A cloud has arisen in Eastern Europe. Some Turkish soldiers
killed some Montenegrins on the frontier, and the Montenegrins in retaliation killed some Turkish soldiers. The Porte, pressed by Russia, admitted that its soldiers were the aggressors, and by a military Commission sitting at Scutari, in Albania, condemned five soldiers to death and twenty to the galleys. The sentences were confirmed at Constantinople, but with the reservation that the Montenegrins must also be tried and sentenced by a Turkish tribunal. The Montenegrins thereupon threatened war, and the three Powers—Russia, Germany, and Austria—taking their side,
e formally demanded that the Minister for Foreign Affairs should be dismissed. The reply has not yet been published, the reported dismissal of Aarifi Pasha being apparently pre- mature, but it is supposed the Sultan will yield. If he does not, the three Powers will try to circumscribe the war within the frontiers of Turkey,—that is, will allow the Sultan at first to see if he can overcome his vassals, which, if they can manage to make Montenegro their battle-field, he cannot do. The Montenegrins are very few, not 30,000 armed men ; but they will be assisted by the Servians, and probably the Roumanians, and though subjects of Turkey, have never been really subdued.
