the farmer, “I use the vreedom, zur, for to tell 'e that thee be a laiar." Well there are quite a lot of Farmer Snowes about to-day who are using the same "vreedom" with regard to Mr. George's remarkable series of terminological inexactitudes. Of course Mr. George is not a "laiar "he is only an ignorant and misinformed demagogue who has found a quite astonishing number of mares' nests. The suggestion that Mr. George should address a series of openair meetings in the English country towns is admirable; but if he takes the suggestion, we should strongly advise him to carry suitable disguises in which to escape from his audiences. For we, believing as we do that the Georgics of our comic Welsh Virgil are covering his party with ridicule, would not have anything happen to him until he and his coadjutors in mischief are laughed out of political existence. IF our farmers are dissatisfied with Mr. George's land campaign, they are even more dissatisfied with his Insurance Act, and the remarkable scenes witnessed at the attempted sale of the Lendrum cow testified to the spirit in which even the naturally law-abiding Scots are resenting the socalled “Insurance" taxation. That the anger against this iniquitous poll-tax is steadily growing we have known for a long time past, and it did not surprise us in the least to find that when the Scottish Commissioners attempted to sell Mr. Paterson's cow for arrears of Insurance contributions the whole district was literally up in arms. It has long been a favourite "platform" theory of the Radical Party that the people, in the last resort, had a sacred right of insurrection; but it does not seem to have dawned upon the maudlin orators of the National Liberal Club that the people would use this "sacred right" against their own meddlesome, unauthorised, and impertinent legislation. MR. HANDEL BOOTH's extraordinarily insolent, but quite characteristic, outburst at the Dublin riots inquiry seems to have taken a good many people by surprise, including, we should imagine, the Commissioners before whom he expanded his singularly unprepossessing personality. But really there is nothing to be surprised at. As Ás Mr. Powell, K.C., no doubt rightly suggested, Mr. Booth imagined himself back at the Marconi inquiry, and let himself go with all the exuberance of his unchastened egoism, with all the natural bad taste of the smallminded man puffed up with a little brief authority. Of course Mr. Booth's presence on the Marconi Committee was an accident of which, if the list of New Year honours is any guide, the better elements of the present Cabinet have the grace to be ashamed. But why Mr. Booth, a private citizen of no real consequence, was permitted by the Dublin Inquiry Commissioners to arrogate to himself the right to cross-examine witnesses and to insult counsel is difficult to understand. Of course he was entitled to be called as a witness and to be examined and cross-examined There on the footing of any other person alleging first-hand knowledge of the matters under investigation. however his privileges would seem to be at an end. The Commissioners however have decided otherwise; and we can only trust they enjoyed the consequences of their complacency. THE foreign events of the week range in importance between the announcement of the French President's coming visit to Russia and the declaration of the Greek Premier to build or buy warships to counterpoise the Turkish purchase of a Brazilian super-Dreadnought, the entry of the daring and capable Enver Bey into the Ottoman Cabinet as Minister of War, and the appearance of Mr. Lloyd George and his two friends as rollicking tourists in a motor-car in Algeria. Many persons will prefer the Marconi Chancellor as a travelling contributor to the gaiety of nations than as a mischievous agent in the disarmament of England in a perilous and critical time. As the promised visit of President Poincaré to the Tsar is not to be expected before May there will be time for the political situation to present many vicissitudes before the French Chief of the State will have carried out his intention —or postponed the demonstration for a more tranquil season. Certainly a good deal may happen before May, and it is added on the Russian side that, if all goes well, the visit of the French President to Petersburg will be reciprocated by the appearance of the Emperor Nicholas II on the Paris boulevards in the autumn. Let us hope that no untoward events will interfere with national courtesies so significant for France and Russia, and so full of interest to Europe at large. M. DOUMERGUE, President Poincaré's Premier and undisguised opponent, has expressed an intention of sharing the visit to Russia. He has also observed that a General Election will take place as soon as the Cabinet can finish various arrangements calculated to improve the prospects of the Cabinet at the polls. The Minister of the Interior is already changing the prefets in order to secure the most expert practitioners in the gentle art of manipulating a French