Chitral, and to recognize as prince a still younger brother, Shujaul-Mulk, a nice little boy, henceforth familiarly known as “Sugarand-Milk." This act was decided upon during the race for the fort, which ended on the 31st of January, 1895, by Robertson and his soldiers dashing into Chitral ahead of all their competitors. For a month they held the enemy at large, waiting for reinforcements which never came, but contriving to keep up communication with India. On the 1st of March the last letter from Chitral was passed along the river to Mastuj, and then Robertson and his gallant company, a mere speck in that huge wilderness of rocks and snows, faded out of sight for fifty days, while the eyes of all England hung, distracted with anxiety, on the shrouded glens of the Hindu-Kush.

This is the necessary prelude to Sir George Robertson's story, which I am not proposing to re-tell tamely here. I am addressing American readers, who, of course, take a very limited interest in our "little wars." With a whole new system of savage archipelagoes of their own, the American nation will soon find themselves provided with quite as many little wars as they need for their private entertainment. But Sir George Robertson's book does not address Englishmen alone. It is a very attractive piece of literature, excellently composed, excellently narrated, with touches of beauty here and there which we might expect a soldier to disdain. It is as a specimen of our new literature of action, to which we may be proud to point our friendliest neighbors, that I am here recommending Sir George Robertson's book. Read "Chitral; The Story of a Minor Siege," I say to those who, being not of us, are yet indulgent to us, for you will never see the virtues of our nation reflected in a more agreeable mirror.

In the first place, to praise a man's modesty is to affront that very merit in him, and yet it is impossible to touch this book, and to escape from the sense of the author's self-abnegation. He has words of praise, congratulation, gratitude, for everybody, for the officers who fought with him, for those who struggled to reach him in vain, for those who, after (it must be said) an unconscionable delay, managed to relieve him at last. All their deeds are glorified, all their names made prominent; but, of himself, scarcely a word. If this were all the history we possessed and if we could not read between the lines, we should think that Robertson played a very third-rate part in this spirited drama. But Lord Roberts knows,

and the Government of India knows, and all who fought beside him and for him know, that Sir George Robertson was the central force of the whole incident, that it was his gallantry and diplomacy and resource that pulled us safely out of that very tight place.

The man of ability who is not eaten up with self-complacency has eyes to observe his surroundings. While the little English garrison were shut up in Chitral, with the murderous hill tribes humming outside, their spirits rose and fell. It was part of the commander's task to watch these fluctuations and to guard against them. Of each of the young officers who were with him, he has a genial portrait. Here is a sketch of one of them:

"He was a melodious person of gregarious instincts. Looking back, one reflects how churlishly his songs and shuffling accompaniments were sometimes received, and how badly we should have missed them. I think that Harley, even after an all-night's watch, always lay down to sleep with reluctance, and would never have rested at all had there been anyone equally companionable to talk to. His unquenchable good spirits stimulated us greatly without our knowing it."

How characteristic this is! and not less so the little touches about dogs which come here and there. "On the Gilgit frontier a subaltern's equipment can hardly be considered complete without a banjo and a fox terrier." The banjo Mr. Kipling has celebrated in one of the most thrilling of his lyrics; the fox terrier figures in every frontier battle. The wounding of "Edwardes' nice little dog" is most gravely recorded among the incidents of the defence of Reshun. It is connected with the tender sentiment about home, and all things home-like, which the smart young soldiers carry with them in every contingency. I must quote from Sir George Robertson again a passage of rare beauty; the moment described is that at which their hopes seemed at their lowest, and nothing seemed before the little English garrison but cruel and humiliating death. The Commander stood on the ramparts, and he looked out over the closely beleaguering forces of the enemy:

"Any attempt on us would have been out of the question on this date, so light was the sky with its young crescent moon. To the north, that wonderful mass of snow mountain looked as lovely and as unsympathetic as ever. Its beauty always made me melancholy, nor could it be looked upon without a long sigh and sad thoughts of those far away at home, who were, we knew, suffering much more for us than we suffered ourselves. We could only repay their anxious thoughts with others as tender. If we could but have sent them a single line of love, a weight would have been lifted from our hearts."

