The German Court is evidently determined to show that, although
it is even now increasing its defensive armaments against Russia, it has no wish to provoke either the Russian dynasty or the Russian people. The heir to the Russian Throne —not a strong man, we fear, but intelligent—has been received in Berlin with more than the usual honour paid to a crowned head ; and on Thursday the Emperor himself, at a luncheon given by the Grenadier Guards, delivered an effusive speech of welcome. We all, declared his Majesty, see in the Czar " not only the noble chief of the regiment, not only our most distinguished comrade, bat, above all, the representative of old and approved monarchical traditions, of well-tried friendship, and of closely knitted relations with my noble predecessors, bonds which, in days gone by, both Russian and Prussian regi- ments sealed with their blood upon fields of battle." Those sen- tences, and especially the allusion to the wars against Napoleon, are most unusually strong, and, after allowing for the speaker's habit of using picturesque words, certainly indicate a great wish to soothe away irritation between the Courts. The German Emperor cannot, of course, alter the general situation ; but he is taking every pains to prevent it from being intensified by a dynastic) quarrel. His grandfather might have uttered that speech, which will be received by Russians as an honourable tribute to the amour-propre wounthd by the frankness of Count Caprivi, and by many recent incidents.
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