constituency. The preparation for a General Election is always an anxious moment in the councils of the Front Benches of the world. Even the Tsar of All the Russias cannot always count upon a Duma perfectly submissive to its pastors and masters. In the French election M. Briand is expected to be the protagonist against all the detractors of M. Poincaré. ANOTHER General Election of a most interesting kind will, according to the latest intelligence from Madrid, have Spain for its theatre. Señor Dato, the present Conservative Premier who succeeded the Liberal Premier, Señor Romanones, is so far from finding a deadly opponent in the latter that the two distinguished rivals will be allies against the Conservative ex-Premier, Señor Maura. The forces led by the latter are the exponents of Conservativism of the older Spanish sort. The sympathies of King Alfonso are known to be bestowed upon the more Liberal side. THE Court-martial on Colonel von Reutter, the commander of the German regiment which garrisoned Zabern in Alsace during the recent disturbance, has been followed with extraordinary interest in Germany. The affair has unfortunately become the battleground between all the Conservative parties on the one side and the entire Left, from Radicals to Socialists. It was Colonel von Reutter who charged the civil authorities with protecting insufficiently the honour of the army and who authorised his officers and soldiers to defend the prestige of the Emperor's uniform by military methods. He avows with pride that he would order the same measures against the same sort of manifestations aimed at the humblest member of the German Army. There certainly can be no doubt that the Zabern crowd showed the utmost disrespect for Colonel von Reutter's officers and orders. that the Crown Prince had sent telegrams of admiration and AN additional feature of exciting interest was the news sympathy to Colonel von Reutter for his unflinching vindication of military pride and comradeship. The question by the Crown Prince? There is a good deal of exasperation arose: Was the Kaiser aware beforehand of the step taken already over the affair. To hiss an Imperial officer, to insult a marching regiment by whistling the French national air of the "Marseillaise," is a new experience in Germany. THE violence of the Liberal and Socialist protests against the maintenance of the traditional privileges of the army in Germany points to the existence of a great deal of the revolutionary spirit. The Radical theory that in time of peace the army can have no privileges beyond any body of civilians is insisted upon even in Liberal organs like the Cologne Gazette, usually at the disposition of the Government; while in democratic papers, like the Frankfurt Gazette and the Berliner Tageblatt, the temperature of editorials hardly falls below the ultra-Socialist Forward itself. All these organs want to know why civilians should not hiss a soldier if they like. "A COLONEL says a civilian must not walk in front of to the domestic and political virtues of the combative an officer!" "The Army claims superiority over the mountaineers. Laws!" This style of headline introduces columns of heated denunciation of military and aristocratic insolence. The plain fact is that the army is necessarily, in a country always under arms like Germany, endowed with a right to respect that is imperative and unconditional. Mobbing an officer must be far more serious than mobbing a tinker or a tailor, however" equal before the law" those useful citizens may be. A colonel may very rightly object to have a civilian, with his hands in his pockets, crossing and recrossing his path, just to show that the colonel is like anybody else. Ir is quite probable that the Prussian military spirit is haughty and unconciliatory, and that the claim to be "the servant of my King" does not square with the new claims of the flatterers of "the Sovereign People." When however whole classes of the people or populace set about treating the army, which made the German Empire, just as if it were no more than a Socialist stump-meeting, throne and country are intended to be insulted in the persons of the wearers of the King's uniform. An Imperial army must be treated with exceptional deference and courtesy, or the sceptre as well as the sword is brought into contempt. A mob of small boys cannot be allowed to whistle anti-German airs at a German regiment, no matter how cruel the annexation of AlsaceLorraine may have been. EVEN democratic equality had better not hustle a King's officer as it might Tavern Tom or Bill. The Bowery toughs who might boo a United States picket of infantry would catch the licking of their lives. Behind all the pretext of the sorrows of the Alsatians there is the pettifogging envy of the Liberal and the frank brutality of the Socialist. There can be no conciliation between the authority indispensable to the King and the licence which is the prelude to treason. By the way, another of those grave affairs of espionage, which are so unpleasantly frequent in