The Outlook

THE RUSSIAN BOLSHEVIKI Germany to evacuate all Russian territory; Poland, Lithuania, and the Lettish provinces to have autonomy; Armenia to be free; the Alsace-Lorraine question to be settled by plebiscite, with guarantees of liberty to vote freely; Belgium to be restored, damages to be paid from an international fund; the same for Serbia and Montenegro, but Serbia also to have access to the Adriatic; Bosnia and Herzegovina to be independent; Rumania to get its territory back, but to promise autonomy to the Dobrudja and to give Jews equal rights; Germany to get back. her colonies; Persia and Greece to be restored; the Trentino and Trieste to have autonomy until their future is left to a plebiscite; the Suez and Panama Canals to be neutralized, as well as all maritime straits (such as the Dardanelles); freedom of the seas to be upheld and the torpedoing of merchant ships forbidden; no indemnities; contributions already exacted to be returned; no commercial boycott; gradual disarmament; no standing armies; no secret treaties; the delegates to the peace congress to be chosen by representative national bodies.

GERMANY

Germany's colonies to be restored to her; Russian territory to be evacuated except Poland, Lithuania, Courland, etc. -thus a plebiscite in these places would be positively under German control and influence; no discrimination after the war against ships or goods of nations now enemies; no payment for damages or repayment of requisitions; German merchant ships to be returned; Belgium to be evacuated, but no reparation from Germany; no yielding by Germany as to Alsace Lorraine; all the Entente Allies to agree to Germany's terms before they are granted to Russia; the nationality of the countries now subject to larger nations to be decided by those nations--this is the only meaning possible in Count Czernin's complicated statement, and under it Bohemia and Armenia would remain subject to Austria and Turkey respectively; Germany to keep garrisons at Riga and Libau, and a few other Russian strongholds.

TURKEY

Free passage for Russian ships through the Dardanelles and Bosphorus; Russia to remove her armies within her own bounds at once, to demobilize her Black Sea navy and her Armenian forces.; Turkey to retain her present army; frontier lines as before the war; individual war losses to be refunded; guarantees for Persian independence.

LLOYD GEORGE

Belgium restored, with reparation so far as possible. "We mean to stand by the French democracy to the death in the demand they make for a reconsideration of the great wrong of "71" (i. e., the seizure of Alsace-Lorraine); the German-African colonies to be administered for the benefit of their peoples, not exploited for European capitalists or governments; "the destruction or disruption of Germany has never been a war aim with us. . . Our wish . . . is to turn her aside from schemes of military domination to devote her strength to the beneficent tasks of the world;" Austria-Hungary and Turkey not to be despoiled; Germany's political Constitution to be left to the German people, although a democratic Constitution is desirable; reference to the reply as to war aims made by Great Britain at President Wilson's request when Germany maintained complete silence as to her objects; Czernin's statement described as one under which "any scheme of conquest and annexations could be perpetrated;" "Democracy in this country will stand to the last by the democracy of France and Italy, . . . Russia can only be saved by her own people ;" an independent Poland, in

cluding all genuinely Polish elements; justice for Rumania, and some way to remove the distrust felt toward Austria-Hungary among the peoples of the Near East; Armenia, Arabia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and Palestine to be independent; the Darda nelles to be neutralized; Turkey to keep its capital; reparation for injuries in violation of international law; an international way of settling disputes after the war.

PRESIDENT WILSON

So far we have summarized the statements of the war aims of our allies. We now quote verbatim President Wilson's summary from his admirable address of January 8 before Congress :

"All the peoples of the world are in effect partners in this interest, and for our own part we see very clearly that unless justice be done to others it will not be done to us.

The programme of the world's peace, therefore, is our programme, and that programme, the only possible programme, as we see it, is this:

I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind; but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants.

III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance.

IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest co-operation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is forever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of all.

IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development.

XI. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated;

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to

the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international cov

In regard to these essential rectifications of wrong and assertions of right, we feel ourselves to be intimate partners of all the governments and peoples associated together against the imperialists. We cannot be separated in interest or divided in purpose. We stand together until the end.

