CONTENTS, CURRENT ‘CANT FOREIGNAFFAIRS.By S . Verdad. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . MILITARY NOTES. By Romney . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . AN EXAMINATION THE NATIONAL OF GUILD SYSTEM-111. By H. Belloc ..................... QUANTITY AND QUALITY. By Guglielmo Ferrero. Trans. from the “Figaro”) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . PRAGMATIC PATRIOTISM 1. WORDs. By A. G. Crafter ’ ... A PILGRIMAGETURKEY TO DURING WARTIME-VI. By Marmaduke Pickthall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . THEORY PRACTICE. Duxmia AND By ............ THEAPPROACH PARIs--.(Concluded). By Ezra Pound ... TO READERS AND WRITERS. By R. ‘H. C. . . . . . . . . . . . . . NOTESOF THE WEEK .................. ..................... PAGE 713 717 7 17 718 719 721 722 723 725 726 728 THEG I P S Y ’ S POINTOF VIEW. By Beatrice M. Dutt ... TIME RECORDERS. Gordon Phillips . . . . . . . . . . . . By ALL EXCEPT ANYTHING. T. K. L. . . . . . . . . . By VIEWS AND REVIEWS. .A. E. R. . . . . . . . . . REVIEWS ........................ PASTICHE.By G. Whiz, Pallister Barkas, William Repton, J. A. M. A., Caleb Porter . . . . . . . . . . . . A N OPEN LETTER TO DUBLIN EMPLOYERS. A. E. (ReBy printed from the “Irish Times”) ............ LETTERS ’ro EDITOR from the Writers of the Articles on the National Guilds, Gaylord Wilshire, Press-cutter, F. Seymour Cocks, Arch. Gibbs, “Truth,” Edward Stafford, Spall Hammer, Paradise, F. J. Wilson, ‘‘O,’.’ George Reston Malloch, William I,. Hare, Perceval Gibbon ... -4. PAGE 731 732 733 734 736 737 738 739 ’ be addressed to THE NEW AGE, 38, Cursitor Street, All communications relative to THENEW AGE should __-.. E .C . _______---- NOTES OF THE WEEK. Too much preliminary booming spoiled the effect of Mr. Lloyd George’s speech at Bedford. W e were led t o expect something desperate, whereas all we got was a little mild Fabianism. Reading between the lines, it is easily inferred that Mr. George has found himselfembarrassed by the strong Whig influence in the Cabinet and the multitude o “experts” on his land commission. f Nothing must be said to antagonise the section led by Mr.LewisHarcourt, whilst itwas politic to drag in somepointurged by each “expert.” The resultant of these forces, so far as practical politics is concerned, is a vagueproposal to offer a ladder of advancement to thethriftyagriculturallabourer. H e i s t,o gethigher wages, somehow, somewhere, somewhen help(God havea bit of garden. “Hours of ing) ; thenhemust labour must be so ordered that leisure shall be left him forcultivatinghisgarden.”The schemewouldtherefore seem to be to provide leisure for the labourer, not for leisurebuttoaugmenthis income. Themeaning o leisure, in the agricultural sense, is apparently f overtime. The dog’s food is to beincreased by agradual curtailment of histail. If thelabourercan physically survive, then the garden may grow into an allotment. Subsequently, at t h e age, say, of sixty, our dear friend Hodgemaysecurea small holding of fifty acres. If he continues thrifty and enterprising, then at the age of ninety he may “look forward to taking his position as one of the substantial farmers in the community.” When our labourer thus has graduated through the garden and the small holding to an actual farm, he will at theage of onehundredandtwenty discover that “the folds shall be full of sheep, the valleys also shall stand so thick corn they with that shall laugh and sing.” The singing will be by Welsh choirs, entrance threepence, frontseats sixpence. At longlastweare to enjoy “rare and refreshing fruits,” with a sing-song thrown in. Shorn of its verbiage rhetorical the and lures, speech proves that our forecast last week was correct : the Government has discovered that in agriculture an increaseofwage will obey thelawof increasing returns. Professors Pigou Spooner and had previously warned that them in manufacturing industries any further wage-increase would obey the law of diminishingreturns hut- that they might safely adopt anagricultural policy that would force up agricultural wages. How this is to be done remains to be discovered. Mr. George gave us no guidance on the point, and we venturetoassertthat he not does know. To augment wages by garden products is not to increase the rate of the labourer’s wage; it is merely to take more out of his physical reserve. But the Government wants the farmers’ vote, and this they cannot get if they propose any increase in (the rates of wages. Last week we remarked that wages had not advanced since the time of the Flood. Mr. George us the tellsthat farmlabourer’s wage had not risen since the time o f Henry VII. Thus are we graduallyeducating our rulers.But it is evident thfat they still have much t,o learn as to the nature o f wages and whilst they are agreed that wages in agriculture must be raised they are puzzled how to setaboutit.The only fund available for thepurpose is that now assigned to rent, interest, and profits. Mr. Georgeemphatically assertsthatthepresentproperty rights the landlords not must be touched. That means rent interest that and must remain a charge upon the land. The profitsnow go to the farmers and thedealers.The scheme,therefore, would seem t’o be to induce the farmers to pay higher wages, backed by legislation increased promising productivity-laws morestringentlygoverning(the preservation of game and limiting amenities-laws giving greater security Qf tenure, and so forth.But tlo obtainthisgreat increase of productivity demands a huge increase of capital outlay. The farmer must look to his b a n k But the banks never give advances beyond the next harvest. Will theGovernment lend i:ts aidbyextended credit? Mr. Georgehintsatnothing in this direction. Meantime, out of what fund is the labourer’s increased rate of wage to come? Mr. George is probablylooking tQ Providence to help him out. Nobody else will. ’The landlords will naturally button up their fobs; the distributed his on present farmer’scapital is already farm; the banks are limited by urbandemands which pay them better. The crux of the problem is not merely farm-wagery but farm-finance. * * + Runningthroughthespeech, observe recurring the emphasis it was interesting to laid upon land as a 714 monopoly. And monopoly is not only property, but responsibility, stewardship. We do not quarrel with this conception, of course; but oddly enough, Mr. George never once seemed to realise that the real counterpoise to the monopoly o land-ownership f is labour-monopoly. Mr. George rightly quite insisted that farm work highly is skilled. “A good labourer is thework of years. I t requiresnoend of skill and experience to be a good labourer. . . There no is labour that is as productive, there is n3 labour that is as essential tothecommunity. It is the oldestlabour of all, and this skilful labour, requiring years of training in themostessential of allindustries,thismost serviceable, honourable labour-it is oldest the aristocracy in the world-we pay it the lowest wages, we giveitthelongesthours,wehouseit in theworst dwellings.” George Mr. cannot be consistent for a quarter of an hour onend. A little later he was gaily anticipatingtheimmigration of town-bredartisansto the country to do workwhich he had just previously declaredrequired years of training. He was forced to this inconsistent conclusion because ,it was vital to his argumenttostatethattherewerereserves o labour f for the proposed increased acreage of productivity. We shallwatchwith interestwhatlinetheLabourParty takes on this question. W e have already tabled our proposals. W e assertthatthe way o u t is by theorganisation of all agriculturallabourculminatingwith anAgricultural Guild. Themost profoundly disquietingfeature of thepresentpositionisthat everybody seems content to let the State become a foster-parent of theagriculturallabourerinstead of encouraging him to organise and fend for himself. In our “Open Letter to the Trades Union Congress” there we suggested that it would positivelypay to spend ~ 2 5 0 , 0 0 0upon thoroughly organising agricultural labour. ConThe W gress voted L ~ O O .e understandthattheCongress nas practically no funds, its but example should be speedily followed by every trade union in the kingdom. If we are to have a tearing, raging, land propaganda, it is surely evident that the various interests affected will each fight for itself. I t follows that the best organised will secure whatever plunder may be available. W e do not think that the Government will succeed in detachi n g the farmers from their present economic affiliation. W e may reasonably expect rent, interest and profits to stand together in this struggle. If so, what chance hasthelabourer? He may get a few crumbsthrown from the table, but precious little more. If the leaders of the Labour Party had an ounce of brains amongst them, they would cease their political chatter and spend every available pound and every available minute in organising army an of agricultural labour that would be powerful enough toinaugurate a new era in our national economy. direct railway policy inthiscountry. Now thecat is out of the bag. Thre “Times” correspondent admits thiat “new conditions havecomeintoexistence lately an.d, these have created, or are creating, a difficult and dangerous set of problems.” A strike is prophesied unless “th,e companies see the men’s case as it is, the men t see th,e companies’ case as it is, and the public o and Parliament see both sides.” We are next told that “ t h e big fight, if it wn1es, will rage mainly round the f ! question o union recognition..” I is admitted that the very solid grieclaim for recognition is based upon vances. ’The Conciliation scheme is not working smoothly; promotion a s a system practically is nonexistent ; the work is harder, and there has been “a great deal of speeding-up.” What’s tobe done? But we musthaveregard f0.r the companies case. They are subject laws to aad regulations; t h , qa r e bound t o accept all goods andpassengers:tomaintain an uninterrupted service; thjey cannotputuptheircharges without State sanction. They, in fact, have the not freedom tlo bargain with trade unions enjoyed by ordinary employers. They cannot bock out their men without breach of the law, and therefore-a gorgeous non sequitur-they cannotgrantrecognition,andthe men oughtnottostrike ! Onsuchanimportantpoint we must risk not even a suspicion of distorting the argument, so l e t us quote : ‘‘AS they a r e bound to maintain a regular service, it follows that their men should b,e bound not to strike. It thus becomes a serious question whlethjer or not a railwayman has any right to be a tradeunionist. Tbe companies, deprived o the f power o thle lock-out, a r e justified in declining to deal f with an agency that possesses the power of the strike.” Nevertheless, the companiesar,e far from happy, and, in’ fact,donot know which way to turn. Curiously enough, whilst our hearts are wrung with sympathy and pity for .the poor companies who are thus burdened with heavy legal responsibilities, little one factor in the situationisnot mentioned. The companiespossess a monlopoly. Why, then, should not men? their We have repeatedly urged thre unions not to strike except for a fundamental change in their wage-system. If the railwaymen mean to strike for recognition, then we implore them toimportsomerealmeaningintothe word. The only“recognition”worth a thought is the recognition by thle monopolistic companies thattheir men also possess a monopoly-the monopoly of railway Let these two monopolies, each recognising labour. th,e other, lock horns and see which can survive. We suggest to therailway union a policy that makes for victory. Let them go ,on for another year gathering in all the non-unionists. Then, they can issue their ultimatwm : seats on thte directorate ;and a division o prosits; f half tlo dividends and half to the labour monopoly. The half to labour must not be dissipated in dribs and drabs. What is wanted is a good fat cheque to the organisation as such.Afterthat,theTransit Guild is not far off. * * * W e hear rumours thlat the Dublin struggle may terminate sooner than wa.s anticipated. If it be so, thlen we have little doubt that A. E.’s letterto thle Dublin masters will haveproved an important factor. It is in its way an historic document, for it is one of the very few impassioned appeals has that really changed;industrial an situation.known It is that speeches in Parliamentrarely influence votes; in like manner, literary appeals seldom influence business policy. But A. E. ’s‘ contribution was s essentially true o and timely that it in fact modified Dublinopinion to a considerable section of the such anl extent that employers were touched with shame. The letter, throwingas it such does a flood of light upon capitalist psychology, warrants more permanentrecord,and we accordingly reproduce it in this issue. Our readers will hardly fail to notice itsendorsement of our own article, “ T h e City of Perpetual Hunger.”Evenmore important than thle Dublin lockout, is the frank recognition, in1 a n obviously inspired article in the “‘Times,” that thle railway directors cannot solve the psychological revolt o their men. A few weeks a g o we asserted that f thle problem of service on, railways become thre had psychological,and thatthiswasknowntothose wh’o *-x-+ W e are glad to see that the proposal of the Miners’ Federationtocountertheemployers’latest combined move by a fighting federation of trade unions is being taken up sympathetically. W e are told that the capita1 of the employers have who organised themselves t o crushtrade unionism is ~ ~ O , O O O , Q O O .I t soundsfearsome,but in realityitdoesnotamountto much. I t representsinappreciable an proportion of industrial’ capital. It however, first is, of importance the that trade unions should promptly provide for a continuous food supply. The way to do this-the only way so far a s we know-is to reach a working agreement with the Co-operative Wholesale Society. And if we are to have an industrial struggle, it is just as well to be prepared withplansforthecampaign.Morethan a year ago, weoutlined a workingcampaign, in our chapters on “The Transition” in our Wage-System series. Briefly, we proposed that every available penny should g o into rations, to be distributed according to the size of each family affected. W e suggested this that should be arrangedwiththe C.W.S. W e further proposed that 715 from the declaration of a strike or lock-out, no rents shouldbepaidin thearea of operations. If the employers (capitalised a -&~O,OOO,OOO)have succeeded in t concentrating attention upon these practical problems, then they have our gratitude. An army marches on its belly ; the commissariat is of first importance. Dillon, on their arrival in New York; next the arrest, of Mr. Harry punishment,andthreateneddeportation Kemp at Southampton; previously occurred had the of such o their men f proscription by Messrs Tilling who wore trade union badges-a bad example followed last week by thetramwayauthorities in Nottingham. ?%ere w a s ds,o the case of theCornish Clay strike, during which the magistrates refused bail to a young manchargedwith wounding a policeman. Therewas also the refusal of bail to Mr. James Larkin and Mr. James Connolly in Dublin. At the first blush, there seems no connection between these varied and widely separated incidents. But let first us briefly statethe facts. Miss Marie Lloyd went to America to fulfil certain contracts. She was accompanied by Mr. Bernard Dillon, who had beencited as co-respondent by Lloyd’s Miss husband. They, in fact, did n o t disguise relations. their The immigration authorities actually charged Dillon, aged twenty-five, with bringing over Miss, Lloyd, aged forty-two, for immoral purposes. Miss Lloyd was charged “passive with consent.” They finally had to give ai bond to leave the Holy Land by March next. The case of Mr. Harry Kemp is different. Hle did, in fact, attempt t.h,e stow-away dodge t o get to England, a d probably he is not whining at twenty-one imprisonment days’ in consequence. But the magistrates have recommended deportationafter serving term. his Mr. Kemphas roughed it in the is not Western) States where travelling as a hoboe regarded as a veryserious offence. H e issomething 8 of a versifier, though a not poet. Of our own personal knowledge, we emphatically affirm that he is not acriminal,notevenremotely. Why, then, this vindictive deportation order?was It stated in evidence, irrelevantly anld cruelly, that he was the co-respondent in the Upton Sinclair divorce suit. ‘The magistrates of Southampton (where sailors ashore frequent only prayer meetings) wer,e inexpressiblyshocked. In ‘theinterests of Southamptonmoralitytheyhave recommended deportatiton for this very harmless and rather foolish versifier. I n th.e case o Tillings, it was assumed that f to wear a badge was something s’o immoral as to warrant instant dismissal. In. the Cornish Clay strike, a young man fired off a loaded revolver and wounded a policeman. I t isdoubtful if he intended it,and,anyhow, the policeman is recovering. Bail was offered and refused. After the strike was over, the magistrates allowed bail. Now the law as to bail is perfectly clear. In. committing a ,man to standhistrial,themagis? tratfes in accepting bail have only to satisfy themselves that thse prisoner will duly appear.They wereclearly exceding their duty, either in refusing bail during the strike, o r acceptingafter strike. young it the The man’s casewas unaffected either way. Mr. Connolly had to hunger-strike for a week and then was allowed out on his own recognisances. Mr. Larkin had to apply to the High Court. There was never the shadow oa f doubt that both would appear at their trial. + + + W e congratulatevery heartily the‘‘DailyHerald” uponits“rally”lastFriday. An enormousaudience, enough to fill the Albert Hall, came to protest against the madness of this naughty world and incidentally to see and hear Mr. James Larkin. The whole thing went with a swing, and should encourage our contemporary to persevere. There were some significant incidents. Mr. Larkin tried to get a cheer forMr.Keir Hardie. He got a perfunctory hand-clap. Mr. Snowden’s name was received with groans. The Labour Party met with jeers and raucous notes of angry disappointment. The temper of themeetingwas distinctlyanti-political. It isnotpossible, of course, for busyjournalists toarrange everything beforehand. Doubtless, after last Friday’s experience,alittlemore thought will bedevotedtothequality of the speeches. With the exception o Mr. f Dyson, excellent their cartoonist, the speeches were simply shocking, utterly lacking in perception in or the true meaning of revolt. “ W ea r e rebels,” shouted all the speakers, after one another, but not a glimpse was vouchsafed of what they were rebelling against. Now, when you bring many thousands of men and women together, the substance of the speeches is far more important than the personnel o the speakers. What, f for example, was the Countess of Warwick doing there? The speaker beforeher had proclaimed class-struggle, the at which the audience shouted approval. dear The Countess followed and blandlyremarked thatthiswasnoclassfight ! Her entourage clapped, but the rest of the audience chuckled with obvious amusement. woman This would never have been asked to speak except for her social position. But we can understand easily the lapse. once Not during the whole evening was the wage-system and the necessity of its abolitionmentionedorhinted at. The workinghypothesis of theEditorandhis staff seems to be that the “Herald” umbrella covers those who call themselves“rebels.”Thereforewas Mr. Wedgwood, a member of the Liberal Party, welcomed on the platform.His“revolt”issingletax. But we know also that he is something of a knight-errant, and we understand. Now wesuggesttothe“DailyHerald”that thereal commondenominatorisnotvague rebellion, but wage-abolition. The whole mass of the proletariat is inbondage. I t istherefore invited to rebel. W h a t must it rebel against? Obviously, against thing the thatkeepsit inbondage. What is that? Wagery, of course. A plain statement of what wagery is and how to abolish it would have been priceless at that meeting. “The hungry sheep looked up and, were not fed.” In the expectation o appearing cantankerous, one more note of f warning. The new movement wants no more heroworship. Ithas been the curse of every democratic movement since the Chartist days. I t killed Chartism ; it killed early Socialism ; it has killed the I.L.P. Unless we are quite frank about it it, will kill the industrial movement in Ireland. Mr. Larkin has done splendidly ; he earned a warm and hospitable reception. But the written panegyric, which the chairman read in introducing him, was not only fulsome, but palpably exaggerated untrue. and “Make no giants, more but elevatetherace at once,”sanganimpatientpoet of the Victorian era. A s forus, we do not know who built Minster. York N0.r does it matter. We hope that before long, the “Herald” will finally concentrate upon the thing immediately to be destroyed-wagery : and the thing to be constructed-the Guild. If oftenhappensthatthe succession. o incidents, f apparentlytrivial in themselves,points a social truth nut otherwise easily t,o be discussed. Such a series of minor happenings last week taken together has a major meaning. There was the detention and threatened deportation of Miss Marie Lloyd and Mr. Bernard * * * S’o much flor thefacts.But how do they al’l come under same ‘the category? Marie Miss Lloyd, Mr.. Harry Kemp, young the Cornish clay worker, Mr. Larkin, and Mr. Connolly have all been guilty (without trial) of breaking bourgeois other morality. In words, both in England and America, economic power, knowing the value of this particular brand of .morality, doesnothesitatetousethelaw,extra-legally, if not N o Atlantic illegally, to punishthosewho disobeyit. liner ever enters New York without bringing some couple who are living together without the sanction of marriage. But Miss Lloyd is class” “no and sol is punished.Mr. Kempis inalike casebut is a much mote innocent sufferer. We may at least hope that t h e Home Office will not issue any deportation orders in his case. W e do not appeal to its sense of honour ; we are content to appeal to its sense of humour. In Southampton, we hadthe police panderingtothemagistrates’ “respectability,” identifying themselves, in fact, with In the proceedings in C0,r-ntheir masters’ morality. wall, a new psychologicaldevelopment was observed.. 