United States does not permit other powers to occupy the territory of a Latin-American state, is not this country bound to be an international policeman and to use the "big stick" on countries that will not pay their debts?

Roosevelt had reason to believe in 1906 that certain foreign powers were on the point of seizing ports of Santo Domingo, because their citizens could not collect money lent to the Dominican government. He therefore took upon himself the great responsibility of making an agreement with the Dominican dictator at that time, by which the custom house was put in charge of a representative of the United States. Forty-five per cent of the proceeds was paid over to the Dominicans who liked that arrangement because they got more cash than when they thought they were getting it all. It pleased the bond-holders because the United States recognized that $15,000,000 out of the nominal debt of $32,000,000 was legitimate, and the 55 per cent of the proceeds pays interest and something on the principal. The government in Washington liked it because it cleared up a disagreeable spot in American diplomacy, and extended the influence of the United States. senate, though with a wry face, finally ratified a treaty under which this system has been going on for the last nine years.

The

President Taft found a similar state of affairs down in Central America. Secretary Knox figured out that the Republic of Honduras owed about $3,000,000 though it is hard to find out where such a sum came from.

Dollar diplomacy was still more in evi

dence in Nicaragua. Knox negotiated a treaty in 1912 by which the custom house was to be turned over to the United States representative, just as in Santo Domingo. That treaty has never been ratified; but the American collector of customs is still right on the spot, and the money is collected. The mix-up here is greater than in Santo Domingo because several American banking houses have advanced money to the government of Nicaragua, on the vague security of their being ratified by the senate. In 1913 Secretary Bryan went still further by negotiating another treaty -which also is still unratified-by which the United States agrees to pay Nicaragua three million dollars for the construction of a canal which nobody expects ever to construct. In that treaty, further, is inserted merely a copy of the Platt resolutions as applied to Cuba. This means that if the treaty is ratified, Nicaragua will be a stepchild of the United States. We shall have to protect it from foreign aggression, to root out the civil wars, to govern it from Washington and very likely, in the end, to annex it.

That is the result toward which the practical protectorate in Santo Domingo is probably moving. If Santo Domingo is annexed, the sister republic of Haiti will follow. If Nicaragua should be annexed, sooner or later the other four Central American states will come along, first as protectorates and then as dependencies.

If that is the policy of the government, and it is thought to be a good policy, why is it not frankly stated to the American people so that they may express their opinion?

WHEN we undertake to recover sal

vage from the destruction wrought

by war it must be found in the rebirth of moral and spiritual qualities, the refining of souls, the growth of the humanities, the extension of patriotism beyond national boundaries into international understandings and sympathies, if any real gain is to be identified amid the immeasurable loss.

As with individuals, so it may be with countries, that those who endure the most poignant sufferings may find surprising revelations of themselves thereby, even to the point of certain mournful compensations.

The devastation of Belgium has brought about awakened interest in her art and literature, and there is already a response to our interest in the appearance of personalities of high distinction in their offerings, who might otherwise have remained unknown to most of us.

14

Foremost among the group of brilliant writers of "Young Belgium," Emile Verhaeren has burst upon us with his impassioned poetry through which we perceive the very soul of this desolated land.

Born nearly sixty years ago on the banks of the "lazy Scheldt" not far from Antwerp, his training in letters was received from the Jesuit college in Ghent, where he numbered among his friends and classmates many who latter became his literary confrères. Among these was Maurice Maeterlinck, who only recently said in regard to the conferring of a seat in the French Academy: "If any honor is to be done it should go to an older" and, he adds modestly, "to a better man, Emile Verhaeren. Any writer with patience enough can do my prose, but not Verhaeren's inspired verse."

Of his associates and influence there, Verhaeren has said: "Their sadness and gentleness, their subtle feeling and talent.

fed on memories and tenderness and silence, wove a wreath of pale violets round the forehead of Flanders." Enshrined in his poetry and forming an essential feature of it are the two elements so characteristic of Flanders and her people-the mystical element that gave us, among artists, Van Eyck and Memling, and in startling contrast, the grossly material element, boisterously carousing, as visualized by the old Flemish

masters.

Hearty eaters and drinkers and able by their prosperity to indulge freely in solid luxury and good living, the Flemish peasants nevertheless remain as unswervingly Catholic as those of Brittany with processions and pilgrimages and all the picturesque popular means of expression that a

vivid faith in the unseen creates for itself. It is these vital national characteristics that form the basis of Verhaeren's muse.

A product of environment, his was a dual nature and he early became iconoclastic in his art. "La Semaine," a light-hearted journal which he published with some of his comrades at Ghent, was soon suppressed by the university authorities. Later in Brussels the young poet collaborated in all the literary magazines that succeeded each other as exponents of young and new ideas and of Belgian life. "Les Flamandes," the volume of poems which marked his début, was almost an imitation of Zola in its stark realism and excited reprobation at once. He might rightly be accused as being excessive at this period and of looking too

confidingly upon the Old Masters, though "Les Flamandes" are only the Women whom Rubens painted.

The next stage of Verhaeren's poetic development was a morbid, extravagant and tormented one, due partly to a severe nervous crisis and his work at this period suggests the unhealthy stimulation of a Verlaine-it represents, however, a transitional state of anguish through which the soul

works its sorrowful way into a richer, more spiritual life.

Then came the clear atmosphere of restored health and hope and sanity and he is soon assuming a definite place in the ranks of the symbolists. The rebellious mood is past and he has attained a clearer vision so that instead of the earlier anarchic violence, there comes a realization of the world's immutable laws. During this