For such arrangements and covenants we are willing to fight, and to continue to fight, until they are achieved; but only because we wish the right to prevail and desire a just and stable peace, such as can be secured only by removing the chief provocations of war-which this programme does remove."

EXPERIMENTS IN REORGANIZATION

BUILDING. OVER THE WAR HE disclosures in Congress concerning the inefficient organization of the War Department and the methods of the War Department bureaucracy have resulted in an attempt to place the bureaus responsible for the purchase and production of supplies upon, a business basis. How successful the present plan for reorganization will be remains to be proved.

Torganization of the War Department and the methods

The Secretary of War has announced that the Ordnance Department, which has up to this time operated through five separate divisions under the Chief of Ordnance, will be consolidated. In the future the Chief of Ordnance will be assisted by an administrative and advisory staff, and his Department will be divided into four operating divisions, instead of five. The four new divisions are expected to co-operate much more closely than did their equivalents under the old form of administration.

It is announced that these four divisions, which will carry on the chief business functions of the Ordnance Department, are to possess the following functions: (1) Procurement; (2) Production; (3) Inspection; (4) Supply. In the hands of the Procurement Division will be placed the power to carry on negotiations for contracts. The Production Division will follow up, supervise, and stimulate the production of all articles contracted for by the Procurement Division. The title of the Inspection Division is self-explanatory. Upon the Supply Division will be placed responsibility for the distribution and transportation of all supplies procured, produced, and inspected by the three preceding divisions. It is expected that civilian heads will be placed in charge of these four new divisions.

It may be captious to remark a superficial similarity between this system and the tale of "Cock Robin" or the "House that Jack Built." Perhaps in fact it will not prove as roundabout as it sounds in the telling...

General Crozier will remain as the titular head of the Ordnance Department, although General Charles B. Wheeler has been designated as Acting Chief of Ordnance. General Crozier, it will be recalled, was recently detailed for duty with the newly created Army War Council. His duties on the Council, so it is announced in Washington, preclude his taking active part in the administration of the Ordnance Department, of which he is still legally chief.

The disclosures in Congress demonstrated clearly that the Ordnance Department was not the only bureau in the War Department which needed a drastic shake-up. The Quartermaster-General's Department under the stress of war proved inadequate to the task assigned to it. Major-General Goethals was therefore made Acting Quartermaster-General soon after General Sharpe, like General Crozier, was removed upward into the Army War Council. To General Goethals's function as

DEPARTMENT MACHINERY

Acting Quartermaster-General, in which office he directs the supply, subsistence, and pay departments of the Army, has now been added the task of Director of War Department Transportation and Storage. All the bureaus of the War Department, which have previously been independent of each other so far as the transportation and storage of material was concerned, have been directed to co-ordinate their demands for transportation through the new Director. The new Director will be in a position to deal with power and efficiency, with the Director of Railroads, Mr. McAdoo, or the Shipping Board, or any other agency of the Government controlling the shipping and transportation facilities of the country.

The Congressional investigations have not only disclosed serious inefficiency within the several bureaus of the War Department, but they have also disclosed an unlooked-for complication in regard to the functions of the Council of National Defense and its subordinate committees. The Council of National Defense, it was hoped, would provide the War Department with a means of expediting the purchase and distribution of supplies. This it has doubtless done to a very large extent, but it is evident that it has also afforded to certain bureaus an opportunity to engage in the very popular Washington game of "passing the buck." Instead of serving to expedite the efforts of the War Department, the Council of National Defense has been used as an excuse to pass on to some one else the responsibility for the failure of the War Department to provide our new Army with the needed supplies and equipment. However much members of the sub-committees of the Council of National Defense may have been at fault in the advice which they have given the War Department, it is obvious that the legal and moral responsibility for the failure to equip our troops rests with the War Department alone. This responsibility isone which cannot be dodged.