716 The police, in giving evidence, spoke of members of the public as ‘‘civilians.” Theyevidently regardedthemselves a s a class apart, bought by the employers to d’o their share in breaking the strike. An observer o this f particular strike, and himself a barrister, puts his finger (in the “Nation’’) on the spot :“When a strike breaks out in a district Iike this the whole administration of the law is a t once inspired with the idea that a striker is already potentially a criminal. He is watched by the police like a dangerous beast; he is threatened llong before he does anything ; he is made to feel that the law is in hostile hands; nlot so muzh a force representing the organised will o f a community, of which he is himself a part, as a weapon in his employer’s hands, a net spread f,or his feet, a bludgeon fior his head.” been eliminated. This Commission many had political tasks to perform-law, police, health, relations with the neighbouring Republics. Being composed men of imbuedvtith the Guild spirit,it did far better thanthe politicians and diplomatists. the It an is entrancing study o the coming form of industrial organisation and f an outstanding proof ,of the efficiency o the Guild. f * * * * * * What have our Labour critics to say io all this? In each casecited,itis painfully evidentthat economic forcesdominate our political system. Do they imagine that a large increase in the Parliamentary Labour Party would particularly modify the biased administration of the law? W e suspect that in each of these cases,thesympathies of t,he LabourParty would be entirely on the side of the administration. Mr. Pointer, weremember,-expressed the opinion that jail was the right place for Mr. Tom Mann. Mr. Snowden is so harmless ,that he was asked to be the guest of a bishop at the recent Church Congress. W e can hardly imagine Mr. J. R. Macdonald drawingthePremier’sattention to theseunimportantdetailswhilstplaying golf with him at Lossiemouth. Arthur Mr. Henderson would probablypoint themoral of each caseat a Pleasant Sunday Afternoon in some Methodist chapel. If Mr. Hardie were asked to intervene he would probably reply that the Labour movement stands primarily for morality. As for Mr. George Barnes ! Unless we watch it, we shall find ourselves moving into aperiod of sumptuarylawsmagisterially enforced. Of the dispute between the United States and Great Britain (France and Germany intervening) also very little need be said. The “Times” correspondent a t WashingtonannouncesthatPresidentWilsonintends to back fall upon the spirit of the Bulwer-Clayton treaty.It doesnot really matter much either way. A few Canadian lumber magnates on the Pacific coast are adversely affected and that, we think, is about all. Of the merits of the case, we might perhaps remark that technically, at least, America is in the right. The treaty was made on the assumption that the Canal was t o he constructedthroughNicaragua.Inthatregion,Great Britain something bring market had to to having a moreorless defined protectorate over theMosquitoe Coast. It was afterwards assumed that the same considerations applied to Panama. America’s mistake was in notnotifyingGreatBritainearlier of herchanged intentions. Morally, therefore, we were right in assuming the validity of thetreaty. I t would certainlybe a graceful and politic act on the part o Washington to f revert to thepreviousunderstanding.Thepassage of the Home Rule Bill into law would probably clinch the matter. + * * * * * With the blowing up of the Gamboa Dyke, the penultimatestage of thePanamaCanalconstructionwas reached. Thus we drawnearthe close of a gigantic experiment in Guild organisation-so giganticthatit was too great either for privateor State capitalism. We have told th.e story in some detail in two of our chapters on the Guilds, but i t is worth while briefly to recapitulate. The private company, financed by France and ~70,000,000 overit,to managed by deLesseps,lost of human life. Then the say nothing of the loss American Government took it up, bought the plant and railway stock o the French company and proceeded t o f wonder how it was going to do it. Private contracting wasout of thequestionand t,heusualgovernmental methods of subcontracting proved equally inappropriate.PresidentRooseveltaccordingly fell back upon the U.S.A. Corps o Engineers, Colonel G. W. Goethals f being appointed Engineer-in-Chief and Chairman of the Isthmian Commission. Throughoutwhale the belt pay has been the system, wages having been found as inappropriate as sub-contracting. Colonel A , 0 a year, 300 perGoethals has for worked forming a task, it, and of proud whlch no European profiteers would have undertaken for ;GIO,OOO. Nothing has been done at a profit, the catering,thedrainage,thehouses-everythingat net ~75,000,000 required has almost cost. Further, the of the Washallbeenfound out of the gold reserves ingtonTreasuryandtheCanalopenspracticallyfree from debt. Amongst the hierarchy the and men a Guild spirit has prevailed. Everybody concerned has worked con amore, and a magnificent example has been afforded of what a properly organised Guild can do. The Isthmian Commission has been the governingauthority. At firstit was runbypoliticians from Washington,gradually but Colonel Goethals quietly elbowed them out and insisted upon every member of the Commissiondoingsomeusefulwork. Thus did economic power dominate the politicians to the advantage of the work, rent, interest and profits having Nothing happened has during past the week to change our considered view that Ulster must stand in with the rest of Ireland. Churchill’s Mr. speech did not close the door against a conference, but it is doubtf u l if his own party would tolerate it. Meantime, it is increasinglyevident that the Carson movement is collapsing. Sir Edward Carson and Mr. F. E. Smith have returned to the Law Courts, where shekels await them, andtheirtone is now as soft as sucking doves. They have seen Mr.BonarLaw ; Mr.BonarLawhas been to Balmoral. There is generally a balmoral somewhere. DO STRIKES PAY? (HENRY BEFOREHARFLEUR.) V Once more into the breach, dearfriends, once more ! No-back ! We have day this fresh rrck’ning made And we do find that this our foolish warfare Holds in its grasp no promise of that filth For which we struck; our counsellors do agree That these stiff sinews, this hard favour’d rage, This overhanging brow, this tiger’s action; That pageantry of warlike mien to which We erstwhile did adjure your English mettle Are out of place. Now must we tune our words To mitigate the fierceness of that wrath T o which ourselves did urge you. Now forget Those images with which we stirred your blood; Relax those features grim ; be mean and base ; Let modest stillness and humility Control you ; lend the eye a mild aspect, And imitate the action of the cow. We spake of English dead, all unaware That living men are of much greater worth Than bloody corpses. Now devoteyourminds To peaceful counsels, and the settled state Of order, how in safety best we may Compass our present aims, dismissing quite walls o Harfleur, f All thoughts of war. There stand the Which must achiitved be ere this our claim To the fair lands of France can be enforc’d. Let us then cogitate. Shall we dispatch Ambassadors with words of sweetest honey, To flatter, coax, and fawn upon those Frenchmen, And blandly ask them to deliver up Their town and lives to our soft mercy? Or shall we play the scaramouch, disguising Our new-found prudence with a swelling port, And breathing forth the most bloodthirsty threats That man’s mind can devise. But soft ! here comes the dusk ; let us retire ; Perhaps the dawn will see the walls of Harfleur Mat on the ground. Perhaps! BARTHOLOMEW HELVELLYN. 717 Current Cant. “HOW to be a philosopher.”--“T.P.’s “London is full of music.”-“Daily Weekly.” Graphic.” “ Our photographerfound Mr. Lloyd George sitting quietly reading the ‘Daily Sketch’ for the truth.”-“Daily Sketch.” Foreign Affairs. By S. Verdad. “Wages went up in 1912 . . . the movement is continuing.”-“News and Leader.” “The people of GreatBritainhavealways,since the electoral duty became general, preferred to bear their own burdens and deal directly with their representatives in Parliament or Council, andhave never been able to tolerate the idea of having their affairs managed for them by professional politicians.”-“The Referee. ” “Under the inspiration of the Bishop of London and his Cathedral staff, the Church life of the City is making itself felt.”-“Morning Post.’’ “Let the cobbler stick to his last,and let us help him to do it.”-“Daily Express.” f “One o the difficulties awaiting the next Cabinet is the insidious growth of indiscipline, disloyalty, and poisoned Socialism in the Civil Service.”-ARNOLD WHITE. THERE have been rumours of a Naval Conference, but nothing definite yet ,has been decided. Our Colonies the habit o f (for I d o n t think we haveyetgotinto referring “our to Dominions”) ,have given the home authorities to understand that a conference is desirable; but they have not, a s one or two papers have stated, actuallyaskedfor a conference. I t would not be im,pssiblse to hold a conference in London this winter to discuss thenavalaffairs o theEmpireatlarge;but f such meetings, if they were held, would not be regarded with very great interest by the general public, and only a few members of the Government would take part in Ithem. Yet th,e proximateinauguration of thePanama Canal will make a Naval Conference necessary in a relatively short time. + * . At present it is probably correct t o say that the public is chiefly interested in Labour unrest, nlot merely because the forces of Labourconstitute such a vast poportion of th,e entity we call the public, but because all classes have o late years been affected by Labour f disputesand are ready to showmoresympathywith the workers they than were a generation’ ago. The Government, on the other hand, i s naturally interested in turning the attention o the public f from Iabour u n r e s t - a really importantmatter, as we ,all knowto some things of lessconsequence, i.e., HomeRule, theLand,WelshDisestablishment,andtheHouse ‘of Lords, in, th’e order named. Butour Colonies, let us remember for a moment, are not particularly attracted by any of these things. Canada, Australia, a d , above all, New Zealand, are preoccupied with thePanama Canal; and India has troubles o her own. f Like many another reader of THENEW AGE, I have taken a great interest in the articles contributed by Mr. Grant Hervey, President of the Foreign Affairs Department of the Young Australian Party; and even a t times when I have felt myself to be bespattered by his mud-slinging I not have altogether resented the experience. Criticism is always valuable; the difference between the old andcultured world and the new and raw world is to be found in the method o applyf ing it. Wh,enMr.Herveythreatens us withGermany (if my recollectionis right,hehasalsothreatened us with tbe United States), he is., I suppose, joking; and I notice that, in THENEW AGE of October 2, a correspondent called our attention t o this. One must presume that if Mr.Hervey’spartycomesinto power there would be s.o;me sort of alliance between Germany and Australia; if we take it for granted, for the sake of argument, that Mr. Hervey isjoking. not Or perhaps between Germany United plus States and to know. But I should Australia? I do not profess like to call the attention of the Young Australian Party and its, critics, in THE NEW AGE and elsewhere, to another aspect o Australian politics which is at present f forming a. subject of very discussion those keen in circles i’n London where Home Rule, theLand,etc., are not regarded as being of any great importance. “Trade Unionism is cutting the ground from under its own feet.”-“A LABOUR MAN” in the “Daily Mail.” “There is no Ireland.”-“Pall Mall Gazette.” “Politics is one of the most consuming passions in life ; to men of middle-age a f least, it becomes an even more powerful passion than that of love. And like love, it is also one of the noblest o passions even when it is disf torted.”-T. P. O’CONNOR. “Arnold Bennett defends Human Nature.”-“Public Opinion. ” “There is not an editor in London who is not anxiously searching for writerswithsomething to say.”-HAROLD BEGBIE. “HOWto become a writer”-“everyman.” “Sir Hubert Herkomer is a Master of Arts, an Honorary Fellow of All Souls’, and an Associate of the Institute of France . . . as a’ film actor, Sir Hubert is judicious and these restrained . . . the most interestingthing about Herkomer Films will be that the public will see a Royal Academician playing in dumb show for its delectation.”FRANK DESPREZ in “The Era.” In order to prove that the Salamander, contrary to tradition, is an animal painfully affected both by fire and heat, the “Eclair” film company have shown upon the cinema a picturein which liveSalamanders are placed upon a grating over Bunsen burners. They are also placed in strong acid and obviously tortured.-“Eclair” Film, seen last week in Chelsea. “ It is noticed that the King, if he has any distance to travel,neverbeginshisvisit on a Monday. Thushis stay with Lord Spencer commences to-morrow instead of to-day. The reason is, of course, to obviate the necessity which hisMajesty has a of travelling on aSunday,to great objection.”-“ Daily Sketch.” * * * * * * By accompanying the King on the Army manoeuvres this week the Queen has created a new record, since upon no previous occasion has the consort of a British sovereign been present at military operations of this character. Her Majesty is not so greatly interested in the tactical operations, which, truth tells, will be rather uninteresting to a non-military spectator, asin seeing the manner in the field, and what which ‘ Tommy ’ lives when in arrangements are made for his comfort and for tending him in case of sickness. Her private motor-car has been sent to Althorp from Buckingham Palace for her use.”-‘‘ Daily Sketch.” “ ‘‘.Honesty is the backbone of business.”-“ Age.” Christian By arrangement with th4e present Government of the Commonwealth, numbers of English naval officers weresent out toassistin thle formation of the new Australian navy. Their tasks weredificult;anditis t beregrettedthat o theyhave beenrewarded chiefly with ingratitude and snubs. Their efforts to raise the standard o discipline-which was exceedinglylax, as f italwaysis in newcountrieslike Australia and the United S t a t e s - w e r e not merely thwarted by thle insolence and unwillingness o the men under f their charge,but also, which is far more serious, by the disposition of t h e local authoritiessupport to the “slackers” to and punish the offenders, when the offenders were punished at all, withexceedingly light and trivialsentences.Inconsequence of this attitude 718 on the part of those who now rule the Commonwealth, many officers have sent in th,eir resignations, and many others have expressed dissatisfaction the their with conditions under which they are expected 60 work. Military Notes. By Romney. be exaggerated or belittled accordingtothetemperamentofthecriticandhisknowledge of Irishaffairs. Butthey haveanotherimportance which is in reality far greater, although for the moment it is being overlooked. Theymarktheend of “lawandorder,”the commencement of an epoch where violence-and what is more,deliberateorganised violence will be openly regarded by men as a method of adjusting their differences. For nearly two hundred years civil war has been unknown, in England, its and possibility has almost ceased to be contemplated. “Law order” and had apparently become part of the national character, hypnotising the populace into submission to anything. ButUlsterhasbrokenthe spell. WhethertheUlster army be serious or a piece *of bluff scarcely matters. The fact remains that in this United Kingdom persons, considering themselves to have a vital grievance, have o purpose, f set organised an deliberately, and that army and prepared for civil war ; and where one others has started, may follow. In futureit will be of nousetellingstarvinglabourers that ,must they starve in quietude for “ L a w and order’s”sake. If peoplemay take up guns and fight inorder to defend therathervagueandunsatisfying privilege of damning the Pope, they may certainly take up arms . t o prevent a gang o obsceneblackguards f ones to death,What starving thleir wives and little is sauce for Belfast is sauce far Dublin, and sauce for Manchester and Liverpool, and even sauce for London a a pinch. t T h e old “Law andorder”lie will never really hypnotiseagain. It is, therefore, opportune to consider the chances o f an insurrection. At first the conditions of a modern State mightseem to rendersuch a thing impossible. Organisation communications and might appear too good. Even as l t as 1745 pretenders could landin ae remote spots (such as the Highlands) gather and a cons,derable army from the disaffected kflcrre so much as thenews couldreach the Royal forces. But to-day the telegraph would rouse every military station within thehour,andin a couple of daystherailway would concentrate sufficient troops at the point of danger to nip the revolution in the bud. I t would, therefore, seem a s if no hope could be placed in that species of insurrection which requirestimetogather force. The revolt must be as sudden and decisive as the measures used to quell. Itmustspring fully armed upon thescene like Minerva the from head of Jove. And that is practicallyimpossible,sinceno onecanorganiseand arm a modern army in secret under the very ‘nose o the f law. But as a matter o fact the insurrection’s prospect is f not as bad as this. Afterall if yourmodernState is a very terrible and efficient machine, italso is an extremelydelicateone. Itis centralised to a n abnmmal degree. It dependsforthose efficient communicas formidable o upon a limited tions which render it number of nerve centres such as power stations,railway junctions, viaducts, the and lik,e. Those seized o r destroyed its terriblelimbs are paralysed.Obvious possibilities suggestthemselves. Another important factor the is comparative impotence of thle modern army when faced withurban insurrection. N o hastilyraisedandbadlydrilled force of rebels could meet, say,the mobilised divisions of the Expeditionary force in the open field. But they might feel mom confidence behind the barricades of a sympatheticcity,andthat for ‘a variety o reasons. f Your modern army marches up to the rebellious city and camps outside its gate. Its ideal course will be t x ~use itsartillery to bombardthe placeintosubjection; but that involves immense destruction of life and property, from which all but th,e really desperate shrink,. especiallywhenthey reflect that the material toss will * * * THE immediate importance of Ulster’s preparations will do notsay that this has anything to do’ with the Young Australian Party ; but it is a state o things with f which, presumably, the Young Australian Party should be acquainted, and I should like to know what they say about it. I t is, of course, difficult to secure definite names evidence. and English officers are not accustomed to grumble in public; and the complaints which havecome tolightarenot widely known.Butmany private letters which have been received from Australia within the last twelvemonths or so makeinteresting reading. i[ * * * The YoungAustralian Party has merely threatened us with Germany. The Australian Liberal andLabour parties, however, are suspected in official circles in London-mind, I d o not say more than suspected-of being even less patriotic, Imperially ,speaking, than Mr. Hervey his and friends. Fo,r Mr. Hervey’s followers would appear to be willingt.0 give us achance. “Do this,or . . .” We canatleastunderstandthatlanguage. But we frankly cannot understand the attitude of the Labour Party andtheattitude of theLiberal Party. Both these political organisations have shown as much unwillingness as can well be imagined to ( 6 meet” the wishes of the Home Government, and chiefly SQ in all discussions connected with t,he fleet. The Australianshavealwaysdemanded thatany fleet €or which they pay, eith,er in men o r in money, shall be kept in Australian waters. The home authmorities naturally enough, want all the shipsof the Empire to be under some common command. Without some such arrangement, indeed, ,the result at a period of crisis would be little less than anarchy. W e should not know, in time, o n whom we might rely ; and, to speak frankly, the sus,picions of many influential people at home are that we shouldnot be able to rely uponAustralianassistance, whether in the form of men, money, or ships. # * * And nowa word onthisquestion of a n Australian navy.Australia would notbesafefrom Japan-Japan .is the bugbear-or, if you ,will, from the United States and Germany, unless she h’ad a fleet at least as large as that 91 Japan, and a fleet a s well manned and equipped and trained. Difficulties of population render alone people. The such a fleet impossible fortheAustralian only hope, then, for Australia, if she wishes to feel safe from the Japs, is relianceon the help which could be afforded by some strong nztion, no matter how far off. If the Japanese, for example, chose to attack quickly, as they have always done, the fleets olf the United, States and Germany would be as useless as the British Fleet. But the British Fleet, it may be said, should station ,a strongsquadron inAustralianwaters, or the United States may do SO and thus afford protection from Japan. * + I t Now, this is asubjectfor discussion. The opening of the Panama Canal will not find us unprepared : we are already strengthening station our naval at Bermuda and revising our strategical arrangements to fit thenew conditions. Butitmay as well bestated at once that neither Germany nor the United States can be relied upon to “defend”Australia. I t would take thce whole American fleet to dlo that, and if the American fleet werestationed in Pacific waterspermanentlythe w,ay would be open to Germany to carry out her colonial designs in South America; and she would, carry them out.Germany,ontheotherhand, would neverdream of sending a strong fleet to the Pacific, especially when France has three super-Dreadnoughts in course of construction and [others on order. One hint to Mr. Hervey andhisfriends : how wouldthey, asstatesmen,deal with a German-Japanesealliance?That is a t least as f likely an event as the rise o the Young Australia Party to power. My compliments to Mr. Hervey. 