Germany, has been discovered on the eastern frontier, in the district of the great fortress of Koenigsberg. As usual the plot was undertaken for the advantage of the Russian War Office. The serious element in the business is the wide ramification of the treachery among "respectable" people, including some inferior officials. It is probable that the spies are not conspicuous admirers of the German Army. One of the chief suspects was found to be the possessor of some hundreds of thousands of francs in private accounts in banks at Koenigsberg and Copenhagen. The enmity between Danes and Germans often provides Russia with useful sympathies. BETWEEN betraying the secrets of the State and endeavouring to weaken the State in presence of public danger there is not enough of moral distinction for Mr. Lloyd George to win the applause of European opinion. Even the citizens of countries not particularly partial to England do not spare mordant criticisms of our Exchequer Chancellor's contribution to the eloquence of the National Suicide Club. Old friends of England, like M. Clemenceau, do not hesitate to administer to the recreant Little Englander some of the most scornful castigation which has ever illustrated the scorching irony of the great French Radical. THE Coming of the Prince of Wied will not be a day too soon if recent reports by American and other witnesses upon renewed massacres by the Servians in Albania can be trusted. There is indeed no ground for doubting their truth. The Servians are still slaughtering the non-Servian population which Sir Edward Grey's feebleness has left in their grasp. The Bulgars in the Monastir district, for instance, are still being so mercilessly persecuted by their Serb tyrants that a new rising of komitadjis has begun. In this connection it may be mentioned that, somehow or other, King Ferdinand of Bulgaria has contrived to replace almost all the losses of material which the Bulgarian armies and arsenals had to suffer through the two wars. EVERYWHERE it appears to be taken for granted that the present peace is only a suspension of hostilities. The foremost organs of the sympathetic French Press report that regular trains of army motor-cars belonging to the Greek Government have carried large numbers of Greek troops through Servian territory into Southern Albania in order to aid the expected insurrection of the Philhellene Party against Albania and its Austro-Italian protectors. Of course the pretension of the Greek Government that it cannot prevent the entry of " 30,000 Greek volunteers" into Southern Albania in order to assist the local Philhellenes is simple manoeuvring of a purely diplomatic description. Mr. Lloyd George has certainly chosen an admirable moment for proposing the disarmament of the English Navy. He appears to know as much of foreign affairs as of National Insurance or even agriculture. Two questions of national claims to territory in this many-sided and kaleidoscopic problem of rival races and governments may be mentioned. The Ægean Islands are always with us at least since the Italian break in the peace of the Levant. The Holy Mountain of Athos comes into the limelight for the first time since centuries. Since the capture of Constantinople by Muhamad II the monasteries of Mount Athos had enjoyed the peace of the Crescent, and like the crowd of bishops and patriarchs had rested beneath the impartial, though contemptuous, protection of the Vicar of the Prophet of Islam. Practically all the pious settlements on the Holy Mountain were Greek, and it was only when the reign of Islam had ceased, and when the Christian brothers of the Balkans proclaimed the recovery of religious freedom, that the astonished monks of Athos realised that the fall of the Crescent brought persecution and slavery. TRUE to her policy of aggressive penetration, pacific or otherwise, Russia had managed to introduce two or three communities of Muscovite monks among the ascetic flocks of the Athos abbots. The appearance of a regiment of Russian marines supported by artillery, in order to excommunicate in an effective manner some dissent in a Russian convent, was the first intimation to the saintly commonwealth that freedom of worship had departed with the Sultan. A still more painful surprise was to reveal to the Greek monasteries of the Holy Mountain the design of Petersburg to elevate them permanently to the peace-which reigns in Warsaw. THERE really appears to be a movement of considerable force among the Moslem clans in Albania which favours a ON the admirably Christian ground that a monastic Moslem Prince for the new State. Izzet Pasha, an Albanian | republic of votaries of the Orthodox faith ought to be under of high descent and just recently Turkish Minister of War, the common protection of the whole of Orthodoxy, Russia is the favourite of the Moslem majority of the population. has proposed to make free Athos a Muscovite barrack. We fear that it would be eminently unwise in any case to "There are six Orthodox States," said the Government of have a Prince of