lin raid on Paris; the seizure of ine town of Memel in East Prussia by the Russians, and their almost immediate relinquishment of it; the inauguration of a new phase of the German blockade of England with the seizure by the German submarine U-28 of two Dutch steamers, which were convoyed by an Unterseeboot to Zeebrugge, where they were confiscated with their cargoes that had been destined for England; and, finally, the disaster which befell the Allies in the bombardment of the Dardanelles.

BLOOD FOR THE TURKS

In the Dardanelles, where we have seen history repeat mythology in the attack of the battle-ship Agamemnon on Fort Dardanos, the Allies, in an action of two hours' duration on March 18, suffered the loss of the British battle-ships Irresistible and Ocean and the French battle-ship Bouvet, and the disablement of the British battle cruiser Inflexible and the French battle-ship Gaulois. According to the British Admiralty, the three vessels destroyed were done for by floating mines carried down the channel by the strong current. The Inflexible and Gaulois, however, were put out of action by shellfire from the forts. Apparently few British tars lost their lives in this spectacular conflict, but when the Bouvet disappeared beneath the waves she took with her most of her crew. After the battle, says a despatch, women on the shores of the Greek islands cast flowers into the sea and said prayers for the unknown dead, as their mothers did before them for the drowned crews of mediæval galleys and more ancient triremes.

The three battle-ships lost by the Allies were old and would soon have been obsolete. Ships of this type are being allowed to bear the brunt of the hammering until the forts are gradually worn down for the supreme effort by the flower of the French and British navies. It seems increasingly probable as these actions in the Dardanelles continue that the straits can be passed only at the cost of a heavy toll in ships. But there is yet no indication that the Allies are unwilling to pay this toll.

RELIEF FOR SERVIA AND PERSIA

To check the epidemics of cholera, typhus, and typhoid fever that are decimating the populations of Servia and part of AustriaHungary, and to prevent the spread of these diseases to other European countries, the American Red Cross Society and the Rocke

feller Foundation are jointly sending to the plague-smitten area a sanitary commission headed by Dr. Richard P. Strong, of the Harvard Medical School, and including some of the foremost medical and sanitary experts in the United States. Persia, like Belgium, Poland, and Servia, is also claiming the aid of the United States. When the Turks and Kurds took Urumia, Tabriz, and other Persian cities from the Russians, 50,000 Assyrian and Armenian Christians, fearing a massacre, fled into Russia or into the American missionary compounds in Urumia and Tabriz. The Persia War Relief Committee, whose Chairman is Mr. Robert E. Speer, is asking for $100,000 to meet the immediate needs of these refugees and restore some of them to their ruined villages. Contributions should be sent marked "Persian Relief Fund ". to Spencer Trask & Co., 43 Exchange Place, New York City.

MODERN BARBARISM

Germany's announcement of the latest phase of her policy of retaliation is an astonishing example of the rapidity and extent to which human nature can deteriorate once the few restraints which bolster the upper crust of what we call civilization have been broken. As a reprisal for the havoc wrought in East Prussia by the Russians the Berlin War Office has declared:

"For every village burned by these Russian hordes on German territory, and for each estate destroyed, three villages or estates on Russian territory occupied by us will be sacrificed to the flames."

So far as we know, the only protest against this ruthless policy in Germany came from two Socialist members of the Reichstag, to their credit be it said. One of them was Dr. Karl Liebknecht, the leader of his party, who denounced the reprisal as "barbarism."

This policy of the German War Office is worthy of the painted North American Indian or the naked black savage of Africa at his worst. Will the Allies now reply with a promise to put the torch to six villages for every three that Germany burns, and will Germany then raise the Allies' bid, and so on ad infinitum, ad nauseam? We hope not, of course, but it is evident that as the war continues the contestants, losing patience at the stubbornness of the conflict, wander farther and farther from man's usual standards of humanity and simple justice.

New York City, March 24, 1915.

A

GENERAL CONDITIONS

RURAL inhabitant rushed madly over to the Cawkins farm, says the Philadelphia "Ledger " (Rep.). 'Help!" he cried; "old man Shules is on a tear and beating his wife to death." " Well," yawned Mr. Cawkins, "it's his wife, ain't it?" Thus our passion for Mexican freedom has resolved itself into chaos for Mexico, comments the "Ledger." Mexico is a shambles and the Mexicans have a right to make it so. That is the result of our humanitarianism."

