Awonaar the numerous speeches, lottery, and communications, official and nonofficial, which the present difficult crisis has called forth, few will be read with more interest and with more respect than the weighty letter of Lord Btratford de Redcliffe, which reached us by the last mail. The oldest and the most experienced of England's diplomatists has addressed to The Times letter so weighed and guarded, and at the same time so firm and consistent in tone, that we cannot help regretting deeply that he is incapacitated by advanced age from taking an active part in these great affairs, and repre. senting Great Britain at the Berlin Conference, if that Conference is destined to sit. The whole history of this complicated and puzzling Eastern question lies before the great diplomatist like an open book. No living man can possibly speak with the authority and impressiveness with whioh Lord Stratford de Redcliffe speaks; and though peace is signed, and the Russians have mi withdrawn two of their most pre-pesterous claims, there is much to be done, and injuries of inoaloulable depth to the cause of civilization to be stopped. But it is now or never. If advantages are conceded to the Czar now, we shall find him or his successor pushing further and farther on the road of aggression, and in ten or fifteen years hence we shall have to deal with a more dangerous foo than we have to combat now.
Apparently, for we dare not use more assured language, the triple Alliance is broken; and the English people have ceased to listen to their misleading and desperate counsellors. The essence of the question is concentrated in the last paragraph of Lord letter:—" A word remains on the subject of territorial tions in Armenia, It is not impossible that Russia may have made such progress in that country as to negotiate for peace while in actual possession of the whole region between Erseroum and Bayazid, including Kors and Batoum, together with the head waters of the Euphrates, That she would thereby acquire the means of ing our Indian possessions with success may well be doubted, but a considerable increase of her influence in Asin Minor, over Persia, and the Black Sea, would in all likelihood accrue to her. Whether our interests would be thereby compromised to a degree requiring the last appeal for their protection, reste on no private judgment to decide. I would only ask whether the Emperor of Russia could push his demands to such an extent with avy pretence of justice, consistency, or reason, He is bound by treaty, in concert with other potentates, to respect the independ. ence and territorial integrity of the Ottoman Empire, He was the og. grosser"" ® Wo now see what demands. The treaty is regarded as waste paper, and he makes conditions that virtually place Turkey under his heel. Not even statesmen and ambassadors who were intimately acquainted with the character of Russia could have been prepared for demands so oppressive and hard as those which have been made. All that the Russophobists, as they are called, have been denounced as fools and ruffians for saying, has come tre and more than true. "The glorious light of generous moderation and houourable consistency" is certainly not perceptible in the extravagant claims put forward now Tarkey is spent with her heroic exertions. Not only British interests, but the interests of the whole civilized world, are imperilled by these astounding demands. That the Czar is either aware that his terms of peace will be refused, or that he is prepared, if he can terrorise or bribe the other Powers into accepting them, to commence farther aggressions at an early is proved by his continued military preparations. The year 1877 has witnessed the beginning of troubles. The battle of civilization has to be fought at Berlin.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.