any Albanian stock, as clan jealousies are Petersburg, "namely, Russia, Greece, Servia, Bulgaria, the chronic curse of the country. The Prince of Wied, who Roumania, and Montenegro. Let the monasteries of is the selection of the Powers, is a gallant soldier, an athlete Mount Athos rest under the impartial supremacy of a council of mighty strength, and an accomplished student in many representing the six." As Russia has notoriously two-thirds departments of knowledge. As he is neither a Greek of the six in her pocket, the community of Mount Athos, Churchman, a Moslem, nor a Catholic, but a plain and which is still preponderatingly Greek in composition, and neutral Protestant, he ought to be quite a model of impar- which has been Greek for a thousand years, recognised that tiality. But impartiality or neutrality has yet to be added it was to be definitely asphyxiated in this religious and fraternal embrace. Mount Athos dare not recall the Sultan. But it appeals to the Great Powers to preserve it in the blessed liberty of the good old Turkish rule! THE suggested abolition of Grand Juries is meeting with such general favour in legal circles that we cannot help thinking these juries must still be of some value to the public, whose interests they are supposed to serve, whose liberties they are supposed to secure. Of course, like any other part of the jury system, they inflict considerable hardship upon the unfortunate jurors, who must often. believe they are mulcted of their valuable time with very little advantage to the community. Nevertheless, with the example before us of a Government utterly unscrupulous, which might carry, and endeavour to enforce, the most iniquitous laws, it behoves us to be very chary of sacrificing any safeguard. Grand Juries, if they chose on occasion to exercise their power, could immediately render abortive any such law. No doubt as a rule the Grand Jury exercises its functions in a more or less perfunctory manner and acts according to directions; nevertheless it has the power, and can use it if and when occasion arises. Therefore, as there is no pressing need for its abolition, had we not betterwait and see? We are informed that the Irish section of the PanamaPacific International Exhibition in San Francisco will occupy 15,000 square feet of space and will have a representative exhibition of Irish manufactures, especially linens, woollens, laces, silks, poplins, and tapestries. The section will be entitled "Shamrock Isle," and a wonderful show of the Irish handicrafts is expected, a serious attempt being made to exhibit all the goods that have made the looms and factories of Ireland famous. It is rather curious to note in this connection that the Irish section, as described to us, will be almost exclusively devoted to the industries of Ulster, a quarter of the Distressful Isle that one would have imagined somewhat out of touch, at the moment, with the IrishAmericans, who, it must be presumed, are financing this part of the Exhibition. Panama is hardly a name to conjure with at our Foreign Office; nevertheless it does occur to us that our manufactures generally may be put at a disadvantage if the Government finally decides to remain unrepresented at the Exhibition. Our trade with the Western States may be small, but with Latin America it is nearly a quarter of the whole trade, and Latin America sends innumerable visitors to the Exhibition. is not difficult to conceive a ceremony which should have been a veritable trial of strength between contending jurists skilfully briefed for the prosecution and defence; and we can well imagine that the late Mr. Andrew Lang could have drawn up briefs for either side and coached the witnesses to such effect that the verdict would have been a not uninteresting addition to Dickensiana. As it was, the performance resolved itself into a particularly foolish burlesque, which reflected little credit upon the many really clever people engaged in its performance. Ar the Lyceum Club dinner on Monday last, when the subject for discussion was "The Rehabilitation of Wildflowers," a proposal was made that a league should be formed to stimulate county councils in enforcing the powers they possess for preserving wildflowers. The proposal, on the surface, seems to have many advantages. There can be no doubt that a flowering hedgerow is one of the great charms of the countryside, and one would be loth to see its beauty depart from the land. But, on second thoughts, it occurs to us that to preserve wildflowers the councils would have to pass very stringent by-laws, with penalties for their breach-laws that would miss the educated and artful botanist and the mischievous sellers of wild plants, who grub them up by their roots, and would hit the children of the rural poor, and by so doing add yet another instrument for the unwitting manufacture of criminals. Forty shillings or a month for making daisy-chains would entail the deprivation of necessary food if the fine were paid, and new Borstal experiments and potential criminals if the