufferance, that they are to obey orders, and that they are not to combine even in a defensive league. Those sentences have, we suspect, advanced confederation by years. The Princes are all jealous, but if they are to be swallowed one by one, they will soon discover a basis for a strong alliance, which even now could control 300,000 good troops.
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