The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-09-20
RUSSIA AND THE WAR.
be London Saturday, Rerislc.

RUSSIA AND THE WAR.
From the London Saturday Reristc.
After the Congress of Paris in 1856 the
policy of Russia was authoritatively declared
to be one of strict isolation and reserve.
England, it was announced, had betrayed the
confidence of the Emperor Nicholas, and re-
pelled his offers of share in the coniscation
of the Turkish empire, in order to throw
herself headlong into an alliance with the
Second Empire. and TO secure the friendship
of dangerous conspirator by lending him
her own prestige. Austria had played an
obscure and shifty part as a neutral; Prussia
had looked more kindly on her old ally, but
declined a closer and more active sympathy.
Russia had learned a severe and bitter but
profitable lesson from her heroic efforts and
glorious reverses: to live her own life,
to recruit and renovate her unexhausted
though shattered energies to devote herself
to the material interests of peace-in word,
to ''collect herself for the sure but not pre-
cipitate fulilment of her destinies. Sc
7ecueiHir-that was to be the whole duty of
Russian craftsmanship for years to come,
according to Prince Gortschakoff. That duty
has been faithfully observed, and new Rus
sia, more Muscovite and more discreet,
though not less despotic, has been created
out of the ruins of the old Russia of serfdom
and silence, of intervention and intrigue. In
the two great centres of the Empire some
thing like national opinion has sprung up
and spread from few salons to the colleges,
and from official circles to public journals.
Foreign capital has been attracted by high
interest and punctual dividends to invest
ments in railway enterprise. The founda-
tions of a new polity and new society have
been laid, and while all this internal renova-
tion was going on, never was the foreign
policy of Russia more decided, more digni-
fed, or more self-possessed. Sebastopol was
scarcely taken when the Emperor Napoleon
was meditating his own terms of peace with
an enemy who, having served his purpose in
obtaining one alliance, might be the conf
dental partner in another. AT the opening
of the Italian war in 1859 Franco Russian
alliance was in the air. Louis Napoleon
courted it, nor was it from any want of
warmth in his courtship that his Intentions"
were declined. What he wanted it for, or
what was the ulterior object of his int tsntions,
is less clear. Probably his Intentions were
only half-formed conspiracies against some
power whose alliance was no longer indis-
pensable to him. Russia knew very we'll
that while he was counting her alliance he
was coquetting, like his uncle, with
the inexhaustible credulity of Poland,
and holding in reserve the dreams
and hopes of that everlasting victim of French
revolutionary jargon. When, few years
later, the Polish insurrection broke out, and
that fantastic and impracticable nationality
threw away the last chance of a government
and administration of its own, the French
Emperor felt himself obliged to make some
show of active sympathy. But the moment
Prince Gortschokoff replied to covert menaces
by disdainful despatch, the heir and sue
cessor of the man for whom thousands of
brave Poles had fallen in battle drew back
and held his peace; and ever since that signal
diplomatic discontinue he has assiduously
cultivated the most friendly relations with
the power that slapped his face, and has al
most obsequiously studied to please the re-
storer of order at Warsaw. His ostentatiously
affectionate welcome to the Gear in Paris
during the International Exhibition well
come so inauspiciously interrupted by a
Polish pistol-was bitterly remarked by
French republicans During the four years
of preparation for the attack upon Prussia,
Louis Napoleon has persevered in his assidui-
ties at st. Petersburg, through one of the
most devoted of his personal agents, whose
favored position at the court of Alexander III
is favorite topic in the Official Journal.
| This laborious affectation of friendship has
not, however, sstranged him from his other
alliances, with England, with Austria, and
with Turkey. 1t has rather assumed the
| character of a warning to his other allies to
| beware of the possibility of that Rus
sian alliance which he could never
obtain. Alexander III, if less disdainful than
his father of these advances, is scarcely more
solicitous of their sincerity. While the Jour
nal Oficieg was dwelling with eager satisfac-
tion on General Fleury's successes as a cour-
tier, the Car was publicly and formally ex-
changing with King William of Prussia con-
gratulatory "reminiscences of a memorable
defeat of the First Napoleon in Germany.
Such were the relations between the Gov
ernments of France and Russia when the
Duke of Gramont read to the Chamber the
declaration of war, and such to all appear
ances they are now, when the German armies
under the Prussian standards are marching
upon the French capital. For the besl
of reasons Russia is watching the frontiers OF
Posen, and holding Austrian neutrality in
check. In the Baltic Russia observes the
movements of the French squadrons with
anxious attention. Russia advises aud sus
tains the neutrality of the Scandinavian
kingdoms Russian influence restrains rather
than encourages the rash intrigues of tn,
King of Italy Russia recognizes the justic,
of the retribution which Prussia is inhictinl
upon Imperial France. But when we sa!
'ERussia y we mean the Russian Court anS