fine were not paid. We are fond enough of flowers, but we value children far more highly, and therefore trust that county councils will leave our hedgerows severely alone. COMING events cast their shadows before, and Lord Massereene, it is reported, has removed the mace of the Irish House of Commons and the chair which his ancestor, Mr. John Foster, the last Speaker of the Irish Parliament, occupied, from the Irish National Museum, where they have been on loan during the past five years. Trust in the people is all very well as a tag in demagogues' orations, but one naturally likes to know who the people are before trusting them with one's personal property. The Irish Parliament, if any, to be set up by the Home Rule Bill, if it ever becomes an Act, is evidently suspect in other quarters than Ulster, and for other reasons; and we have no doubt that if in the near future the Bill should seem likely to become law, the removals of portable property from Ireland will rival in quantity the removals from France on the eve of the great revolution. THE anticipated promotion of Mr. Masterman, the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, to Cabinet rank is already casting its shadow over the Radical Party in Bethnal Green, which seat at the last election in the division the THE debate at the Headmasters' Conference on the prositting member only retained by the narrow margin of 184. nunciation of Latin in our public schools and universities Considering that Mr. Masterman took a very prominent has stirred the higher educational world to its depths, and part in the thoroughly inadequate discussion of the Insurance letters upon the subject have poured into the daily Press from Bill, and as he must be thoroughly associated in the minds of all quarters. We must admit that we are in favour of the the Bethnal Green electorate with that most objectionable uniform and reformed pronunciation as recommended by measure, the Unionists should be able to capture the seat the Classical Association, for the simple reason that so prowithout much difficulty. As a somewhat saponaceous sup-nounced Latin is far more euphonious than it is when porter of Mr. Lloyd George's financial blunders Mr. Masterman has endeared himself to that section of the partyvery small now, we should imagine-who still believe that Mr. George is a sort of inspired political revivalist; but otherwise the Financial Secretary is not what one would call a strong opponent. Hence Bethnal Green should be added to the other victories of the Unionists. pronounced in any other way hitherto tried. Nevertheless we agree with one schoolmaster who wrote complaining that Latin pronounced in the new style makes it difficult for the small boy to understand the derivation of English words and their connection with Latin. As for the assertion that the new pronunciation makes Latin universally intelligible throughout Europe, we think that is of little moment. Nor do we believe that the assumption that the ancient Romans must have used the modern Italian pronunciation can possibly be sustained. The original Latin-speaking people are at present quite unknown to ethnology. Very likely the early historical Romans spoke Latin with a strong Etruscan accent. Later in their history a Celtic pronunciation may have been the vogue. German influence may then have prevailed, and so on. Clearly any assumption that Latin must be pronounced one way or another is rash. THE mock trial of "Jasper " for the murder of "Edwin Drood," of which so much was made in advance, can only be described as a silly and dreary fiasco. To a great extent the puerile clowning of Mr. Bernard Shaw stripped the performance of any pretence it might otherwise have had of being a serious attempt to solve a most difficult and attractive problem. But even had Mr. Shaw been absent, we doubt if the "trial" was sufficiently well thought-out and arranged to do anything but mildly amuse an idle audience. Yet it in the extreme. NOTICE. The Editor cannot be held responsible for unsolicited manu scripts. Every endeavour will be made to return rejected contributions when stamped addressed envelopes are enclosed. The receipt of a proof must not be taken as an acceptance of an article. OFFICES OF "THE OUTLOOK," 167 STRAND, W.C. Telephone, 2945 Central. MR The Outlook Saturday, January 10, 1914. MR. CHAMBERLAIN. change of view was in the interests of the truth and a R. CHAMBERLAIN'S decision to retire from political life, unhappily long since recognised as a grim and pathetic necessity, has evoked an outburst of sympathy at once personal and national. What the doughty fighter and strong man has felt through the long period of disablement he alone can fully know what the nation has lost none can know, but many can conjecture. Mr. Chamberlain has been cheered during seven weary and anxious years by innumerable tributes from people at home and throughout the Empire eager to do him honour, constant in their prayers that he might again be found in the van of the Imperial movement. Seldom in our island