and progress, we may well regard with sympathy the efforts of our rival in the same direction.

Apologizing for this little digression, I proceed now to consider very briefly the danger of future conflict between the two great empires which have come within striking distance of each other.

This danger, as it seems to me, though serious enough, is not so great as is commonly supposed. We have many interests in common, as our present alliance proves, and there are only two localities in which a future conflict is to be apprehended. These are Constantinople and our Indian frontier.

Napoleon is reported to have said that the nation which occupies Constantinople must dominate the world. The present occupants have proved that this dictum is, to say the least, an exaggeration, but there is no doubt that if Russia possessed the Bosphorus and Dardanelles, her power, for defensive and offensive purposes, would be greatly increased, and she might seriously threaten our line of communications with India through the Suez Canal. This danger, however, is very remote. So many great powers are interested in preventing her from obtaining such a commanding position in the Mediterranean, that if she made any aggressive movement in that direction she would certainly find herself confronted by a very formidable European coalition.

An attack on our Indian frontier is likewise, I venture to think, a very improbable contingency. There may possibly be in Russia some political dreamers who imagine, in their idle hours, that it would be a grand thing to conquer India, with its teeming millions of inhabitants, and appropriate the countless wealth which it is falsely supposed to possess; but I have never met or heard of any serious Russian politician capable of advocating such a hazardous enterprise. Certainly there is no immediate danger. When the European struggle in which we are now engaged is brought to an end, the nations who are taking part in it will husband their resources for many years before launching into any wild adventures. More

over, our position in our great Eastern dependency has never previously been so secure as it is now. The Government has long been taking precautionary measures against possible troubles on the frontier, and in the interior of the country the great mass of the inhabitants are prosperous and contented. Hindus and Mohammedans alike are learning to appreciate the benefits of British rule, as is shown by the fact that in the present crisis the native Princes are generously placing all the available resources of their States at the disposal of the Central Government.

An additional security against danger in that quarter is afforded by the character of the present Czar. His natural disposition is not at all of the adventurous type, and he will doubtless profit by past experience. He will not soon forget how he inadvertently drifted into the Japanese conflict because he let himself be persuaded by ill-informed counselors that a war with Japan was altogether out of the question. We can hardly suppose that he will listen to such counselors a second time. Moreover, he showed on one memorable occasion that he was animated with friendly sentiments toward England. The incident has hitherto been kept secret, but may now be divulged. During the South African war a hint came to him from a foreign potentate that the moment had arrived for clipping England's wings and that Russia might play a useful part in the operation by making a military demonstration on the Afghan frontier. To this suggestion the Czar turned a deaf ear. I am well aware that in semiofficial conversation the foreign potentate in question has represented the incident in a very different light, but recent experience has taught us to be chary of accepting literally any diplomatic assurances coming from that quarter.

On this subject of possible future conflicts with Russia and of the best means of averting them, I have a great deal more to say, but I have now reached the limits of the space at my disposal, not to mention the patience of my readers. I confine myself, therefore, to a

North Sea to shipping, and warnings to this effect have been sent out to all neutrals and commercial concerns of belligerent nations, as follows:

Ships of all countries wishing to travel to and from Norway, the Baltic, Denmark, and Holland are advised to come, if inward bound, by the English Channel and the Strait of Dover. There they will be given sailing directions which will pass them safely. By strict adherence to these routes the commerce of all countries will be able to reach its destination in safety, so far as Great Britain is concerned.

A Franco-British squadron attacked the Dardanelles on Nov. 3. The forts immediately replied, but did no damage. H. M. S. Minerva, arriving at Akaba, found it occupied by armed natives under a German officer. The landing party destroyed the forts, the barracks, the Post Office, and stores. On the western coast of Asia Minor some British destroyers demanded the surrender of the coast defenses. The Turkish vessels opened fire on the British, whereupon the British destroyed both them and their defenses.

At sea the British Navy has scored many successes, wiping out the defeat off Chile with the annihilation of von Spee's squadron by Admiral Sturdee in the Pacific on Dec. 8, off the Falkland Islands. Since that engagement the German naval fleet has ceased to exist outside the Bight of Heligoland. Admiral Sturdee's victorious squadron experienced practically no casualtics.

A brilliant piece of individual daring was performed by the British submarine B-11 in penetrating the Dardanelles, diving under five rows of mines, torpedoing a Turkish battleship, and returning safely in spite of heavy gun fire, a deed by which its commander, Lieutenant Holbrook, earned the Victoria Cross.

After the whereabouts of the German sea raider Königsberg was indicated to the British by the Pegasus a concentration of fast cruisers was arranged by the Admiralty in the East African waters, and a thorough and prolonged search resulted in the discovery of the Königsberg by the Chatham about six miles up the Rufigi River, opposite Mafia Island, in German East Africa.

While the Chatham was bombarding the Königsberg, which was running for the shore, effective steps were taken to block her in by colliers in the only navigable channel, and she was thus rendered unable to do any further harm. The fast vessels which had been searching for her were thus released for other service.

The raider Emden also came to a dramatic end on Nov. 10. Pursued by a squadron of fast British, French, Russian, and Japanese cruisers, with the aid of the Austrialian battleships Melbourne and Sydney, she was caught at Keeling, Cocos Island, and forced to fight by the Sydney, with the result that she was driven ashore and burned. A party from the Sydney landed on the island and destroyed the wireless.

