THE WEEK'S GREAT DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 163, 13 July 1931, Page 6

THE WEEK'S GREAT DAY.

JULY 13.—"PEACE WITH HONOUR"

TREATY,

(Copyrighted.)

Fifty-two years ago, 011 July 13, IS7S, the •epresentatives of the various great European Powers, who had been assembled in Berlin during the preceding month, affixed their signatures to the celebrated treaty, which is regarded as the crowning diplomatic triumph in the career jf Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield. Although the treaty failed to produce the beneficial results which the British Government liad expected, the securing of it was undoubtedly i very remarkable diplomatic achievement, but the manner in which it was created was e\en nore remarkable. It was an extraordinary example of Disraeli's propensity for providing his statecraft with a setting of pageantry and mystery, and the lengthy conference of the plenipotentiaries at Berlin was merely an impressive, but entirely useless, ceremonial, as at the time when the great British statesman set out for the meeting he had already entered into secret treaties with Russia and Turkey, which had settled all the disputed questions in advance, so that there was no necessity for any such discussion and negotiation as took place during the progress of the Berlin Congress. The war between Russia and Turkey, which commenced in April, 1577, had ended with the defeat of the latter, and ori March 3, IS7S, the belligerents had entered into a treaty of peace, the terms of which Beaconsfield regarded as inimical to British interests, and he therefore adopted prompt and secret measures to prevent them from being carried into effect. At first Russia refused to make any concessions, but the dispatch of the Mediterranean fleet into the Dardanelles and other warlike preparations on the part of Britain secured everything that Beaconsfield demanded, the principal concession being a considerable limitation of Russian power and influence in the Balkan Peninsula, in return for which Russia was to be given the territory oi southern Bessarabia in the Turkish vassal State of Rumania. Having secured all that he wanted by secret treaties with the two Powers, Beaconsfield declared that the Treaty of Paris in 1856, which had ended the Crimean campaign, had guaranteed the integrity of the Turkish Empire, and that, therefore, its terms could not be varied in any way except by the assent of all the great European Powers. His demand that the Conceit of Europe should meet to discuss and reconsider the whole Eastern question was agreed to by the interested Powers, and a congress of representatives of Great Britain, Russia, Austria, Italy, Germany and Turkey was arranged to ! meet in Berlin on June 13 under the presidency of Prince Bismarck, the German Chancellor. Beaconsfield, accompanied by the Marquis of Salisbury, made a spectacular journey across Europe to Berlin, where lie took a prominent pait in discussing the many questions winch were supposed to be still in dispute, but which in reality had already been settled in the secret treaties, and on his return home his progress through the streets of London was that of a conquering hero. It was in the course of a speech which "he delivered to the vast crowd which a c 6embled outside the Foreign Office on the nig lit of his arrival home that he proclaimed, m words which became memorable, that he had ' brought J back 'peace with honour.'" _ , The word "jingoism." which is now applied to bellicose and provocative patriotism, first made its appearance in 1878, when Bcaconsfiekl's threats of war against Russia was backed by the overwhelming support of the British public, and the national spirit was echoed in the lines of a popular son"- sung by G. H. MacDermott, a music-hall j vocalist of those days: We don't want to fight, but, by .lingo, it we do. We've got the ships, we've got the men, we ve O ot the money too.