The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-08-08

plating and meditating about as the worst
part of their oountry's history in this cen
tury; as q long-stretched inglorious present
to which the late imperial concessions,
crowned by a plebisoitum of O strangely
dubious character, seem to form a continue
ton rather than a concluding and reconciling
epilogue. Nothing would be more apt to inn
press upon the recent constitutional change
in France the character of such an epilogue
than the suddenly following opening of a new
series of events, sufficiently dramatic and
beroically tragic to strike the Imagination of
the people with the idea of entirely novel,
grand performances, with the impression of. a
new era opening in the history of their coun-
try. Should speedy victory perch upon the
imperial eagles, the new era would be hailed,
as such, with all the rapture of national va
nifty; should q long war with varying success
ensue, the multiplicity and intensity of the
new impressions would the more easily cast
the late past into comparative oblivion. In
either case, Napoleon would appear in the
new light of a champion of France in a grand
contest with an envied rival.
Nor have the provocations to hostility, on
the part of Prussia, been slight in the eyes of
Napoleon. Not only has she dared to conquer
beyond all measure compatible with "the
honor of France; not only has she used and
abused her victory exclusively for her own
benefit and without any regard to the claims
ana remonstrances of the monarch who at
first aided her by his counsel and connivance;
but she has also crossed and baf4led some of
his most ~favorite schemes in an almost afro
cious way. 1t was he who proclaimed him
self the protector and regenerator of the de-
cayed Latin race, from the Pontus to the Pa
citic. 1t was he who brought about the union
of Moldavia and Wallachia in the shape of an
all but independent Roumania. 1t was he
who worked with Cavour and fought with
Garibaldi for the freedom of Italy, ''from the
Alps to the Adriatic. 1t was he who eucour-
aged ODonnell to revive the ancient glory of
Spain on the soil of the Moors and to restore
her sway in the Antilles. 1t was he who erected
and defended, as a shield of the Latin race
against the Anglo-Saxon, the imperial throne
of Macmillan in Mexico. Surely it was a
great dream, this universal Latin protectorate
of France. And how has it vanished Ex-
cepting Mexico, where it ended in a tragedy.
Prussia has turned it into a mockery every
where. She has placed q prince of her royal
house, Charles of Hohenzollern, on the
throne of Roumania. She has conquered
at Sadowa-the Italian quadrilateral of fort
resses, which her arming in 1859 prevented
Napoleon from assaulting, and has surren-
dered it and Venice to Italy-through his
own hands. And now she has arranged to
set another Hohenzollern prince on the
throne even of Spain. Are not all these pro-
vocations, put together. too destructive of
the prestige, too insulting to the pride of a
Napoleon to be submitted to calmly. to be
borne without an attempt at revenge ? We
presume they have weighed heavily in the
scales in which the Emperor of the French
lately weighed peace or war.