CONTINENTAL COMMENTS.

TH

Paris.

HE Chamber of Deputies having wisely prohibited the members of the Budget Committee from belonging to the Customs Committee, I can speak freely respecting the latter. Whatever judgment I may pass it shall not be said of me," Vous êtes orfèvre." Let me add, without in the least being ashamed of it, that if I had had the honour to be a member I should not always have voted with the majority, nay, I should more than once have given my feeble support to the minority. Please to observe that in describing these two fractions of the Committee, I do not make use of the usual terms, " Protectionist" and "Free Traders." Except M. Léon Say, I have not yet succeeded in discovering in our Customs Areopagus a single Free Trader really worthy of that distinguished but antediluvian name. All Protectionists! Ask anyone of the honourable members for Marseilles to suppress the duties on soap; you will have a nice reception.

As a general rule-M. Léon Say always excepted-people are real Free Traders only when the interests of others are concerned. The heaviest duties-some say the most exorbitant-which have been voted by the Committee were due to the report of a member for Paris who calls himself, and believes himself, a Free Trader. I mean M. Georges Berger. It is thus, moreover, that England acts. The grand words "Free Trade" shine out in letters of gold upon her standard, but under the pretext of chronic cattle disease she has for twenty years closed her market to our Norman cattle. Rather smart, this! The discussion in the Chamber upon the general tariff will occupy several weeks; if it occupied several months I should not complain. At the outset the essential thing

on both sides is to conduct the debate in a spirit of the utmost moderation. The more passionate it becomes the less will be the chance of arriving at a durable, useful, and solid result.

Passion is a bad counsellor in politics; it is a detestable counsellor in political economy. At the risk of being excommunicated at once by all the Schools and all the Churches, I recognise only one principle, one single principle, in Customs Duties—the national interests. It is just as culpable to sacrifice those general interests of the entire nation to an absolute principle as to a special interest. We ought to take into account the national interests alone, and make them clearly obvious; and it is for their triumph that we ought to work.

To introduce into the discussion of a Customs Tariff the famous saying, "Perish the colonies rather than a principle," is worse than a crime. And what is true of principles is a priori true of Jerusalem artichokes. Our first duty is to save the colonies. Moderation should prevail in substance and in form. Threats, insults, intimidation, have never done good to anyone. We may accept or reject the duties upon carriages, hosiery, or lard without, therefore, being scoundrels without scruple or patriotism. The effect of all exaggeration is, in the first place, and above all, to do wrong to the truth upon which it is based. As to what I may perhaps be allowed to call the language of civil war, such as words likely to arouse the anger of peasants against workmen, or consumers against producers, appeals calculated to lead to reprisals against the foreigner or to excite the rancour of electors, they cannot be too severely condemned, and I commend them beforehand to the stern severity of M. Floquet.

These truths, upon which it is our duty to meditate, we might ask some of our neighbours to meditate upon also. It is perfectly certain, for instance, that, in finally drawing up the Customs Tariff, Parliament will have to take scrupulously into account our commercial and political relations with foreign countries, and the wrong that we should do ourselves if we took it into our heads to blow up all our bridges, and to surround ourselves with an impassable palisade.

An old proverb says, "There are other persons also behind the mountain," and in their turn they can establish tariffs which might impede us. But it is not by seeking to intimidate us that we shall be made to reflect, or that the most hot-headed among us will be made reasonable. They will simply be rendered rather more hot-headed than before. Excited as they may be, they are not more ignorant than others, and, therefore, all the fine stories of Customs Unions which complacent telegrams have related to us for some few weeks can only have an exactly opposite effect to that intended.

