Tux: perilous condition of the Crown Prince of Germany ocettpied public atteutiv when the Saturday and Spectator were published. The latter has a long article on the danger to Europe in general and Germany in particular should the death of the Prince leave 1 the heir to the throne, succeed. The the press, wh sure, Cap the young man or of his character and five years in command in the P. & O. opinions, qualified, however, by his inhentthe characteristics of his race; which is service without a mistake; he has a Very great qualiticati attained to the command of one of the he is made to appear in, show ships of the company, and no one This passage is interesting; Dears higher testimony to his merits If he the Crown Prine es, oF is incapaci than his own colleagues; and yet he suspended because the licensed Trinity eldest e William, a young man of tated, his power passes tv his
twenty-eight, as yet little known to the publi. Tut believe ly ull who have access employ, makes a mistake, To us such pilot, whom he is compelled by law to anil especially by his grandfather, who in his injustice seems shortsighted in the ex-long life has never misjudged the powers of any man, to be a competent Hohenzollern, treme. No commander can go about his that is, 4 man who can and will govern duty with the calumess and coolness strongly, but who is also believed to be, like which should actuated a captain, when hig grandfather, before all things & soldier, ith w confidence not unnatural in such a feels all the time that for a m ike, man that all questions can be most easily not his own, he may be suspended at solved by the sword. The Army is his preoveupation, and the long suspense of his nation any moment. The injustice of the step under its heavy armour wearies and disgusts the Board of Directors have taken (prefer a final, and therefore obvious, As we pointed out when com m of all difficulties. It is obvious that such a man will be more ready menting on the recent case of the Thibet, to give the signal for lottie than either his it has been distinctly laid down by graulfather or ami this even if he Mr. Rothery. Commi changes as much as history shows that the heirs to crowns have changed upon accession that the to the three, When a Prince success to a in interfering with a duly throne, he enters a new atmosphere, feels the pilot; the utmost he may do is to reintinenve of new circumstances, and is con: trolled by a new sense of his responsibities monstrate or suggest; but he certainly but still, like any other man, is "not jus i essentially himself, ati his a influence which en They recom the object of carrying out that sugyes-Il displease, more especially when, tion." i The case in question is that of i germany, and still more in Prussia, the the collision between the Borderer and "influence of the Kingship is strengthened Minorca. There a general feeling bya trad which makes it shameful for the support of positive law, aul among masters of ships that they are any man in uniform to disregard his King. more hardly treated than mew of any There would be, therefore, in the accession Prince William, if he i as martial as he is other profession, if they make a mistake, Ielieved to be, positive increase in the or if some-one else makes a mistake in liability of Europe to a war which, unless all which they are involved, and such a calculations are at fault, might end in that ease as that of Captain Hector goes far serta calamity, a long-frawn contest between to confirm this feeling. Commanders tinent of the globe. two nearly equal halves of the ruling con-first-class vessels go so far as to say The Saturday looks on the probability of that no shipmaster now brings hi the early accession of Prince William to the throne from another point of view, when up to the merchant service by hi it says will and consent. The life of a ship-If—the death of the Crown Prince—will master is nowadays one of incessant Lung a new element into the politics of Europe if the throne of the-Empire is filled by a young man of whom little is known, and who has no experience either of government or war. There is a possibility that his accession might subject even the unity of the Empire to a perceptible strain. As head of the House of Hohenzollern he is sure of the loyal support of his hereditat kingdom of Prussia, but it is at least doubtful whether he could calculate anything approaching to the same traditional devotion from the other States of the Empire, Germany as a United State is very young, and there old memories which, in spite of the Netermination of Germars never again to sub-of national feeling, and the unanimous
ject themselves to the risk of a sudden French invasion, might revive if the central Government were directed with less tact amd judgment than is displayed at present. "The Emperor William occupies a wholly excep tional position. His age, his services to Germany, and his-personal' character give him almost paternal authority over the other princes of the Empire. The Crown Prince, although he has abstained carefully from patting hiuwelf forward inp matters, jas contrived to inspire general canfidenc his temper and abilities. He has proved hit sell a good if not a brilliant, gener king el Saxony or of Bavaria could defer to either father or son without loss of dignity, They might not find it so easy to do so if the ruler of the Empire, which it must not be forgotten has come into existence during their lifetime, were a young man, National feeling in Germany has become strony of late years, but it is going far to take it for granted that it will necessarily ally itself with devotion to the House of Hohenzullen, The personal character of Prince William can be little more than a matter of speculation at present. Even if all that is said of him is true (which, seem, how m: personages are talked about, is improbable), it does not follow that he ously roy will do when he conies to the throne what he promised or threatened when he was removed. from it by two degrees. It is a trite enough observation that the heir-apparent and the King differ considerably. But, whatever the character and abilities of Prince William may Ve, he is unknown, and his accession to the throne or to power as Reyent would add another element of uncertainly to the state of Europe.
An article in the Spectator deuls with the Now Spirit in Politics," which is how Mr, John Page Hopps, " Unitarian Minister of Leicester describes Gladstonianism, as shown, in its Home Rule campaigns. The paper contains long extracts from a communica. tion of Mr. Hopps's to the Snpuirer, and in these sentences he describes the' uew "This Irish business hay brought home to hundreds of thousands a sense of shan luite new to us a way that has utirel; ly altered tone to our poli-almost say there it. We used to fight for our party; now we are on a crusade in behalf of our long misunderstood and illused brothers and sisters across the sea, Ouve we fought to win something for ourselves now we are willing to struggle and make suerifives for others. Once we marched to the ery of ' Britons never will be slaves but now we burn with indignation at the thought of mak. ing other people slaves. We may be mistaken, but we believe we are for once true to the prophet'sery: Whut doth the Lord thy God. Teyuire of thee, but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?" Extremes meet, and there is no doubt that Mr. Balfour, the Irish Secretary and the Radical Cuitarian are at the extremes of the political world, and we therefore find that the former sees sower kind, in the devotion Mr. Gladstone. At ngham, Mr, Balfour described the conversion of Liberals to Home Rule, after Mr. Gladstone had embraced it, as a spectacle for which there had been no' parelld since our barbarous an-cesters were baptised in tribes on the con version of their Kings to Christianity. In the paper on the Right of Public Meeting"' it is maintained that Sir Charles Warren in Square, as he has an undoubted has a legal right to prohibit public meetings
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.