ion farm and small-town buildings with concrete, or elevating them on posts out

of rat reach, would deprive most of the

rat population at once of shelter and livelihood. The cost of the job might seem greater than the result would justify if we did not have grounds to believe the extraordinary estimated yearly total of the rat's depredations. A private corporation would jump at the chance to spend on construction several times the amount that would result in annual savings. Five times even one hundred millions, a mere half of the estimated yearly rat damage, would suffice to shut the rat out of most of his abodes and free-lunch

counters. The job might quite conceivably pay in a purely financial sense, to say nothing of the security it would afford as to rat-communicated diseases.

Pulverized Fuel-An Important New Technical Development

W

ITHIN the past year or two those who maintain an interest in the more important advances which are made from time to time by industry and engineering have heard occasional mention of a new technique-the burning in many of the Nation's largest electric and industrial power houses of finely powdered coal for fuel. Here, indeed, is something essentially new in its recent application, decidedly interesting and significant.

It is significant because it is permitting us to capture more of the latent energy that is contained in our coal than we have been capturing; also because it is bringing into practical commercial use some extremely inferior varieties of coal which we have heretofore had to throw away.

Why It Is Important

THIS method of burning coal for gen

erating power by steam is almost entirely an American development. It is used chiefly in large installations. For instance, the Ford Motor Company now has three large pulverized coal power installations. The Detroit Edison Company has one such. So have immense So have immense electric power companies in Milwaukee, St. Louis, Cleveland, and many other cities. The city of Winnipeg uses it for burning lignite or brown coal.

When coal is burned in this form, its combustion is very complete, for there is little chance for any part of each minute particle to remain unconsumed. Again, the facility with which the volume of flame may be changed simply by changing the feed of coal powder permits a more economical adjustment to the demands for electricity, which fluctuate hourly in all cities, than is possible with the type of coal fire with which we are all familiar.

Best of all, it permits the use of a wide range of coal qualities from week to week in one installation. This is most im

portant, for, to a far greater extent than home-owners, industrial consumers of coal find it difficult to get uniformly good deliveries. Almost any grade of coal may, however, be pulverized and burned to better advantage than was possible before the new method was developed.

Regrettably, a considerable percentage of the ash, minutely divided into lightcolored particles, passes through the stack, and this is said to be causing perturbation in some communities.

Landor, the Explorer

cording to his claim, and recounts many incidents of torture, captivity, and suffering. Despite the doubt thrown on this book, Landor seems now to be fairly well accepted as a genuine explorer whose stories must not be taken too literally but with due allowance for his love of startling his reader. Quite recently he brought out a comprehensive work called "Everywhere," which has been favorably received by reviewers even while they speak of his unreliability as a narrator in the past. This covers in a general survey the adventures of Landor's exciting life. The New York "Herald Tribune" perhaps represents the present view of Landor when it says: "The elder Landor wrote 'Imaginary Conversations,' the younger wrote of travels that may have been embroidered here and there by imagination; but, for that matter, did not Herodotus and Marco Polo draw the long bow?"

Evidently Landor should have been the last man, when his own records were so dubious, to attack another explorer. Impetuously, however, he rushed into the discussion of Mr. Roosevelt's exploration of the so-called River of Doubt, quite evidently knowing nothing about the subject.

A common comment on the Landors, grandfather and grandson, has been that they lived up to their family name "Savage." The earlier writer was notoriously irascible, and the younger writer had been in hot water, so to speak, all of his life. We cannot refrain from repeating an old story which seems to be based on fact. A despatch from St. Petersburg announcing that Landor had forced his way out of Tibet to civilization was mis

coal is decidedly simple and understandable. As it arrives in coal cars it is pulverized in a machine. This machine or mill does not merely grind it to the small grainlike sizes one sometimes sees used in ultra-modern house-heating furnaces, but reduces every ounce of millions of tons to a veritable dust, a black dust most of which is as fine as talcum powder and as light in weight as flour.