719 fall mainly on the governing class to whom theproperty belongs. And few modern Governments are desperateorevenaveragely strong-minded. Men like Gallifet a r e not found among the rulers of the average modern State. McKenna and Samuel are the more type. T h e chances are, therefore, thatthearmy will notbombard. I t will attempt to subduethe insurrection tionwithbayonetand rifle.And tbenitstroubles will begin. T h e city is, let u s assume, two or three miles square andcontains a b u t a million inhabitants. Your army numbers about 150,000. If it initiates a siege with the view s f reducing the city ‘by starvation, it is obliged t o distribute itself around perimeter loses the and its numerical advantage by making itself weak at all points and strong at none. I t may, therefore,bedefeated by a concentrated sally o the defenders, and in any case, f must be prepared to sit stillfor a considerable period whilst revolt and demoralisation a’re spreading an’d tho’se of itsownparty within the city arestarvingside by side with the defenders. If, on the other hand, it keeps fairlyconcentratedandtries to fightitswayintothe city in1 several large columns (thus ending the revolt at a blow), it will be faced with a difficult task. Its modern rifles will lose their advantage of range in the narrow, winding streets, and as they advance their owners will be subjected to a pelting fire o projectiles f fromthe houses oneither flank. Foeslurking in ‘bystreets, houses, and subterranean ways, will spring up and close in behind them. Every block of buildings diffiwill be a fortressto be taken by assault.Such culties have often vanquished well-organised troops in as in Paris in1 1830, 1848. There is no the past, reason why they should not do so again in Ithe future. But an insurrection on these lines would have to be sudden and universal. Itmight well develop from a successful riot in thestreet.But in any case, unless practically the wholepopulationwereunited in spontaneous and desperate resistance, disipline and organisation would prevail. Half measures are no use against a modernState. The examination of this type is of particular importance because it is obviously the type to which we can approach most immediately in the present condition o industrial society. Indeed most ofthcose who propose f theestablishment of whatis called“Guild,Socialism” speak asthoughan immediateconsummation of this mrt-“The Guild working in conjunction with the Employers”-were the object they had in mind. Ishallnotherediscuss how far the achievement is practicable. The whole question of whatis and what is not practicable, and of what is ‘most easily practicable, Ishalldealwithinthelatterpart o thesepapers. f I am considering only the necessary consequences o each f particular type of Guild as an ideal type. In other words, let u s first set up such and such’ a type of Guild by hypothesis in order to discoverhow far it satisfies thehuman end for which Guilds are imagined,. Only thus can we discover which type should be our ideal. Then, when we know which type is the satisfactory one, we canproceed to examine how far our idealispractically realisable. N o w it should be evident-I would almost call it selfevident-that a Guild the members ‘of which controlled in theorynothingmorethantheir own labour, while their instruments of production and their stores of food were controlled by a Capitalist class, would be no advance whatsoever towards the Guild idea and would be as much a negation of it as the first type in which the Statewastheowner of thecapital.For you have in this second type exactly the same dilemma as you have in the either Capitalist owning first; the class the machinery and the stores of food, fuel, clothing and the rest really controls these o’r only nominally controls them. If it really controlsthem, if that all-important point of Property resides in the Capitalist class, then the Capitalistclasscanalwaysand necessarily dictateits terms to the Guild. You may reply just was as replied -in the case 0.f State Ownership that in point of fact the Capitalist class would be beaten in any such struggle once Guilds of this sort were established. “The Guild havingthe monopoly of labour,’’ you say, ‘‘can by refusing labour its bring things to a standstill.”Whether it can do so or notconcernsthe practical and not the theoretical part of my discussion : it deals with the question “How Guilds may be made,” cot with the question “Which Guildis good.” But it is obvious that if the Proletarian Guild, by refusing its labour,canforcetheCapitalistownerstocapitulate, then the Guild has passed from type No. 2 to type No. 3. Before its victory it was a Guild of proletarians working Capitalist under masters or-if the word “under” be offensive to muddled brains, then“in association with” Capitalist masters; after its victoryit will have become a Guild controllingits own capital, and will be a Guild of what I have called the third type, that is, a Guild themembers of which hold corporate property in its means of production. Let us takeaconcrete case. The Miners’ Guild is working with machinery owned by the Capitalist class. It has amonopoly in the labour of mining which certainlynoman canlearn a t a moment’snotice. It is “black-leg”proof. I t informstheCapitaliststhrough its officials that the men propose in future to work six hours less in the week. The Capitalists rejecttheproposal. There foilows what is called a strike to-day, but what I suppose to be called when these Guilds were working association “in with” Capitalists, a painful disagreement. Capitalist The class also is in control of theFood Guilds, the Clothing Guilds,the Housing Guilds, the Railway Guilds, a t least in so far as material objects are concerned. (I know that this a ishighly theoreticway of putting it, and that in practice there will be plenty of leakage and plenty of opportunity for the proletarians of the Guild to accumulate small stores forthepurpose of afight.Butpleaseremember that in this first part of my discussion I am carefully keepi n g to the ground of pure theory.) An Examination of the National Guild System.-III. By H. Belloc. OFthe two typesof Proletarian Guild-that is, of “autonomous associations for the regulation o labour existf ingamong men dispossessed o capital working f and with the capital they may not (own’’-we have seen that the first type ,(that in which the State was 1 he owner of the Capital) was in effect a negation of the Guild idea. So long as thjat type, which I have called type No. I , trulyexists, so long as theState effectively controls the means of production for which the Guild worked, so long those human needs for which a Guild is called into existence are leftunsatisfied. For the members of the Guild cannot in any test casecontrol the conditions o their own labour if their supplies of food and instruf ments of toil are in the hands of the politicians. Whenever a conflict might arise between the Guildmen’s conception of what theyshould do and the conception of those who controlled the capital used in their trade, the Guildmen-having no food and no tools--are atthe mercy of those who control that capital. If in a struggle they defeated the State, thenthe Guild hadceased to be a Guild of the first and type, had changed its character altogether. It had become a Guild o’f the type I have called type No. 3, a Co-operative Guild owning its own capital. Let u s next consider the second type of Proletarian Guild which I have calledtype No. 2. In this type the Capitalist class continues to own the capital with which the Guild works-just as it owns that Capital to-day in ‘England-and the Guild consists in no morethan a n association of proletariansorganisedforthe supposed autonomous control of their hours methods and of labour. 720 It cannot be denied that in such a struggle the proletarians would be by definition entirely in the hands of their Capitalist associates the for simple reason that they could not eat so long asthestruggle endured. Strikers can eat to-day while the struggle endures because our laws have not established Proletarian Guilds o this kind f with the corresponding control over material objects vested in a Capitalist class. One may say that such is the rough plan of society, but the plan is most imperfect, and our Trades Unions, though virtually proletarian, accumulate can to a smallextent. Our laws preconceive property as a general right and as an universalinstitution(thoughinpoint of fact it has ceased to be so), and the proletarian groupscan own a little and are secure in their control of that little. But in the pure theory of type No. z you have Capitalism in theoretic absolute control the and Guild wholly proletarian, Evensuppose that the Guildwins, whether because the system was not ideally perfect (as of course in practice it could never be) or because men in the Food and Clothing other and Guilds revolted successfully and wereable to help their fellowsin th’e Miners’Guild. Why thlen, the Miners’ Guild, as an association of Proletarians working “in conjunction with” the Capitalists, the Guild,which I have called type No. 2 , would be trailsformed something into quite different. It would have become a Guild of the type No. 3. For if ycu can beat the Capitalist on one question you can beat him on another. If your monopoly o:f labourenables you to say how and when you shall work it equally enables you to say what proportion of the total produce you shall have, and naturally you would ask for asmuch a s you can get and Capitalist the will (be squeezed out. But if the Capitalist is squeezed out and Proletarian the Guild steps his into shoes then Proletarian that Guild is no longer proletarian, but has become a Guild possessed of corporate ,ownership in its means o production : that f is, it has become a Guild of the third type. I know very well that this self-evident and deductive reasoning will seem terribly jejune tlo the fine, confused thinking o our time, and I am a little ashamed f to set down at such length a process of reasoning so exceedingly simple. I t isnone thelessnecessary,thoughit sound repetitive in the ears of the intelligent and though its ,conclusions be fairly obvious its from premises. I t i,s necessary to go through this elementary process because, until we are quite clearly fixed upon our first principles, we perpetually tend to sentimental or vague expressions the essential quality of which is an attempt to combine two contradictory things’. Let me for the sake of illustration leave my theoretic method for a moment and put the matter actually, that I may drive home my conclusion. I say that a guild of type No. 2, a Proletarian Guild working “in association with’’ Capitalist owners, fails to satisfy the human needs for which a guild is t o exist. Those needs are the choice by the workman of !he conditions of his work and the control by the workman of his own lifle : the escape from a sense of dependence and exploitation and the enjoyment of a sense of economic freedom. Now put yourself into the shoes of an engine driver in the Railway Guild. He has had cause to. cornplain to his officials of the quality of the coal supplied to him. He is given coal which subjects him to a perpetual anxiety because heisnever certainhow long he can keep up hishead of steam and his fireman is under a ceaseless strain of stoking whi,ch interferes with all the other work on the foot-plate. Both men are discontented unhappy; and they feel they living are in a fashion which they certainly would not live in if t h e y had anything to do with tbe supply of coal. There is already behind this strain and unhappiness, a larger foundation of discontentinthefactthat they cannot live unless they receive their weekly wage,andthatpredisposes them to worry even over trifles, because it is an inhuman condition. I will admit for the moment that if the Guild supplied. the coal and controlled it the engine driver, as a member of the Guild, would feel that he had some power (I only admitthisforthesake of hypothesis at this point). Well,hegoestohis official ,and complains. he The official, beingan official of the Guild andnot of the Capitalist, sympathises and says he will see what can be done. The request is passed on, and ultimately it must come before wm,e person who speaks and acts for the actual controllers o the coal, the people in whom the f coal is vested as property by law, and whom the armed. forces of the community protect in the exercise of that property : th.at is,theCapitalists. If theydecide that ; if they-not living thethecoalis“goodenough” engine-driver’s life andnotcaring much whether he suffers or no so long as they can just save the breaking point-refuse to change the coal, and if the Guild supports the engine driver ( a large admission which I again make for the sake of hypothesis), then there is a strike. Take the matter as one of principleandleteachside. fight it out ; the Capitalist controllers of the coal are asmuch the masters as they were before any Guild came intoexistence. Theycontrolnot only thecoalbutthe food by which the man and his family live, and they can shut off supplies. If, inpointoffact, they give way and if the rule about the coal is changed permanently, then in thatsection of the means of production the official of t h e Guild is the controller for the future. The Guild will only have to report “bad coal,” and to refuse it, for othercoal to be suppliedhim. In other words, who happens to sign the cheque for the coal or to send the order to t,hecolliery,isindifferent. It is the Guild official who creates the demand and who can effectively obtain the supply. And to that extent-in the one’ matter o the coal-the GuiId has enteredinto posses-. f si*on of itsInstruments of Toil. If it thussuperseded the Capitalists in a few points the Guild would still remain under type No. 2 as the dominant type, and upon most matterstheenginedriver m u l d stillremain a n unsatisfied and therefore unhappy proletarian. His. Guild would not be fulfilling the function of giving him asense of controloverthe conditions o hislabour. f But if the Guild weretosupersedetheCapitalist on very many such points o command, then it would mean f that the dominant type had passed from Guild No. 2 to Guild No. 3 , and that the Railwaymen’s Guild was more the master of its instruments held in corporate propertythan the Capitalists were. But so long as the effective control o the means o f f production and o the store of food, etc., are to a def termining extent in the hands of a Capitalist class, an& so long asthe Guild remainsProletarian,that Guild does not satisfy the human need. The truth is that neither Guild No. I nor Guild No. 2 , neither the Guild whose capital is owned by the State, northe Guild whtose capital is owned by a Capitalist class, are really Guilds at all. Neithera is solution of our economic difficulties ; to call such organisation “Guilds” is in the case of both merely substituting pleasant for unpleasant words ; while thosewho telr u s that such“Guilds” would lead to a better state of things which they proceed to describe, are merely telling us that they do not make either of these Guilds their ideal and their object. Nio one can seriously support the Guild idea unless he, has for his ideal and his object one of the two remaining. types Guild, of one of thetwo Owning Guilds as I have called them, and the serious part of our theoretical’ discussion must turn upon which of these two is theoretically satisfactory to thehuman needs we are attempting to supply. Does the Guild which is in corporate possession of its means of production, or the Guild whose members are possessed of several property, w,h,ether in thleir own Association o r elsewhere, best fulfil the Guild function and best supply in theory the human needs which are cryingoutagainsttheCapitalistsystemof to-day ? That is the question which I propose to approach in mytwo next articles. 72 I Quantity and Quality. By Guglielmo Ferrero. (Translated by R . H . C . from the Figaro '' of October 7, 7913.) THEnewspapers have been discussing during last month a problem of fiscal policy which has recently arisen between France and Germany. I t concerns more the f vigorous application o one of the French fiscal regulations., the purport o which, if I understandit,isto f require that objectsmadeabroadshallalsohearthe mark of the country that imports them, thus :-"Imin ported fnom so and so." Germany,itseems,isnot f favour o so precise a regulation; and doubtlessthe matter will b'e settled by mutual concessions after the manner o all those problems in which only limited cow f flicting interests a r e at stake.Thereare,it is true, of a graver nature at this enough preoccupations moment to excuse the public from reflecting much. upon the general bearing of a trifling tariff question. All the kind a considerable same, questions of this conceal socialimportancebeneaththeirmodestaspect,for the gravest current problem of modern industry is involved in thlem. Modern industry has succeeded in .multiplying the production of commodities to extent an that would appearfantasticto aman of t h e eighteenth century. From the point of view of quantity, as a philosopher has said, we haveperformed prodigies. Butfromth.e point of view of quality, modern industry threatens to I t so mingles make of the world one colossal mystery. and confuses models with imitations that very soon nobody will beable to tell onefrom.theother. You imagine, forexample,that you arebuyingIndianor Japanese articles. But they hlave been manufactured in such and a suchfactory Europe. in Parisian goods, English wares, etc., etc., are made anywhere an'd everywh,ere. The characteristic souvenirs which Oriental travellers bring home are nearlyallmadeinEurope. In Lombardy,instance, manufacture for they and export to the East a goodmany Smyrna carpets. The problem of origins ,becomes even moremysteriousin the sphere of luxuries over which chemistry wields its magical wand-perfumes, liqueurs, and so on. Speaking for myself, I cannot conceive a more curious conversation than one between who men knew modern commerce through and through, and were at the same time disposed to l'et u s into little its secrets. The devices employed to-day to palm o f on tbe public as of f a superiorqualityarticles of nomorethan a cheap quality, are certainly incredibly complicated and r dined. How muchgeniushas been spent in inventing these thousand and one mystifications ! A phenomenon of such,magnitudeisnotthe effect of merechanceor of any inexplicable vagary of the human mind. It is intimately bound up with the whole movement of modern civilisation which has everywhere seen quantity triumph over quality. Sooner or later,however, it will, benecessary toputsomelimits tothis licence to practise mystification on the public; at least id we do not wish to see the sense of beauty and the desire for perfection utterly extinguished in our epoch. W e laugh readily enough at men who ask, before judging whether a thing is beautiful or not, whence it comes, and who made it. This blind confidence in mere ticketing seems so absurdly superstitious that it justifies in th.e eyes of many people the men who unscrupulously is not the question necessary bo enable exploitit.Yet US to learn, todistinguish between thegoodandthe mediocre and the bad? The majorityofmen are not born with aninstinct sufficiently certain to make this distinction by themselves; they become capable of makingit by comparingmanyobjectsamongthemselves, and against objects whichserve as a standard of measurement. The blind confidence in certain labels, with which people are reproached, only shows their need of a standard of value by which to judge the quality o f things. Of course, the perfection of those objects that serve as a model is absolute. not I t is obvious that neither Japanese porcelain nor Persian carpets represent a level of perfection which can never again be reached or even surpassed. They are only models of relative perfection, like all the other works of man which hav'e acquired, by dint of prolonged effort, a great reputation. But ftor this very reason th,ey serve for a time thle purposes both of a standard by which to judge objects o the f as incentives to do, stillbetter. They samekindand of the. most important factors in are,therefore,one progress.Buttheycannot play thisimportant role if they areconstantly being falsified as they are being to-day. The good and themediocre, I repeat, are now so mixed thatitisalmost impossible to distinguish them.Henceitcomesthatquality is judged by price instead of price by quality. In American journals one finds already advertisements which recomm'end their goods because they are the most costly. Is it necessary 'to point out th,e dangers involved in adopting this standard of value for the quality of things? The countries an,d the industries which have created models ought therefore to defend thceir authenticity, noct only in their )own interest, but in the great interests of civilisation.Givingmankind the means of distinguishing the genuine from its imitations is a contribution to the most exalted conception of progress. But the task is far fr,omeasy. The resistance offered to s simple o and modest a. remedy as thle declaration of origin is a proof of it.Modernsociety is suchanetwork of conflictingintereststhat even the countrieswhose goods are most generally imitated great have difficulty in. organisinganeffective defence. The spirit o theage f favours cheap imitations. And this state of affairs can only be improved by modifying certain ideas which today are verypopular. It is necessary to give a little mo're importancetoquality in respect of everything, even, and above all, in matters ,economic. Nations have too readily submitted, perhaps, to the blind tyranny of statistics. Take, example, for the statistics .of relative exports. Usually it is only the figures that are compared. When these increasethere isprogress; whentheyfall, it is decadence;andthe nations that can point t'o the largestfigures are supposed tomarchatthe head of civilisation. Butthesejudgas they do 'of quantity only, ments,, taking account too simple expeditioustest. and a Unseem a little doubtedly quantity is a power; it h'as always been; above all it is a power in a n age like ours which tends everywhere It0 exploit territories large and to organise formidable armies. The nations thlat to-day can proc duce much and quickly, enjoy advantages which no age has before ever known. Even the nations that have inherited the traditions of old civilisations find themselves compelled to reckon with the new situation. But quantity, though a force, and a great force, ought not men wish to be transtobe the force,unlessindeed formedintosimplewealth-producing