The Express.
London, England, 1857-02-21 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS, SATURDAY EVENING, FEBRUARY 21, 1857.

are wmt to

will be found many

prermat and ',eighty assrvatioas in the spas& Of
the Member for Oilerd and it is idle to oatmeal
from oesselvis that the vehement and "'natal hos-
tility at melt a man in the House of C 0112131001 la in
itself no anhapoetant item in the oonsidmation of
probabilities ea to the fate of the Budget.

Rs there con no kisser remain any room to
ink the terms of alliance, cdreneive and defensive,
eastrocted between the hitherto alienated leaders of
the Tory party. Henceforward they may be re-
garded se to all intents and purposes of the present
Nedra identified in their policy and aim. It is
evidendy a part of the compact that they are to bid
high for popular favour on Basal and financial
questions.

The enthoissm with which Mr. GLADSTONE was
greeted by the balk of the Conservative party
throughout his address is not to be mistaken. A
score of mutineers las Mr. Burrurcx and Mr.
Broox in may out of spite go over to Lard PAL-
aratrox on a division. But the deeper currents of
opinion are not indicated by the straws on the sur-
face. The event aseuredly will not depend upon the
part taken by such sam. It will avail Ministers
nothing when the day of trial shall arrive, that by
votes like that of Thursday night against the 101.
franchise, and their refusal to originate any measure
of political progress, they have succeeded in crimp-
ing a /quad of such recruits as theme. Ere it be
too late, it behoves them to look to this. Party lima
indeed for a long while apposed to be in a state of
unexampled disorgenketion ; and they have spared
no pain to prolong as far as in them lay a eondition
of things so favourable to legislative immobility and
administrative stagnation. Bat the latest tendencies
to political cohesion are beginning to manifest them-
selves once more. Men seem to be growing tired of
the my license they have rem /idly enjoyed.
They are gathering into groups for mutual sym-
pathy end support. By-and-bye they will be found
modualled as of yore into rival hosts, acting with
the unity and discipline which after all we are
peon is essential to the well-working of a re-
pressolalive system. With what device will Lard
Paurnaorox then inscribe his banner P Truly he
ant Illad =Whin; better than "New Taxes" and
" No Eskra!

Tax great peculiarity of all questions of foreign
policy, more particularly at the present time, is the
impossibility of resolving them alone. Not farther
back than a quarter of a century, several Powers,
even great ones, were in positions that led them to
abstain from meddling in matters not immediately
concerning them. Matra would not join the nego-
tiations respecting Oreece. France was content to
give up to Russia or to England the chief influence
at the Porte. Prima did not count in general
politics. Now things take a different aspect. Every
country puts itself forward, and no one is contented
to remain passive or in the back ground. France
theists on tilling the part of a first-rate and domi-
nant emantry at Constantinople ; and Austria, how-
ever neutral in war, is decided and almost belligerent
in its diplomacy.
' The consequence is, the impossibility of having,
in the affairs of the Levant km example, a policy or
an opinion exclusively one's own. With respect to
them, we cannot agree with Russia. If, in addition
to this, we cannot agree with France either, we
are driven perforce to mos to some kind of an under-
standing with Austria. For powerful as England may
be, she cannot meet combination but by combina-
tion ; and to be isolated at Constantinople, or in a
Paris Conference, is to lose voice and influence alto-
gether.

It cannot be concealed that we hare of late fallen
under this somewhat untoward necessity. We have
drifted away from the French alliance; and as the
Emperor NAPOLEON augmented his obsequiousness
to the CUE, we have adopted similar obsequiousness
M the Court of Vienna. The close alliance with
Austria \nu in fact, become the theme of the minis-
Neill popsy The official organs of Downing-street
Mid tus at the opening of the year that henceforth
me was to be an Austrian policy in the Levant.
And it is quite manifest that we cannot be Austrian
on the Danube, without being cousistently in accord
with the same Imperial Government upon the Tiber
and the Po.

We cannot form a competent judgment at present
as to bow far France has been mime or culpable in
courting Russian alliance, or as to how much our own
obstinacy, jealousy, and maladies. are to blame for
having estranged us from France. It may be that
in the concession to Russia, especially on the Besse-
rabian frontier, the Emperor NAPOLEON was actuated
more by the vanity of the sovereign than by the
duplicity of the tickle statesman. Mach of our
antagonisms with Frame may be traced to the per-
sonal rivalry of the ambassadors of the two countries
at Constantinople. And though M. THOUVEREL
may be an unfair and hostile personage, Lord
STRATFORD was never the man in whose hands
should have been left the power of making or of
breaking the Anglo-French alliance.
The deplorable result of even the weakening of
this alliance has been to place both France and Eng-
land, as well as the liberal tendencies of both, under
the shadow, the one of Russian, the other of Aus-
trian influence. And if the Courts of St. Peters-
burg and Vienna had come to a secret agreement to
nullify the influence and exclude the ideas of the
West from the settlement of the Levant, they couldnot
have acted otherwise, or succeeded more completely.
France, diplomatically linked with Russia, will put
down the freedom and development of any and all
Levantine races ; whilst England, hearkening to
Austrian suggestions, has declared itself the foe of
their nationality, and refuses to recognise even their
existence.

To give advice under such conjuncture► would
require a fuller knowledge of circumstances. The
better plan would seem to be to retrace our steps,
and, in fair concert with France, give that advice
and that support to Turkey which would place it
and its subject-lands in accordance with the require-
ments and ideas of the West. If, however, France
be too far estranged, and if there be no possibility
of acting in accord with the Emperor NAPOLEON
without at the same time acting in subservience to
the CZAR, then the Austrian alliance may become a
necessity.

But even in an event so much to be deprecated,
there are many ways of contracting and accepting
alliances. We may do so upon equal terms, and
without the sacrifice of our principles or the sur-
render of our judgment. It is impossible for an
English statesman to consider and examine the policy
pursued by Austria towards Hungary, towards
Beryls, and towards the Moldo-Wallachians,
without perceiving that it is of the most
retrograde and oppressive kind, calculated
not to win, but to alienate these races, and
to convert them into the permanent partizans
and hidden allies of Russia. Austria assumes it as a
principle to despise popular feeling, and to exercise
its authority and ascendancy by violence and by
terror. Russia, on the contrary, flatters every popu-
lar passion, and abets, or pretends to abet, every
national desire. In this antagonistic policy
and warfare with respect to the countries of