they were put in commission, to sell to a thirdclass European power for the price of one good ship.

There you have what is, perhaps, the most striking concrete example of the results of Congressional interference in the province of the experts in one of the most highly technical professions in the world. It was chosen here to stand as Exhibit A for the prosecution, because two years spent in the "dog-house" of the Idaho, as a junior watch officer on board that ship, still vividly remembered, though eight years have since intervened, qualify the present writer to speak of the case with feeling.

But it is very far indeed from being the only case of the sort. Indeed, just after the Mississippi and Idaho were perpetrated upon the world, the same attitude on the part of Congress caused the insertion in next year's appropriation bill of clauses requiring the Navy's designers to give the Michigan and South Carolina, on a displacement of 16,000 tons, an armament comparable with that of foreign ships of 18,000 tons and over, and but for an amazing display of resourcefulness on the part of their designers, might also have utterly ruined those two ships.

It was Congress also, let it be remembered, which was responsible for the once far-famed "dynamite cruiser" Vesuvius, which never dynamited anything more formidable than a cactus bush; which kept on insisting upon building monitors for years after it was perfectly plain to real students of the problem that there was no longer a place for the type in an American naval policy which must embrace the two greatest oceans in the world; which only the other day wanted to spend $987,000 on an electrically-controlled wireless torpedo; which for years refused every plea to provide the fleet with something like an adequate number of scouts and destroyers, and refused to build any battle-cruisers at all.

And yet, impressive as is the case for the prosecution, when marshalled, plain as is the long series of Congressional blunders in the experts' field, even one who in the old days cursed Congress through sweltering nights in

the Idaho's "dog-house," must admit that there is also a strong case for the defense, and that it does not rest exclusively with the probability that Congress, by its very interference, and by the almost insoluble problems it has complacently proposed, has helped materially, though unwittingly, in the development of that unequalled resourcefulness on the part of our warship designers, which has contributed so much to the present greatness of our Navy.

The true case for the defense can best be visualized, perhaps, by a brief study of the naval policy of Germany.

Not only were the United States and Germany, before the war, at opposite poles in many respects, but in the development of their respective navies this unlikeness was most complete, and it is personified in the men who, just before the war, were chiefly responsible. It would be hard to imagine two men more utterly unlike than Josephus Daniels, United States Secretary of the Navy, and Grand-Admiral von Tirpitz, German Minister of Marine.

The one superficial point of resemblance between them lay in their common attribute of success, but this was a likeness which sprang from a deeper difference. The worst enemies of Mr. Daniels have always admitted that he possesses a positive genius for getting what he wants from Congress, and that his achievements in this respect surpass those of virtually all his predecessors. In like manner, before the war, Grand Admiral von Tirpitz was chiefly known to fame in Germany for his skill and success in getting what he wanted from the Reichstag.

Their very success, however, emphasizes the profound difference in methods between the two men, and the profound difference in character between two countries in which such different methods could win comparable success. Mr. Daniels' strongest card has always been his entire frankness, his patience, his diplomacy, and his thorough knowledge of the intricate cross-channels of American politics which underlie any Congressional action. He has won out, in the main, because he has known how to go fairly and honestly after what he

wanted, and has thereby won the confidence of Congress to a remarkable degree.

Grand-Admiral von Tirpitz, as unlike our genial Secretary as man could be, won out in the Reichstag by a typically Prussian mixture of bullying and cajolery. Knowing how to flatter individual members when it suited the game he was playing, and playing skilfully on popular sentiment through his personal creation, the German Navy League, none the less, having once made himself the indispensable tool and trusted adviser of a greater than the Reichstag, in the person of Wilhem II, he was, in the days of his power, cavalier and contemptuous toward the representatives of the German people to the last degree.

As a result, Admiral von Tirpitz's appropriations were to a very large extent simply blank checks drawn upon the German treasury to the credit of the Admiralty General Staff. In some cases, as in the audacious adaptation of the famous "Ersatz" law, he suc

ceeded in stretching his authority as it could not have been stretched in any other country in the world, nor even in Germany without the full approval and backing of the "All-Highest," whom no man in the country dared call to account.

