The Sun.
London, England, 1870-08-05 00:00:00

EV EMNG, AUGUST 5. 1870

it came about that Count Bismarck listened to
the French propositions, and urge that they never
could have been brought forward had not Prussia
shewn herself willing to lend a ready ear, Count
Bismarck has a very simple answer to return.
He was obliged to temporise with France, or war would
have been declared against Germany long ago. It
is commonly supposed, and with perfect accuracy, that
Frar.ce is much stronger from a military point
of view than she was three years since ; but
the respite gained by Germany has been even more
advantageous. So at least it is maintained here
Count Bismarck professes never to have intended
to let France have a rood of soil, German, Dutch,

or Belgian, if he could help it ; but he had to keep France
dangling till the moment arrived to keep her at arm's
length. There can be no doubt that he is disappointed at
the revulsion of feeling produced in England against
France not being greater even than it is. Do not
imagine that the common German wish. to fight
France singlehanded prevails among politicians here.
They would vastly like to have England on their side; and
if an alliance between England, Germany, and Austria
is not ultimately brought about, the objects of Berlinese
statesmanship will not have been successfully attained.
But pray bear in mind what is the alternative. France
and Germany will not fight long for the sole benefit of
England and Russia, and when they do agree their agree-
ment will be wonderful. An early and diplomatic peace
is still talked of here if England manifests indifference to
the situation.—Correspondent of the Standard at Berlin.
FEELING IN AUSTRIA.—If war if inevitable,
Hungarian opinion, from fear of Russian aggression, is in
favour of joining France. Bohemian sympathies are in
favour of Prussia. The astute Bismarck has actively
employed the last four years, since the Treaty
of Prague, in familiarising the northern portion
of Bohemia with the peaceful and industrial
adventures of Prussian capital and energy, by
means of incomparable agents. These enterprises have
been of public notoriety for a long time ; but, as usual,
the Austrians evaded the trouble of thinking what might
result from them. His other enterprises of a more clan-
destine nature can be pretty well guessed, and here he is
believed capable of anything. Perhaps he is. At all
events the obstinate fractiousness and childish
sulking of the Bohemians are attributed to him.
If the worthy Czechs imagine that, in an eventu-
ality, Bismarck would give them the autonomy
for which they clamour, and which, if separated from
Austria, they could not maintain single-handed for one
week against Prussia or Russia, they ought once more to
take themselves to the study of the old hackneyed
fable of King Log and King Stork. In the
German provinces of the Empire the feeling is
generally Prussian—not, you may be sure, from any love
of the Hohenzollerns or admiration of their Chancellor's
great talents or policy, but because they regard the house
of Bonaparte as the traditional enemy of the whole
German race, and look upon a French soldier very much
in the same manner as the Devil is supposed to regard
holy water.--Telegraph Correspondent at Vienna.
GOING TO MASS.—When M. 011ivier—not quite
his own master perhaps—gave orders that no newspaper
correspondent should exercise his functions at the front,
_ _

he invited the eager tribe of journalists to present them-
selves at the Rue Cambaceres every night at twelve
o'clock to receive the news of the day. At this invitation
the wary and experienced shrugged thoir shoulders, and
punctually they went to be at 11.30 p.m. Would that
the English public knew as much of that foreign
institution called a " Bureau de la Presse" as do these
veterans ! If it were so, I also would go to bed at 11.30
p.m., and no reader of the _Daily Telegraph would blame
me. The office of the Rue Cambaceres is a practical
joke. Reading its nightly reports, given with so much
solemnity, after grave verification of powers and
mucn whispering of the bureaucrats, a stranger
could never suspect that the deadliest combat of
our generation was brooding even now upon the
frontier. On Sunday night we went, eager and hopeful,
to this merry Bureau de la Presse. Surely, we thought,
there is something new. The Emperor has arrived ;he
has done, or said something. Gravely the portfolios are
handed to us. There is not one cigarette alight in all
the handsome room, where they generally blaze like
stars on the sea. We sit down. We hunt
amongst the multitudinous leaves of blotting paper
that give the portfolios so respectable an appear-
ance. We find the dingy half-sheet of cream laid, and
we read with emotion inexpressible that " the Emperor
and all his household went on foot to the Cathedral to-
day, where they heard mass." Not a word more from
the frontier. Whilst we sit, open-mouthed, staring at the
news, a young French journalist hurries in, takes his port-
folio, impatiently finds the paragraph, reads, and slams it
down. " Pour le coup," cries he, " c'est trop fort !" and
dashes out. And everybody in France echoes the indig
nant words. The Bureau de la Presse simply laughs at
us all. When the whole world is a tip-toe with expecta-
tion, it pretends to satisfy the universal appetite with
news that the Emperor has been to mass. Was
it worth while to drag us out at midnight to
tell us that ? Who ever doubted he'd been to mass? ,
Perhaps it was the order of his going which might be sup-
posed to interest the universe. His household accom-
panied him, mark you,, and on foot. Well, as evidence
that Napoleon is not so ill as some would make him out,
the story has its value ; but as news from the seat of war
it is merely a foolish jest. —Paris Correspondent of the Tele- I
graph.

