The San Francisco call., 1898-01-30
 VOLCANO IS
 NOT EXTINCT
Slum berS While Pop ular Opinion Re-
 mains Excited.
Copyright. 1898 by James Gordon Bennett.

Copyright. 1898. by James Gordon Bennett.
 PARIS. Jan. 29.-Although the Drey- fus crisis has been less acute durinh the past week, popular opinion is still very excited over the matter. The vol cano is not extinct; it is simply slun.- berfng. One point which has tended to excite the public is the fear of compli- cations with Germany, although there seems to be little ground for expecting any. M. Henri Rochefort, in a discus sion of the matter this morning, said: T don't fear complications with Ger many. What, however, is certain is that were any to arise, the Jews will be the first to suffer from it."
 This puts the matter in a nutshell. Rightly or wrongly, popular feeling is against a revival of the Dreyfus case and is bitterly opposed to the people advocating it. It is felt that the case cannot be opened to the public without such details being discussed as might endanger the peaceful relations of France with other nations This feel ing can only be realized by likening it to the state of mind of the entire na- tion at the time of the French revolp- ton. In fact the history of 'S7 seems
 
 way. Then mere frivolous matter about diamond necklace played a prominent part in the furor and led to an important event
 To-day 1t is question of military ! trial, which, as M. Edmond Drumont points out, concerns no one but miIi- tary officers. As he says officers in inc army arc there of their free will and soldiers by compulsion. There may be therefore, some reason for disputing inc authority of the cOurt-martial in the case of a common soldier, but there can be none in the case of an officer see ing that he has voluntarily placed him. self within its jurisdiction Now. just as 1793, when popular feeling was ex cited to an extent that led to the most | terrible events that ever occurred is | added the threatened intervention of foreign nations in Frances domestic af
 fairs. And, again, to-day dread of in ! tervention on the part of Germany over the Dreyfus matter has embittered the feeling against those whom the peo- | pie consider guilty of bringing about a | possibility of this intervention. If is | useless blinking at the fact that the nation looks upon this attempt to re- i habilitate Dreyfus as the result of a | radical combination. If the result should lead to difficulties with any for ! eign nation it would be just the same ] as in 1793. That is to say. first. the 1 fury of the populace would be spent | upon those. accused of causing it. Re- cent events in Algiers proved this. If | the Prussian and Austrian armies ha d not been summoned to the frontier in ] the early days of the first republic 1 Louis XVI might have retained his ] head, but at the first breath of foreign 1 interference all other sentiment seems ] to have been swept away by rage and fear and the aristocrats whom the peo- l pie believed to be guilty of calling for
 eign aid had to bear the onslaught of i the frenzied nation.
 | To-day at the first idea that Germany might intervene, owing to the fnflu i ence of what the nation at large l chooses to call the Jewish syndicate
 the people would get into a dangerous state of eXcitation, and the Jews vouId ! be in a precarious situation were any 1 international difficulties to spring out of the present agitation.