DEMOCRATIC OPINION

This is not the opinion of Republican papers only. Hear the Democratic :

"The situation in Mexico is aptly described by the single word chaos," affirms the Harrisburg "Patriot." "It is a condition unfortunate to the last degree, the end of which is not yet in sight. . . . This does not necessarily mean any change in the Administration's attitude and policy. Patient watchfulness will be continued, but there is a point which, once passed, action will be demanded."

The Knoxville "Sentinel" asserts:

It is the obvious and cheap expedient of the President's critics, of course-the instinctive and accustomed resort of small minds incapable of conceiving anything more elevating or gratifying than the claptrap of pot-house politicsto sneer at him for lack of spirit and courage because of his aversion to the creed of conquest, carnage, and bloodshed so rampant throughout the world; but the least intelligent patriot can readily see that it has required more true grit and nerve in the President of the United States to keep his head while rulers and potentates all around were losing theirs, and steer this country clear of hostilities under the most trying conditions, perhaps, to which an American Government was ever subjected.

But the call of humanity is one that in the last resort must be heeded and hearkened to by a Christian Government, and it seemingly has now become, or is about to become, a simple issue of humanity for the United States to intervene in Mexico.

The Columbia "State" (Dem.) thus pro

nounces:

If there shall be war with Mexico, it will be such a war as was never waged before.

It will be a war with no government, and for

a people, by a government which has gone even to the point of accepting ridicule in the desire for faith to avoid it.

We might have been in war with Mexico a year and a half ago, and there would have been no blame attached to the decision which made it. There have been all sorts of provocations out of Mexico to the United States to wage a war. Yet these incitements have come from men, and not from a people. We have been faced with making the decision whether there is such a thing as the people of Mexico, whether there is such a thing as a man who is leader of the people of that worried country.

"The present Administration has submitted to many insults," asserts the Jacksonville, Florida, "Times-Union" (Dem.), and rather resentfully continues, "but it has much more patience than the American people who sooner or later would elect to power an administration that would wipe out all scores.'

Any thoughtful observer of Mexican affairs will probably admit that intervention now seems inevitable," admits the WinstonSalem "Journal" (Dem.). But there are two ways of intervening in the affairs of a foreign nation:

We may enter Mexico with a strong army, shoot down all opposition, and impose a bloody and tyrannical peace; or we may enter as Mexico's big brother, with the acquiescence of the leading factions, exercising only borrowed policy powers for the suppression of brigandage and the restoration of order, industry, and commerce.

The former method would cost thousands of lives and hundreds of millions of dollars and earn us a heritage of suspicion and hate from all the Latin-American nations with whom we are just growing into genuine friendship and co-operation. The second method would strengthen the bonds of Pan-Americanism and win us honor from all the world.

INDEPENDENT OPINION

Still another Southern paper, but of very independent proclivities, the New Orleans

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Item," thus comments:

Nobody wants to go to war with Mexico. The trouble with the wretched imbroglio that now confronts us, as bequeathed to us by President Taft and nourished by President Wilson, is that it threatens us continually with war-not only with the murderous banditti of Mexico itself, but with the more formidable

powers of Europe, whose people and property they outrage as they do ours.

A strong hand in Washington during the latter years of Mr. Taft's Presidency would have spared us this embarrassing menace. A strong hand at the opening of Mr. Wilson's term would have done it.

We have pledged non-intervention and have intervened. We have threatened intervention and have abstained. We have neither gotten in altogether, nor have we altogether kept out. We have piffled and piddled and dabbled, and sought to serve Mexico if we can find a way" without serving Mexico, ourselves, or civilization.

The Sault Ste. Marie" News" (Ind. Rep.) concludes:

When the history of these times is written, the wretched state of Mexico may not be charged to the account of the Wilson Administration, for the Mexican troubles go far back of the present régime in Washington; but it is certain that the way the President and the Secretary of State have meddled with Mexican affairs will be classed as one of the forces which have prolonged and intensified the misfortunes and calamities of the country they have sought to help but have only injured:

Along the same line the Philadelphia "Telegraph" (Rep.) speaks as follows:

If President Wilson is in a dilemma regarding Mexico, it is his own dilemma. Not only has his policy for two years been weak and uncertain, but his speech at Indianapolis two months ago, in which he declared the policy to be to keep hands off and let the Mexicans fight it out, has seemingly encouraged the Mexicans to make conditions more intolerable than ever....

It is a serious thing for the Secretary of State

to order Americans out of Mexico when they should be afforded protection there. . . . A spineless course only means more trouble.