machines. I t woul'd bedesirable,th,erefore, toanalyse alittle more carefully than we usually do our statistics of industry an,d commerce, and to see what composes them. The exports ,of raw material and thle exports of m a n factured g o d s mayequally enlarge th'e figures of the returns; but they have a very different moral and social significance. Among the manufactured goods which nations mutually exchange there are also considerable differences. Nativeindustries, which aretheresult of long national effort, ought by no means to be confused withtheindustries of imitation,fortheformer alone are the manifestation of the real creative energy of the nation.I do n.st understand whyanynation that sells its native original products for a hundred millions should consider itself inferior to a nation that sells imitations of the same things for twice or thrice that sum. 722 Pragmatic Patriotism v. Words. PHILOSOPHERS, eminent publicists, even, particuand larly super-eminent politicians, all find it diffcult to express the only unbiased truths of theirown,ortheir Party’s, quasi-national and quasi-imperial predilections in current English, and, ipso facto, in un-British (as it happens to be) and unnational political phraseology. A s amatter of fact,the onlypoliticalnomenclaturepermitted and popularised by the associated factions of an obsolete system makes it impossible either to think (for we think in words) or speak clearly of any British (not English) national problem which exceeds the bounds of a mere privilegedalways junta’s and only local monopoly. Inthisconnection, 1 amassured by two editorsone a Socialist, other the a Conservative-that Imperialistsgenerallyaim atnomorethan somecloser form of co-operation, a closerunion,between the only five actualStates of their own sovereignBritishrace. But this section of self-styled Imperialists, in that they exclude six-sevenths of the people of the Imperial British Empire, and includeonly the States and white citizens of their own historic national (not Imperial) expansion, in fact, States the of this kingdom (not “ country”) in its expansion-our own people Qf our own race and history and patriotism, in five countries (not of five “nations”?), surely are not Imperialistsare greater than Imperialists, in that they are British Nationalists? For, after all, the ultimate power of, and over, this Imperial Empire is the Sovereign Nation and its Crown.They forgetthattheempireissubject-to thissovereignPower.Theythink of an English Empire, over, and with, a “greater” British Empire, without perceivingclearly theessential differencebetween the two words English British, and and when they should think of their own in truth greater National sovereignty which is supreme over its subject empire. But still, an overwhelming majority of leading anda s Brougham would have put it-“proper” Imperialists unquestionably areEmpireNationalists,or(thesame thing) Imperial Nationalists, or, to use a more common phrase,ImperialUnionists. In the words of a leading Imperialistdaily(andI could quotemanyleaders, including prospective and ex-Ministers, to the same effect) this stronger section desire-“the independence of Great Britain, and the politicalunity in whichiscomprised the KingdomDominions, United and the including the Empire o India and the protectorate over f Egypt.” It does matter not that in this “unity” British subject negroes, for instance, will outnumber Englishmen. Any kind of Imperialism, for that matter, in all itsingloriousrun of fortyormoreyears, still resists, a s must, it economic and terminological analysis, as well as public discussion, argument, or criticism. Nevertheless, this all in case, depends on whatismeant by the word “unity,” and whether the phrase, “the independence of Great Britain,” subconsciously or otherwise, postulates English domination. Here we havetwokinds of Imperialists,eachspeaking of unity though aiming at different “ideals,” each even among themselves, confusedwith and supporting the other, but both (and thisis the point which I am trying to make clear) imbued with the extraordinary hallucmation that unity, either national Imperial, or can carry it with any (preferably form “English”) of domination together with its corollary subjection. Usage, I amfurther told by twootherpre-eminent leaders of “the backslumsofFleetStreet,”together with the inconvenience of tryingtoexpress political thought in other than an admittedly inaccurate, though popular,terminology,isthereason why speakersand writers label things which are predominantly British, English. Two years ago the Colonial Secretary refused to define the word “Imperial.” To-day no party statesman dares to question any interpretation either of that or offer a precise descripword or the word “Nation, tion of either British o r National patriotism. As a matter of fact, no responsible statesman could authori)) tatively pronounce any judgment in these matters, for the very simple and sufficient reason that, in the absence. of any National authority-Executive or Parliamentary,, and because Sovereignty has devolved from one to five divided States(the four Dominion States exclusively governtwo-thirds of the Empire’s territory, and onefourth of the sovereign nation) there is now, with interState,andinter-Party jealousy, machinery no left in any State through which a National pronouncement can beobtainedorsuggestedwithoutrisking a charge o f intolerance. Yet, at this time, a s every informed thinking man is aware, there are two grave questions involving practically every considerable measure within the now restricted jurisdiction of the Parties, which should overlap, all the hubbub of this partisan and unnational localism, but which,nevertheless, are entirelyswampedin the silly frenzied struggleforPartysupremacy : (i) Can the natural or any resources of little Britain provide a n adequate remedy for her social problems? (ii) Can Britain alone, drained as she is first of money and then of men, nolongerpre-eminenteven in herforeigntradeand’ foreign markets, in fact, relatively, indubitably, and inevitably retrogressive in both wages and trade, preserve that prestige (and security) which has been the privilege of British citizenship, which is the right of each State of the sovereign nation, as well as our sole inter-State warrant of Empire? Look where you will for impartial evidence, thereisbutoneanswertoboththesequestions. Nor is this a pessimistic conclusion. W ea r e , greater than we know. Britons can still hold their own without fear; though Britain must fail, and though “England”andthe“English”admittheir equitable. part in a greater inter-State sovereign nation and kingdom. Let me now briefly touch on some causes that indubit-. ably make for the curious political waste of our unprecedented inter-State National (Imperial, is a wrong term) resources and opportunities, and which, I submit,. are due to the economicdisunitycaused by our utter failure to appreciate the real value of words or the true. history of British National Imperial) (not expansion. Speaking at Newcastlerecently, anUnderSecretary, Mr. J. M. Robertson, M.P., said : ‘‘ I t is because I am a champion of smallnationalitiesthat I a m a Home Ruler . . . wherever one race has power over another race there is danger of injustice.” In this case, race is. a sub-British professing race, nationality, or rather BritishnationalityandBritishpatriotism,isgiven thetitle. But I could quote other and more eminent authorities who variously claim that country, or Government, or history, are each main factors in nationality. Which precept is made to predominate depends almost entirely on Party bias, localism, and the exigencies of a transient argument ; while National expediency and history a r e wholly ignored. Anyhow, if I take another of these authorities, the “Morning Post,” I find that that paper admits that there are thirteen “nations” of the “British, race” in “England”and in thefour Dominions. But it does not admit (nor can it deny) that all these are, in fact, the one sovereign Nation of one British kingdom, a sovereign State of five States. Nor will itadmit (or. deny) that this Kingdom and this nation stand supreme as the sovereign Power over, and apart from, the subject empire. Now claim I (i) that the inclusion of the subject empire in what is fundamentally an economic problem of Britishunitybars all progress,iswrongfromevery material point of view, and simply adds chaos to chaos. Furthermore, I believe (ii) that, in these days, nationality must include statehood, recognition, and its. own patriotism, an exclusive patriotism. The sovereign Power of this Empire, and like, because British of, patriotism,isnational. I t follows thatcommunities of the British race and patriotism, and the peoples o the. f Empire, who are not of that sovereign nationality, perforce are subject-subordinate, inferior-to it. T h e “Post” claims that usage makes it correct t o label t h e British of Britain “English. ’’ Consequently, Canadians and Australasians should ask themselves whether they 723 are and subject inferior, subordinate, or the to “English. ’’ If theyreally areseparatenationals,and if they agree with the late Prime Minister of Australia that they are “subordinate” nations, then they are not subordinate to, or “within the Empire,”which obviously is not a Power, but to a sovereignty and to a nationality which, according to the “Post,” is English. nation A is the greatest political combination. British sovereignty is in nationality and its patriotism. The bulk of the resources ‘and real wealth of this Nation, the future of this Nation a s a Power, is not in Britain, butin,andwith,the Dominions,. But,in my opinion, if the British of the Dominions are encouraged, as they are, to persist in their claim to separate nationality, the end can only bring a clear title to that claim, which is sovereignty independence. would with This mean, of course, the finish of British prestigeandthe fall of another Empire. other In words, Imperialism still is andalwaysthechimera of sentimentalistsorworse : English localism, in turn,disregardingthesourcesof all wealth, is an argument, of a kind, against the established economic advantages of combination ; while Nationalism, with, in our case, inter-State co-operation of one people qf one common patriotism, is the proper basicsolution of most of ourproblems. A. G. CRAFTER. as if England were a perfect country, with no political o r social evils, invariably animated in its foreign dealings by motives of humanity and abstract justice. Many will object that to assert thle contrary would be disloyal and t’o “give away” on$e’snative land. Such objectors are the very persons that I have in mind and by that very thought “giv,e to away’’ admit hypocrisy. An Englishman once lectured me for three-quarters of an hour ,in(a n Egyptian train upon the superiority of England and the English in a most offensive tone under the impression ,that he was talking, as he put it, ta “ a n intelligent native.” I amglad, f’or the good name of England, that eloquence for once was thrown away upon a fellow-countryman. Personally, ‘having a great dislike bo bombast o the f sort, I amnot above confessing imperfection even to a n African.Ourself-righteousness is principally to blame for the horror which has filled the East upon th.e recrudescence of the wicked old crusading spirit in our midst, duly reported by the Turkish and the Indian Press, at a timewhenTurkeywasdeserving of all humanpity. We had talked as if fanaticism were extinct in England. Just when the shore began toglide away, the steamer backing slowly from landing-stage the in search of room to turn amid, the crowd of boats, a man I knew came up to sit by me. Seeing him salute [he two dld him t o present me to critics of the English, I .begged them. After some demur, he for declared that they were quite old-fashioned and uninteresting, he complied. Referring to their former conversation about England overheard by .me, Itried to tellthemwhat 1 thought the truth, that the English people who reviled Mahomedans did so fromsheerignorance,fostered by the Press, inwhich theTurkishpoint of view was never even stated, while long ,diatribes in favour of the Balkan I asked them t o say States were published daily. frankly wbether they themselves these in conditions would ,not have sided with a league of Muslim States (supposing such existed) against a Christian Power accused of .persecuting Muslims, at once, without a second thought of right or wrong? To this they b t h assented very readily. “But what do you mean,’’ they asked, “‘by saying it was not permitted to state the case for Turkey in the newspapers? W a s it by order of the Government ? The Opposition would submit to no such order.” There was no Opposition where foreign affairs were concerned and in every case it was probably more apparent than real, I confessed, and tried to show the comic side of party government. (My hearers chuckled, saying that they had observed the same phenomena at home in Turkey.) As for the boasted Freedom o the Press, it had ceased f to be a factor in our national life, through the fault not o the journalists themselves, ,but ,of the proprietors of f journalswho,desiring‘honours at the hand of oneor other of the two great parties, were amenable t’o party discipline. Touching theorderagainstpublishing proTurkishmatter, I could notsaywhetheritemanated from Government, from the or some huge financial interest,butthat such ,an orderhad been laid on the was a fact well whole party Press for many weeks known tlo everyTurcophil in England. The friends of Turkey numbered many thousands, and were mostly to be found among educated the classes. But they had neverbeen allowed a public hearing. As far as I was aware the only paper in all England which had published anything like a full statement of the case was THENEW AGE-a weekly independent journal much too honest to be widely read. a short laugh. “Mash’ Allah !” theyexclaimedwith “Then your country is not perfect, as they always tell US. There are faults and drawbacks in existence there as here !” “Exactly,” I replied, “and also crime and ignorance. Our leaders are not always of the first intelligence. They sometimes make mistakes, dare own and not them. Our people are tenacious of old prejudices. We are upon the whole a most unamiable nation, composed of quite well-meaning individuals. ” When the two old gentlemen perceived ,that, though A Pilgrimage Turkey During Wartime. to VI. B y Marmaduke Pickthall. ONEevening when I was returningfromStamboul, I got on board theboatsome time before itstarted. Views of England. Choosing a seat whence I could see the mosques and the old palace looking down upon the sapphire water gay with little boats, I began to glance through the. columns o ani evening paper I had purchased on the quay. As it f happened there were sitting near me two old gentlemen, also with evening papers in their hands ; who presently f began discussing the report therein contained o a meeting of pro-TurksinLondon to protestagainstGreat Britain’sBalkan policy. I ‘hadread the notice of the meeting in my journal, so knew a t once to what their taIkreferred. It ran like thi,s : “ I t seems we have some friends there as in France !’’ (6 Aye, as in France precisely-a few exalted souls like Pierre Loti, are who persecuted derided and ! The English, like the French, are full of words-toleration, humanity, liberty, and so onlbut when itcomesto deedsthosewordsare seen to be quite empty. The common people are exceedingly fanatical, and common people in thoselandscontroltheGovernment.Please Godthey will bepunishedfortheir perfidy. Indiais not contented with the course affairs are taking,” “They say that England has decided to give u p India to the Russians some day.” “ I don’tgive five paras for that opinion. England will give u p nothingshehas laid herhandson.The Anglo-Russallianceisbuttemporary, asagainstthe Muslims. It is apure product of fanaticism.Assoon as Persia and the Guarded Realms* have been subjected altogether to a Christian yoke, England and Russia will fight furiously for the spoils.” Their conversation soon meandered off to other topics, while I watched the city growing dreamlike as the sun sank. The view of modern Europe a s old Christendom, united by a fanatic hatred of Islam, was nothing new t o me. All Muslims hold it more or less,andthey are justified by the whole course of recent history. The feeling towards us English, have who not been among the active persecutors, would not have been SO very bitter .among Turks, wh,o are extraordinarily philosophical, not were it for our self righteousness : the way our diplomats, our missionaries and many private individuals in Turkey have of talking * Memaliki Mahrusah : i.e., the Ottoman Empire. 724 my tone flippant, was I was really earnest in apologising for my country’s failings, they at once began to differ from me, pointing instances British out of uprightness, intelligence, pluck, amiability, and what not, evinced in past affairs of Turkey, and the more I harped onourinfirmities,themoreenthusiastic theybecame. When I parted from them in the crowd at Haidar Pasha they were chattering together eagerly, vying with each other in pro-Britishardour.“If England-thepeople, not the Government-will stand by Turkey we are saved. I t is England’s turn to Russia that has been our death-blow. There no is other country in the world where public opinion is so free and so powerful. Ifonlly the English would behold u s as we are, a people struggling to be something noble in the world,they would befriend us though we are Mahomedans. They are not really such fanatics the as Serbs Bulgars. and And they would find us grateful, far more grateful than the Christians.” Those were some of theremarksto which I was obliged to listen. And theywerespoken earnestly, not in smooth the .and flowery language of convention which (supposingthat sthbey had felt not inclined to fight) would h,ave hailed a loud performance the on British trumpet. I n the train’ again came I upon the friend who, having performed the introduction, b d sat listening to our conversation, helping me with words when needed. He beckoned me to come and sit beside him, and at once began : “ W h a t you said to those two old efendis was pretty; but you know as well as I do that your Government is very clever, and does not take part against ;he Muslims ! Is he fromstupidity.Look a t SirGrey,forinstance not a very clever man?” I said that I had n,o,tthe honour of his personal acquaintance, but was assured that he cameof a very good family, and was considered to maintain the best traditions of the Houseof Commons in his speech and bearing. He chuckled and looked hard at me a minute. “Well,” he said, “you will not deny that the Liberals are the fanatics, the Conservatives the progressive and enlightenedparty in yourcountry.TheLiberalshate the Muslimsand would welcome theirextermination. W e have it seen many times in my remembrance. Therefore it is a great misfortune for the Muslim world that a Liberal Government should have held the power in England at this great crisis of our fate.’’ I wished some Liberals a t home in England could have heard him. The Liberals, answered, be I might called the English a s opposed to the Imperial party inter(he you were fanatics”),that ruptedwith : “I told they is, they gave to home affairs the first place ; and, while not neglecting colonial and foreign business would not allow ittheimportance whichConservativesascribed to it. In fact they hardly viewed the British Empire as a whole, but as England and a number of dependencies. There was something to be said for that opinion, since England still was head ; and at a timewhen, as at present, she was on the verge of a great social revolution, the Government might be excused for being deeply occupied with affairs. home Having assigned the Foreign Office to a highly respectable man, beloved of the Opposition, thus precluding trouble in that quarter, they had hoped to hear nu more of it. The Balkan war had been a great distress to them, and there was not a man among themcapable of dealing bravely with the greater problems which raised. it Their so-called policy had been to drift along from day to day, trimming their sails to every wind that blew o r seemed a b u t to blow;andthroughit all theyhadbeen hampered by theiroldtradition, which hadmade o theBulgarian f and Armenian massacres a party cry to rouse fanaticism -a fanaticismwhichstill lived, and which they could not now control. “Thatis precisely whatI told you. Theyarethe fanatics,” said my friend. “Now listen ! They are doing untold harm t’oEngland, senselessly. It must be dearto everybody of intelligence thatTurkeyisno o danger t any Power of Europe at the present time. help her to increase her power? There is another danger which know, you as well as I d.0. N o t until the last Muslim Power has fallen under Christian rule will theIslamic world bereunited in a league of lifeand death,andthegreat revolt begin. W e do not want this. We consider it would be a great disaster for the Muslims and the world at large, w’hich should advance towards peace and universal toleration. But Europe seemsto wish toforceiton us. . . . Iwonder how much Russia spends upon your present Ministry !” I said that I believed our Ministers to ]be examples of integrity. H e only shookhisheadandsighed : “Who knows?” “ W e need the help o Englishmen,” he said after a f pause,“not of the BritishGovernment,butEnglishmen, in ,our endeavour toraiseupthe people. Your individuals are splendid,thereisnodenying,andwe could trust them to deal fairly with a given charge. But the British .Government is treacherous, as we have Seen ahundredtimes. I t ,may be, as you say,thenatural consequence of a democracy; but yourGovernment is faithless,inconsistent.’’ I said that there was probably no living Englishman who did not in hisheartdistrusttheBritish Government, even though it represented his own party views, although to foreigners we all upheld it from a sense of patrioticduty. “ I admire that !” he exclaimed. “Would to God our peopledid the same thing when abroad. Instead, they grow enamoured of thecountrytheyarevisiting and pour contempt upon the name of Turkey.’’ My friend, I may remark, had never been t’o Europe. “When they come home again they are insufferable. They would altereverything, upon the model o the country they f admire. They have no idea of the value of national charactertoa people strugglingfor existence. They confound patriotism with fanaticism, a boneless ctosmopolitanism enlightenment. with The cause is in the lack of education-not mere instruction out of booksbut education in the strict religious sense. You English have preserved it ; you are very wise !” H e paused for half aminuteandthensighed : “Give us a dozen of your young administrators for a term of years !” I asked what cause he had fo,r thinking that Englishmenwould serve the needs of Turkey better than any otherEuropeans.Heansweredthatthe men of other European nations whenemployed by Turkey remained the servants of their Governments against I he Turks; f whereas it seemed to be a point o honour with the individual Englishman (from what he could hear) to be true to his employer against all the world. “But Frenchmen make as loyal: mercenaries,” I contended. “Yes,”heagreed,“they wo8uld notcheat us on a bargain.ButtheFrench, my friend,havethis peculiarity : that every Frenchmanis a missionary of h,is country’s language, irreligion, social chaos. The English,lessattractiveandlessamiable(savingyour presence), are the better educators. They do not make their pupils wish to become Englishmen, but by means of discipline, and natural the opposition arouses, it enable them to develop strong character.’’ “And the Germans?” I inquired when he had finished speaking. We had by this time alighted from the train and were walking in the twilight down the avenue of fine acacias which led past both our houses to the sea. “ W e like the Germans” he replied with a short laugh. “With a little practice and instruction they make quite good Turks. they too But are pervasive. We are muchafraid of them, desiring, a s wedo, to keep our country.” Upon a pauseheadded : “Has it ever struck you thiat Germany and Russia have a secret understanding? Think it over !” With these words he left me, turning in at his own gate. Why support her in her great crusade against us, and But Russia will become ere lo,ng a general danger. 725 Theory and Practice. By Duxmia. N o attentivestudent o thetimes will havefailedto f notice the growth during the last half century of what a great authority (Professor Chump in “The Modernist’s Year Book”) styled, has “Thoughtthought’s for sake.” “Up till about that time,” the well-known p m fessor remarked, “ O U ~ intellects were hindered by constant contact with’ the realities of daily life. The recurrence at frequent intervals of war and civil tumults, the o earning a livelihood at some f everpresentnecessity commonplace trade-for as yet there was no money in the Higher Thought-tied us by the leg. Our speedlationswerethose of ordinaryindividuals on a slightly We understoodthevulgarand more elevated plane. were understanded of them : our opinions rested upon a soundbasis of realexperience. Thehigherandmore beautiful forms of fatuousness were impossible to a class which was part of, and obliged to make itself comprehended common by, folk. Hence distressing the sanity o so much, of the thought of that epoch. f “But,”theProfessorwenton,“inthiswonderful twentieth century nous avons changd tout cela. The development o our urban life, the comparative absence f o science by the f of social disturbance, the endowment of the wealthy, all have permitted segregation the thinking class and its evolution upon lines designed to satisfy, not the multitude, but itself. Unfettered by the demands of reality(whichindeed we have almost excluded from our existences), we have entered upon the hitherto virgin fields of hallucination and delirium : we evolveideas that havenoreference to things as they are,are and meant not to have. ‘Thought f,or thought’ssake’is o u r motto.Thought i s deed in the of the term, and the rehighest and truest acceptation cognition o this truth may be held to absolve from the f execution o ideas f whose practice, put to it plainly, might land u s in almost irretrievable disaster.” S w h , in the Professor’s words, the are principles underlying the production o so many gems o contemf f porary ratiocination. To the thinker all things are permitted-except the practice o what hethinks. f It was to the neglect o this sovereign maxim that t h e imparf tial observer must attribute the declineand fall of tbe infant Renaissance of the South Suburban Area, which in its turn will be found to have dated its inception from theunfortunatecatastrophetoDr. Klaptamovski and the Associated Supermen of Upper Tooting, whose history is related in this article. The trouble arose with the introduction of the publican Bounce. This individual, essentially whose coarse, plebeian nature had been still further degraded by three and twenty years in the ranks of the British Army and by a lifelong indulgence in beer, should never have been admitted to the gatherings of a society devoted to the discussion and propagation o the Higher f Thought, his but position as landlord of the Scipio Road Assembly Rooms (where the meetings were held), and as supplier of the excellent Medoc a t a shilling the bottle,upon a constant supply of whichtheirsuccess was felt to depend, gave himclaims that the qualities o his mind and heart could never have subtantiated. f Already his ungentlemanly description of Nietzsche, the tutelary deity of the society, a s a “+y lunatic” had suggested his expulsion, but the dislike of unpleasantness natural to Supermen had prevented this being executed in time to avert the fatal blow which killed so promisingamovement atits birth.Uponsuchtrifles does the future of our race depend. I t fell during the course of the 132nd weekly meeting when the President, Klaptamovski, engaged Dr. was upon the reading of a brilliant and scholarly paper entitled, “The art of seduction : or the Superman’s moyensdeparvenir.” The doctordisserted atlength and withelegance upon thetheory s f an accomplishment without which no real Superman can consider his educationcompleted, andit was t h e universalfeeling that a fresh chapter was being added to the literature o amovement which wastravelling,inthewords f of its mosteloquentexponent,“beyond good and evil to something sweetly luxuriously and disgusting.” The Doctor had just reached that passage where, with peculiar subtlety, he describes the pleasures and efficacy of cruelty subduing in the female mind, when Bounce, whose coarse and material intellect remained impervious to the serene and horrible beauty o the Doctor’s conf ception, and who, like s many o his kidney, remained o f in bondagetothedogmas of an obsolete and servile theology, exclaimed, “Seduce ! You little worm ! An’ ’00 are you to talk abaht seduce? There ain’t one of you ’ere would ’ave the courage to seduce a b y clothes’or%.”Mr.Bouncethenwentontorefer to “chicken-’hearted little blighters mouthin’ filth that none of ’em would lavethegutstoperform,”after which he roseand left the room. Of such were those who persecuted Galileo Copernicus and and opposers and obstructors of progress in every age. I t would have been more prudent, it would have been more worldly,it would have been morewisehadthe Superman treated these manifestations o the publican f intellect withthatcontempt which thehigherrightly feels towards the lower at every age and every in clime : but the natural mettlesomeness o the thoroughf bred, intensified perhaps by an average o at least threef quarters o abottle of notverymuchdiluted f Medoc, suggested a course t a t c o d e r wisdom would have platform, deprecated o r disallowed. Springing to the Dakapple, whose reputation a s adashing immoralist haspenetrated-tothePutneyFuturistsandwas not altogether unknown even among the Progress Societies of Hammersmith Turnham and Green, called loudly upon the excited gatheringtodisprovethis deliberate insult to the virility of aproud’and heartless brotherhood. “Seduce !” he bellowed. “ I sayto you that in expiation o thisindignityI f will seducenota clothes horse,noryetone livingfemale,noryetfifty,but a thousandandten ! Virginsshall be violatedinassertion of oursupermanity : flappersshall he deflowered that Bounce, the publican, may be brought to nought ! Balhamshallbesweetwith blood ! Lovely,fair, and terrible things shall be enacted after dark on Clapham Common. There shall tears be in Tooting ! Goroo ! Goroo !” Here Mr. Dakapple repeatedly kicked the small boy kept by the society for the especial mnvenience o members wishing to relieve their supermanity, f and the rest of the meeting quaffed great draughts of red wine, gurgling “Gore !” And thus it was that, starting from the next morning the Associated Supermen beganthatseries of heroic attempts to put their principles into practice, which resulted, alas, in the collapse and discredit of the movement, and the decline and fall of all the infant Renaissance of the South Suburban Area. Sed resurgat. Sweet folly is immortal. As general reporter the to “Brixton Times” Clapham and correspondent of the “Stockwell Sentinel,” found I myself summoned by telegram at an early hour toattendthe preliminary f meeting o the Supermen before setting out upon their by variousroads.The scene, so beautifullyportrayed the inspired Cubist, L’Artichaut, in his famous tableaux “Klaptamovski’s Farewell” was solemn and impressive in thetruest sense. In aroomthronged by his followers,theauthor of “TheArt of Seduction”stood gracefully apart and bade a cheerful good-bye to each of his fellow Ubermenschen : hiseyes,peering uncertainly t,hrough his gold-rimmed spectacles, spoke better than words to those who knew him of confidence, a hope,andthestrange,unearthlybeauty of theSouth Suburban Renaissance was adequately symbolised in the flask-like contour of hisshouldersandthecreases in hisboots. “ I s all ready?”he inquired,and upon receiving the affirmative, passed to his doom through quietlyand the double row of Press photographers as proudly as ever he had passed from his bedchamber to theeggs and bacon of breakfast.Thedetails of his subsequent attempt to vindicate the brutality of the 726 Association by pulling Mr. Bounce’s were nose fully related at the inquest. The scene of the next act in the drama of that remarkabledaylay in the Nightingale Lane, where that fair flower of evil, Dakapple, attempted the forcible abduction of Miss Rosina Cale, a prominent lady resident in that neighbourhood. “Marriage by capture,” Dakapple had said, ‘‘is the only species o sexual contract Worthy f of Supermen,” and now he showed that he was ready to act UP tohisopinion.Haltingthehirelingtaxidriver at the gate (for his nervous an’d romantic temperament, unsuited toequitation, prohibited the employment of the traditional horse), the Futurist knight in a burst of ubermenshlich savagery, effected the breach of an area window ;;but-such is the uncharity of fortune-the pasdesage of his body through the aperture thus created rived an added difficulty from the attachment of a bulldog to those softer regions surrounding the extremities of the Dorsa Magna from which it can usually be separated only ‘by the application !of heatediron. The to zhe same artificial impediment precludedreturn a cab. At this point the advent o the guardians of a serf vile morality put a term to a situation which would have been uncomfortable to any man, but which to a Superman double was humiliation. subsequent The fine of A and costs was borne with greater equanimity than 5 t h e observations of t.he magistrate, a totally uncultured person whose daily contact with the lower classes had deprived him of any vestiges of sympathy with the misfortunes of a highly strung and romantic temperament. LudovicoSforzaBanks,conceivinghis will to find its highest expression in the elimination of the unfit, set out with a hunting spear and half a dozen bloodhounds upon thechase of those unfortunates whom suphe posed to beresidentsomewherein the north-easterly direction of the Walworth However, Road. upon reaching Camberwell he was set upon by three drunken navvies nearthe“PintPot’’ public-house and all his boneswerebroken. Scarcely more fortunatewasthe experience of the three Bawley brothers and the Tripe Girl, who, inspired Dionysos, by stripped naked and ran up Bedford Hill, crying that they were Bacchantes and waving thyrses hastily constructed from pea sticks and hair ribbon. For near St. John’s Episcopal Church theyfoundtheroadup,and,theirbare feet proving unable to cross the flints,theywererounded up and captured in the front garden o number fourteen .by the f police and crowd. The unfortunate proximity the of central establishment ‘of the Metropolitan Asylums Board, suggesting as it did a solution only too welcome to the unscholarly intellect, resulted in their immediate incarceration during his Majesty’s pleasure amongst a crowd of other supermen (including King Solomon and the Knave o Spades), in whose segregation an obscuf rantist world hadfoundthe only effectual method of silencing teachers whose message it was unable to hear. Mr. Baldwin Stace, wh,o stood forTootingasthe incarnation of the master’s “beautiful blonde beast,” resolved on polygamyanda start withsevenwives, the which obtained he by luring his into residence that number of flappers from Miss McTurphy’s select establishment for the daughters of gentlemen in Beverstoke Road. The bait employed was cocoanut ice. The nuptial ceremonies were inaugurated by a dance around an improvised statue o Priapus(representedfor f the occasion .by an uprooted pillar-box) which Mr. Stace had set up in back his garden. Upon a revelation, ’however, of the deity’s attributes the flappers’ attitudechanged.They placed the reviver of anancient cultbeneathhisowngod as beneathanextinguisher, and turned the hose on through the slot : thus disproving the ridiculous assertion o the f romanticists that “ many waters cannot quench love.” The unlucky polygamist was only released by the appearance of Miss McTurphy herself, who decided in the interests of her establishment to the hush matter up. The ground which she advanced that he was “more fool than knave” was not contested by the victim of feminine fickleness, f in whom the lowering effects o H,O, as supplied by the Metropolitan Water Board, induced had more temperateviewsregardinghisrelativeimportance in the scheme of things. A great initial success awaited Mr. Goldenburg, who found practice the of amorality a great help in his business relations, until it penetrated to his clerks. The elopement o his cashier with the contents f of the safe wasthemoststriking o a seriesofincidents f which caused to him waver in his opinions, and finally to forsakethe Society. Such the was glorious failure of the Associated Supermen of UpperTooting.Furtherdetails will be found among the contributions of “Our specialcorrespondent” in the “Stockwell Sentinel” and the “Brixton Times.’’ In that failure were involved the Dulwich Daredevils,thePutneyFuturists,thestrong men of Sydenham, and in short all the infant’s Renaissance of theSouthSuburban Area. Thus everthroughoutthe history of man the higher is worsted by the lower, the better the by worse. They before were their time. Only thecompletedisappearance of reality fromthe world will permit the practice of those beautiful and airy theories for which Dakapple was sentenced to fourteen days’imprisonmentwithouttheoption of a fine-and Klaptamovski died. The Approach to Paris. By Ezra Pound. French, writers persistently refuse to acquire.Idonot mean that England has no writers who should learn to write less.And theFrench,ontheotherhand, may produce an (occasional writerwhodoesnotwrite too much. There is the stock example of Rimbaud. But Rimbaud is not really an exception,hedidnot H e simply quit writing. I drag learn t.0 producelittle. in Rimbaud because he is a difficult case. H e does not belong in adiscussion of livingwriters except on the ground the that living writers in Paris might have learnedcertainthingsfrom him. As anactualfactI think Rimbaud was probably more right than ,his critics, when he wrote :Que comprendre Q ma parole? I1 fait qu’elle fuie et vole ! However, one cannot neglect a poet who has written : Tendentleurs oremus risibles et tstus. Aux femmes, c’est bien de faire des bancs lisses Apres les six jours noirs ou Dieu les fait souffrir ! Elles bercent, tordus d’6tranges pelisses, Des especes d’enfants qui pleurent 5 mourir. Yet Rimbaud’s work, or at least a great part of it, is perhaps more comparable to the beautiful forms made by chance in some process like the oxidisation o silver f carved by anartist. As one crystalsthan to figures often finds,inveryearlywork of one’sown, chance that only with great hints of things are reacquired labour, so one might find in Rimbaud’s work promise of things that the rest of the French writers have scarcely yet acquired. One is not forced on this account to consider Rimbaud a s their teacher, o r as a man born before his time. In “T2te de Faune” he has produced an almost perfect example of almost exactly the sort of beauty that we are, in this particular month and year, in search of. I am not sure that we would notice the poem if we had not come, by our own route, to this precise desire. Forwhatitisworth,ParishadRimbaud’s work. Certainthingshad been donehaphazard. Paris might have learned from this work a certain sort o concisef ness.Yet Rimbaud’s work is presented insuchaway that I am not sure that anyone could or can be expected to learn from Rimbaud anything that he has not already found out for himself. By that I mean that Rimbaud should neither be under- VII. BREVITY the one virtue that our writers do not is need to learn from the French. It is the one virtue which the 727 estimated as apoet nor over-estimated as a factor in the development d the art. As for prose-poetry, I suppose n.0 one will deny that i t is at least as old as Ossian. Rimbaud’s “Aube” and ”‘Vierge Folle” do not need any charm of novelty, and things like “Villes” are a great comfort. It is true that they are bitten with the pox of rhetoric, but a knowledge of themenablesone to take the wind of many later sails. “Des groupes de beffrois chantent les idbes d e s peoples” and all that fashion of speaking. Yes, it is often a great comfort to know thatbad artists have not even that flavour of novelty upon which they pride themselves. From amateur mystics and from all rhetoricians and more especially from amateur French mysticsandfromFrenchrhetoricians“Good Lord deliver u s !” Rimbaud does not belong in either of these categories. It is true that he can scarcely ever let out a noun unchaperoned,but in return we mustrememberthathis own faults so displeased him that he left off composing. Hehas leftsome thingsperfectandsomethings instinct with vigour and some of curious interest. I mention Rimbaud in this place because I think certain English readers and critics are apt to estimate presentday poets in France without taking due count of his preexistence, and because they seem to give credit for certain discoveries to those have who no’t really made them. There remain numerous writers whom one might discuss at some length. I shall not write of Verhaeren, for everybody writes of Verhaeren, 0682 KEY€t%p Besides, what in heaven’s namecanone say of Verhaeren ? I believehim the sincerest of men. Whenwrites he as in 4 4 L e s Pauvres ” plus lourds de peine et de fardeaux que les toits des cassines brunes, parmilesdunes. or : aux gestes lzs et indulgent he a is very fine poet, and when he speaks of the Flamand country he speaks as hardly anyone has been able to speaksince Wordsworth,and when hewrites about “lebondissant t,cM=sindesvbrit&svivantes,etc., etc.,” is a hejust hopeless rhetorician, with great ‘“nobility of soul. ” 3And there is M. le Prince des Poetes, Paul Fort, with a delicate, ironical and kindly temper. “Pourtant, B la heure, meme ou -mu s’en faut (dites-moi, qu’est une heure devant Dieu? un jour? un mois? un an?-un an, voire, ce n’est p o w h i le temps de manger une poire), B cette donc, hour Warwick, s’btait de qui avisb retrher Lancastre pour s’immortaliser,” and so 0.n. One must read Fort aloud, o r hear him so read. H e is delicacy and charm, and he is much more civilised than we shall ever care to be and h e is what they call “The Last Bohemian.” To exhibit Paul Fort to a foreign public by means of criticism ! I t would be trying like to exhibit butterflies with a threshing machine. Ce soir, on vend des fleurs sur le Pont au Change. L’air par bouffees, sent la tubQeuse et la poussiere. C’est demain Sainte-Marie. Une heure doree coule aufond du ciel occidental et sur les quais, et jette un k l a t fauve au milieu de la foule. On voit le mouvement trouble de la plac du Chatelet. Sept heurs vont sonner A l’horologe du Palais. L’otcident, sur Paris, est comrne un lac d’or plain. Dans l’est nuageux gronde un orage incertain. L’air est chaud par bouffkes, A peine l’un respire. E t je songe A Manon et deux fois je soupire. L’air est chaud par bouffbes et berce l’odeur large de ces fleurs yu’on ecrase. . . On soupire en voyant de frais courants violets s’ktirer sous lesarches du Pont-Neuf qui pmdroie sur le soleil morant.“Tule sais, toi, Manon, si je t’a? bien aimGe !” L’orage gronde au loin. L’air est c h a d parbouffes. I t is as natural as that. I give part of a strophe and one whole strophe from a poem containing five. 2. I do n,ot know that he has given a name to his system of metric. We shallprobablyadoptthe Greeksystem of quantitative verse in English before we try this subtle combination 0.f accordes. Also the Greek system is probably more germane to the nature of our speech. I shall not preach Paul Fort in these islands for I do not think islands these want him. Poetry is not Iike an economic idea, there is no reason why any person, or nation,shouldacceptthekind of poetryit does not like. ; perhaps I should Or perhaps this is a misstatement say that it is in the nature o f economic ldeators to try to make nations and persons accept distasteful ideas. The difference is that good poetry is free; it is at the disposal of anyone who wants it; and wealthis nothence the difference between the position of the critic of poetryandthat of the economicideator. It is the function of the art-critic to bring his public, as expedif tiously as possible, to those works o art in which they may take pleasure. 4I shallnotwrite of Paul Claudel until I havehad further opportunity read prose to his as well as his verse-and then Claudel has th,e cry. Perhaps he will have a crazelike Maeterlinck andBergson,andthen I shall not h a w t o write about him,. Among the men who are neither old nor young, Andre Spire is well worth attention.Hehaslearned not to slop over. T h e quality of his charm is perhaps best presented by quotation. “ Dames Anciermes” begins with him in his attic, “ 1.e p d l e de faieblanche,” etc. Mitre, le printemps aux doigts ti2des A souleve l’espagnolette De mes fenctres sans rideaux. Faites taire toutes ses vojx qui montent J u s q u ’ ma table de travail. 