The siege of Chitral was a return to a primitive condition of

things. The methods of the besiegers and of the besieged were mediæval, and the old value of individual bravery, each man in some degree cast upon his own resources, was strangely revived. It might have been reasonably supposed that this would prove a great disadvantage to English officers, trained to depend on all the mechanical aids of our elaborate civilization. It was a disadvantage, of course; it added to the difficulties, but they humorously accepted and surmounted it. The essential interest of this book, apart, of course, from its merits as a narrative superlatively told, lies in the evidence it supplies of the rapidity with which the wellbred and disciplined young Anglo-Saxon accepts responsibility and turns it to good account. Mr. Rudyard Kipling has a story of the veteran writer who meets in London a group of polite, wellgroomed, modest youths, who turn out to have been actually doing, in the wild places of the world, the work that he has been dreaming about. It is impossible to read Sir George Robertson's "Chitral" and not see that these are those very youths in action. These British officers of his, with their irresistible pluck and energy merely dormant, ready to break out into a blaze at a moment's notice, are what Mr. Kipling gazes at fondly, and murmurs "Mine own people!"

If this is the temper and these the abilities which our recent national predilection for the literature of action fosters, we need hardly regret that "bower of roses in Bendameer's stream" in which the Middle Victorian poets lay at full length, discussing the subtleties of the passion of love. If it were going to last forever, if there were to be no reaction from this materialism, I should deeply deplore it. A man should not, and a nation should not, spend its whole life with a musket in its hand, behind a barricade. But there are times and seasons in the life of a nation, as in the life of a man, when self-respect and all the dearest emotions of the heart compel the strictest attention to practical defence. The American people, with whose thoughts and instincts we are more closely in sympathy than with those of any other race, have lately proved this necessity. They have passed through a crisis which many of their most contemplative spirits regretted, but which was inevitable. Their honor, their place in civilization, called imperiously upon them for an action which they deplored, but which they did not dream of evading.

We, too, in England to-day hear something very like the same

call, but pronounced with even intenser gravity. All I have attempted to do here is to sketch very roughly the history and character of the literature which has prepared us to receive the order with serenity and firmness. We, in our beleaguered island, hear, or believe we hear, the muffled sound of the pick-axe mining our prosperity and our rights. An hysterical excitement would be out of place, and there is no sign among us of its being felt. We believe, humbly, gravely, that we are ready. And there is evidence in our literature of the last twelve years to show that we have been preparing ourselves for a great international struggle by the games we have loved best to play, the stories which have entertained us most, and the narratives of historical adventures which we have been most eager to read.

EDMUND GOSSE.

THE UNITED STATES AT THE PARIS EXPOSITION

IN 1900.

BY FERDINAND W. PECK, COMMISSION ER-GENERAL

FOR THE

UNITED STATES TO THE PARIS EXPOSITION OF 1900.

By their efforts to surpass each other in the magnificence of their displays, foreign countries will obtain for the French the realization of their prophecy that the Paris Exposition of 1900 will be the climax of exposition achievements.

The nineteenth century has been notable for its unparalleled progress, and to secure the greatest credit for assisting in this upward sweep, and to obtain the emoluments which will come from a fine display, more than fifty nations will be present at the exposition, arrayed in the best they can produce. They will not spare money to secure the best effects, and will follow the French in adopting "quality, not quantity," as the motto by which they will select their exhibits. It is therefore assured that the best crystallized ideals of all nations will be displayed in the exhibits and their installation, and that the exposition in every particular will be of unsurpassed grandeur and perfection.

The spot chosen for the exposition is in the heart of Paris, on the site already made historical by four international expositions. The beautiful Seine winds its way through it, and magnificent boulevards with stately edifices and monuments surround and traverse it. The entire city of Paris is to be greatly beautified by additional parks and gardens, so that in 1900 it will have still a greater charm than now, and serve as an appropriate setting to the brilliant exposition.

The passing of the old century and the greeting of the new will take to Paris the people of leisure and the pleasure seekers of every clime. The wealthy, the purchasing agents, the scientists