The disclosures of the efforts of War Department officials to pass on the responsibility for faure to the Council of National Defense and the complementary (but not very compli mentary) rejoinders by members of the Council of National Defense concerning the inadequate organization within the War Department, have resulted in a movement to take the question of conflicting authority between the War Department and the Council of National Defense out of the realm of controversy. Senator Chamberlain has drafted a bill providing for the creation of a Secretary of Munitions, with a seat in the Cabinet, whose function it will be to direct the purchase of all war materials. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that such a step may have to be taken as the only way to cut the Gordian knot of red tape. The value of a Secretary of Munitions, however, would depend on the competence of the man selected for the post.

A VINDICATION OF JAPAN'S FOREIGN POLICY BY MARQUIS OKUMA
AS INTERVIEWED BY GREGORY MASON, OF THE OUTLOOK STAFF

FEW months ago his opponents were sure that politically Marquis Okuma was finished. More recently it seemed that in a completer sense he had run his course, when for several days he balanced on the edge of death. But a knack of turning defeat into victory has marked the long life of the young old man who has five times been a member of the Cabinet and twice Premier of Japan. The other day Marquis Okuma was entertained at dinner by three hundred friends who toasted his return to health. And he is no more dead politically than physically. He may not hold office again, but while he lives he will be a force in politics.

Marquis Okuma has begun again writing articles and giving interviews on political, social, and educational questions of the day everything from the "open door" in China to the advisa bility of the adoption of Roman letters for the written language of Japan. This method of expression has long been a favorite one with Okuma, especially when the tiller of Government is out of his hand. Okuma is like Roosevelt-you can deprive him of office, but while he lives you cannot deprive him of influence. Nor while he lives can you deprive him of his wide and deep interest in life. That has saved him from death time and again. You can see this in his eyes-very shrewd but very kind-eyes that have been kept young by their zest for everything they have seen. What other living eyes have seen more than they? They have seen a barbarous feudal state where men wore two swords at the thigh become a modern nation of factories, limousines, and derby hats. Were there an Englishman or a Frenchman now living who had lived in the England or the France of the feudal period he would have known no greater changes than those which Okuma has known. And it is the determination to see the outcome of other changes now in evolution which keeps Okuma alive and energetic at eighty.

"About two months ago, when I was very seriously ill," said he when I had congratulated him on his recovery, "the world seemed wonderfully interesting. So I determined to postpone my departure from it for a little while longer."

We were sitting in a parlor of Okuma's big, foreign-style house at Waseda, a suburb of Tokyo, the site of Waseda University, founded by Okuma and still governed by him. The room was very large, and bitter cold. In Japanese fashion, it had been unheated till we entered it, but now gas jets were lighted behind the imitation coals in the single fireplace. Twenty feet away from its desirable warmth we huddled around a little table-Okuma, Dr. Masasada Shiozawa, Dean of the School of Economics of Waseda University, and I. As slight auxiliaries against the damp cold of the great room there were the thick flaming red carpet and a pile of igneous and calorific substances which a servant placed on the table before us at Okuma's order. There were cigars, Japanese and foreign cigarettes, "whisky bonbons," crackers, and piping hot tea. This was English tea served with sugar and "cream "-as thin milk is courteously called in Japan, where champagne is common and real cream is a luxury seldom seen and hardly ever tasted. Later, as we talked, servants brought in more tea-Japanese tea, fragrant, untainted with sugar, and served in daintily colored cups.

Marquis Okuma reads English and understands some of the spoken language, but speaks it little himself. Dr. Shiozawa, a distinguished and accomplished gentleman of average Japanese size, with a huge, handsome mustache drooping like a pirate's, had volunteered as interpreter.

Except for the luxury of that frigid room we might have 'been three desperate Arctic explorers conferring over their last cache of supplies: Okuma-plainly the leader with high cheek bones and bold head like a Cossack, and an Irish boldness in his voice and eye; Dr. Shiozawa, little, with intelligent, sympathetic eyes showing out of his enveloping winter kimono and from behind his great tusks of mustache, where tiny icicles 'tried to form; myself, long, bony, cadaverous with cold.

I would like to ask Marquis Okuma for his opinion of the Ishii-Lansing Agreement with regard to China," I said to Dr.

Shiozawa. The Marquis understood what I had said, and without waiting for any interpretation launched into a discourse which lasted fully half an hour. He is a great talker. His opponents twit him about his fondness for monologues. But without understanding the Japanese language I could tell it was eloquent; he hardly paused for breath, and worked himself into a great earnestness, tapping his knee with his cigarette-holder for emphasis.