The Emden alone had effected a loss to British shipping of about $10,000,000, of which half was covered by insurance. The premium dropped 50 per cent. over the East Suez immediately after the destruction of the Emden was announced. The following is a list of this raider's victims:

with cable connections with Europe and Australia. The inhabitants are mostly Malays. The Emden had gone there to cut the British cables, and had succeeded in cutting one, but while this was happening the other cable was flashing signals to the Sydney.

A

S long as hostile censors muzzle truth there is no use in discussing the European military situation. Where the ingenuity of American newspaper men has failed it would be presumptious for any one to try. But the question, Why are we at war? can be answered fairly well by anybody conversant with the facts of the European situation.

We are not at war because the Emperor, as war lord, has sent out word to his legions to begin a war of worldwide aggression, carrying into its vortex intellectual Germany, notwithstanding all her peaceful aspirations.

I may fairly claim to be a representative of that intellectual Germany which comes in now for a good deal of sympathy, but I must own that intellectual Germany, as far as I know about her, thoroughly approves of the Emperor's present policy.

She approves of it not on the principle merely "Right or wrong, my country "; she does so because she knows that war has become inevitable, and that we must face that ordeal when we are ready for it, not at the moment most agreeable to our enemies. If intellectual Germany wants to develop the moral and intellectual qualities of the German people she can do so only if there is peace-real peace-not endangered by the fear of some sudden and treacherous aggression.

We approve of the war because we realize that such a peace was no longer

possible. Some of our critics are trying to show that we wanted a war, as we wanted the colonial empire of France.

We have, indeed, refused the demand made by England as the price for her neutrality that we should not be allowed to take any part of France's colonial domains, even in case of complete victory.

We refused this stipulation, not because we were after those colonies, but because a so-called neutral power tried to impose conditions upon us she would never have dreamed of asking from France.

If we were hankering after conquest we would have made war long ago. We would have done so during the Morocco crisis, when Russia had not yet recovered from the Japanese war; when Turkey was still a mighty empire, ready tɔ take our side, overawing the Balkan States and threatening Russia; when Rumania was our ally and when France, trying to swallow up the independent States of Morocco, put herself morally in the wrong.

We refrained from war not because England supported France. The developments of the last week have shown that we are ready to face England, too, when needs must be. We decided for peace because we were convinced that no amount of colonial aggrandizement could compensate us for the dangers and horrors of a big European war.

Our diplomatic methods during those

days may have been brusque and annoying, but our aim was peace. Though we are held up continually as the disturber of European peace, driven on by a mad desire for territorial aggrandizement, we are the only big European nation which has not increased her territory during the last twenty-five years.

Russia tried to steal the Far East and is now going half shares with England in Persia. England annexed the Boer republics and is playing with Russia for the Persian States.

France has taken Morocco; Italy, Tripoli; Austria-Hungary has formally annexed Bosnia.

Even little Servia, who is praised just now as the most just and God-fearing nation, has succeeded in wresting a large part of Macedonia, inhabited by Bulgarians, from her Bulgarian allies.

The only conquest we went in for was an exchange of a strip of West Africa, which we got from France as a kind of hush money, for her Morocco policy, England, Italy, and Spain having taken their payment in advance.

We have led no war of aggression for new territorics, and we are held up to moral contempt by all those nations who have taken their shares.

We went to war because we had to keep faith with Austria. We do not and we did not approve of every step our ally has taken. But our idea of a faithful alliance is not that you can chuck your partner whenever he has made a mistake, but that you must stick to him through good and evil.

You may upbraid him privately if you dislike his methods; you may give him a fair warning, but as long as your bargain exists you must stick to it.

And our alliance with Austria is not a mere piece of political strategy, not an unholy alliance like that of republican France with despotic Russia or AngloSaxon England with Mongol Japan.

Our States have a common history. We are, as far as the Austrian Germans are concerned-about a third of the population of Austria-the same people. We have, and that is perhaps the most decisive point in the alliance, nearly the

same position on the surface of the globe. We are both inland empires situated in the centre of Europe, surrounded by many different nations, all of whom may bear some grudge against us.

As long as our joint frontiers are safe we can stand back to back and face calmly any unnatural confederation like the present one.

We concluded the alliance with Austria because we wanted to safeguard ourselves against foreign attack; it has turned out the alliance has involved us in war. We might have avoided the war at present if we had broken faith with our ally.

It would not have been difficult for us to find some legal quibbles, like those which Italy, following a policy of very sober national egotism, is now earnestly exclaiming to all the world.

If we had done so we should have been knaves, but we should have been fools as well. For surely nobody can believe that the forces antagonistic to Germany would have ceased to act if we had left Austria in the lurch.

Neither France nor Russia nor England would have changed their policy. "They might, moreover, have tried to make Austria join in some future conspiracy against us.

There are three main causes to which the war is due:

1. The French have never forgotten their defeat in 1870 and 1871. They have always been thirsting for revenge.

2. We are at war because Russia thinks she has a mission on behlf of the Slavic world; she feels that mission can only be fulfilled by smashing Germany, the bulwark of Western ideas.

3. We are at war because England has returned to her old political ideals. She means to enforce anew the balance of power, and she wants to cut down Germany to that normal dead-level which alone, she thinks, is consistent with her own security.

As far as our antagonism to France is concerned, we have always looked upon it as a regrettable fact which time, perhaps, might do away with. We are just enough to understand that a country like France, with a glorious past, a gallant