story has it been the lot of an individual statesman to make the British nation as consciously proud of its achievements even in adversity, and its ultimate mission as did Mr. Chamberlain during the years 1896-1903. The atmosphere and outlook of the Empire changed The elder Pitt did it; Wellington did it at Waterloo; under Mr. Chamberlain's régime at the Colonial Palmerston did it; Disraeli did it. Melbourne, Office, even as they changed when Pitt took the reins Russell, Aberdeen, Gladstone made the component in 1757. Sir William Harcourt once said that Mr. atoms, the races, the cliques, the classes, conscious Chamberlain seemed to be of the opinion that he was chiefly of themselves. Mr. Chamberlain, in the years General Wolfe and Captain Cook rolled in one-that which we trust he will yet enjoy, may look back he had stormed the heights of Quebec and discovered upon his work as that of the master alchemist. He Australia. If Mr. Chamberlain did not discover gave twenty of the best years of his life to the appeal the Empire, he did a vast deal to help the Empire to all that is best and most steadfast in the nation. to discover itself. The South African War brought A people only becomes great when it is greatly led. the Empire together as nothing else could have done. Democracy depends on its leaders: it may lay what What he accomplished in a military he would have flattering unction it likes to its own soul; it becomes accomplished in an economic sense if he had been something more than "a blunt monster with un-permitted. Tariff Reform was intended to benefit counted heads" only when it finds the man who can direct its course-for good or ill. Mr. Chamberlain's earliest essays in leadership suggested something very different from that which he ultimately accomplished; ke seemed to be a mere prototype of the Lloyd George of to-day. The explanation was that he became a leader in a locality, and it was not till he breathed the fuller air of the nation and the Empire that his real self was revealed. The essential difference between a man like the Chamberlain of 1880-85 and a Lloyd George is that the one modified his attitude towards many questions with riper experience; the other becomes more confirmed in his prejudices the more reason and fact show them to be ill-found. Nothing is worthier in Mr. Chamberlain's career than his readiness to confess and amend when he saw the error of his ways; he never feared a charge of inconsistency when circumstances showed that a the business of the United Kingdom, but it sprang from Mr. Chamberlain's conception that in benefiting the kingdom he would be serving an Imperial end. He abandoned Cobdenism when the great truth was borne in upon him that the Empire could supply for itself what hitherto the world at large had supplied. Mr. Chamberlain's illness in 1906 was an Imperial misfortune. If he had been able to take his stand at the head of the stalwarts who fought the Budget of 1909 and the Parliament Bill, if his voice could have been raised on such questions as Colonial Contributions to the Navy, if he could have been heard on the Ulster question, it is no reflection on Unionist leaders to say that things might not be quite what they are. As it is, we have the memory of his example to inspire us, and we can best show our appreciation of his work by fighting for his ideals-ideals which his opponents have never entertained and are incapable of understanding. IT THE FIGHT FOR THE NAVY. or more." disregard the sincere and emotional desires of at least a hundred Parliamentary followers, however insignificant these may individually be. So through the columns of that very enterprising journal, the Daily Chronicle, he has given these seasick Radicals the encouragement they desired. T would be a strange turn of Fortune's wheel if Mr. Winston Churchill, whose father resigned office as a protest against a combined naval and military bill of thirty millions, should himself resign as a protest against any reduction on a naval bill Apart altogether from the views and motives of of last year's dimensions. Yet, if the Little Navyites, the cormorant of Criccieth, this new and very deterwho are growing very insistent and clamorous, suc-mined agitation of the pacifists and reducers consticeed in getting into the saddle," that may easily tutes a real danger. The international conditions. happen. It would be difficult to recall a more acute described by Mr. Churchill at the Guildhall Banquet difference of opinion within a political party than that which divides Liberals and probably the Liberal are still unchanged. We can see no signs, we grieveto say, of that "new temper among the peoples of Cabinet on this subject. The Radical pacifists de- Europe" on the subject of competitive armaments. mand, sans phrase, a reduction in the coming Navy which Mr. George professes to have discovered. Estimates. They will not wait for concurrent inter-The measured and unbroken development of the national action. England is to cut off a portion of German Navy," said the First