Dr. Shiozawa put his translation into the first person, speaking as if he were Okuma.

"When I heard of the conclusion of the Ishii-Lansing Agreement, I shouted for joy. It is a splendid thing, a splendid arrangement for China, for America, and for Japan. I rejoice because it contains just the sort of principles I have been fighting for through long years of my public career.

"More than twenty years ago Japan had a war with China. Japan did not seek that war. It was forced upon her. But, since she had to fight, she fought as well as she could, which was good enough to win. Seeing that she had exposed China's weakness and that she had gained some pieces of territory by the war, the Powers began to talk about partitioning China. I was Foreign Minister then, and I opposed that suggestion. They wanted to divide up China in much the same way as the Powers had divided up Africa. But China is not like Africa. China has a definite civilization of its own, Africa has nothing of this sort. Incidentally it would be a difficult labor for any nation to absorb much of China. In the end, like a creeping vine, China might choke any nation that tried it.

"Some of the Powers were much disappointed because of Japan's opposition to the partition of China. In particular Germany was disappointed. So the Kaiser spoke up and warned the world against what he called the 'Yellow Peril.'

"Later, when Russia tried to encroach on parts of China not guaranteed by treaty against aggression, Germany backed her up. Germany was playing an underhanded game. Japan's warning roused the attention of the other Powers, and Germany and Russia backed down.

"Then John Hay came forward with his proposal for the 'open door' in China. Japan welcomed this. It was just the sort of thing we had been fighting for. It displeased Russia and Germany, but they had to accept.

"But before long Russia began encroaching again, on Korea and Manchuria. Four times Japan gave in to Russia, when some other nations would have fought; but the time came when Japan could give in no more. Japan fought in self-defense-an island Empire threatened with being pushed into the sea by the Russian landslide.

"As a result of that war Japan got Korea and part of Saghalien, but she had not gone into the war with any aim of territorial aggrandizement. Nevertheless people again began talking of the Yellow Peril.'

"When the present war began, Japan had no thought of aggression or foreign conquest. She was devoting herself to her own peculiar problems, local and internal. But the Allies asked her to do her part under the Anglo-Japanese Alliance, and she was glad to do so. England had been a good friend of Japan and deserved a friendly return. So Japan swept the Germans out of the Orient and off the Pacific. Again some enemies charged that Japan was self-seeking, and raised the cry about the Yellow Peril.' How absurd that is! No one has ever suggested that Japan was concerned with beginning the war! Then why blame her for fulfilling her legal obligations to England, which is all she has done, and which she has been glad to do?

But in regard to the Ishii-Lansing Agreement. It is true that it's nothing new, as the critics say. But it is good, it will do much good. It is valuable to have these principles reiterated and in writing. When the news of it was brought to me I was very glad. It means the dawn of a new day in the Far East and on the Pacific. It gives the lie to the talk of self-seeking, on both sides. It is very substantial evidence that both sides

want to be fair and friendly. And, above all, it declares that China must not be partitioned, as I have contended all along.

"By the Ishii-Lansing Agreement the Far East ceases to be a center of suspicion. The convention gives Japan her just dues-and nothing more which is all she wants.

"No one need worry about the question of the future interpretation of the clause which recognizes Japan's special interests in China. What Japan wants in China is the right of commercial expansion under equal opportunity. She has no desire to push other nations out."

Dr. Shiozawa stopped speaking. I asked a question about Okuma's understanding of the last clause in the Ishii-Lansing Agreement, in which the two Powers "mutually declare" that they are opposed to any infringement of China's integrity. I put the question as follows:

"Some men say that this last clause of the Agreement means that if terrible disorder should break out in China, endangering foreign interests and lives, Japan, in view of her 'special' relation to China, would be justified in sending in an army to protect foreign interests and restore order just as she did at the time of the Boxer Rebellion, and just as America sent General Pershing into Mexico. Aud, moreover, that in the event of such an occurrence America's pledge as now given to Japan means that, being too far away to act as policeman in China herself, she will support Japanese police intervention in China, perhaps financially, morally at any rate-vouching to the other Powers for Japan's disinterestedness and sincerity, and guaranteeing that Japan is only acting as policeman, and will not permanently occupy any part of China. Do you understand that this last clause of the Ishii-Lansing Agreement means that?" "Yes," was Okuma's reply, "I understand it means just something like that. Japan is not anxious to do any active constabulary work within China-it would be very difficult. Besides, the same old suspicious groups would raise the cry that Japan was intending to take something for herself, just as some people said the Pershing expedition was sent into Mexico for conquest. Naturally, while China is unsettled a policeman may be needed. Japan, through propinquity, is the natural one to fill the position. The Ishii-Lansing Agreement is Japan's pledge that she will act in good faith in case she is called on to do police work in China, and it is America's indorsement of the validity of Japan's pledge and America's guarantee to other Powers that Japan will keep her word.

So the Agreement will defeat the attempts of all those who are trying to separate Japan and the United States and who seek to create bad feeling and suspicion out of Far Eastern issues generally."

While Dr. Shiozawa had been interpreting, the venerable statesman had pressed a button somewhere and given instructions to the summoned servant, who now returned carrying a bronze Buddha, about eight inches high and sitting cross-legged on a lotus flower, as Buddhas like to do. The right breast of the image was bare, the right hand thrust downward against the right knee, while the left hand lay open and relaxed on the left knee. With his boyish Celtic smile Okuma hitched his chair close to the table and pointed to the figure, speaking as follows, in short, emphatic sentences:

"Let us take this whole figure as a symbol of Japan. The right fist, pushing downward, is repressing evil, pushing all bad spirits away. The left hand is open and ready to be extended in welcome. It signifies generosity and love. The right breast, which is open to the air, also means love, friendship, and sympathy for the world.

"That is the spirit of Japan. That is Bushido-that is the spirit and attitude of the Samurai. Japan fights evil when it is necessary. She is prepared to fight. But, like her old Samurai, she prides herself on drawing the sword as rarely as possible. (Of course she has her militarists, but so has every country, and it is not fair to judge Japan by these few men alone. They are not in control in Japan, and will not be.) So, you see, Japan draws the sword only in defense. But she is an island Empire, with a growing population. She is dependent on outside commerce and industry, and she must be ready to defend herself against aggression, especially such aggression from Asia as Russia brought against her in the past. But she has no aggressive designs. She represses evil with one hand, as this Buddha does;

the other hand is extended in welcome, and the breast is bared in kindness and love for all good influences. Japan is stern and chaste-as America is. Our Samurai spirit is matched by your Puritan spirit. So may Japan and America work in harmony for good.

"Please remember, though, all friends of Japan-as you Americans-when men speak against Japan you must always wait to hear her side. Some say that the United States was aggressive and determined on conquest in the war with Spain because she came out of that war with Porto Rico and the Philippines. Some say that England was unjust and selfish in her war with African tribes because she emerged with Egypt in her possession. But intelligent Japanese know that such charges are absurd. So do we hope you will recognize that it is absurd when it is said that Japan has gone into her wars for conquest.' While all this was being interpreted Okuma kept smiling and nodding his head. When he turned his profile as he lit a cigarette he silhouetted against the window his jutting eyebrows, his prognathic mouth, the upper lip slightly prehensile, like a flute player's. These features and something quizzical and boyish in his expression kept suggesting an Irishman rather than a Japanese. He looked a little like old Mike Donovan, once famous pugilist and later famous as the boxing instructor and friend of many well-known Americans, including Theodore Roosevelt. He seemed democratic, un-selfconscious, full of pure enjoyment in his talk, altogether the sort of man you would call behind his back "a fine old boy."