We cannot tolerate the conditions now existing. . . . We did not tolerate them in Cuba.

If the Washington Administration would notify the several bandits who are now ravaging Mexico . . . that order must be restored and a stable government established by them, or it would be established, as it was in Cuba, by the intervention of the United States, matters would be different. If such notice failed, intervention would be justified by the people of this country and by every civilized nation.

The Des Moines "Capital" remarks:

We do not say that the United States will have to declare war upon Mexico. We do say that the United States will have to take a hand in straightening out affairs in Mexico, and that when the time comes the necessity will be found a hundredfold more urgent than the case of Cuba ever was. And the United States never has and never will apologize for the work she performed in Cuba.

VERA CRUZ

However, the despatch of two battleships from the American fleet at Guantanamo to Vera Cruz indicates that the Administration considers the situation in Mexico City more serious than it likes to admit," says the South Bend "Tribune" (Rep.), and adds:

It emphasizes the mistake which was made when the American troops were withdrawn from Vera Cruz a few months ago. When the withdrawal was made, the public opinion, so far as it was expressed in the press, was almost unanimous that the Administration was making a mistake in ordering the retirement of the troops. Even papers which had consistently upheld the policy of non-intervention in Mexico expressed grave doubts upon the wisdom of withdrawing from Vera Cruz.

"Once more we have war-ships at Vera Cruz, and shall probably soon have them at other important Mexican ports," remarks the Rochester "Post-Express" (Rep.), and continues:

This time they will not steam out to sea when rioting is in progress lest their presence irritate the howling mobs hunting American citizens through the streets. The Administration would seem to be teachable to some extent by experi

ence.

Thus, in the words of the Leavenworth "Times" (Rep.), "after two years of dillydallying and waiting the Administration is beginning to stiffen up its backbone some

what, and there appear to be hopeful signs of a more worthy policy."

THE A B C POWERS

But suppose this country does not undertake the task alone? The principal Independent-Democratic organ, the New York "Times," asserts:

There is no excuse for the intemperate criticism of President Wilson's policy in which some of the Republican newspapers are indulging. He did not make the situation, and his calmness and patience in the face of its perplexities are most encouraging. He has kept us out of war with Mexico, he has restrained the hotheads and ignored the mischief-makers.

But the "Times" adds:

It seems advisable, however, in view of the dark outlook, for the United States to enter once more into an understanding with the South American republics, with a view to some kind of concerted action in this Mexican matter.

Another Wilson supporter, the Rochester “Union and Advertiser" (Ind. Dem.), thus comments:

It is difficult to conceive that the great, responsible Latin-American nations of South America, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile can have any sympathy with conditions in Mexico. They are steady, progressive nations. They do not believe, as the less advanced Latin-American countries do, that the United States aspires to rule over the whole continent. Brazil has been flouted, and it is quite likely that instances of the flouting of the other stable South American countries can be found that will give them a sufficient excuse for intervention. If a necessary degree of force were used, the Mexican people would possibly be brought to see that they were not the victims of the designing United States, but the object of the indignation of all the leading nations of the New World.

By asking one or all of these nations to assist us in restoring order in Mexico, we would show to them that we are not the aspirants for domination of the continent that so many LatinAmericans believe us. They would be more willing to join us, as, acting with us, they would be a check upon any aspirations towards undue power that we might foster. It would be worth while for the Administration to sound these nations upon their attitude towards a move to put an end to a condition of affairs in Mexico that is fraught with such possibilities of trouble for the whole continent.

Republican papers like the Detroit "Journal" welcome the notion:

The happiest development from the prolonged Mexican trouble was the mediation of the three

nations, America, Brazil, and Chile, the A-B-C of Pan-Americanism. This co-operative effort should be revived, and a legation guard, composed of Brazilians, Chileans, and Americans, could well be set up in Mexico City. . . . Along this line will come the easiest solution.

And the Burlington "Free Press :"

If President Wilson is prudent, he will invite some of the leading South American republics to adopt joint action with the United States for the purpose of attempting pacification of Mexico and the restoration of law and order. If Argen.tina, Brazil, and Chile, for example, were to cooperate with this country, there could be no chance to ascribe ulterior designs to Uncle Sam.

But the President told White House callers yesterday that the suggestion that this Government unite with South American governments for intervention had never been authoritatively brought to him," chronicles the Chicago "Post" (Prog.), and queries: Why should it be? Why should we wait until the suggestion is brought to us? Why should we not go out and bring it to the South American governments?

