GERMANY AND RUSSIA.

Southland Times, Issue 1986, 21 September 1874, Page 3

GERMANY AND RUSSIA.

A Berlin letter, on the approaching Brussels Congress, speaking of the current "German conference, says a number of little circumstances throw some light on the subject, and the first is the wellknown relations existing between the German and 'Bussian Chancellors. The personal and political intimacy between Prince Bismarck and Prince Gortsehakoff is one of the most striking, not to say portentous, facts in European politics to-day. It is common to speak of the friendship of the two Emperors as a basis of harmony of policy between empires, and since this friendship falls in with the purposes of the two chancellors, it is, of course, an important factor ; but the sovereigns are minor pieces after all. They are pawns of the game. A significant fact is that the fortunes of Europe are now at the mercy of two penetrating and ambitious politicians. In view of this state of things, it seems morally impossible that Prince Gortsbakuff could have planned the Brussels Congress without the concurrence of his German colleagues. It would, indeed, have been imprudent to do so. A congress under the distinct and exclusive patronage of Kussia would have been impotent from the start. France and England would have controlled it completely, and the reserve which those tates now show proves at least that they detect a combination more or less solid between the three great Eastern powers which support the highest standing armies, and they are interested in adding to the value of their armies by paralysing all other combinations only.