Lately the Japanese press has been full of editorials and interviews purporting to prove how impossible it is for Japan to do more in the war than she is doing, and especially that it is out of the question to consider sending Japanese troops to any European front. All this seems to be called forth by the belief that there is danger that the Allies will ask Japan to make greater sacrifices. The intimations from Washington that the Ishii mission had arranged with the American State Department for an enlargement of Japan's share in the war have been the cause of much discussion and speculation in Japan. So I asked Marquis Okuma if he thought Japan would do anything more in the war than she has been doing. Said he:

"It cannot be said that Japan will not do more, because conditions may change. At present it can only be said that public opinion is all against sending Japanese soldiers to Europe. The people feel that Japan has done her part, and they don't see why she should do more. We have swept the Germans from the Far East, which was our field. Our people feel that the other fronts are very remote. The Allies must not be unfair to Japan be cause of this feeling of our people. We recognize that it is a war for democracy, that it is a war for international justice. It isn't that we don't sympathize with our allies, but that we doubt the need of helping them with men, now.

Remember, it took two and a half years for American public opinion to be roused to the point of wanting to fight. In a sense you are nearer the war than we- -at least you have suffered more from German submarine attacks. It is quite possible that Japanese public opinion on this question will change. The capture of Petrograd by the Germans might make a change in Japanese feeling. Any likelihood of a German advance east through Russia, either now or as a result of victories later, would alarm the Japanese people. Other things, too, might change public opinion here. Anyway, Japanese officers are in France studying the military problems there closely, and our army is keeping up to date-in case it should be needed.”

"Do you mean to say that the Japanese are more vitally interested in the French front than in any other?" I asked. "What front do you think the Japanese would probably go to in case their troops should be sent abroad?"

That," he replied, "would be determined largely by our public opinion. You know we Japanese are much moved by matters of sentiment. I should imagine that public opinion would favor the western front, for it is part of the Samurai spirit to choose the hardest tasks. We would perhaps send half a million men, perhaps more, but we would be ready to sacrifice that many men at once, anyway. We would hope to be given twenty to fifty miles of the western front, and we would pray to be given Hindenburg, Mackensen, or the Crown Prince as our opponent. Then we would drive in, ready to lose half of our

five hundred thousand men or all of them, but confident that we could strike the Germans such a blow that, with the pressure of our allies on each side, the Germans would fall back to the Rhine. "That is the Samurai spirit, and Japan would fight in that spirit or not at all. Lesser tasks on weaker fronts do not appeal to our national sentiment.

"You can sympathize with that feeling, you Americans, who can match the hardihood which our people have inherited from our Samurai with the stern courage which you have inherited from your Puritans."

Okuma had spoken in a full, vigorous voice. With his alert, unhesitating manner, he looked more like a man of sixty than a man of eighty. The first sign of infirmity was when he rose, for he stood quite unsteadily on the artificial leg which he has used ever since the attempt to assassinate him in 1888. Dr.

Shiozawa took his left arm and I took his right. It was as big as a shot-putter's and as hard as iron.

Okuma's views have far more weight than those of an ordinary statesman out of office. The man who has fought a lifelong fight for liberty and democracy in the autocratic Empire wields a vast, quiet influence in Japan. He is almost alone among the old men of Japan in his liberalism. It is true that his liberalism seems to shrink when he holds office, but this is true of other Japanese statesmen, and influences which work secretly back of the Government may be the cause. Okuma is the friend of the young men of his country in whose hands lies the cause of Japanese democracy. He has always been a young man's man. He has always looked forward. His Japan is the new Japan which the world will know in the years that are ahead.

Tokyo, December 3, 1917.

HE most frightful death that can be feared in war aviation is perhaps that of burning alive in mid flight far above the possibility of succor or escape. A shot in the fuel tank or a back-fire of an overheated engine may ignite the petrol The unfortunate pilot has but two courses open-to descend while his very motion fans the flames into redoubled fury, or to jump from his machine to certain death without the torture of burning.

Airplane parachutes are now perfected whereby a fair chance for escape is given to an unhappy pilot thus driven over the side of his doomed machine. A comparatively safe fuel tank has recently been devised which will quite adequately protect the petrol from ignition by bullets or shell. Thus necessity continues to be the mother of invention, and thus gigantic strides for the safety of aircraft are impelled by these uncivilized perils of warfare to the eternal benefit of this fascinating sport. German airplanes of late 1917 design are equipped with a device whereby a flaming fuel tank can be discarded by the pilot with one stroke of a lever. A small additional tank pro vides essence enough to take the airplane home.

