RUSSIA AND ROUMANIA.
[TO THE EDITOR OF THE °SPECTATOR:1
Sin,—Lord Redesdale said on Monday in the House of Lords that "the demand by Russia for the cession of territory in Bessarabia is preposterous." He proceeded to speak of treaties, of international law, and to call for a protest from all civilised nations. To me it seems of especial importance that in regard to this matter, members of the Legislature shall honestly make that endeavour to which Sir Stafford Northcote lately pledged himself, viz.,—" in every controversy, to put himself as far as possible in the position of those on the other side."
To those who make that endeavour, the demand of Russia will not, I think, appear preposterous ; nor will they be surprised if that demand—supposing it restricted to the northern bank of the Kilia mouth of the Danube, and not to extend to a com- mand of the river from Ismail to Galatz, and to have been in that form accepted by Roumania—should receive the unhesitating assent of the Powers in Congress.
The territory which is now known as Roumanian Bessarabia was, by Article 20 of the Treaty of Paris, ceded to the victorious allies " in ordermore fully to secure the navigation of the Danube," and at the same time it was added to the Principality of Moldavia. Then, by the Convention of 1858, also signed at Paris, the United Principalities, placed "under the suzerainty of his Majesty the Sultan," were declared "to enjoy, under the collective guarantee of the Contracting Powers, the privileges and immunities of which they are now in possession."
When, as Roumania, the United Principalities joined Russia in making war upon the Sultan, the Government of Prince Charles, in common with all Europe, must have known the ardent desire of Russia for the retrocession of that territory. Sheltered by Russian arms, the United Principalities, with no regard to the Guaranteeing -Powers, declared their independence. On May 21, 1877, the Roumanian Chamber resolved that, the independ- ence of Roumania having received official realisation, the Chamber, "counting on the justice of the Guaranteeing Powers, passes to the order of the day ;" and next morning, Prince Charles publicly repudiated "those ill-defined and unwarrantable ties which were called suzerainty at Constantinople and vassalage at Bucharest." In these circumstances, Roumania, having declared her complete independence, it may be contended by Russia that Roumania at the same time assumed a right to deal with her territory as an independent State, and that the retrocession could be a fait .accompli as between Russia and Roumania, before the submission of the change to a Congress of the signatories of the Treaty of 1856 and of the Convention of 1858.
I should be sorry to have to defend the policy of the Treaty of Paris, either in regard to the naval stipulation, which was aban- doned in 1871, or with reference to the territorial cession, which had but one object, that of pushing Russia away from the Danube. The boundary then fixed had no other recommendation ; ethno- logically or geographically, it is neither fit nor natural. Any one who maintains that Roumania has ethnological claims to the shore of Bessarabia between Ismail and the Euxine must be ignorant of the character of the population in that swampy region.
To me it has always appeared that the naval stipulation and the territorial cession stood together, and I confess I have never thought that one would long survive the other. In consequence of the Treaty of 1871, Russia may now have unlimited naval force at the mouth of the Danube, and in view of that fact, of the settled authority of the International Commission, and also of the fact that the deepest and most used entrance—the Sulina mouth —would be in possession of Roumania, I do not see why Russia should fail to obtain the pacific concurrence of the Powers, if she could succeed in getting ths assent of Roumania to the retro- cession, which is not likely to be withheld, if Russia is willing to fix her western boundary about Ismail.
"It is the misfortune of such stipulations "—I am quoting Mr. Mill's words touching the naval stipulation in the Treaty of Paris, words which, I think, are, to some extent, applicable also to the simultaneous cession of Russian territory on the Danube—" even if as temporary arrangements they might have been justifiable, that if concluded for permanency, they are seldom to be got rid of without some lawless act on the part of the nation bound by them." But this misconduct of Russia (misconduct not so much before the bar of history and the past practice of nations, as before that of true morality, and of what we may hope will become the future customs) does not entitle us to bring upon millions of innocent persons the unspeakable evils of war.—I am, Sir, &c.,
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