The Sun.
London, England, 1867-01-16 00:00:00

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SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC. JOURNALS.

TIMES.—The dangers of a general war from which
Europe had a narrow escape last summer, immedi-
ately after the signature of the Nikolsburg prelimi-
naries, form the theme of somewhat lengthy publi-
'eations in the German papers, of which a summary
is given in the letter of our Berlin Correspondent
published in another column. The success of the
Emperor Napoleon in his Italian
policy of 1859-60
was but too obviously calculated to inspire him with
confidence as to the practicability, of adopting a
similar course in the treatment of the German ques-
tion. The conclusion of the interview of Plombieres
may well be allowed to remain a secret to the end of
time; but there is every reason to believe that, as it
was then asserted, an agreement was there entered
into between Napoleon and Cavour, by which the
latter should have ceded. Savoy to France as soon as
by the aid of the former Italy was enabled to drive
the Austrians from the soil of the Peninsula as far as
the Adriatic. The war of Lombardy had, however, a
different termination from what was anticipated. The
enterprise broke down half way. Lombardy was made
over to King
Victor Emmanuel as an entirely free
gift, and, the compact about the cession of Savoy,
if it ever was really made, was fairly and de-
finitively abandoned. Had the Italians been
content to abide by the terms of the
Peace of Villafranca, France would have
made good her boast that she had gone to war for
an idea. But the Italians broke through the con-
ditions of that-treaty. They aspired to a fusion of
Piedmont
Tus-
cany,ancleLo and it was th2n that France, in consideration
l:abardy with the Emilia and
Of her consent to those annexations, put forth her
-61 aims not only to Sivoy, but also to Nide, about
which not one word had in all probability been said
at Plombieres, and grounded them not on the blood
she had bravely shed for the Italian cause, but
simply on a principle of compensation due to her in
consequence of Italy's aggrandisement. We think
it necessary to go back to so well-known a chapter
in recent history, both :on account of the analogy
between the case of Italy and-that of Germany, and
also because in her claims upon the latter country
France was encouraged by the ready admission of
her pretensions by the former. Whatever may have
passed between Napoleon and Bismark at Biarritz,
it is evident that the conversation between those
two personages exercised no material influence
on subsequent events. Napoleon was, from the
beginning, far more outspoken and consistent
with respect to Germany than he had been about
Italy. He stood upon the doctrine for which
the cession of Savoy and Nice afforded a pre-
cedent, that no State in Europe, or, at least, none
bordering on France, could aspire to any significant
accession of either power or territory, without, as it
were, compounding with that mighty Empire by
paying some such tithes on its acquisition as had
been exacted from Italy. Words to that effect were
spoken by the French Monarch at a time in which
he might still hope they could have power to stayand in which, at any rate, he
the movements and shake the resolutions of the Ger-
man
still reckon upon winning
very
in France to that policy of ex-
pectant over an
might
p public belligerents,
yb
choopinionse
neutrality which seemed, if not the most
generous, at least the most plausible. Napoleon's
policy turned out a failure, in spite of its apparent
wisdom, but the Emperor, loth to acknowledge him-
self thoroughly beaten, as the world held him,
threw out just one word about compensation, partly
on the obvious maxim, " No harm in trying," partly
with a view to allay, however momentarily, the
angry excitement then rife throughout France ;
partly, finally, for the purpose of establishing even
the merest shadow of a pretext for future reclama-
tions. The demands put forth by France under those
circumstances turn out to be perfectly identical
with what was generally bruited or confidently sur-
mised at the time. From Prussia the German jour-
nals now positively assert that France would only
have taken the districts of Saarlouis and Saarbruck
with their renowned and long coveted coalfields ;
but she expected either Prussia's help, or at least
her connivance, to obtain from Bavaria and Hesse
Darmstadt their provinces on the left bank of the
Rhine, with the fortresses of Landau and Mayence.
She also wished for a renunciation on the part of
Prussia and Germany of their right to garrison the
Federal stronghold of Luxembourg. In other words,
besides the cession of lands inhabited by about one
million of Germans, France was to gain possession