5- Et de la mPre de ton p h e , Qui cause de leurs maris morts, E t de leurs fils partis. Avec, au coin de leurs l h - e s , Ces moustaches de cafe au lait? Et dans leurs mains ces tartines ? Dans leurs bouches ces kouguelofs? Ce sont des cavales anciennes Qui mkhonnent le peu d’herbe douce Que Dieu veut bien Ieur hisser. Mhre, lesmaitressensible Lachent les juments inutiles D a w lea pr&, non dans mon jardin ! Sois tranquille, mon fils, sois tranquille, Elles ne brouteront pas tes fleurs Mere, que n’y occupent-elles leurs Ewes, E t leurs trop courtes dents trop blanches De porcelaine trop fragile! Mon fils, fermez votre fenetre. Mon fils, vous n’stes pas crktien! In the earlier work “ E t Vous Riez,” h,e writes with a dealmoreeagerness;witharatherfine, embittered impatience, firstwith his literaryfriends becausethey persist in concerning themselves exclusively withtheir craft, instead of attempting to uplift the proletariat ; second, with the proletariat !because it won’t let him civilise it, and won’t civilise itself in three weeks. The book i,s a sort o autobiography of fie modern f Faust in pilgrimage. The modern Faust does not wish to conquer world; th,e he does not desire to dominate the wholeprovince o f knowledge; he desires to arrange the equitable social order. It is a finer ambition. And then, n,o one has conquered the world -to hisown satisfaction,and no one hasattainedto So Spiresays they told him to universalknowledge. sing for the people, dance-songs for their children, etc., Ce sont les anlies de ma mere 728 and “cris pour ses colkres,” and then he met the best sons o the people. f Les sombres militants, plus tristes que moi-m&ne., 11s m’ ont dit . . . Assemble les oiseaux . . . Et chanteleur. Mais tenter d’exalter ces hommes sans desirs, Ce peuple qui se traine ! Tu n’as donc pas encore regad6 ses yeux vides ? Viens avec nous, Rythme-nous des injures pour fouetter son dos mou. Par crainte de nos coups il levera la tete, Et, nous le lancerons contre ceux qui l’oppriment. I1 n’a pas releve la t&. I1 a g6mi : “A quoi bon ces grands cris sur mes epauIes lasses. Mes yeux regaTderont tousjours pieds mes trop lourds. J’ai cru longtemps, j ’ai cru me posseder un jour. Mais, chaque fois qu’ un peu de s h e m’est donnee, L’un de vous me la prend, pour s’eu faire homme.” I think Spire is honest and that he writes from himself. Among theyounger menJouveseemstometo show promise and Apollinaire has brought out a clever bok 6. M. Henri-Martin Barzun has an idea that we should write poems like orchestral scores with a dozen voices a t once. The page would look not unlike the page o f Jammesquoted in last week’s essay. People doread orchestral scores. I suppose one could learn toread five or ten lines at once or at least to imagine that the five or ten sounds represented in the different lines were all going on at once. There .are in this plan both opportua good deal of nities dangers. might and One save time-in dispensing descriptive with passages of the novel fsor example. Onemightrepresentthe confusion of metropolitan life where too much does certainly happen all a t once. M. Barzun offers a mode of synthesisthatis not to be despised. Of coursethereare any number of objections. If you insist being in all apperception and all sorts of apperception at once you f are in danger of paralysing thought; o bringing all your other faculties to astandstill.Art is, at least to some extent, selection. If you merely drapeanidea in this complicated paraphernalia you have not much advanced. f At the same time there is no reason why solos o clear thought or emotion should not emerge like arias from the grumbling of M. Barzun’s orchestration. M. Barzun’s “HymneForces” des moved me, althoughIthoughtit rhetorical. I t seemed to me significant that the voice o the mass shouldhavecome f SO near to being coherent. M. Barzun is nowhere near being content with the book above-mentioned. The polyphonic method will be justified when a great work is no ispresentedthroughit.Inthemeantimethere use blinding oneself to the fact that the next great work may bewritten in thismanner. It is not an impossibility, and M. Barzun is not altogether an imbecile. bad manners in anyone but a good artist do not make one ill at ease-me mereIy passes the other way; but with a good artist one’s interest in him and his work mayhave led one into an exposedposition,one may have displayed thisinterestrashlyorinsuch a way disconthat his display of bad manners is sudden and certing. Whereveranartisticstandardexists one does not demand constraint, one does not demand the that artist ble a member of th.e London County Council, or Sir Dash, or Lord UnTel, in order that one may respect him. Where a scientific standard exists demand we of the scientist only that hisdiscoveries o r his knowledge be sound and interesting. Where artistic no standard exists a man’ds work is judged by his respectability and his social position. Only in a state of Victorian darkness can th’e oversplashing “ Great Figure” exist. Intelligent does respect nut afflict one’srespiration. My contention was that Paris is rather better off for poetsthan London is, or if you like, “thatParis is twenty, at least twenty, years ahead of the other worlds of letters.”This is perhaps a rashstatement. I have no intimate acquaintance with the state of literary affairs in Tibet, or Kiev, in or in Umhatuumgam. I t is possible that London is not second or third, but ninth. Still, I do not think Madrid or Rome will enter the contest, nor yet Budapest. Let us, however, be safe; let us say that Paris is better of€ a t themomentthan London. Dante defined poetry as a composition of words set to music. With thle passage of the centuries poetry has been gradually divorced from the art of music, as theterm“music”isgenerallyused, i.,e., from melody of pitch-variation. T ha r t e of music whjch stiW remains to the is poetthat of rhythm, and of a sort of melody dependent on the order and arrangement of varied vowel andconsonantalsounds. The rhythm is a matter of duration of individualsoundsand of stress, and the matter of thde “word melody”depends largely on the fitness of this duration and stress to the sounds wherewith it is connected. In determining th,e relative state of art in Paris and in London, one would consider rhythm, word melody, and thte composition of words, o words that is, conf s sidered a language not as sound. As to rhythm, I doubt if there is in England at the time of this writing, anyone whose rhythm and word melody are comparable to those o Remy de Gourmont f o r of Paul Fort, or o De Regnier in the “ Odelettes.” f I think there is no one who writes English as well as De Regnier writesFrench, o whose work has the r quality of seeming so modo pumice expoliturn. Neither have we a satirist comparable to Laurent Tailharde, nor yet a poet who delineates his time as clearly as does Francis Jammes. Nor, for that matter, can I see about me any young manwhoseworkis as refreshing as Romains’. I t is true that there are a few writers who are attempting a simplification of structure, somewhat like that attempted by the crowd gathered about “ L’Effrt Libre”; but for the most part both writers and critics in England are so ignorant that if a man attempt these fineraccords and simplicities thereishardlyanyone whocan tell whatheis up to. Neither d o I believe that the excellencesreferred to will appear in English writing until at least twenty years after their respective appearances in France. And with that I rest my case. . )I . It is not possible for me to discuss all the fifty-rhree authors contained in Van Bever and Leataud’s anthology. Thereare a host o younger f writers who will doubtless receive fitting recognition at thehands of Mr. Flint. My intention at the outset was to write in conversational tone of my personal adventure; of such Frenchpoetry of to-day a s had seemed of interestto one as easily bored as I am. A curiousobjectionhas been broughtforththat I breathe “too freely in the atmosphere of Paris for great respect.” Now the good artist isnot a mastodon nlor th.e lion of Androcles that one should be constrained or ill atease in his presence. Th’egoodartist is a person whose intelligence functions-at least in certain directions-exceptionally well. As intelligence is as rare as it is charming, one takes delight either in the presence or in th.e works of a good artist. One is only whenhe constrained in th’epresence of agoodartist happens to *possess very bad manners, and bad manners arenotinseparablefromthegoodartist. Of course, 1. Readers and Writers. MR. HEWLETT’S “Bendish,” hero the of which is modelled on Byron, has been commercially lucky enough toprovoke a discussion of the legitimacy of real figures infiction. Lots of people, raw hands in literature, will buy the book merely to come to some concIusion on the subject. The conclusion, however, to which MY. Hewlett’s handling o Byron will bringthem will be f superficial in the extreme; for his failure by nlo means proves that what he has tried without SUCCESS may not 729 be tried withsuccess. Everythingdepends, of course, on the choice of subject and on the fitness o the writer f t~odeal withit. Inthecase of Mr. Hewlettthe personality of Byron i s I should say, a sealed book to him. H e could not even write a good biography of the man, let alone play in imagination with Byron’s potential or only half manifestedpowers. Thesamethingistrue of Tolstoy, whose figure of Napoleon in “ W a r and Peace” is a dummy to illustrateatract.Tolstoyhad simplynopoint o contactwith Napoleon, and could f not brought have himself even to record the bare incidents of his life. My own opinion is that real personages, so they be within the compass of a writer o f fiction, are not onlylegitimate,butthey are excellent materialsfordramatic invention and imagination. N’o hero’s life has ever exhausted the sum of his gifts. There remain still in him, when all the calls o circumf stance have been made, powers of response which artless circumstance has never evoked-powers which a real creative imagination in dramatist or author might divine and make manifest. To be sure such a supplementary portraiture of a great man would appear, on the surface, different from man the a s revealed by chanceevents. Itmightcontain, in fact,none of the incidents o his real with f life which the world was familiar. Profound students of character, however, would knowthatthe fictional andrealwerecomplementary. Xenophon’s Socrates and Plato’s are, after all, the same. The method, on the other hand, is not oneto recommend to any novelist. Most novelists, I fear, are too blind to realise even what a great man has done, stillmore to visualise what a great man might have done. * * R fiddle in explanatory details of a quite superfluous character. After (I), forinstance,hewrites : He did not believe in the necessity for Sphinxes, or in their reality, for that matter-they did not exist for him. Indeed, he was one to whom the Sphinx would not have been visible. He might have eyed it, and noted a certain bulk of grotesque stone, but nothing more significant. Now, is ,anything there in this adds that to the information contained in the opening sentence? Plainly there isnothing. I t is simplerepetition,anddoesnot f advance the interest o the “study” by asingle idea. Thesametreatment, however, given is thenextand the third and the fourth, and indeed each of thle succeedingparagraphopenings.The second is aparticularly bad example of literary rattle. “He,” we are told, “ w a s sex-blind,” and hence “could appreciate not women,” a deduction, of course,which we could not draw without assistance ! Mr. Stephens then continues :If he had been pressed for a theory or metaphysic of womanhood, he would have been unable to formulate any. Their presence headmitted,perforce;theirutility was quiteapparenttohim on the surface, but,subterraneously, he doubted both their existence and their utility. And so on for anothertwenty lines. I ask my correspondentwhetherthis is writingto somepurpose or not mere penny-a-lining. I am content to leave the decision, to anybody. * * * “The Unexpurgated against Case Women’s Sufrage” (Constable, 2 s . 6d.), by Dr. Almroth Wright, has proved to be disappointing to a publicrecentlyfedon White Slavemeat. In the private glossary of most of thePress“unexpurgated ” could relate only to sex. In consequence they expected a treat from a book. with what they now denounce as a “catchpenny” title. I have the read book and my conclusion is Dr. that Wrightwasunaware when chose he histitle of the kind of expectation it would arouse. At any rate, there is the not smallest trace of self-consciousness his in pages,nor, of course,anything remotelysalacious. It is a proof, by the way, of the obsession sex has made of itself in the West that manysuchwords as “expurgated,”originally of a wideconnotation,havecome to sexmatters.Virtue, conto beconfinedpopularly tinence,chastity,licentious,sensual,passionate, lustthelistmightbe indefinitelyextended. Thosewords I fancy, owe their degradation to novelists and women, inneither of which classesisthebrainthecentre of intelligence. It is not merely the indelicacy but the imbecility of advertisers is thatremarkable. the day Only other THENEW AGE received an unsolicited offer of a couple of pages of advertisement of a notorious encyclopaedia on condition the that advertisement should appear in the middle of the paper. Apart from the unconscious offence against taste involved in this proposal to break the form of THENEW AGE (for each issue is obviously as. carefully constructed a s a sonnet), the business instinct of the suggestion is conspicuously missing. What, I should like to know, would be the attitude o readers o f f THENEW AGE towards a publication whose presence was intrudedintothe midst of,say,thesenotes? I trust that they would swear never to look atit, never to tolerate its name in polite society, never to think of it without wishing Only it dead. by refusing to buy articles that are vulgarly advertised shall we bring advertiserstotheirsenses.For my part,animpudent advertisement warns me of an impudent commodity. * * * * * + A correspondent,still a little puzzled by theunique o Mr. f contempt of NEW AGE reviewersforthework James Stephens-notably his“TheCrockof Gold”asks to me look a t Mr. Stephens’ sketch in the “Nation” of October 4, and to pronounce it bad a t my peril. Well,theriskisnotgreat, as I a u l d prove if space would allow a long commentary. Mr. Stephens is one of those copious writers who can never march on from idea to idea, but must needs stop to elaborate each as if hewere in doubtwhatthenextshouldbe,or whether his readers were following him. In the sketch referred to the opening sentences of the first four paragraphs are as follows : (I) He was one who would have passed by the Sphinx without seeing it. (2) He was sex-blind, and, so, peculiarly limited by the fact that he could notappreciate women. (3) He could be brutal at times. (4) Even his mother was an abstraction to him. Apart from the redundancy contained in the second of these openings, the four sentences, I contend, are sufficiently sequential and comprehensible to form the exorstudy.” But Mr. Stephens must dium of a “short Of the English edition o Gobineau’s “Renaissance” f (Heinemann, 10s.) the best thing, I find, isDr. Oscar Levy’s Introduction. This, as my readers mayremember, I hadtheprivilege of reading before the text of Gobineau’s work was available. I regret now that I haveread Gobineauhimself. He would have been so much more attractive left as Dr.Levylefthiminmy mind. “The Renaissance”consists of five “plays”or sets of dialogues, each concerned with one of the chief figures o the period o theItalian revival. Theyare f f 11, Leo as follows : Savonarola, Cesare Borgia, Julius X , and Michael Angelo. In the section devoted to Savanarola are some thirty or forty scenes, distributed between Rome, Florence, Milan, etc. ; and in each scene we are presented with a dialogue between two or more of the contemporaries of Savonarola, occasionally with Savonarola himself. Tto my mind the conversations which Gobineau makes to take place between these historic personages are either trivial or ranting. He contrives, no doubt, to keep close t o his book and in some. instancestoincorporateintohisreportthedetails as we knowthem of hischaracters’ life and works. But the effect is farfrom enablingus to supplementour knowledgewith a freshinsight.Onthecontrary,his figuresdwindleunderhistreatmentand become little more than platitudinous puppets. Look, for example, at the conversation fpp. 16-17) between Michael Angelo and Machiavelli. They m a y havetalked like this,but a priori it is incredible. MACHIAVELLI : Ah ! my friend, I have come to tel1 you 730 quickly what it is that fills my soul with joy. The French will be here in a few hours. MICHAEL, ANGELO As friends ? -4s enemies ? : MACHIAVELLI : Nothing is known. Negotiations are being carried on; if friendship cannot be established, we shall resist like men and defend our country. But there’s de Medici commits nothinghut more to come ! Piero follies. Fra Girolamo has come over to our way of thinking, and is joining the popular party, so that the coming o the French will cause the fall of that haughty house f whose pride stifles our liberties. MICHAEL ANGELO I owe everything to the father, and : will not be reckoned among the foes of the children. MACHIAVELLI You have a heart;but remember that : the interests of your country comebefore your own. All is inferment;the water is hot,burning,boiling.The whole people is working itself into a frenzy. Ah, Michael Angelo ! what a gloriousmoment ! I amgoingto see liberty, settled order, wise government elsewhere than in the dead pages of old books and in the abstractions of my dreams. . . . This may, a s I say, have warrant in the hints Machiavelli gives us of his real passion for liberty ; but I cannot imaginehiseversayingit,least of all to a Michael blunt, it is the kind of stuff Marie Angelo. To be Corelli would makethesefiguresspout.Nor is Gobineau, I think, on a higher level in dealing with the other great characters. They talkdamned all a sight too much and too much a s if they were playing to the gallery of a popular theatre. calls passion is nothing but lust. All the chief charactersareas promiscuous as they hang can together. f There is neither charm nor virtue in one o them. The decision of the Southampton magistrates to recommend the American versifier, Mr. Harry Kemp, for deportation as an undesirable alien is possibly no more than a reply t o America’s tomfoolery about Miss Marie Lloyd-as that, in itsturn,waspoeticjusticeonher own expressed approval of the boycott of Jack Johnson. Such games at international tennis do take place, and I hope the matter is no more serious for Mr. Kemp than to play ball for a day or two. Deportation of one poet is merelyinvidious.Ihaveseen in manuscipt a good deal of Mr. Kemp’s occasional verse, and it strikes me as being quite up to the level of most current English work,. In fact, it is better than the verse of several of our stars. If these were sentenced to be deported with him for their mutual criticism I have no doubt they would all return one day good citizens ; lbut alone, as I say, his selection is invidious. It is probable that a more truthful book on publicschool life will never be written than “The Harrovians” byArnold Lunn(Methuen, 6s.) Mr. Lunnappearsnot only to have remembered his impressions vividly, but to have succeeded in themore difficult task of recalling his feelings as a boy and of explaining them as a man. Hitherto the life o the public school has been without f its realist. Thepleasantromanceimportedintoit by Talbot Baines Reed-whose “Fifth Form of St. Dominie’s” nevertheless still pleases me-was balanced by the unpleasant romance of Mr. Kipling. Between them the real boys and the real life of the public schools remainedgenerallyesoteric. Mr. Lunn’streatment of the subject is neither sentimental nor crudely realistic. His boys are undoubtedly boys, and a s undoubtedly they are boys at Harrow. * * D * * * * * * * * * I have now read the copy o his ‘‘ Passionate Friends” f (Macmillan, 6s.) which Mr. Wells has had sent to THE NEW AGE. It is not a masterly work in anysense o f the word, but, on the contrary, as loose and incontinent a production both in style and idea a s could w,ell be produced by an habitual writer. Usually, as is well known, an author becomes more real, defined, and concrete as his discipline o thoughtandwritinginvigorateshis f mind. Ruskin, for example, who began as a windbag, ended by nearly writing perfect good sense; in time, he would have written, perhaps, as simply a s Swift wrote or as passionately to the point as Demosthenes spoke. With’ Mr. Wells, however, the case is just the reverse. of definite persons,things, an,d He began by writing ideas,andhe is now writing indefinitely of anything. In fact, he appears to suppose that indefiniteness is a virtue, a quality characteristic of the best intelligence. To obliterate thenatural o acquireddistinctions ber tween the sexes, fior instance, is for him a kind of duty to civilisation. When his heroine, the Lady Mary, talks of living her own lif,e and of belonging to herself, not onlydoes the fool hem, Stephen, assent to her claim of thlese male privileges; but Mr. Wells pleads folr the view with a n almost personal appeal. But such chatter on the part of a womanlikeMary,incapable of supporting herself for a day, is chatter and nothing more; and if Stephen were the not “complementary male” spoken o by Dr. f Almroth Wright, he would have eitherlaughed at her orturnedand lefther. That, I hope and believe, is what young men are to-day doing with the apes o thle f wives of Ibsen’s Shaw’s and eunuchsandbaby-husbands.Butjust a s Mr. Wells is DO longerable t o discriminate between a manand a woman, and would have it that a woman can possibly be as “free” as a man, so, I find, he is no longer able to discriminate between economic and spiritual affairs, between democracy and aristocracy, between one form of government another, and between Socialism and all thlese subjects aimlessamiableSocialReform.On ‘in thecourse of interminabledigressions,Mr. Wells exfoliates to marvel, but he never by any chance drops a seed. Idid notnote in my readingasingleobservation fit t be placed atthe head of an o essay or demanding a moment’s reflection t o open it. This, which wou-Id be no defect if the story were continuous, is a damning defect in a story deliberately interrupted to admit reflections and observations. The book, as my readers will gather, irritated me. I t did more, it disgusted me. Thereisnotasign of passion (which ’is intelligent single-mindedness) in the “Passionate Friends” beginning from to end. What Mr. Wells The “ Nineteenth Century” under Mr. . W. Wray Skilbeck hassunk very low in itsjudgmentwhen it accepts an article on “Some Recent Notable Novels,” by Mr. DarrelFiggis.Mr. Figgis isundoubtedlytaking some painstolearntowriteEnglish,buthisstyle is still little betterthan a babu’s. Listen, example, for to this :Theemptying of h full flood of passion into a book does notalterthat fact, does not woo away its central ineffectuality. or to this :-Passion remains passion, even when it is meretricious. W h a t on earth does the first sentence convey to a merely English reader or the second to a mind capable o seeing a self-contradiction? remains f Passion passion,evenwhenitisnotpassion ! IsupposeMr. Figgis would he quite prepared to defend that nonsense ! Ho,wever,- I console myself by reflecting that most of the novels on which he exercises his weird vocabulary are worth it. Another writer in the same issue of the Review asks and answers the silly question : “ Is the present neglect of Pope merited ? ” By whom,I should like to know, is Pope “ neglected” ? That Pope is not as popular a s Masefield or as often mentioned in “T.P. ’ s Weekly” as Mr. Haldane Macfall is certainly but true; Pope would notregard t m omission as neglect. As many he peopleread Pope to-day as read him in his own day; and that is always the way with classic writers. Their audience of readers is small,butitisconstant.Only a t intervals does some whim enlarge their audience and then not for long. Another marvellous discovery has been made by some greenhorntothe effect that my namesake, Congreve, anticipated opinions the of Mr. Shaw, particularly on thie subject o f , women. Congreve, we are told though not informed, held the view that women run after men, a view so strangeasto have lain dormant all these yearsuntilMr. Shaw rediscovered it. The ignorance this kind of research implies of Englishliterature is something prodigious. * * * R. H. C . 