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"Are we simply to wait ?" asks the" Post," and continues:

To wait until there is a terrible holocaust in the City of Mexico? To wait until foreign diplomats abandon the country in order to save their lives? To wait until the Powers of Europe at last drive home their proper and long-withheld protests? To wait until these incompetent and selfish "leaders" in Mexico exhaust the country so that she cannot recover?

We do not believe that we can so wait. "Watchful waiting " has proven a final failure. It has not established a stable and just form of government in Mexico. It has not even cleared the ground or laid the foundations for such a government.

In the name of humanity and in behalf of Mexico, President Wilson should now act along that line of action which has been his sole success in the whole Mexican trouble. He should call in the governments of the Argentine, Brazil, and Chile to act with us.

.

Why wait for a fundamental policy to be suggested to us? Why wait till Argentina, Brazil, and Chile bring forward the idea of intervention? As a matter of history, the main weakness in our association with those Powers before lay in the fact that they seemed to be helping us out of a hole instead of going in at our request to solve a problem that affected both Americas.

In the Monroe Doctrine we assert for the United States a leadership in the affairs of the Western Hemisphere. Why, then, wait to be led? Why not lead?

N an article published in the magazine section of the New York " Times," March 14, 1915, Mr. George B. McClellan, former Mayor of New York, said:

"It should never be forgotten that while Russia is the most eastern of Western states she is, at the same time, the most western of Eastern states. She is, in fact, far more an Eastern Power than at heart a member of the European family. She wears a European gloss on the surface, but her European manners are only skin-deep, and in customs, in methods, in statecraft, and in point of view she is essentially an Oriental nation."

In the same article he also said:

"In our meaning of the term, there is no public opinion among the Czar's subjects. The vast majority of the people are hopelessly ignorant and poor, while the ruling bureaucracy, the Tchin, sees to it that any public expression is in the bureaucratic interests."

Certain erroneous conceptions and statements with regard to foreign peoples seem in the United States to be endowed with perennial life. Year after year, in the press or in conversation, one sees or hears the same old assertions and references concerning the Chinese cashiers in Japanese banks, the Tartar who is found when a Russian is scratched, the "hordes of Russian barbarians who may swamp the civilization of Europe, the Cossack who is an imaginary combination of devil and centaur, the Russia that is "the most western of Eastern states," and the population of one hundred and seventy millions in which there is "no public opinion." It seems at times almost hopeless to combat these ancient and apparently invincible errors, but perhaps if they are killed often enough they will at last stay dead. I purpose in this article to deal only with the two that seem to have the Princeton instructor's authoritative support.

Upon what ground it is asserted that the Russians" are essentially an Oriental nation I do not know. They are our remote kinsmen in blood, they speak one of the IndoGermanic languages, and they have been

settled in Europe since the dawn of history. It is true that their ancestors came originally from Asia, but so probably did ours. It is not customary to describe the civilization of the Finns and the Hungarians as "essentially Oriental," and yet ethnologically the Finns and the Magyars belong to the Ugro-Altaic race, and are far more truly Asiatic than the Russians are. The Slavs happen to live next door to the Orientals, but if mere proximity is sufficient to establish relationship Europeans might say of us that while we are the most southern of the Anglo-American states, we are also the most northern of the LatinAmerican states; and that in customs, in methods, in statecraft, and in point of view we are essentially Mexican.

But it may be imagined, perhaps, that the Russians have shown sympathy with the Orientals, or have formed alliances with them, or have adopted their point of view with reference to Christendom. History does not so report. If there be a people in Europe that has always and everywhere fought the Asiatics, it is the Russians. The British, the French, the Germans, and the Italians have all, at one time or another, supported the Crescent against the Cross; but the Russians never! In the thousand years of their history they have fought almost every nationality in Asia; and, instead of fraternizing with the Orientals, they have generally treated the latter with undue and unmerited contempt.

It is true that the Russians were once subjugated by the Asiatics, and that this Oriental domination greatly retarded their national development; but it is certainly ungrateful in the Kaiser now to characterize as "barbarous " and "semi-Oriental" the people who probably saved Germany from devastation at the hands of Asiatics in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Russia stopped the great Mongol invasion, and Germany profited by the protective interference. Temporary alien control, moreover, is not equivalent to racial assimilation. Russia is not Asiatic merely because she was once conquered by Asia. As Gilbert K. Chesterton has wittily said: "Jonah may or may not have been