And no matter how great our detestation of the German system, of our horror of the things to which, under the amiable Tirpitz's leadership, it has inevitably come, we cannot in fairness deny that the money which the grim old Admiral obtained so liberally was, from the strict viewpoint of the upbuilding of a Navy as a fighting machine-extremely well spentfar better spent, in fact, by the standard of pounds of hitting power per dollar, than Congress has often spent our own generous naval appropriations.

But of course that is not all. The past four years has written for any man to read, what comes when the terrible power of a modern Navy is placed unquestioningly in the hands

of one man, to do with it what seems best to him has written the story on the face of the waters, in letters of blood and fire. We had far rather go on as we have gone than to seek naval efficiency by the road that leads to "spurlos versenkt."

But must we? Is an adequate measure of democratic control of the Navy utterly incompatible with efficient, expert guidance? Is there no middle road between Congress, and a Tirpitz? A great many people nowadays are saying, despairingly, that there is not-that democracies are condemned, by their very nature, to inefficiency in war. But is efficiency in war so different from efficiency anywhere else? And is not efficiency, after all, the true object of democracy, as it is of every other theory of human organization?

In searching for the golden mean between amateur interference in the province of experts, and autocratic control, with all the opportunities for its misuse which inevitably follow, the first thing that you find is, that you must have, first of all, experts you can trust. If there is any one thing to be clearly seen in the long story of Congressional interference in our naval policy, it is that it springs very largely from Congressional distrust of the Navy. And since Congress, in its state of mind, is fairly representative of the state of mind of the people of the United States, it is apparent that in the past the people in general have had a sort of vague distrust of the Navy-the sort of distrust, mingled with pride, with which the old folks at home greet the brilliant young son who has been away at college.

It is one of the compensations of the war that, for the present, at least, that vague feeling of distrust has been altogether swept away and swallowed up in a wave of pride and thankfulness at the splendid manner in which the Navy has responded to the emergency. The boy may have been away and gotten a bit snobbish at college, but his heart is in the right place.

But will it last? When the war is over and we all settle down to peaceful ways again, will the Navy and the country once more

gradually become estranged? If they are not to do so, we must begin to take advantage of our present opportunity, and recast our fundamentals to obviate the mistakes of the past.

When you have a toothache, you go to a dentist, and you take his word for what needs to be done. You don't insist upon telling him what instruments to use, how to go about cleaning out the cavity, and what kind of filling he had best put in. But if the results of his work are unsatisfactory, if the tooth keeps on aching, you don't have to go back to himyou go to another dentist. In other words, you put your case unreservedly in the hands of an expert, just as Germany put the upbuilding of her Navy in the hands of an expert. But, unlike Germany, you watch the work of your expert pretty sharply, and you judge him closely, by the only test that counts,-the test of results.

That, in plain terms, is the solution of the age-long dispute between Congress and the experts the harmonization of democratic and civilian control of naval policy, which is pretty close to a fundamental of American political theory, with the need of expert handling of a highly involved and technical science. We must, on the one hand, trust our experts far more completely than ever before-but before we can do that we must change the machinery of our Navy so that we can hold each and every man in it, from the Secretary of the Navy down to the least coal-passer, immediately responsible for the production of results.

Once we have made the Secretary of the Navy directly responsible to Congress for the results in his department, and have made each and every subordinate officer directly responsible to the Secretary of the Navy—as they are not now, and never will be until the Secretary possesses, and can delegate, the power of summary discharge over every officer and man, from the Commander-in-Chief down-we can stop blundering over half-measures, and set out in earnest on the road to a Navy more efficient than ever was Germany's, and at the same time more genuinely democratic than any the world has ever seen.

The March number of this magazine, under the editorial direction of The National Marine League of the U. S. A., comes to its readers with a new cover and a new name. The periodical that began with The Navy thirteen years ago and has been continued of late as The Navy and Merchant Marine begs leave to make its bow to the public under the title The National Marine. The new title associates closely the magazine with the League, under whose direction it is published, and presents in compact manner the thought and aims of the organization of which it is the spokesman. We beg to restate these aims in the words of the founder:

"To awaken the people of the United States, whether living on the seacoast or in the interior, to a full understanding of the necessity of re-establishing an American overseas commercial marine, particularly for the expansion of our commerce with South America and Asia through the Panama Canal.

"To formulate measures for this purpose from the standpoint of our national policy and development, and not from that of any special interest.