Thus comminuted, the powder is conveyed to the boilers through long pipes by means of air blasts steadily maintained. Here it is mixed with the proper proportion of air necessary to cause its most efficient combustion, and is steadily conducted through nozzles into the fire space just as gas would be. The complete combustion of each particle of coal now takes place within two or three seconds.

turer, explorer, and writer, died on December 27 in Florence, Italy, where he was born. He was a grandson of Walter Savage Landor, the English author of "Imaginary Conversations," who was a friend of Coleridge, Shelley, and Brownfriend of Coleridge, Shelley, and Browning.

Savage Landor, as the explorer was generally called, had a passion for traveling in unknown or little-known countries. His books tell of these adventures in China, Tibet, and South America. They are exceedingly thrilling, but, unfortunately, some of them are, in part at least, of more than doubtful authenticity. This applies particularly to his volume "The Forbidden Land," which describes his experiences (partly actual, partly imaginary) in Tibet, which he was the first white man to explore, ac

which stated that "a savage landor got into St. Petersburg yesterday and the people of the city were terrified." France in a Quandary

IN trying to placate her implacable

critics, France has been following a course that has brought apprehension to some of her best friends.

She has come to terms with the Bolsheviki.

She has lessened the pressure upon Germany.

She has shown lenity toward her own defeatists who had tried to break her spirit when she was defending her soil.

She has turned aside from her attempt to balance her Budget by taxes instead of loans.

She has seened to be intimating that

the damage and debt she was forced to incur in the war should be shouldered by her friends rather than her quondam enemy. And what is her reward?

The Bolsheviki of Russia have taken advantage of her amiability to spread their propaganda among her people.

The Germans have begun to talk repudiation again.

The French defeatists are beginning to predict their own return to power.

The cost of living in France has continued to bear heavily on the French people.

The American Government has made it clear that it does not propose to assume a burden that, though now resting on France, belongs to Germany.

And those who were unfriendly to France are quite as unfriendly as ever. No wonder M. Herriot is ill.

What are Billions Between Friends?

N

o doubt M. Herriot has had the best of intentions. He is a humane man who wants to see his fellow-men live under happy circumstances. It would not be fair perhaps to call him the Mayor Hylan of Lyons; but he was long the Mayor of the silk city. As far back as November, 1915, The Outlook had an article which told about Mayor Herriot's vocational schools for the wounded. Now that he is Premier of France, M. Herriot has been honestly pursuing a policy of reconciliation.

Unfortunately, M. Herriot's good will has been interpreted as weakness.

After all, however, with all his sympathy for humanity at large, M. Herriot

is a Frenchman. He wants security for his country. He wants no more wounded, even if more wounded meant new vocational schools to found.

So when it was discovered, as it apparently has been, that the Germans have been concealing quantities of arms above what is allotted to them by treaty, M. Herriot has made it plain that he regards France as released from any obligation to retire from the bridgehead at Cologne on January 10.

The Treaty specifically makes as a condition for the withdrawal of the troops from the bridgeheads the observance by the Germans of the Peace Treaty's stipulations concerning the disarmament of Germany. Apparently the Germans did not think that a man like Herriot would take those stipulations seriously. Now that M. Herriot does take them seriously, the Germans exhibit a pained surprise. They say now that, since the troops are remaining in the occupied regions after the stipulated time, they may not want to carry through the Dawes Plan for the payment of reparations. "So be it," say the French in effect, M. Herriot apparently concurring; "we prefer security to all the money that Germany is likely to pay under the Dawes Plan or any other plan; indeed, we prefer security to all the money that Germany can pay, which is a great deal more than she is likely to." That, however, leaves France facing a most unpleasant dilemma. Since the war was fought on her soil, she has suffered terrible damage. It is as if the great industrial regions of New England and Pennsylvania, the richest coal fields of

Pennsylvania and the Middle West, and the most fertile agricultural regions of the Northwest had been laid waste. What is France to do?

Perhaps her allies and friends who have been so solicitous about Germany will pay the damage. That could be easily arranged, it seems, for France owes some billions of dollars with unpaid interest for money she borrowed to prosecute the war. Most of this she spent in this country to hold back the Germans while we were making up our minds that the fight was ours as well as hers.

