The Sun.
London, England, 1867-10-16 00:00:00

CUNT NENTAL ALARMS.

(From (he Economist.)
It cannot be denied that the prevalent uneasiness
n Europe, far from subsiding, appears rather to in-

crease. We think little of the agitation and disturb-
ance manifested on the Paris Bourse, nor of the

rumours of ministerial changes and diplomatic com-

munications to which that agitation is in a great
measure to be attributed ; for these things among
our neighbours, far more frequently than with us,
are artificial effc3ts got up by jobbing speculators
for their own sinister ends and to aid mere temp-

rary operations, which the very next week they
might find it for their interest to reverse. But the
mere prolongation of anxiety and expectation in a
case of this sort is of itself an aggravation of the
danger, and has a tendency both to realise men's

:ears and to render the state of fe'r by degrees

almost more intolerable than the reality would be.

The subject of war, and the mutual distrust and
;rritation which alone make war likely, are kept

perpetually before the public mind, and discussed,
often with ill-temper and insulting comments, in
the journals of the countries more immediately

concerned. It is notorious that France and Prus-

sia are both vigorous and invqsant is military
preparations, so as to be prepared for any emer-
gency ; and now the disturbances, local, isolated,
and thus for insignificant as they appear to be,

which have occurred in Italy in consequence of

Garibaldi's mischievo Pi projects, and their judicious
prevention by his timely arrest, have come to com-
plicate the position and augment the peril. Still, in
spite of all these obvious symptoms of excitement

and sources of danger, we bel;eve the alarm felt at
this moment to be exaggerated, and we regard the
probabilities t 3 be in favour of present, and, we
would fain hope, of ultimate peace. Almost the
most menacing featrre of the case in our judgment
is the alarm itself ; because, if that cannot be
allayed, commerce will not revive, enterpCse must
be suspended, industry will languish, employment
will decrease; and in all countries, and notlbly in
France, an unemployed and suffering population
always become dangerous to a Government which
refuges to occupy their minds and divert their pas-

sions by a foreign war. Neverthel cz.s, and giving
full weight to all these considerations, we incline to
a tolerably hopeful view of the position for the fol-
lowing reasons :—First. There is the vagueness of
the subject matter of the quarrel. It is difficult
even for the French to go to war from mere jealousy
of the increasing power and prosperity of a rival
n ation which has done them no wrong, which has
offered them no insult, which has taken no action
whatever in their concerns, which is simply
en deavouring, with singular consentaneousness of
feeling and wonderfully prompt success, to carry
out those doctrines of nationality which France has
always proclaimed as sacred. Secondly. There is
considerable reason to doubt whether any great
majority of the French nation do seriously just now
desire war with Prussia: Parliamentary orators and
Orleanist or Legitimist journalists, whose patriotism
is not always pure nor often very enlightened, may
desire it. The excitable population of Paris and
some of the great cities of the empire, who have got
a dim and angry notion that French honour has
been tarnished, and that French preponderance is
threatened, may long for the recurrence of those
days of turbulent passion and disorder which con-
stitute the element in which they love to live ; and
it is possible that ere long, if the present uneasiness
continues to paralyse industry and commerce, their
ranks may be swelled by hosts of unemployed arti-
sans, in which case the danger would be much in-
creased. But the peasantry, to whom war means a
doubled conscription, on whom the chief weight of
the conscription falls, and among whom the con-
scription is of all their burdens the most unpopular,
are certainly not anxious for war, and, indeed,
seldom can be so, unless under the pressure of
actual danger or artificially excited passions. Com-
mercial men, as distinguished from speculators and
stock-jobbers, are always averse to hostilities, and
they constitute a far more influential class in France
than formerly. It is very doubtful, too, from all
that we can learn, whether the army itself is sin-
cerely eager for a struggle with an enemy whose
real prowess and resources they feel unable to cal.
culate or measure with any confidence. They hate
the Prussians, no doubt, and long to humble them,
but we have reason to believe that among the offi-
cers of the French army there is not that conviction
of easy and certain superiority in such a conflict
which hitherto they have been wont to feel ; while
among the private soldiers there prevails a kind of
vague alarm at the possible powers of the new
weapon which did such powers at Sadowa, and an
unavowed but still w:despread feeling of doubt, and
almost of discouragement, at the prospect of en-
countering troops who overthrew in a short cam-
paign and in a series of desperate encounters the
adversaries whom they themselves found so hard to
beat at Magenta and Solferino. Thirdly. But it is
on the statesmen at the head of the two angry nations
that we mainly rely for our hopes that peace will be
maintained. The times are changed since eager
rulers dragged reluctant peoples into war. Now, it
is the people who aro ready to fight, and monarchs
and ministers who hold them back. We believe
that both Count Bismarck and Napoleon aro anxious
to avoid a rupture, and have good reason to be so,
and will do all that can be done to avert it. As
for the Prussian statesman, his work of unifica-
tion is going on at least as fast as he can desire
—perhaps even faster—and a war with France, if
it could not prevent it or retard it, would either
complicate and perplex, or, at all events, precipi-
tate his schemes. his ultimate success is certain,
and that success will bo complete and beneficent
probably just in proportion to the gradual and
spontaneous manner in which it is wrought out.
His great desire now must be to consolidate and
fuse the already vastly increased dominions of his
master—not to repeat the policy which Garibaldi
in 1860 forced upon the Italian Government. He
can have no possible motive to hasten an absolutely
certain issue—still less to have it precipitated and
confused by a foreign war, which, however glorious
and successful it might possibly be, would be
long, desperate, bloody, costly, and desolating.
The Emperor of Austria has even stronger mo-
tives to withhold him from allowing France to
drag him into a struggle to prevent that German
unity which has now become the cherished hope
and dream of the entire Fatherland, such a blun-