Lord at the Guildhall, her tail and then hope that other nations will emulate" and the simultaneous building by many Powers, her abbreviated condition. We are told that the great and small, of powerful and large modern ships. moment was never more favourable for what Mr. of war, will undoubtedly require from us expenditure Lloyd George calls a "bold and independent step and exertions greater than those we have ever madeon the part of this country. The only possible in time of peace, and next year it will be my duty, pretext, it is said, for maintaining or increasing our if I should be responsible for this important Departnaval strength is the preservation of the "balance of ment of State, to present to Parliament estimates power" and the fulfilment of our obligations to the substantially greater than the enormous sum originTriple Entente. But the Radical "hot gospeller ally voted in the present year." These Navy Estiwill hear of no such excuses. "The Triple Entente," mates have now been submitted, though it is undersays the Manchester Guardian, “has no meaning or stood the Cabinet has not yet passed them in their reality for us, and we owe no manner of allegiance final form. If, as Mr. Churchill predicted, they are to it." Again we read, "Liberals are most anxious" substantially greater" than last year's, and if, as is. to break up the formal division of Europe between the probable, they are so passed by the Cabinet, we have Triple Entente and the Triple Alliance." And as no doubt the Little Navyites in Parliament and in the regards the balance of power, Liberals, we are told country will cause as much trouble as they dare. by this same patriotic and Empire-loving journal, It will then be the duty of Unionists to sacrifice some"English Liberals have hated it for a hundred years personal feeling and to give Mr. Churchill a vigorous When we consider that these navy-support in his policy of naval maintenance and descrappers are not usually much impressed by the velopment. We have heard a good deal this week necessity of defending our widely dispersed Empire, about the dissatisfaction of our friends in the Entente or of defending anything else in particular, we need at Mr. George's allusions to British naval strength. not wonder if they should see no reason for maintain- We have heard less about the feelings of our fellowing even our existing standard of sea-power. subjects in the Dominions. To Australia, New This new agitation has received a fillip from a few Zealand, and British Columbia, looking out over an impulsive remarks by the "stormy petrel" before ocean from which the White Ensign has almost he winged his way to southern climes. Some specu- entirely vanished, the British Navy does not seem lation has arisen as to why the Chancellor of the too large, and it is not surprising to hear that this Exchequer should have thus deserted his own last movement in the Motherland should have arouseď and encroached upon the functions of colleagues to some "apprehension." Unionists are not in favour whom these matters of defence are specially entrusted. of reckless and needless expenditure. That indeed Is it Mr. George's intention to place himself bodily is not in the Conservative tradition. They regret as and visibly at the head of the Brunners and Mol-much as any this continually growing expenditure tenos and Gordon Harveys, and to put an end once on the implements of destruction. But England has for all to this absurd superstition of British sea- to meet her requirements and obligations, and on supremacy? Or is this spectacular toeing of the rearward line merely a device to divert the public mind from an unhealthy concentration on the Irish question? It is sad work, as Lord Byron long ago remarked, to penetrate into human motives. The question, moreover, is more interesting to the Tapers and Tadpoles of the clubs than to serious students of politics. One may just recall, however, that Mr. Lloyd George is now the most popular and influential leader of the Liberal Party. He appeals far more vividly to the Liberal imagination than his own chief, the Prime Minister. He has long ago shown Mr. Churchill a valedictory pair of heels. That lively gentleman's fortunes were indeed never so obscured as at the present moment. This being Mr. George's position, and Mr. George being honestly minded to maintain it, he cannot afford to this subject Unionists have greater faith in the opinion of the experts-the men who have specially studied this intricate and momentous problem-than in the noisy crowd of fanatics and Little Englanders. PRUSSIA'S BLUNDER AND RUSSIA'S POWER. T is already certain that Germany is paying and must continue to pay the most tremendous penalty for its Kaiser's support of the RomanofHohenzollern compact against Poland in the most dangerous crisis of Russia's existence in modern times. When the internal revolution after the catastrophe of the Manchurian war placed Russia absolutely at the mercy of the German power, Wilhelm II, fearing that the fall of Russia would emancipate |