New-York tribune., 1882-03-02
SPECTRE-H1TNTED EUROPE.

The most alarming symptom of the public
life of Europe is the excessive distrust with
which nations and races regard one another.
The whole continent seems to be spectre
haunted. Diplomatists are not playing out
right with Bismarch's "irOn dice of war nor
is one gree: State offering to another the direct
menace of unwonted military preparations !;
yet political society throughout Europe is con-
tinually disquieted by morbid suspicion-is
beating the air and fighting with shadows as
if overborne by hideous nightmare.
This condition of nervous agitation and ap-
prehension is illustrated by two incidents
which have occurred within fortnight. Ono
is new chapter In the literature Of the Chan
mel Tunnel, in which the dangers of that en-
terprise have been grossly exaggerated. One
English journal has Wed with another in panic
mongcring. The helpessness and insecurity
of the United Kingdom have been openly pro-
claimed. Dover has been described by one of
the highest military authorities as fortress
defended with pop-guns, which could be
knocked to pieces in an hour by the fire of n
single iron-clad. The Channel squadron has
been found to consist of three old IRON
clads, defective in design and awkward
in maneuvring. which have ceased to
be regarded as strong and efficient armored
vessels. The fifty thousand volunteers, who
were brought together within twcnty-four
hours for review at Windsor last summer, arc
dismissed contemptuously as a handful of
troops that would be utterly pOwcrlcss to re-
sist a foreign army of invasion marching on
J0ndon. The facility with which the garrison
at Dover could be surprised and a horde of
soldiery shot through the Channel Tunnel, is
illustrated by a hundred hypothesis, every one
of which appeals to the timOrousness and
credulity of o nation that "never will be
slaves" to aught save panic-terror and
the spectres of q disordered imagination.
Without pausing to consider how any
nation except France could steal march
upon England, nor how that nation could get
possession Of the Dover end Of the tunnel be-
fore war had been formally declared and all
nroper precautions taken to secure the defence
of the fortress and even the destruction OF
the submarine passage itself, the military
critics and public prints fall an easy prey to
the morbid anxiety which pervades all Eu-
rOpean States.
The second illustration is found in the eX
citcment caused IN various capitals by two
speeches made by General Skobeleff, the most
popular soldier in the Russian service. In one
of these harangues he boasted that by its
victories in the Trans-Caspian region and
bv its intrigues in Central Asia and
Persia his Government had secured an
advance-post on the road to IIerat, and could
occupy Merry AT its convenience; and III the
other he proclaimed the sympathy of the
Northern Slays with their brethren of the
same race the Southern Slays, in Dalmatia
Bosnia, Herzegovina, Scryia and Montenegro,
who were either resisting the Austrian con-
scription or recoiling from the despOtic sway
Of the Hapsburgs. Appealing to the commu-
nity of feeling existing between these two
great divisions of the Slav camp, he declared
that they would stand side by side in the
great battle with the TcutOn, which
was inevitable and conld not long be
deferred. In these two speeches, despite his
own avowal of sOberncss and moderation, there
was more champagne than water, yet the
papic-mOngers throughout Europe have been
chattering for a fortnight. These utteranccs
are interpreted as menace To III 6land from
the side of Afghani5tan, to Germany from the
east, and 10 Austria from the Balkan peninsula.
The movement of Russian engineers IN the dl-
recton of Sarukhs, the rcctliicatlon OF the FER
sian frontier, the growth of race feeling In
South Slayonia, the spread of disaiiectlon
among Austria's two millions of Adriatic Slays,
the Russian sympathies of the Montencgrin
and Servian Courts, and the aggressive ness of
Pan-Slavlsm in Moscow, are magnificd, each
in turn, as ominous signs of war and devasta-
ton, menacing the peace of the whole contl-
nent General Skobeef may be sternly re-
proved upon his arrival in St. Petersburg. and