There has been no explicit attempt to repudiate this debt; but it seems significant that it does not figure as a liability in the French Budget.. That has been explained on the ground that it was not definitely determined; but friends of France in Congress as well as her suspicious critics do not like the apparent intimation that France does not take this debt seriously. Of course no one thinks of pressing France for payment, but scarcely any one in America seriously thinks that the debt will be canceled.

If reconciliation between Germany and France means letting Germany off and making the French pay not only for what they did in helping to defend the rest of the world but for all that the Germans did to France besides, it will be secured at the cost of elementary justice and righteousness; and at that price reconciliation will be a mere name signifying nothing.

Those, therefore, who are reminding France of her obligation to pay her debts are probably doing her the best possible. service. France may now reassert, in

stronger terms than she has used since Poincaré fell, her rightful demands upon Germany. And if she does, the friends she owes may find new reasons for backing her up. A few billions between friends may, after all, aid the cause of justice.

Ireland and the League

THE

HE British Government's action in questioning the right of the Free State to register the Anglo-Irish Treaty at Geneva has aroused considerable resentment in Ireland. The old suspicions of English policy have been reawakened -a result to be deplored, for the Treaty has been, ever since its acceptance, intimately connected with confidence in English good faith. Since the Treaty is the document upon which the Free State bases its membership in the League of Nations, it felt compelled to register its Treaty in accordance with Article 18 of the Covenant of the League, which stipulates that every treaty entered into between its members must be registered with its Secretariat, or otherwise become null and void. Hence a refusal to do so would have been a repudiation of the Covenant and the annulment of the Treaty.

The British contention, voiced by Mr. Austen Chamberlain, is that Article 18 does not apply to agreements between the Imperial Government and the Dominions. But Mr. Chamberlain has spoken late. The time for protest was last July, before the Free State delegates went to Geneva, where they were warmly welcomed by the British delegates there present, and obtained for their country the League's hall-mark, which covers. equal rights as well as equal duties.

The Irish Government is fully convinced that its position is unassailable, so it is very wisely leaving the worrying to the Conservative Party in England, who, obviously, are afraid that the Free State may appeal to the League regarding the boundary question in the event of failure on the part of the Commission, now functioning, to effect a settlement. Time will tell whether the British Government has made a false move or not. It has at least furnished substantial material to anti-treaty propagandists, and they are busy making the most of it. Free Staters seem to be quite satisfied that if the matter comes before the Assembly of the League Ireland will get wide support, not only from the Dominions, but from Continental nations as well. In this connection a special correspondent of the "Journal de Genève"

THE SECRETARY GENERAL

To the "Government's of the Irichten Stau

This is a picture of a thorn in Britain's side, for it makes Ireland look like a sovereign state. It certifies that the treaty between Ireland and Great Britain has been registered with the League of Nations

a paper generally recognized as the semiofficial organ of the League-states that in the first Council of the League Mr. Chamberlain addressed the members "on behalf of the British Empire" and that he spoke later "in the name of six governments."

"This conception," the correspondent continues, "is very much open to objection in law and in fact. Mr. Chamberlain in the Council is not the representa

tive of the British Empire; he is the representative of Great Britain, which is not the same thing. The League of Nations ignores the British Empire. She only recognizes her own members, who are all independent of one another."

That Canada will accept Mr. Chamberlain's interpretation of Article 18 the correspondent is extremely doubtful, and he asks, "Does Mr. Chamberlain really represent her [Canada] here more than

he represents Ireland? We are rather of opinion that the British Government, with its mania for imperialism, is about to embark on an adventure which will bring it farther than it expects." And so also thinks the Irish Government. At all events, it is now one of the component parts of the great League, and there it is going to remain. Its position regarding England, in spite of comparisons to the contrary, is not like that of AlsaceLorraine to Paris, or the eighteen German states to Berlin.

The Narrow Way of Reconstruction in Hungary

are looking forward to the future with confidence. They at least know where they stand, and, although the road before them is narrow and all too evidently difficult, it does clearly lead to the plain of better things.

