The San Francisco call., 1896-03-08
NERVOUSNESS OF
GREAT NATIONS,
It Is Typifed in the Wild
Agitation Over Italy's
Disaster.
CRISPI CANNOT RETURN
Neither Can Di Rudini Recome
Neither Can Di Rudini Become
Premier, for His Policy Is
Opposed by the King.
HUMBERT Is NOT FOR PEACE.
Meanwhile the Powers Keenly Watch
Events and Await the
Outcome.
copyright, 1896, by the New York Times.l

Copyright, 1896, by the New York Times.l
LONDON, ENG, March For months
international affairs have been growing
more and more unsettled here in Europe,
ana now 1taly's tragic misadventure has
thrown them altogether out of balance. If
the battle of Adowah had been fought on
the slope OF the Alps it could hardly have
wrought more blind confusion and diplo-
matte panic. No nation feels that it stands
where it stood last week, but there the
knowledge ends. No one can tell what
new combinations may emerge when order
subdues chaos again. Italy itself in its
wild agitation typihes the nervous con-
vulsion which has set al its neighbors
shaking. 1t is not merely bad defeat
upon the Tiger highlands of Nubia that
has hurled Crispi from power and brought
mobs out into the streets of fifty Italian
cities and turned the Italian Parliament
into bedlam. At another time such a
disaster might have passed with little
notice. 1t came, however, al a moment
when the public mind there as elsewhere
had grown saturated with apprehensions
of it hardly knew what, and thus coming
it promptly produced a crash.
Whatever happens, it seems clear that
Crispi cannot come back. The earnest OBJ
server in Rome reflects the belief that no.
body can succeed him and hold his place
who does not agree to make peace with
Meneik and withdraw the Italian forces
to the portion of the Red Sea Iittoral about
which there is no dispute with him. This
is understood TO be di Rudini's policy, but
for that 4 ~ reason it appears that .di
RudlHs sga no. bezfremier. because King
Humbert has declared that he will aodi-
cate rather than consent to take such a
step.
Thus the problem shifts round to the
contest between Italy and the Savoy
dynasty, and all those manifold prophecies
OF the overthrow of the monarchy which
were rife two years ago are clamoring in
the air again. 1t is too soon to listen much
70 them, but it is plain enough that the
situation may easily come TO that. There
Is a sinister significance in the fact that
those German papers which speak for the
German Foreign Office all urge Italy not
to hesitate for moment. but to redouble
her energies to wipe out this blot on her
hazards.
The Austrian official press reports this
advice in a rather vague, hating way, but
from Germany it comes urgently and with
out reservation. / say that this is signIf-
cant. because 1t shows plainly what these
dispatches have long been insisting on,
that Germany no longer relies on the
Triple Alliance and no longer has direct
interest in ItaIy's conserving her strength
for possible European action. Her one
interest in Italy is now 10 keep her en-
broiled with France, which is what the
Abyssinian adventure does, and thus let
these two Latin nations neutralize each
other while Germany and Russia pursue
the projects of their new partnership un-
disturbed.
Some perception of this treachery is in
every Italian mind, and more than any
question of African conquest it has aroused
the Italian popular passion wave OF indlg-
nation, under which Crispi had gone down
and even the throne is shaken. 1t is really
directed toward Germany and the mockery
of the German alliance. II the statesmen
who are now controlling France, and they
seem by happy fate to be statesmen, have
the genius to rise to the occasion, they
can undo now in week all that the Triple
Alliance has done for the past seventeen
years.
England has palpitating concern in
the possibility of such com bination as
that of the British, French and Italians in
a West European league and is fondly
tempted 10 hope that Austria might be
brought into it as well. There is, at least,
1 he suspicious omen that the Emperor OF
Austria this week has broken the tradition
nv which no ally of the German Kaiser
met French President, and 1t IS also
hopeful sign that in Faure's progress
through the south OF France Bourgeois
has seen him cheered as loudly as he, and
that the President has gone out OF his way
to show his joy in the fact
Although voluminous enough. to-day's
London press comment on the venezuelan
blue book may hardly be called important.
Most of the papers take it for granted that
England has made an exceptionally pow
erful case. and assume that when the
Americans perceive its unanswerable
they will at once admit that they
are surprised and hasten to advise Vene-
zuela to give in. The Daily Cnronlcle
alone shows a comprehensive knowledge
OF the details involved, and consequently
alone crlticizes the report rather sharpiy
as piece OF smart, lawyer-iike case max
ing. which skilIfully ignores or glides over
difficult spots and lays street on the points
favoring its own side.
The Chronicle, moreover, pressed the
legitimate party point against Lord Sails
bury that he is now revealed as willing to
subscribe to a treaty of arbitration, which
ten years ago, on succeeding Granville at
the Foreign Office, he deliberately tore up,
but after all, the main thing is that the
English have at last made an official state
ment NJ THAR case so that the two Gov