731 The Gypsy’s Point i< of View. I FOUND old Joshua Gray seated on t5e ground in the shade o his ornate caravan, mending f a chair. He greeted me in the Romany tongue. Sa shan, my RAni ! (Howdo you do, my lady.) The missus I andwas only talking about you this mornin’. W e thought you must be offended with us.” ‘‘ My RomanyPal(gypsybrother) shouldknow me better than to think I could be offended withhim,”I said, as I handed him my cigarette case. “Where’s Mrs. Gray? ” “She’s gone into the town. She’ll be back afore six. Plenty 0’ holiday folk about, but not much doin’.’’ “ Very little fortune telling? ” Old Joshua shook his head. ‘‘ Them town palmists have taken the bread out 0’ our mouths. The police is down on the lot 0’ us becos 0’ them. The missusha’gotto be careful.’Tisonly by sellin’somethin’out 0’ the basket she can do any dukerin (fortune telling). I tell her that more than half of gals the have jined them sufferget women. They don’t want to know nothin’ about future husbands. They haven’t no use for them.” “ Don’t you believe it, Mr. Gray.Most womendesire husbands, whatever they may say to the contrary.’’ “ That’s just what the missus will have,” said the old gypsy,laughing.“Shesay,them t h a t havm’t got a man want one bad, and them that are tied up don’t feel satisfied-want to change over somebody for else’s property. There’s some queer very folk about, my RAni. Gals are bred different fromwhatthey used to be. Nowadaysthe women ‘aren’thappy if theydon’t live gadabout lives and dress theirselves up in all manner of bird-scarin’ cloes. They want to do everything except stay at home an’ havebabies. Men aren’t men neither,elsetheywouldn’tput up withit. What are wives for if----” “ Look, look !” I interrupted, “here comes a flying machine. ” I showed more excitement than the sight of the aeroplane caused me to feel, fearing the subject of wives and their duties might prove embarrassing. W e watchedtheaeroplane fly over our headsand disappear out of sight. ‘‘ Would you like to fly, Mr. Gray?” Old Joshua shook his head. “ Not if you was to give me a thousan’ pounds, my see n o sense in exasperatin’theLord RAni. I don’t Almighty. It’saskin’forjudgment. If we wasmeant to fly, nature would have given us wings. Flyin’ is foolhardypluck,and only fools incourageit.” I wanted to point out to my gypsy friend the opinions held by the Army and Navy, but knowing his conservative mind I suppressed the inclination. ‘‘ ’Tisthesamesort 0’ pluck that folkshave who look up spirits.’’ he went on contemptuously. Not being to able follow his train of thought, I nodded understandingly. “ Folks who see them by chance is not to blame. But there’s them that’ll rent a haunted house on purpose to see the ghost. Standin’ up, I call it,tothe Almighty. There’s some things we poor mortals aren’t meant to see into-folks are gettin’ more and more too big for their boots. W h a t with flyin’ and motor cars and then religions. ” I laughed outright at his unexpected classification. ‘‘ What about the religions?” I asked. “ There’s fartoomany on them,”wasthe reply. “ .4t one time there was only church and chapel. Now there’s a dozen different kinds at least. An’ the parsons, instead 0’ learnin’the peoplefrom the Bible, the R1mighty’s own book, they preach out 0’ their own heads, which, if size countforanything,don’t hold much. T haven’t no opinion 0’ parsons. Show one me who’ll share all h’e ha’ ,got with them that haven’t anything, who neverthink a b u t what heshall eat and drink, who’d preach the gospel for nothin’, and I’ll shake hands with him.’’ “ Rut there are good parsons as well as bad,’’ I protested, feebly. “It aint their livin’ in bighouses with servantsto work forthemonSundays as well as weekdays that make me angry, Rani. I believe in a man havin’ all he can get. ’Tis pretendin’ they are followin’ Christ that’s bad : takin’ the Almighty’s name in vain. I can look up to a man who do things for money in a straightforward manner.’Tishumannatureto like money. Butthese parsons--1 ask you, RAni, howmanyonthem do you think would try and stop a poorgypsybein’ sent t~ prison if he was catched poachin’ a rabbit ?” “ 0 ! many of them would, I am sure,” I said. The old gypsy laughed sarcastically. “Ah, myRAni, Iaint no fool. I know what I’m talkin’ about. Parsons often are magistrates, you know. And there’s some ones hard doin’ business. that I tell you this, and ’tis thte truth : we poor gypsies, spat on by servant gals and them that ha’ got nobreedin’, live moreaccordin’ to the Book than most o ‘them that’s f got learnin’ enough to preach about it. W e poach becos we enjoy a bit 0’ sport. And there aint no wrong done. I don’t say we don’t do in the landowners and farmers when we can by gettin’ off early without payin’ for a night’s camp ; an’ that aint a big sin to my mind. W e are very hard pushed when we steal ; an’ though that mayn’t be quite right, we can’t !et our children starve. W e pay the price if we are catched. There wouldn’t be nothin’ to pay if we was judged by what the Book say. W e never interferewith nobody. When all’ssaid an’ done we’re a s good as wecan be. You can’tsaythe same about folks who haven’t no excuse for bein’ bad. The gAg6s (Gentiles) say gypsies a r e liars. I don’t deny we tell lies. W e have to tell ’em to earn a livin’, same as other people ; only we haven’t got the learnin’ how to tell ’em and not be found out like the rich. They cheat becostheylike cheatin’; an’ they make money out 0’ theirfriends. It aint becosthey’sfrightened about tomorrow’s bread. Theywant t.o grab everything. The more they get the more they want, and then they aren’t happy. I don’t their like ways. Cuttin’ the up roads with their motors and spoilin’ the pretty flowerswith their dirty leavin’s. The trees have to be cut down for themand all thetall,beautifulhedges.They’dchoke the songs in the little bads’ throats if they could. They spoilall theprettycountry.Nowhere now where you can put up a bit 0’ tan (tent), and make a fire. As for lettin’ the gri (horse) help hisself to a bit of grass off the a good-sized roadside, you’,d have t,opayforitwith fine. There aint the feelin’ for horses like there used to be. How any sensible gentleman want can a motor when he can have for the money a pair of beautiful bays is a puzzle. And what’s a prettier sight than to see a lady on horseback, dressed neat with high-topped boots -patent ones?” “ 1 don’t know that the boots matter,” I said, laughing, “but I agreewith you that a goodhorseand a good rider make a pretty picture.” “ Oh ! it make me angry to think 0’ them noble: creatures an’ the use there was for them. Soon they won’t be bred a t all. W h a t wi’ one thing on top another, the world’ll soon come to a stan’still, an’-” Old Joshua stopped suddenly and broke into a merry peal of laughter. “ Dordi, my RAni,” he cried out in Romany, “tuti is pening, toherkokerohave lesty diktrashed.Tuti jal’ed rokerin’ dinlo, so b6t. Mandi am SA tatcho, chavie. ” (‘i Faith, my lady, you look frightened. You are saying to yourself, has he gone mad talking so much : I am all right, child.”) ‘‘ I have been layin’down thelaw,haven’t I ? As bad as a rashi(parson).Butitdo me good toget things off mymind. An’ you know when I talk about gAg6’s ways I don’t mean my RAni, rny Romany RAni. You is like a true gypsy, not like a g$gO.” I t was old Joshua’s highest compliment. H e had paid i: many times before, but his words never fail to thrill me with pleasure. BEATRICE DUTT. M. 732 Time Recorders. ACCORDING averyancienttradition-thoughI to am afraid it is no use looking for it in the Talmud or other Rabbinical writings-for thefirsttwoorthree Years afterthe expulsionfrom Eden, Adam hadnosortof delusions about the nature of the punishment which he hadbrought uponhimself. To earnhisbread in the sweat of his brow was decidedly a curse. I t never occurred to him either in his private reflections or his conversationswithEve to regard it as anything else. But when Cain and Abel had grown old enough to take an interest in thingstherecame a change.Inwhatever state of wearinessAdamcrawledintothehome at nightfall he started to make a point of pulling himself together in the presence of the children. On these occasions no he longer complained of his lot-his simple spouse grew accustomed to such phrases as “excellent moral discipline” or“the need for an interest in life,”untilgraduallyher limitedintelligence grew aware that by some curious process the primeval curse had swung round into the most unqualified blessing ever conferred on humanity. And by the time that Cain and Abel had come to years of discretion and were in somedanger of formingtheirown opinionon the matter, the well-known doctrine had been explicitly formulated. The slightest symptom of revolt brought down on theyoung men from the patriarch-whose own task. by this time lay mainly in the supervision of those of his two sons-an immediate discourse on the Essential Amiability of Labour. Thus (according tothetradition)arosethedoctrine which has been preached with such persistence by those in authorityever since. Rut humanity’sstudentshave noted that neitherin theEastnortheWesthasthe employer of labour put much ever very faith in the doctrine,“simple of itself,’’ as a meanstogetting a given amountwork of done by somebody else. It needed reinforcing-in the East by the taskmaster, the lash and bastinado, in the West by the attitude which has culminated in and is typified by the time recorder. In point of humanity the discerning will perceive that the East has the pull. There must needs be something human and corruptible, by gold or perhaps even friendship,about a taskmaster.Whereasthere is obviously nothing to be hoped for from a creature whose general appearance resembles that of a penny-in-the-slot weighing machine and whose bowels a r e of stamped steel. Therein,ofcourse,liesits chief recommendation to our conquerors, the employers of labour. They ordered this matter better in England in the before days America discovered our unhappy island. A timekeeper, a man and open to the friendly impulses and imperfections of men, sat in a littlehutchandsetdowneach workman’stime as he came in themorning.Butthis hadseriousdisadvantages. So muchturned upon the man you installed in the hutch. example, For there was a certain ironworks in the North which had for a space a thenobscureyouth called PhilMay to supervise thecomingsandgoings of itshands.Theresult (as recorded by May’s official biographer) was that after abriefperiodof the completestastonishment at the sudden. and quite unparalleled punctuality of their entire staff the lords of the said ironworks sought out and installed a t their gates a new timekeeper. But perhaps I go too fast. There may be those who are unacquaintedwiththetimerecorderand, as Mr. Belloc would say,“allthatthetermconnotes.”The time recorder, then, is the last word in the mastery of matter overmind. It stands forall that pervertedingenuityhasyet accomplished in theway of turning human beings into well-behaved machines. (This endeavour, I believe, is gracefully described as “the speeding up of industry”-a process with which, we areassured,isbounduptheadvancement of civilisation.) The timerecorderissoldbymisanthropic individuals who are,Isuspect,ex-wardersandhangmen dismissed for undue severity, and bought by gentlemen. with sandy moustaches, no chins, and pale, protruding eyes,who are hoping todetect in themselves resemblances to the Napoleonic features of the ideal business. man as displayedon the backs of the business magazines. The workman humbly presents himself before it as his particular employer decrees it and as often mechanically registersthetimes of hismovements. It has added a new verb the to mother tongue. The workman “clocks on” when he arrives, he ‘‘clocks off” when, he departs. H e clocks of and on for meal times, f and in some cases at the beginning and end of a given job. Inthe necessaryintervalsheisbusycompleting in monotonous sequence, some small, intermediate, and extremely uninteresting stage in the manufacture of a finished article which he will never handle in a finished state,nor, indeed,in anysavethat which heispersistently employed on. To this add his knowledge that his properoutputisbeingcalculatedtothesixteenth part of a pennyby an elaborate costing system-also from America. It is an engaging picture. And one can see that it is only theworkman’sregrettablehabit of leaving the premises at night which stands in the way of including him in the annual inventory under heading the of machineryandplant.This difficulty will probably be overcome shortly by the more enlightened employer. The compound system suggests an obvious way out of it. Meanwhile-like the young gentleman who assured, I think,Dr.Johnson,thathehadtriedhardto become a philosopher “ but cheerfulness kept breaking in” -the humanimpulse occasionallyintrudes. And your workman, beginning to doubt whether he possesses a soul goes on striketodiscoveritandtosecurefor himself a further shilling a week to spend on disordered living, cheap cigarettes, sporting and editions of the I am told thatthereare people who eveningpapers. wonder a t this. But the time recorder its has conquests in other directions. It has invaded-not with very much success u p b now-what o was once known asthecountinghouse, that region which at one time had a certain air of gentilityaboutit,wherethe well-behaved occassionally. worked their way right through from office boy to junior partner,andeventothegreatPanjandrum’sprivate office. (All this, of course, in the daysbefore the limited company had evolved itself and taught the present generation of vipers to replacemasterandman by “employee” and a few thousanddim,irresponsibleshareholders.) In that world the time recorder goes hand-inhand with the card index, the vertical filing system, and all the other interesting devices for the complication of labour, whereby the creation or care of any document becomes an elaborate ritual, and a subsequent reference to it a miracle of unnecessaryresearch. Itis on the strength of theseandsimilar devices that the trading classes of thiscountry,spurredon by themaxims of certainAmericanmonthlies, havelatelytaken t o persuading themselves-and attempting to persuade the intelligent sections of society-that “business” is now a profession,andtheapplication o thesacred principle f eachfor himself and the devil take the hindermosta pursuit which might very appropriately engage the noblest intellects of the A age.rather grubby, but eminently shrewd middleman of my acquaintance keeps apokyofficeupthreeflights of dusty stairs, jabs his letters on a stick file in the order he receives them, and for many years now hashadhishandsdeep in his neighbours’ pockets to an extent that would turn many o his “professional” competitors pallid with envy. He,. f onhis part-when he pauses to consider that type of competitor a t all-likens them to children “playing at shop.”Itisnopart of anhonestman’s concern to defend methods the of one rogue against those of another, but I confess thatthe comparison seems a tolerably apt one. For whatever may be the debatable advantages from some of these devices,I amafraidthatthe time recorder is not of much practical use in an office. Ta 733 some types of employer it may have its points-it is extrelnely irksome, instance, for and inflicts a certain amount of salutarydishonour on theclerk.Butthere its advantages end. For it is a hardermattertoestimate sild control the amount of work which should be done by a clerk than it is to estimate and control that which should be done by a mechanic. When Lavengro waited upon the Mid-Victorian man of affairs, he records that this worthy paused in going through the countinghouse, “looked into the book in which the foreignvisaged clerk was writing, and, seemingly not satisfied with the manner inwhichhe was executing his task, he gave him two or three cuffs, telling him at the same time that he deserved crucifixion.’’ I t is not a particularly edifying incident, but a s a way of getting someone a else todoworkto one’s own satisfactionthereis gooddeal to be saidfor it. The contemporary man of business,faced by the same problem, buys a time recorderandretiresto bind cold towels about his head lest it should swell beyond recognition at the thought of his successful own cunning.Hewas probably induced to this take step by an advertisement which assured him that if he paid twenty clerks a t a rate, let us say? of a shilling an hour, and each clerk came ten minutes late every morning, it meant a loss of twenty twopences, or three fourpence, This, and daily. a final flourish would explain to him, meant a loss of exactly twenty shillings a week, or fifty-two sovereigns in the year. It is aningenious proposition, but n o one exceptabusinessmanwouldbedeceived by it. For itis based on the pathetic assumption to that have twentyclerks safely caged withinfourwallsisnecessarily the same thing as to have twenty clerks working at the top of their powers, and that each of the twenty will begin toiling the instant after the time recorder has secured a record of his arrival--a fallacy so tremendous that even Satire softens at the spectacle of such pitiful credulity. Lavengro’s business man was not an amiable character, but he had more sense than this. Plainly, the intelligence of our trading classes not has increased during the last sixty years. No-the timerecorder, at present at any rate, does notpress veryheavilyon the clerk. Theworkshopis itsproper province. And there, God knows,it is fearsomely established. some years I have a very cherished illustration torn ago from a catalogue of timerecorders. It shows the entrance hall to some works, a bare, forbidding apartment, walls and floor executed in unbroken concrete slabs.Across the hal runs a barrier of iron railings, no mere trellis work, but six feet high, stout and spearheaded. Beyond t h e railings thle distance of the gaunt hall sinks into gloom and, the impressionable might easily take it, penal servitude for life. The only break in the barrier IS provided by fourmassiveturnstiles.Opposite each turnstile stands a great, round-faced time recorder. At either side of the hall are stationed, at strict attention, two men--watchmen, suppose-in I the severest of apparently official uniforms. And overthis picture is solemnly printed, in large red capital letters, the legend “An Admirably Planned Entrance”. . . . To such straits have we been brought by theShalfords of mankind in their pursuit of “Fishency” in business. And with this deeply illuminating glimpse of the time recorder one might very well leave the whole distressing subject. But I am sometimes inclined to wonder whether our captains of industry have not cut away more than they know, whether they have not gravely endangered the efficacy of their ultimate means of keeping their hirelings submission. us in Let say that workmen the at this particular establishment, growing ungratefully weary of the entrance which has go out on strike. been admirably planned them, for Let us say that they peacefully picket (in their own interpretation of the phrase) and break a few heads and all the windows theycanreach. W h a t a r e you going to do with the culprits? I can only suggest a revival of the rack or thumbscrews. Gaol have can remarkably few terrors for their disciplined souls. All except Anything. By T. K. L. GORDON PHILLIPS. READER, whenI beganthesearticlesIhad no notion thattherewere so manyFrenchmen ! I thought they were doing these things better in France. alas, But, France is swarming : and every second individual is a poetexactly a s overherein these chilly, but prolific, . islands.Exactly,too, as overhereeveryone of these poetsis unique, incomparable, defiant of computation; his very own ; everyone every one makeshispoems challenges in hisespecialpersonall the old poets and poeticaltrappings ; every one sings of the commonplace, the ordinary youand the ordinary me, and particularly of the .ordinary young female person ; every one talks “normally” instead of posing a s a Bard ; every oneprints his BareStatement of Things in metrical lines. It begins tc beat me to know one from another in spite of the that fact they are all unique. Wherein, then, shall I seek and find, as I must, the distinction of the so