At the same date the _North German Gazette_ said that since General Boulanger had assumed charge of the French war office not a day had passed without measures being taken to augment the offensive strength of the army, and there were constant movements of troops upon the frontiers. February 19 the news was still more alarming at Berlin. Work was going on night and day on the fortifications at Verdun and Belfort. "All commerce has been suspended at Metz, excepting in food. The inhabitants are storing their houses from cellar to garret." A Russian paper of that date said, "Existing circumstances admit of no delay." At Vienna, February 18, it was announced that "a semi-official letter from St. Petersburg represents that Russia is waiting for a Franco-German conflict, _which she considers inevitable_, to realize her own Balkan projects. Russia would consider it to be to her own interest not to allow Germany to be victorious." February 19 Senator Beck at Washington referred to an extract from a late speech of Count von Moltke before the German Reichstag, to show that _war is inevitable_. February 27 the London despatch to the _Boston Herald_ said: "Within the last forty-eight hours confidence in the maintenance of peace has visibly lessened." About the same time in Russian government circles the conviction was said to be gaining ground that a Franco-German war was inevitable, and that it would be for the interest of Russia to save France from disaster. March 6 the _North German Gazette_ said that the Alsace elections had strengthened the war party in France. War seems to have been the general anticipation of military men. General Wolseley (February 26) is reported to have said: "I feel sure that a vast, appalling war is certainly in the near future; but this, indeed, everybody may be said to know." But "everybody" is as liable to be mistaken on questions of futurity as on questions of philosophy and religion, on which the multitude called "everybody" has been largely mistaken ever since the earliest periods known to history. "Everybody" is generally pessimistic, apt to be superstitious, and never philosophic. A single good psychometric perception is worth much more than Mr. Everybody's opinion, whether upon national policy, personal character, historical truth, or medical science. The psychometric opinion is the opposite of that of General Wolseley and Senator Beck, for the psychometric soul is in the calm sphere of truth, in which the passions have no deceiving power. I have already published in the "Manual of Psychometry" the prediction of universal peace at the end of five years from the prophecy, and I now repeat the statement that great Franco-German war is but the fantasy of passion and fear. The last psychometric expression, March 11, confirms the uniform statements heretofore. Upon the question "What of the war in Europe?" this was the impression: