BERLIN AND VIENNA.


The pre-eminence of London and Paris in the European world is
unquestioned, and, so far as we can foresee, permanent. Although
England is withdrawing herself more and more from the affairs of
the Continent, and becoming a purely insular and quasi-Oriental
power--although France has lost the lead in war and politics, and does
not seem likely to regain it--yet the capitals of these two countries
hold their own. In the accumulation of wealth and population, in
science, letters and the arts, London and Paris seem to be out of
reach of competition. Other cities grow, and grow rapidly, but do
not gain upon them. Even Berlin and Vienna, which have become so
conspicuous of late years, will remain what they are--local centres
rather than world-centres. The most zealous friend of German and
Austrian progress can scarcely claim for Berlin and Vienna, as cities,
more than secondary interest. Nevertheless, these minor capitals are
not to be overlooked, especially at the present conjuncture. One of
them is the residence of the most powerful dynasty in Europe: the
other is the base of an aggressive movement which tends to free at
last the lower Danube from Mohammedanism. If, as is possible, the
courts of Berlin and Vienna should decide to act in concert, if the
surplus vitality and population of the German empire, instead of
finding its outlet in the Western hemisphere, should be reversed
and made to flow to the south-east, we should witness a strange
recuscitation of the past. We should behold the Germanic race,
after two thousand years of vicissitude, of migration, conquest,
subordination and triumph, reverting to its early home, reoccupying