ENGLAND AND BELGIUM.—The serious represen-
tations of Lord Granville to the French Government as to
our treaty obligations to uphold the neutrality and inde-
pendence of Belgium, have led the French Government
to send over the Marquis de Caumont la Force with
personal explanations. Lord Granville, who was not per-
mitted to have a copy of the Duc de Grammont's last
despatch to the French Ambassador in London,
will not, however, be satisfied with personal assurances,
but will insist upon a written and authoritative declara-
tion by the French Government as to their Belgian policy,
in every eventuality of war and peace. It is held almost
impossible that Great Britain can keep out of a war which
is widening over the entire Continent.—Birmingham Post.

"In my last I told. you that all here agreed that
was a sadness in the expression of Napoleon's features
which every one believed to be a sign as to how disturbed
he was in his mind. I myself had not seen the Emperor
then ; but now that I have had a good oppor-
runity of judging of his appearance, I am
satisfied that the supposed sad look is nothing
but an air of continual bodily suffering. Indeed,
he walks with his body half bent and with so little elas-
ticity in his steps that any one accustomed to note the
outward muscular indications of a long-standing and
continually wearing disease can easily tell the half
melancholy cast of countenance, which arises from no
disturbance of the mind, but rather from some organic
derangement of some .functions of the body.—Henry
Mayhew in the Globe.

A WAR WAGER,—A certain M. Thomas, of
Paris, lately offered in the Figaro to bet 200,000 francs
to 100,000 francs, that the French would be in Berlin by
the 15th of August, and stated that the money had been
deposited. Some members of the Union Club of Berlin
have accepted the wager, and placed the 100,000 francs
required in the hands of the firm of Rothschild, in Lon-
don. They now hope that M. Thomas will follow their
example, as they have communicated the fact to the
editor of the Figaro, and given him a longer time than he
demanded. The wager now stands :—M. Thomas lays
200,000 francs to 100,000, and asserts that the French will
enter Berlin as conquerors before the end of next August.
We are, after all, not so much astonished at the bet of M.
Thomas, for the great majority of Frenchmen firmly
believe that Berlin is on the Rhine.—North German Corre-
spondent.

NAVAL AND MILITARY INTELLIGENCE.
More than the usual amount of activity is just now
°ha:rya:We in the iron shipbuilding department at Chat-
ham dockyard, the'whole of the available hands being
employed-on the Sultan, the Glatton, and the Rupert,
ironclad ships, which are being brought forward for sea
as rapidly as the resources of the establishment will.
allow. Of the vessels building the chief work is concen-
trated on the Glatton, 2,709 tons, 500-horse power
(nominal), which has several hundred hands employed on
her in preparing her for being floated out of dock.
Three Volunteer Engineer corps are to take part in the
siege operations and engineering works intended to be car-
ried on at Chatham on Monday next. The Volunteer
Engineer' corps selected for this duty are the Ist Middle-
sex, the 2nd Tower Hamlets, and the Ist' London. The
volunteers will arrive at Chatham by special train early
on Monday morning.
The lrasiness of recruiting for Jhe army excites much in-
terest in Chatham. On Thursday a Strong drum and fife
band, with recruiting sergeants, &c-, marcned through the
streets, beating up for recruits.
The pattern of the Mitrailleuse, which has for some
time pa-4 been stored at the Royal-Arsenal, Woolwich,
has been sent to the Royal Artillery establishment at
Shousburyness, where experiments will be made wit.h it,
next week, on the beach, where-the gunnery operations of
the Royal Artillery are carried on. Other patterns of the
znitrailleuse are expected to arrive from the Continent and
America in the course of a few weeks, and with these also
experiments will be made at Shoeburyness.
Information was received at Woolwich on Thursday
that the Field-Marshal Commanding-in-Chief, accom.
parried by his personal staff and a number of other officers,
would visit Woolwich for the purpose of in-
specting the different departments in the Royal Arsenal.
and also the artillery reserve stores at the grand depot in
the New-road.

An order has been promulgated at Woolwich to the
!fleet that each battery of garrison artillery is at all
times to have attached to it two soldier artificers, as
wheeler and smith. This is intended to obviate as
much as possible the necessity of employing civilian
artificers.

Lieutenant-General Sir J. Hope Grant, G.C.8.,
Quartermaster-General and several other officers, visited
the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich, on Thursday, and, accompa-
nied by Captain Gordon, C.B. Controller, examined
various descriptions of stores for the use of cavalry in the
field, together with an improved set of surgical instruments
-.e use on active service.