When we learn from Vienna, from Berlin, from London, that an agreement has been arrived at among the Powers against France, that the Austro-German Treaty has been signed, that Belgium, Switzerland, and Italy have given in their adhesion to it, who is taken in by all this? The Austro-German Treaty! Why, for years it has always been upon the point of being signed; and, moreover, if it were signed, and if it included Belgium, Switzerland, and Italy, Article XI. of the Treaty of Frankfort would none the less remain in force, and it accords to us the treatment of the most favoured nation. Every concession made by Germany to Switzerland, to Austria, or to Belgium would, ipso facto, benefit France, and all these treaties with which we are threatened would, consequently, at least in this respect, be simply agreeable to us. As to the other Powers, those irritated States which would raise their tariffs in order thereby to stop our exports-well, we know all about their commercial statistics; we have read them again and again, and this study has sufficiently enlightened us. Austria-Hungary? It buys scarcely anything of us : 22,500,000fr. in 1889, and sells us a good deal-125,500,000fr. during the same year; net profit in its favour, 102,000,000fr. Do you really think Austria-Hungary would be willing to deprive itself of 102,000,000fr. to please the "King of Prussia" and the doctrinaires of absolute Free Trade?

If from Austria you pass to Roumania, Belgium, Italy, or Switzerland, you will everywhere find a similar state of things which the semi-official journal of M. di Rudini has so well described in

these words: “Our Government is favourable to Treaties of Commerce, but it does not believe in the possibility of forming Customs Unions, which would only lead to an opposite result to that intended, and thus render more bitter the disputes between the States of the Union and those which would remain outside of it.”

Let us, therefore, talk reason, and discuss as much as you like. We are ready to study these complex problems with the utmost care; we have the most ardent desire to retain for France as much sympathy as possible; everything that we can concede we will concede to our neighbours and, above all, to our friends, without prejudice to our national industries, without acting as dupes, which is always foolish because it does not even secure the gratitude of the other side; but if you wish us to be reasonable, don't try to frighten us.

In a word, we are quite ready for a revision in obedience to experience and equity, but not in obedience to intimidation. Evidently the Internationalzollverein is a terrible word.

"On croit en l'entendant qu'on sonne de la trompe."

But we are too old to believe in hobgoblins. To play with spectres is a very amusing game which often pleases the gallery, but it would be more useful to search together for the truth. Here, again, if I am well informed, it is by steering a middle course that we shall have the best chance of arriving safely in harbour.

JOSEPH REINACH.

Berlin.

TH

HE temptation to explain a few characteristics of an episode perhaps the most peculiar and sensational of modern days, I mean the political contention still raging between his Majesty William II. and Prince Bismarck, is too strong for me. I succumb manfully."

Years ago, when Bismarck loved to inform his more intimate guests that, again submitting to Royal importunities, he had resolved to continue in power, a stalwart and outspoken companion of his younger days exclaimed: "Then had you not better have done

with these constant frictions at Court ? Withdraw from office. Enter Parliament. Your position there is made and your power is simply unlimited." This reply, which was reported to me at the time, is worth recording just now, when the reactionary, protectionist, and clerical battalions within the Reichstag are deprived, by the death of Windthorst, of their last commanding personality, when, in fact, all that is retrogressive, all that is driven by selfinterest throughout the length and breadth of the country cries out for a leader and finds none. Looking good-naturedly at his guileless old chum, Bismarck said: “Ah, you think so, do you? Well, let me tell you that you are entirely mistaken, and that, in Prussia, no man is anything save what his office makes him." I consider that no more truthful saying, none more instructive, ever fell from his mouth. Those few masterly words contain one-half of the whole bitter truth as in a nutshell; the other half being that the nobodies, the prophets whom everybody respects and everybody scorns (geachtet und geachtet), and who are not wanting in Germany, have their day only when safe in their graves.

It is evident that Prince Bismarck's views have undergone a change on the question of his entering Parliament. There were hints given of what he would do or not do if returned to the Reichstag, and, latterly, he allowed his candidature to be set up at Geestemünde. To outsiders it must be surprising that no seat was offered him during the whole first year of his seclusion from office, and that he should now obtain but a scant majority over an obscure Jack Cade. Those who have carefully observed political life in Germany will not wonder for a moment. If Prince Bismarck were credited with qualities indispensable to a Parliamentary leader, such as patience, plausibility, a power to grasp other people's opinions, or a modicum of steadfastness in alliance, he would be hailed as the Heaven-sent by whole classes of people. Taking his character as evolved through his wonderful political career, however welcome, for example, an onslaught by him on the forthcoming Austro-German Treaty of Commerce might be to the landlord class anxious to retain an insanely high duty on cereals, they know him too well to entrust