The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-04-20
France and Prussia.

From the Tribune
week ago we received cable despatch
stating that Count Bismark had sent an ener-
getic note to France demanding of the Empe-
ror Napoleon his reasons for arming, and ask
ing the immediate cessation of warlike prepa-
ratiOns. Such note, one would think, must
have produced throughout Europe the most
profound excitement and it has therefore been
a cause ef general surprise that, during the
week since elapsed, so little has been heard of
the effects of the Prussian note. 1t has since
been stated that the people of Luxembourg
generally were opposed to being sold to France;
that proposition was under consideration to
declare Luxembourg neutral territory; that, in
case of war, Bavaria and Baden would aid
Prussia; but not word of what the official and
unofficial press OF Paris, Berlin St. Petersburg,
and Vienna had to say of a note of so eXtraor-
dinary a character. This strange silence of the
cable could not fail to make the impression
that either the report of Count Bismark's S note
was gross eXaggeration, or that the informa-
tion sent to us concerning one of the most i'm
portant events of the present year has been
| most garingly deficient.
Yesterday morning we had another alarming
! despatch The negotiations between France
! and Prussia are said to have been broken
off. The prominence which the entire press
of Europe has for several weeks been giving
TO the Luxembourg question, ought certainly
TO have furnished material enough for fuller
| and more ineligible despatch. We have
thus far had no intelligence of any
direct negotiations between France and Prus-
sia. By the Scotia we received the news that
the Government of Holland has informed
Prussia that Luxembourg wOuld never
be sold without the previous consent
of Prussia. Bismark had taken the
ground that, although Germany could
not claim the entrance of Luxembourg
inte the Confederation, she had a right to
onpose the sale to France of a fortress which
has been completed by the money of the old
Federal Diet and which, in the hands OF
France, would constitute permanent danger
10 Germany. He had also insisted that the
consent of all the powers which had guaran-
teed the Treaty of 1889 was requisite for such
n sale. 1t was further stated that Russia
had protested against the sale and that the
Enoish Ministry had officially declared that
the sale could not take place, because the con-
sent of Prussia would never be given.
This is all the authentic information we
have thus far received about the relations OF
France and Prussia to the Luxembourg ques-
| tion. SuppOsing the intelligence given in the
cable despatch yesterday morning to be correct,
lis meaning seems to be that the efforts OF
Prussia to prevail upon France to abandon the
claimed right of purchasing Luxembourg have
failed. But intelligence fuller and more dis
tinct than the dispatches thus far received, is
needed to explain the present situation. The
latest articles in the semi-official papers o.
Prussia indicate, however, that the relations
between France and Prussia were not of q
friendly nature.
After writing the above, we received q
despatch from Berlin stating that Napoleon il
reported to be strengthening his forces and
military posts on the frontier, putting his ar
tillery on war footing, purchasing ambu,
lances, and that the reserves of 1868 would
be called out on the first of May. Russia is
also reported to be making active military
preparytions.