The great problem facing Hungary is just this question of what to do with the educated middle class. After the breakup of the monarchy, these people flocked to Budapest in thousands-officers without regiments, schoolmasters and professors replaced by Czechs and Rumanians, Government officials from every town and village of the "lost territories." For the present the Government is meet

is gone is quite as high an honor as any they can conceivably render to any man.

The choice of Viscount Cecil as the recipient of Woodrow Wilson's mantle was inevitable. He has been the one outstanding figure among all the supporters of the League of Nations. Against his winning personality opponents are disarmed. He puts his case in such a way that skeptics wish they might believe. Lacking the aspect of fierce resolution and uncompromising adherence to the creed embodied in the Covenant that seemed to characterize the man for whom the Foundation is named, Viscount Cecil does not arouse but allays

there can be no doubt that the troubled state of Hungary is at last well on the way to reconstruction.

It is true that a casual visit to Budapest might incline one to exactly the opposite conclusion. A great many people in Hungary, especially in the capital city, are worse off than they were some nine months ago when Mr. Jeremiah Smith, Jr., of Boston, and his little band of assistants assumed control of the finances of the country, under the auspices of the League of Nations. A year or so ago the inflation of the currency was making business brisk, just as it had done, for a time, in Austria and Germany. Those who could not enough to satisfy their needs resorted naturally to gambling. Brokers, bankers, printers, were kept busy, and gave employment to a large number of assistants. The hundreds of thousands who went down in the struggle were overlooked because of the brave show of the tens of thousands who won out. No attempt, in other words, was being made to envisage the situation as it really was, and hope was sustained by a false confidence that something was bound to turn up.

earn

As the result of nine months' patient work, the deceptive veil of inflation has been torn down and the financial situation stated in plain terms. The crown has been stabilized. The national income has been ascertained and the limits of just expenditure revealed.

The immediate result is unemployment. The banks have turned away the extra staff they formerly engaged; the army of amateur speculators has vanished, and it is estimated that in Budapest alone there are at least 10,000 educated middle-class people out of employment and without any immediate prospect of getting anything to do. Nevertheless business men everywhere

them on its pension roll, but such a policy cannot be long continued, and it is welcome to find that the authorities, under the patient pressure of Mr. Smith, fully recognize the fact.

An effort has accordingly been made to develop the industries of the country, and it is proving successful. An entirely new textile industry has been created, and vigorous efforts are being made in other similar directions to redress the lopsided character of the country due to the fact that it is so preponderantly agricultural. It may take a long time to solve the problem in this way, but the way is sure enough if pursued faithfully. The hopefulness of the whole situation lies in the fact that at least the building there is now on an assured foundation.

of exclusiveness. His is not a cult of close communion. He wants to sweep into the faith all who are contributing in any way to the end which he has in view.

It

His speech before those gathered to do him honor was one of the most persuasive that was ever delivered on behalf of the League of Nations. His summary of its achievements was impressive. is true that he could bring in as evidence no really major achievement. The nearest that he could come to it was the course pursued after the Corfu incident, and that has been a matter of debate even among the supporters of the League themselves. Even under the most favorable interpretations, that incident can be likened to the occasion of the World War only in some of its outward aspects. There was nothing in that incident comparable to the causes of the World War which lay far behind Sarajevo. Even so, the facts that Viscount Cecil cited must be taken into account in any plans made or carried out for future international relations.

It is a happy circumstance that has brought so able, honest, and openminded a man where he can guide the thoughts of the believers in the League as the solvent of the world's troubles.

Critic and Playwright

ILLIAM ARCHER, who died in London on December 27, was both dramatic critic and dramatic author. It is a singular fact that the one play he wrote was as far as possible in subject and character from the plays of the dramatist whom Mr. Archer most admired and whose cult he sedulously urged-Henrik Ibsen.

As a critic Archer preached realism; as a playwright he gave imagination full flight. Archer translated "Peer Gynt" and he was the editor of the au