The daily morning journal and courier., 1897-05-01
AN OSSIANIC KAISER.

icy, ot the Germen emperor He is dis playing a character with which 1t Is most difficult for diplomatists to deal
 and which is not entirely consistent
 with his earlier career. The habit of ruling, and the success, or rather the absence of resistance, which in internal affairs has so far distinguished his reign, have developed the emperor's pe-
 culiarities in a most marked degree.
 He had always a sufficient belief in
 himself, as he showed in his dismissal
 of Prince Bismarck, but of late this be- lief has become exaggerated into con- tidence scarcely to be distinguished from presumption. He seems capable of thanking God for a great harvest
 and sending Him the Order of the Red
 Eagle in acknowledgement, Even his own subjects, who were at first dis posed by tradition and habit of mind to welcome another strong" Hohenzol- Tern, now shake their heads and lament
 that their Kaiser, who is also their
 commander-i -in-chief, acts so completely
 under the influence of his own will. They never know what he will do to- morrow. There is no ruling statesman now visible in Germany. for the Cham cellor Is old and deferential, the minis ter of war accepts instead of advising orders, the finance minister (Dr Mi queD is highly intelligent, exception ally intelligent, instrument of His Ma jesty, and Baron Von Marschail, as re- cent trials proved though able and fairly trusted, has to contend against many adverse influences. The emperor is all in all, he is more determined than ever to play the first role in the politi- cal drama, and as his claim Is entirely acknowledged within his own domin- ions, where to speak lightly of His Ma jesty now involves a sort of civil death, he extends it to all Europe, and indeed
 to all the world. It is to be lord" of @ I worldwide empire" that the emperor demands, or threatens to demand, from his Parliament such vast additions to the navy.
 Naturally, holding such position, his jealousy of Great Britain, the only worldwide power has grown excessive, | overmastering personal liking for England and the English court; and, naturally also, revolutionary ideas, which are floating about in half-de- 1 veloped way all through Germany, ap- pear to him almost impieties. The | Revolution" is to William II. what
 "clericalism" is to many French Radi-
 cals-the enemy. It Is his business, he
 thinks, as the first of kings, to protect
 the rights of sovereigns, though he is
 an emperor because his grandfather
 crushed dynasties, some of them older
 than his own, by the half-dozen, and l he cannot bear to see the sovereign
 rights" even of a sultan of Turkey in
 terfered with Suppose Abdul Hamid
 has massacred Armenians, they were his own subjects, and were almost In
 rebellion. Is that any reason why he
 should lose without war the right of
 garrisoning his own dominions? His
 dignity must, at all events, be pre-
 served, and those who have affronted it | by invading Crete must be humiliated
 even if they are not punished. They
 are close relatives of the emperor, but
 that Is an additional reason for giving
 an example to the world for have they
 not been false to their order in inva-
 ding, from motives which at bottom are
 democratic, sacred sovereign rights? The king of Greece is not king in Will | liam II. s eyes, but @ mere Garibaldian, l who is dallying with the Revolution,
 and even advancing its favorite idea, l the right of nationalities, as an excuse | for democratic action. Let him abdi-
 cate if he will but let Germany main
 tain the principle that kings must gov-
 ern unthreatened from without In no
 case must the Revolution triumph. It | ;e I %c1 h ,ig J,,oo 1on fo,t days ago, in speech which reads as if
 it had been uttered by a crowned Ossian
 of Tory convictions, "the disease which
 all Germans must combat by all means
 in their power, the disease which not 1 only infects the nation, but also seeks 1 to undermine the life of the family yes, and to undermine the holiest thing we Germans know-the position of wo- man."
 A monarch who is imnued with ideas like these so imbued with them that he ceases to argue, and expresses himself
 in dithyrambs and who also commands an army supposed to be the strongest
 in Europe is of necessity most un-
 comfortable factor in European diplo- macy. You cannot discuss politics I "ltiI lllol NuO lo oiISlll6p lhS speech we have quoted is really a song
 of battle-not without a Tyrtaean note in 1t too-against the Revolution, and
 the royal family of Greece as fosterers
 of the same. It would not have been difficult, if the emperor had been a man like his grandfather, who subordinated himself to his policy, to arrange the Cretan difficulty by a few reasonable concessions to Greek pride. The
 Greeks would have accepted the auton- omy of Crete with cordiality if only the
 prince had been left to popular elec-
 ton, and the suzerainty modified by a special flag, and the Turkish troops l withdrawn at the same moment as the Greek; but those were precisely the
 concessions which William II. could not
 bring himself to make. The Sultan
 was a sovereign, and sovereigns are en- titled to garrison their dominions. so dc Snot talk of withdrawing Turkish troops
 Greece must go first, that is fiat, be- cause Greece has broken rules. She shall have no concern with Crete, what ever happens, even as an autonomous
 province, for else she would profit by
 misdotng; while as to an election of 6
 prince. that is the favorite device of ev. cry revOlutionist: Elect prince, in. deed. Not while l am emperor. A; Austria could not break away iron