for a breakfast, and seven and one half cents for luncheon and supper. This enterprise has proved a great success, and the average number of patrons is five thousand daily. Primary schools for training artisans, where boys are taught printing and carpentry, have also been established.

HARDLY has the new constitution of India begun to function, when it is put to a very severe test, if not a critical one. This is described by the Spectator as follows: 'A situation has arisen such as it was obvious to everyone would sooner or later arise, and to meet which the framers of the Constitution set up a certain, definite remedy. This remedy has now been applied and we may judge of its efficacy. To be particular, the Legislative Assembly have twice rejected the Government's proposal to double the salt tax, in order to fill the gap of some £2,666,000 between expenditure and revenue. The Government was unable to effect further retrenchments, and the Legislative Assembly made no alternative proposal for raising the revenue. Hence Lord Reading, the Governor-General, considered that the measure was "essential to the interests of British India" within the meaning of the Government of India Act. Accordingly he used his powers under section 67B of that Act to "certify" the measure in other words, to declare it law over the head of the Assembly.'

THE capability of being shocked is an extremely personal matter. A filibuster in Congress defeats the undoubted will of the country, and a few people feel that all is not what it should be, but are by no means goaded into action on the subject. Twelve million wild animals are caught every year in steel traps in North America, suffering vary

ing degrees of agony, millions of them to the death, and people exclaim 'How awful!' and go on doing nothing about it.

But there are many people who will be both shocked and surprised to hear that there is one settled and somewhat civilized country left in the world, namely, Abyssinia, where a system of human slavery still obtains. And this is not only the variety of social and economic life that is more or less inevitable in most parts of that country, but real slave-raiding of the old-fashioned, brutal kind, which has rendered derelict the once populous and semicultivated regions of Lake Rudolf, Uganda, and Kenya, the inhabitants of which have to a great extent been either massacred or carried off by bands of hillsmen from the central plateau of Abyssinia. The fault is said to lie, not with the laws and decrees of Adis Ababa, or his regent, Ras Tafari, but in their inability to enforce them. It seems a subject that might well interest the League of Nations.

THE price of agricultural land has more than doubled in France since 1914, though it has not risen to correspond with the declining value of the franc, measured in gold. Crop lands now sell for about 1000 paper francs an acre. Meanwhile the price of wheat has quadrupled, the price of wine has multiplied from five to ten fold, and the price of cattle has risen to five or six times what it was before the war.

Agricultural laborers are paid from 2500 to 3500 francs a year, with food and lodging. Young lads receive from one half to two thirds this amount. Farm wages have trebled in nominal value during the war, though they have actually declined if measured by purchasing power.

To put it concisely, what we are pleased to call 'Allied Politics' is nothing more nor less than the bitter clash of interests between the two principal and most powerful comrades-in-arms, since the United States has practically withdrawn from participation in European affairs. I refer, of course, to Great Britain and France.

There is no doubt that the British Government, influenced by the traditional policy of Great Britain, has not viewed the question of Reparations from the same angle as have the several French Governments which have been in power since the Armistice. Under these circumstances it behooves us frankly to consider whether our course has really been such as to lead to the solution of this problem so set about with difficulties.

The surprise evinced by many Frenchmen at England's present attitude finds its explanation in our ignorance of the traditional policy of Great Britain.

THE POLICY OF GREAT BRITAIN

History teaches us that there is scarcely a nation which, at one time or another, has not aimed at the political hegemony of Europe, if not of the world. But not one has done this with so much energy and continuity as England, irrespective of the particular party in power. To this traditional policy she owes her immense colonial

empire, her mastery of the seas, the enormous prestige which she enjoys in world politics, and, finally, her financial and economic power.

