ce and
Prussia. In spite of the official neutrality observed by England
during this war, public sentiment was pro-French, and France
undoubtedly received considerable legitimate commercial assistance
from England. This claim is well borne out by the fact that a short
time after the war, as we have already learned during the
consideration of French history, the French Parliament passed a
resolution expressing the thanks of the French nation to England for
its expressions of friendship during the recent war. In Germany this
attitude of the English public was well known and caused a
considerable amount of ill feeling. It was at that time that
Bismarck published Napoleon III's suggestion of 1867 in regard to
the invasion and annexation of Belgium, and its publication at this
particular moment had two results: it made English intervention in
favor of France absolutely impossible and it caused the English
Government to demand from both belligerents--France and
Germany--their signatures to a treaty guaranteeing the neutrality of
Belgium and arranging that in case either France or Prussia would
violate this neutrality Great Britain would intervene in conjunction
with the other for the defense of Belgium. This treaty was also
extended to include Luxemburg. Another indirect result of the
Franco-Prussian War, Russia's declaration in October, 1870, that it
considered itself no longer bound to the terms of the treaty of
Paris, 1856, in regard to the neutrality of the Black Sea, aroused
vigorous English protests. For a time it seemed as if public opinion
would force England to go to war against Russia, but a conference of
the powers who had signed the 1856 treaty was finally called at
London in December, 1870, the results of which we have already
learned. In December, 1870, the difficulties between England and the
United States, which had held over until then from the Civil War,
were satisfactorily settled by international commissioners at
Geneva. A revolution of French-Canadians broke out in 1872, but was
quickly put down. Cape Colony added to its territory in 1871 by
annexing, over the protests of the Orange Free State, territory
known then as Griqualand West. In the same year the Gold Coast was
acquired on the West Coast of Africa through a treaty with Holland,
Great Britain relinquishing in exchange its claims to Dutch Indian
Sumatra. Russia's increased activity in Asia caused considerable
apprehension, which, however, was remov