Our first contingent of American-trained fliers to arrive at the front contained a finished pilot and a charming gentleman in the person of the debonair Ned Post, of New York and Harvard. To the thousands of his friends who have delightedly witnessed his daring flights at Governor's Island and Garden City his latest exploit in France will be of interest.

On September 25, 1917, Lieutenant Post went aloft in a new type of airplane, the swiftest and fastest-climbing machine known to aviation. He attained a height of twenty-two thousand feet in the frigid air before he discovered that he was numb with cold. It was the first trial of his new machine, and he had left the ground simply for the purpose of testing its capacities.

Volplaning steeply down towards his airdrome, Post strained his new craft to the utmost with every variety of twist and turn that could possibly be experienced in the throes of actual aerial combat. Arriving at some two or three thousand feet above ground, the lieutenant moderated his contortions and looked carefully over his wires and supports to see that all had with, stood the strain he had given them. To his horror he discovered that his fuel tank was ablaze and that flames were spreading rapidly back along the length of the tail of his machine.

With his customary sang-froid, Post cut off his motor and eased his blazing airplane down to the nearest landing-place, unfastening his tools and throwing them out as he fell, and detaching as many of the instruments from the dashboard as could be loosened in such a perilous descent. As the airplane rubbed along the ground Post dropped the control-stick, climbed out to the forward step, and before the roaring flames had time to swoop over him he jumped.

This cool escape from an apparently certain death, together with his forethought in saving his tools from destruction, was rewarded by a recent citation from his general, praising his skill and deportment as an airman, and recommending his cool

ness and judgment as an example to other aviators now training in France.

On September 10, 1915, a French reconnaissance biplane, piloted by Lieutenant Le Gall and occupied by Captain Sollier as observer, was circling disdainfully over the German guns at a low elevation and plainly within the sight of the admiring poilus from their trenches. Captain Sollier was correcting: his map of the enemy's position and was jotting down in his note book frequent items of interest as the enemy strongholds were revealed to his survey.

Le Gall, the pilot, amused himself with watching the futile bursts of anti-aircraft shells as they dotted the air behind him. Far overhead sat a trio of scouting machines guarding them from attack by enemy airmen.

Suddenly a German shell burst directly beneath them. The explosion hurled the biplane violently upwards. The machine turned upside down, and as the two comrades looked at each other they saw a burst of flame gush from the ruptured fuel tank behind them.

The wind was blowing towards the French lines. As the airplane dropped, swooping this way and that, the hot flames alternately licked their faces, paused there for an instant, then swept away from them with the breeze, only to return to their torture with the following swoop. Their clothing was ablaze, and a landing-place was still hundreds of feet distant. They could not hope to reach it. The blazing machine must crash inside the German lines; the shock of landing might extinguish the flames, and in this case their papers would be left unconsumed in the hands of the enemy.

Captain Sollier, who sat nearest the blaze, reached forward and handed his pilot some of his maps and his note-book. Both began rapidly tearing the papers into tiny squares. No matter whether the fire consumed them or not, no information should be saved for the enemy!

The breeze carried the fluttering fragments across the trenches into the French lines, and as the white-faced poilus saw them falling they uncovered their heads and bowed low in their reverence for this last act of devotion to their beloved France.

Lieutenant Flock and Sergeant Rodde were flying above Mülhausen on March 18, 1916, in a slow-going observing machine, when suddenly out of a floating cloud above them darted a German Fokker which had been concealed from their view within the cloud. They turned and dived for safety, but the swifter fighting machine had them at its mercy. The German outmaneuvered them on every turn, and, despite all their artifices, the Hun kept safely outside their zone of fire.

A running fight of many minutes ensued, and as the French lines drew closer the French airmen were beginning to hope for a safe escape from the unequal combat, when suddenly their antagonist darted beneath them and, coming upright on his tail, poured a stream of lead into them from below. Their fuel tank was punctured, and immediately their airplane was ablaze.

Without an instant's hesitation, Flock lowered his elevators

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The Outlook, Zväzok 118