It has become almost banal to say that the international policy of England is determined solely by her economic interests, in which, let us not forget, sentiment is allowed no part. It would be self-deception to imagine for a moment that the disappearance of Mr. Lloyd George from the official stage will result in any serious change in British foreign policy. The form may perhaps be affected, but the basis will remain immutable. The policy of the Bonar Law Government, notably at the Lausanne Conference and since the occupation of the Ruhr, leaves no doubt of this. It must not be forgotten that it was under a British Liberal Ministry that the French evacuated Egypt. And it was an eminent Conservative statesman who, in a striking summary, enunciated, once for all, the foreign policy of Great Britain, which has served, and no doubt will continue to serve, as the political chart for all British Governments of whatever party. It was Lord Salisbury, at Manchester in 1879, who said in the course of a speech which has remained memorable:

'The Occupation of Cyprus was merely following out the traditional policy of the English Government for a long time past. When the interest of

Europe was centred in the conflicts that were waged in Spain, England occupied Gibraltar. When the interest of Europe was centred in the conflicts that were being waged in Italy, England occupied Malta; and now that there is a chance that the interests of Europe will be centred in Asia Minor or in Egypt, England has occupied Cyprus. There is nothing new in the policy; we do not claim to have any thing new in our policy. Our claim is that we follow the tradition that has been handed down to us, with but one very disastrous interruption, for a long succession of Governments.'

As a matter of fact, British policy for more than a century has not deviated from this vital and immutable tradition of which Lord Salisbury merely reminded us. It dates from the second half of the seventeenth century, when, after the destruction of the Dutch fleet, England secured the domination of the seas, a domination which she has never since allowed to be taken from her.

Subsequently, with the creation and the growth of her colonial possessions, this domination became for her a question of life and death, on account of the profound transformation that took place in her economic life at home. Industrialism enjoyed a vast development and agriculture declined simultaneously on account of the exodus of the country people, who flocked to the cities and industrial centres. In this manner England was transformed into a country which depended on the importation of raw materials for its factories and of food products for the nourishment of its inhabitants.

On the other hand, on the economic principle of barter, products were exchanged for products, and England was obliged to rely upon the exportation of her manufactures. She thus speedily developed, by force of circum

stances, into a world state, protected by a powerful navy which from that time on had to be the mightiest in existence. For the security of the ocean lanes over which passed the raw materials and food products essential to her life, she could not afford to tolerate another naval force capable of disputing with her the empire of the seas.

The keystone of Britain's colonial empire is India with its 300,000,000 inhabitants. From India she receives cotton, cereals, rice, sugar, precious metals, and other materials. Thus it is easy to see why she must retain military control of the Mediterranean, in order to keep open her line of communication with India, along which Gibraltar, Malta, Cyprus, and Egypt are but advanced bases.

Not only could England tolerate no rival world-power, but she has always viewed with a decidedly hostile eye any nation which aspired to the hegemony of Europe. The long rivalry between England and France had no other cause. But for the naval ambitions of Louis XIV an alliance might have been formed between the two nations. England carried on a long and costly conflict with Napoleon I on account of his policy of domination, which, one might say, he succeeded in extending over all Europe. And thus he came to dream even of a naval offensive against England.

After Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo, England, feeling that her colonies were safe and her world hegemony unchallenged for presumably a long time, showed little interest in the affairs of her allies at the Congress of Vienna. When the policy of Nicholas I of Russia aroused the suspicions of England in the Orient, the Crimean War very opportunely put an end to the imperialistic ambitions of the Tsars, just as later on Japan, Britain's ally, by smashing the Russian army at

Mukden, put an end to Muscovite imperialism in the Far East, which had very seriously alarmed the Government at London. All this did not prevent Great Britain from remaining neutral during the war of 1870, for France was at that time the most powerful nation in Europe, whose merchant marine had made very substantial progress; nor from accepting, at the recent Washington Conference, the abrogation of the Anglo-Japanese Treaty, demanded by the United States.

After the war of 1870, which terminated the preponderance of France in Europe and at the same time hindered the development of her merchant fleet, Great Britain for a time enjoyed a political breathing-spell, during which she was able to give her whole attention and energy to the exploitation of her colonies. The last quarter of the nineteenth century was marked by the extraordinary prosperity of these colonies, while during the same period Britain's naval and maritime development reached its apogee. She doubtless counted on her ability to maintain this marvelous state of affairs indefinitely.

But, toward the end of the nineteenth century, there appeared on the European horizon a people which lost little time in making its economic influence felt in the markets of the world, in which British industry and commerce had hitherto been supreme. The newcomer, moreover, did not content itself with competing with Britain in the field of trade, but, ambitious to make itself independent of British steamshiplines, proceeded to the creation, with astonishing rapidity, of a merchant marine which, at the outbreak of the war of 1914, had a tonnage of over five millions, and whose liberty of movement was guaranteed by a powerful and efficient navy. Possessing an army capable of repelling any attack on its land frontiers, it was justified

in claiming the rôle of a world power, and insisting that for the future no great step in international life should be taken without consulting it.