"To promote full recognition of the paramount need of providing the world-wide export outlets for the products of our manufacturing industries, that labor and capital may be more steadily and profitably employed."

No one living in these momentous days will require argument to convince him that a Merchant Marine can, at least at present, be either effective or independent without the protecting shield of a strong navy. The magazine, therefore, as in the past, will devote itself to Naval as well as to Merchant Marine affairs. The two are as fully interlocked and interdependent as are the sea and the land.

May we bespeak for the magazine as for The National Marine League a new co-operation on the part of readers and members in a time when patriotism and the safety of democracy are virtually synonymous with "Ships and then more ships."

How You Can Help

Every member of the League and every reader of the magazine can assist greatly just now in extending this cause of shipping and foreign trade, which in a real sense is the common task of all,

1. By your subscription to The National Marine magazine. Until June 1st this subscription will be as usual, $2.50; thereafter, because of the greatly increased cost of production, the annual subscription will be $3.00.

2. By sending us the names of two or three persons whose names you would like to have proposed for membership in The National Marine League. (All members of the League receive the Magazine.)

3. By suggestion and criticism. Frankness will be appreciated-yet we may add, in the words of a certain Latin American,

"We don't mind being criticised adversely so long as the critics are thoughtful enough to add some means of improvement."

4. By your written contribution to the pages of The National Marine.

The editors agree to print your articles if they can do so in justice to the limitation of space and to the fallibility of their editorial judgment; and when they must needs return your manuscript they will do so with promptness, tenderness, grief and fear-undoubtedly with feelings akin to those of the Chinese editor who is reported to have returned a manuscript with the following note:

"Most honored brother of the sun and the moon: Your slave is prostrate at your feet! I kiss the ground before you, and implore you to authorize me to speak and live. Your manuscript has permitted itself to be looked upon by us, and we have read it with enchantment. I swear on the tomb of my ancestors that I have never read anything more exalted. It is with fear and terror that I send it back. If I allowed myself to print this treasure, the president would immediately order me to use it forever for an example, and forbid me to dare print anything inferior. My literary experience enables me to declare that such literary pearls are only created once in ten thousand years, and this is why I take the liberty of returning it to you."

Finally, you can aid us by letting us aid you and your cause, of whatever name or sign, provided it contributes to a fuller and better understanding between our own and other nations. We exist to serve, whether in lines of trade by sea or in promoting a closer understanding of those peoples into whose borders we must of necessity go increasingly in the future, in reciprocal commerce and in reciprocal good will.

Wrong Conceptions of South America.

The American who wrote recently to a friend in Rio de Janeiro saying that it was his intention to bring down his high powered automobile in order to motor from Rio to the coast of Peru evidently possessed zeal but lacked knowledge. Ostensibly he was unaware of the fact that much of the country through

which he planned to motor had as yet never been traversed by white men. He must needs climb snow capped mountains, ford unbridged rivers, invade the intricate jungles in the steaming tropics, and through some sections at least, for such a journey, an automobilist would need a formidable body-guard as protection against Amazonian bushmen and Indians who have thus far defied all attempts of adventurous pioneers to entice them from their impenetrable jungles. The honesty of the answer given to the enthusiastic automobilist was commendable.

"There are seven reasons why you can not do this: the first one is, there are no roads; the other six don't count."

If all those who propose to go to South America for the sake either of travel or investment of their money possessed a friend as honest as the one referred to, there would be fewer disillusioned ones and a less formidable array of unfulfilled hopes regarding these Republics.

Those who represent South America as the unadulterated Land of Promise and an Eldorado wherein fortunes can be had for the asking should also show the other side of the shield, making their readers as certain of the obstacles and conditions of success as of the attractive possibilities.

South America is waiting for population, but this does not mean that every kind of an American is needed down there, or that men sent down here promiscuously, without careful preparation, succeed. The list of South American failures is a long one. If one doubts this statement let him talk with any American Consul who has served any length of time in this country whose sympathy, ingenuity and pocketbook have been thoroughly exercised in the attempt to get well meaning but misinformed Americans "back to the States."

South America is indeed an Eldorado. It has untold wealth in mines, in agricultural lands, in forests, in cattle and sheep, in tropical products of almost every kind and description. Its matchless resources have hardly been discovered as yet in many sections, but the