In this manner Germany acquired the right to be considered by Great Britain as the dominating Continental Power, and, in consequence, as her direct antagonist in world politics, a position which her traditional policy could not tolerate. Therefore, by virtue of her traditions, England naturally ranged herself alongside those Continental Powers which were likely to have differences with the newcomer.

The audacious and astonishing Bagdad enterprise, whose history partakes of the sensational, was very wrongly considered to be purely a political measure, whereas, on the contrary, its object was one of economic penetration - in other words, a work of civilization of the first importance. But England looked upon it as a menacing point directed at her Indian Empire· and the Great War has swept Germany from the stage of world politics.

It has seemed profitable to recall to our compatriots in a few words this traditional policy of Great Britain, in order that they may understand clearly the attitude of these our neighbors, which has so disconcerted us since the signing of the Armistice, and particularly since our occupation of the Ruhr.

Germany crushed, deprived of her colonies, her navy and her merchant fleet, and, too, her economic and financial foreign-commerce system thoroughly disorganized, once again England, believing her world hegemony secure for a long period of time, returned to her own affairs. All through the negotiations of the Treaty of Versailles, her Government was dominated by the anxiety to secure for the British nation its indispensable supply of raw materials and food products, as

well as the placing of its manufactures in the markets of the world.

So far as raw materials are concerned, a new factor entered into diplomatic calculations, the importance of which the war brought into high relief, both from a military and an economic point of view-namely, petroleum. We know what a rôle this combustible has played in British designs. Doubtless the surprise of the French public will be recalled when it learned that the rich petroleum-fields of the vilayet of Mosul had been handed over to the British. The truth is that this was nothing less than a revelation to the great majority of Frenchmen, if not to all. And this very fact explains the ease with which the British negotiators gained their point. They on their side were perfectly aware of the fact that the region in question was an immense reservoir of the precious combustible, a circumstance which doubtless was not unconnected with the bitter opposition of England to the German railway to Bagdad.

We are familiar with England's efforts to control the oil regions of the Caucasus. Having failed militarily, she endeavored afterward to gain her point by means of diplomacy, which is proved by certain steps taken at the Genoa Conference. In fact, perhaps oil is more responsible than anything else for the coolness which exists to-day between the two great nations. Mosul was the first shower-bath. The effects may be measured by the difficulty which the two countries are now experiencing in their efforts to find a common ground for the restoration of peace in Turkey and the solution of the Reparations problem.

So far as Turkey is concerned, economic requirements have compelled Britain to take a firm stand on the question of the Dardanelles, a vital one for her. A nation of commercial

carriers, merchants, and sailors, she can hardly be expected to permit the existence of any system under which, at any moment, the passage of the Dardanelles and the Bosporus may be blocked by military, or even diplomatic, action. An important position in the economic life of Great Britain is filled by the Black Sea, the great port of exit for the raw materials and agricultural products of a large part of Russia, notably the Caucasus, of Rumania, and of Bulgaria. For this reason Britain would not hesitate, even by force of arms, to defend the freedom of the Straits. It will be remembered that this problem came up at Lausanne, but no decision has yet been arrived at.

It is evident, of course, that the fearful shock of the World War was too violent not to have jarred to some extent the foundations of her proud and imposing empire. This does not mean, let us hasten to say, that England is on the eve of losing her immense colonial possessions, though it is clear that her authority has become weaker. In Egypt she has had to grant autonomy. In India the same question calls for solution. One is justified in doubting whether England can much longer successfully resist the demand for selfgovernment which the national party of this vast colony is making. The Allies indulged too often in the boast that the war was a kind of crusade undertaken for the liberties of peoples, who were thereafter to be the arbiters of their own destinies, not to have these fair promises taken seriously by those who aspire to self-government, an aspiration which sooner or later must be accorded satisfaction.

This problem does not affect Great Britain alone. Other nations find themselves, or will soon find themselves, confronted with the same difficulties — difficulties which the rather hasty fixing of frontiers, both by the Treaty of