distinguished Monsieur Jammes? Let me begin by saying what he is not, and what he does not do. M. Jammes is not a Pindarist. He does not celebrate the Grand Prix by .a yell f,or some god to dignify the “loftystrain.”Hisstrainsare not “lofty.” You may excuse Pindar’s invocation perhaps the on grounds whch you would allow to an archbishop who sho,uld include Jehovah in a religious celebration. Pindar believedin thedeities of the Hellenes,actually believed that theiraidwasessentialboth in warand in those martial exercises, the Olympic Games. The victor always and everywhere owed his success to a well-spent life under godly direction. Hence the deific invocations ! To-day, very few people believe that God is present at theGrandPrix. To besure you may often hear that congregation invoking every god ever heard of, and as many devils ; but something, je ne sais quoi, informs our souls that those Grand Prix deities have another odour thanPindar’sgodshadforhim,or even for the uninitiated Olympic multitudes. Even on secular grounds, Jammesis all there not to imitate*theoldbards. In days when the Homer, bard, for instance, actually toyed with the plectrum, or flattered the Pythian victor (likePindar),orpresentedatragedy with masks (like Sophocles), someone was probably tickled to death, or their sporting instincts flattered, were or they were paid to attend, like the Paris claque.Anyway, it was thefashion (of thetimeforbards to rampabout. It is notthefashion now, and so Jammes doesn’t ramp about. You may say, if you wish to say something, that our own times are full of large event, procession, andcatastrophe. I reply thatthePoets o ourtimes f do think not so. They have a new perspective. The common, the so-called “trivial,” is nowseenbythem to be the one thing that is really poetical. ,Tn England as well as in France, in America as well as In Germany andBengal,we sing now the eternal Trifle. I t is not my d,oing, is it? I merely statetbefactthat poetical perspective has changed ! Not for Jammes, that almighty pose o Pindar-the tongue of Jove ! Not for f Jammes the Muse, the loftypoet’s Lyre of Language, the Singing Robes o inspiration. f Jammes knows noth,ing of these appurtenances,and is not going to pretend that he does. I’ may as well leave negativising Jammes and tell you what contain. shown he does have I you Remy de Gourmont, Imagiste; ViIdrac, Humaniste; Tailharde,Helleniste ; Romains,Unanimiste,andothers, each one inhisownunique way bent upon clarifying poetic diction, making a plain statement and scheduling to Jammes I allot a special his times for posterity. But niche upon the newParnassus,forJammes is more uniquely unique than---I had nearly said-than any otherlivingFrenchpoet,butwemustconserveour plaudits-any o the above-mentioned unique poets; he f makes things more his own than I can express; he has perfected new the perfection of being a man inthe street;he is your very ordinary self, your office-boy, your office, yourtelephone,your insurance card, and 734 vour stamp ! He is the great eliminator of the abstract, ihegeneral,theuniversal,th,eessential,thetranscendental-but he the is grand recorder of the Detail ! Jammes has written a novel in verse,detailinglife in every small town in France. Think of that ! To write a novel in verse as a series of scenesis nothing new or strange. True, it has hardly been done successfully Puedeser, even since and o him f a few people mild thathe tied uphiscow’stailwithblue ribands and so set folk laughing at thenaturally respectable creature. S o it said is to-day that Mr. Jammes appear absurdly has made the provinces of France aspiring and precious, the which th’ey are not, but just common!, by printing the daily round of their dull histories in metriclines.People will always b,e saying something. Jammes, nevertheless, writes his novel in verse. He sees, like modern all poets, immature an female personThis child will be stupid As these other folk, like her father and mother, And pet she has an infinite grace. In her is the intelligence of beauty. How delicious ! herbreast that does not exist, Her back andher feet. But she will be stupid As a goose in two years from now. “ ELle sera bete comme un,e oie deux ans d’ici.” You see I have not absurdly exalted the poet in translating him. Oneistempted.Thereaboveisno word you or I might not have said to one another. Jammes alwaysusesourlanguage ! Consider that miracle of simple and adequate statement in the scene where Madame Larribeau discovers her husband’s infidelity with the servant. The poor woman “Gueu, sobs gueu, gueu, . . .” thirty-five times. Janlmes writes them all down. I t is allexactly like a realistic novel anddone to the life. Jammes is 2 Detailist, and every single one of Madame’s noises is to him a natural and mentionableDetail. Now- I think of Naturalism.Shall Itherefore call Monsieur Jammes a Naturaliste? Why not? is He a Naturaliste. ,mentions He everything. He is a part of our normal life. H e is a Mentionaliste. H e is a Normaliste. Hle produces in E.is poems the effect o a conversation. Heis a f Conversationaliste. He says something-so few people do ! H e is a Somethingaliste. And now, perhaps, have we Jammes,. I think I have said that M. Jammescantouchnothing without making it h.i,s own. Yes, I have certainly said that. I will say some moreaboutit.It is, I think, thegreat gift. Itis“style” in the fine sense. I t is, in the fine sense, literature. Now, perhaps., have we our Gift. M. Jammes makes the famous pilgrimage to Lourdes own, his every detail of it. He looks, sees, and writes down a simple statement. H e has the art .of the Prosie; writes he prose in metrical lines’! Many other poets o to-day do this.Jamrnesdoesit f as only Jammes can ! You must be subtle to discern the difference between Jammes’ prosies and the prosies of, ,say, my friend Vildrac. If you are subtle you will note Jammes’ especial unique and use of rhyme. A man deaf to all rhyme sav’e cat-and-hat will obviously fail to hear Jammes’ rhymes, he will fancy Jammes is notrhyming a t all, o r he will fancy thatJammesis murdering assonance. I invite to listen them that comprehend. the beauty of such tonal delicacies or the delicacies of such tonal beauties, whichever YOU will, a s drapeaux-en or; wit-il mourir; s,erait-ce qule-priait Dieu-these a few of Jammes’ line-endings. Exceptforthe rhyme, t h e poem onthepilgrimage would have passed for a mere ordinary prosieLes drapeaux, se penchaient avec leur devises enor. Le soleil etait blanc sur les escaliers, dans l’air bleu, sur les clochers dhchiquete. The banners hung down with their devices of gold. The sun was white on the stairways, in the blue air, on the jagged belfries. These delicate rhymes are as close as I can reproduce those o M. Jammes. But what aplain statement ! I t f is as clear as a “ news-story”; it is the plainest prose. But Jammes prints it in metric. Do not ask me why, I do not explain Jammes. He prints it in metric ! Wi,th small letters at the beginnings of lines. Eccentric? I repeatthat I dto not explain. Jammes,reporting, is not a mere reporter. I suggest that the average “ news-story”inmetric reporter does not arrange his lines, whereas Jammes does. Jammes does and becomes a poet. Your reporter does not, and remains a reporter. T h e metric line is a recognised property of p e t s . If the above were set straight along, how would one knowthatitwas a poem?The rhymes alone would nlot sufficiently markit;theyare too delicate. But I object to appearing to defendJammes. I put the proposition that one o thse laws o poetry may be that f f prose be shall printed in metrical (and lines called Prosie), andpasson.“I’veseen,”writes JammesI’ve seen in old galleries Flemish pictures where, in a dark inn, one saw a type . . . qui buvait de la biQe, et sa trPs mince pipe avait un point rouge, et il fumait doucenient . . that sat drinking beer, and his slenderpipe had markings of red, and he smoked at his ease. She gavethem some broth,without any bread, And whippedthem all soundly. . . . In English.thismetreis old andsacred to doggerel. We gives you the Rut Jammes writes in French ! Detail, unadulterated, tbe unsentimental, simple, adequate Detail. Some think of J.ammes as the dullest dlog that ,ever wrote anywhere but in England, as o an f incessant a.nd pretentious talker, talking in verse, talking o the obvious, talking, talking, talking, dropping f his rhymes like a dude dropping his aitches, insisting on hissmallletters like a provincial insistingonhis burr, staring at everything with the greed of a youth making his living with a Kodak, as ‘of a rude, intrusive, eavesdropping,scandalous,relentless bore.Personally, I find thathegivesmedistinctpleasure. I have Seen lots of the details he mentions. Ihave,forinstance, seen just such an inn as he describes. He freshens my memory. have, I also, seen and heard such just a. young miss as he celebrates“ Oh, my dear ! Oh ! 18 la . . . . . . Justimagine . . . on Tuesday I saw him . . . I 1-laughed ! She talks Like that. Jammes has written “The Life of a Passionate Young Girl,” also “The Life of an Ancient Young Girl.” In each case he gives us the Detail and abjures the Whole. You might think YOU were reading Mr. W. W. Gibson; just as inreading M. Tailharde, youthink he is Mr. Aleister Crowley; M. Vildrac-Mr. Yeats; M. Romains -M. r JamesStephens; M. de Gourmont-Mr. Arthur Symons. In so supposing you would be neglecting the nuances ! I h a w not,however,saidthatJammesis th’e very greatest living poet. I don’t know that I shall do so even nlow. I don’t think I shalleversay another word about him. e Views and Reviews.” HUXLEY once said that every scientific man ought to be pole-axed at the age of sixty, as, after that age, he was incapable of understanding 3 new idea. I am not denying the value of Dr. Wallace’s scientificwork when I say that his latest book has remindedme of Huxley’s, dictum. To most eclectic minds, Alfred Russel Wallace is, or has been, a powerful and beautiful influence ; and if his attempt to segregate the soul of man fromthe operation o Natural Selection led him to a renunciation f of science (“ Science commits suicide when it adopts a creed,”saidHuxley),the value of hiswitnesstothe miraculous, at that time of day and ,in those conditions of thought, cannot be over-estimated. it preBut is cisely because I have natural this affection for Dr. * ‘‘ The Revolt of Democracy.” Wallace. (Cassell 2s. 6d. net.) By Alfred Russel 735 Wallace, because I appreciate his influence rather than accept his results, that I wish that he, like Moses, had been translated while yet “his eye was not dim nor his natural force abated.” It is certain that if anyone were to write of his beloved Spiritualism, or the theory of Natural Selection,with theauthoritythat now attachestothename of Alfred RusselWallace, a s ineffectively as he here ‘has written of the economic question, that Dr. Wallace would not be the last to offer criticism o suchawork. f Much as Idislike anything man is not only savouring of disrespect to a who venerable in age andattainments,‘butisone of my heroes, the meed of criticism is the due of his authority, although the book itself is o little value. f As a scientist, Dr. Wallace must know not only the value, but the necessity, of exact definition of the terms used ; yet he writes of “the problem ,of wages” without quoting or offering a definition of wages. This remarkable omission is equivalent t,o a denial of ihe reality o’f the problem that confronts us; it enables Dr. Wallace tosupposethatwagesare fixed \by the good-will of employers. Fromthat heinfers that low wagesarea proof of little good-will of theemployers towards the men, and that the problem can be solved by exhorting the employerstoexercisemoregoodwill.Moregoodwill, more wages, and everything will then be all right ; thus I may summarise,withoutunfairness,theargument o Dr. Wallace. H e calls upon the State to set an f example to other employers by establishing a very high minimum wage for its employees ; indeed, he calls upon the Government to settle the whole problem, and says : “Fortunately, we have a Chancellor of the Exchequer who will know how to raise the money required for the salvation of t m destitute from the excessive and harmful he accumulations of the very rich.” Without considering hisotherproposals, such asthat of the provision of free bread to the destitute (which will give them indigestion)andtheintroduction of a system of multipleindustrial training (which will decrease the economic value of industrial efficiency), wemaysay that Dr. Wallace is as far from the realities of the situation as an idealist ought to be. If I wanted to chop logic I should argue th,at, unless you know what wages are, you cannot know whether T’o call them the it is possible to raise o r lower them. product or proof of goodwill is to d,omore credit to the heartthantothe head. Unless we are merely sentimentalaboutthematter, we cannotsupposethatthe rise in wagesthat followed the Black Death,forexample, was due to an increase of goodwill among the employers of labour; for we know Parliament that legislated against the increase, and that the landowners frequently complained in ParliamentthattheStatute was inoperative. In this case, as in most other cases, wages rose, as Dr. Wallace would say, ”automatically in obedience to some mysterious economic law” ; there exhortation was neither nor to denunciation of goodwill. Employers regretted the economic necessity of payingwages, high but they had to pay them just the same. Labour was scarce at a time when it was most needed, and, in addition, the men had the alternative of self-employment, an alternative that is no longer open to them. If the Black Death practically emancipated serfs, the as Thorold Rogers declared, the employers carefully relieved them of everything but their freedom, as this passage from “Work and Wages” proves : “ I have protested bef’ore against complacent that optimism which concludes, because the health of the upper classes has been greatly improved, because that of the working classes has been bettered, and appliances, unknown before, have become familiar and cheap, that therefore the country in which these improvements have been effected must be considered to have made, for all its people, regular and continuousprogress. I contendthatfrom 1563 to 1824 a conspiracy, concocted by thelawandcarriedout by parties interested in its success, entered to was into cheat the English workman of his wages, to tie him to the soil, to deprive him o hope, and to degrade him :.nto f irremediablepoverty. In a subsequentchapterIshall dwell on the palliatives adopted in order to mitigate the o his life-palliaf worst and most intolerable burdens tives which were rendered necessary by no faults of i is but by the deliberate malignity of Governments and Parliaments.Formorethantwocenturiesanda half the English law, and those whoadministeredthelaw, were engaged in grinding the English workman down to the lowest pittance, in stamping out every expression or act which indicated any organised discontent, and in multiplying penalties upon him when he thought of his natural rights. I am not deceived by the hypocrisy which the preamble of an Act of Parliament habitually contains, and the assertions which are as habitually contradicted by the details of the measure. The Act of Elizabeth declares that ‘the wages of labourers are too small,andnotanswerable to these times,’ and speaks od the ‘grief and burden of the poor labourer and hired man,’ thereupon and enacts a law which effectually makes thewagessmalland multiplies thelabourer’s grief and burden, by allowing those who are interested in keeping him poor to fix the wages on which he shall subsist,andtoexact a testimonialfrom his past ernployersandtheoverseersorchurchwardens when he quitted a service, which he to had show before he entered another. ” It is tlo a State with this history, to a Parliament with these traditions, that Dr. Wallace looks for a refor natiosn of socialandindustrialconditions. Nespeaks of our Chancellor !of the Exchequer (Mr. Lloyd George) as thoughhisexpressed goodwillwere of somevalue in this connection, btu he never defines the economics of Mr. Lloyd George.Mr.LloydGeorge did that himself in a speech in the House of Commons on the “Railways (No. 2) Bill,” and Mr. Kenney has quoted the passage in his recent book, “Men and Rails.” “We are simply giving the railway companies a right which is now extended to every business-man in the community,” said Mr. Lloyd George. “Any other employer could take all those charges into account. If there is a great settlement betweencolliery-ownersandtheiremployees, or great cotton-spinners, or in any other industry which involvesaheavyincreasein the labour bill, they pass iton,andtheyareentitledtopassiton.”Thereare t.he economics of Mr. Lloyd George in that last phrase, and it is clear that if every increase of wages is to be accompanied by an increase ‘of prices, wages will not really rise. Here, then, we see the futility o Dr. Wallace’s grand f panacea. The Labour Party, which he adores almost a s much as he adores Mr. Lloyd George, is unable to prevent an increase of prices coincident with’ a supposed increase of wages. It is safe to say that every legislative enactmentthat is supposed diminish to profits wally results in an increase of prices. Chiozza Mr. Money, forexample,arguedthatthe employers’ contribution tothecost ‘of NationalInsuranceactuallyraisedthe wages of every employee by 3d. per week. But in his “Insurance v. Poverty” he quotes Herr Schmidt, pres.ident of theGermanTobaccoManufacturers’ Association, on the actual results ,of Compulsory Insurance in Germany, to this effect : “ I am convinced that when the social legislation was introduced, and for the first time the large contributions for sickness insurance had tu be paid, many of us groaned. To-day, however, +.hesecontributions, which occur every y e s , are booked either tco the general expenses account olr the wages account, for they are in fact a part o,f wages, and they are naturally calculated as part of the cost of production, and eventually appear in the price of the goods, though perhaps not to the full extent in times of bad trade.” If Dr. Wallace will ponder that simple fact he will see how impossible it is to raise real wages by legislative enactment ; and he may also-discover the necessity of defining wages beforemakinganyproposalsfortheir increase. Then he may discover that there is really nothing to be d m e withwagesbut to abolishthem. If hediscovers this, I can promise him a new lease of life. A. E. R. 736 REVIEWS. 6s .) This is not a book about gardening, hut a novel. An artist, troubled abouthistechnique, goes to Cornwall and paints pictures with a pickaxe, as m e of the charactersdescribes them. He discoversmanythings as a consequence o this visit; for example, a somewhat f ample woman with a boy. Said woman suppresses her physical and mental advantages at home; she is really only waiting for the death o h,er husband SO that she f SO, and, of may take London in her Does arms. course, instinctively adopts the mode of furnishing most in accord with the new spirit of art. Complications of all kinds, of course, the artist developing more and more in themoderntradition,loseshis fiancee, who disapproves his of development of and the factthat is the symbol and focusofthe the Cornish woman movement.More development and complications, and then theartist proposes tothe Cornishwoman. She loves him, but she had also loved a young novelist who had mistaken her in thse streets for an improper female; said novelist marries the artist’s fiancee. Everything but sex, therefore, between the Cornish woman and the artist; and the new movement in art espresses itself in an imitation, of theWilliam Morris factory, with this difference, that there is no autocracy of the artist. The f spirit o brotherhood isthe theme, and all thearts the Cornish woman to aid in its exgather around pression. Moral : go to Cornwall ? By Frederic Lawrence. (Kelly. 2s. 6d. net.) These five sketches of Grieg,Chopin,Tchaikovsky, Schumann, and Wagner, may he recommended with’ a warning to ail young ladies. There is a time of life when we can take ,the view of music here expresed; but the risks to, health and sanity in s o doing are considerable. Tchaikovsky, for example, vampire a is when one is in this frame of mind; it is impossible to hear his “ Pathetique” symphony without being physically exhausted. depressant,its Sorrow a is and physiological effects when expressed in music by certain people are bad. Wagner a is subtler antagonist; it is only years afterwards that we realise th’e damage done by the hyper-excitation of the nerves. The whole five (of these musicians something have feminine in their composition; they take strength, and give technique, a s a woman will give charm in return for energy the transmitted by a man. Tlo approach such composers in the frame of mind of Mr. Lawrence, in thatfeminine mood of self-surrender,is to ask for troubleand toget it. Thereare individual works of all these composers that not do have this effect of depletion; no one is weaker for hearing the introduction to thethird act of “ Lohengrin,”orthe“Capriccio Italien”; what but is needed is not sentimental this raving about sentimentalists, but a warning against of their seductions until the hearer has learnt the art self-protection. A compulsorycourse of Beethoven, as a preliminary, would probably most secure people against the physiological effects of theseother composers; but vampirism will always flourish while people are willing to be vampirised. Subsoil. By Charles Marriott. (Hurst and Blackett. ‘‘exposed their charms” to the gaze of the painter, to quote Dr. Rappoport’s cliche, and whohadnomotive otherthanthat o servingArt f by unveiling Beauty. example, not menPauline Buonoparte is one good tioned,wethink, by Dr.Rappoport;and MissChudleigh, who became the famous Duchess of Kingston, is another. truth The is that question the of morality ought never to have been introduced; and any relation but the artistic between ‘the artist and themodel should have been excluded. The precise value of the model to the artist is not to be determined by any account of their sexual relations; and whether the model exhibited herself f m Iove 0.f art or of the artist, tbe fact remains or thatsheconcernsusnot a t all except inthe picture. Dr. Rappoport has added a value to an otherwise superfluous volume by an appendix of brief biographical f is illustrated. sketches o the artists. The volume William o Germany. By Stanley Shaw. f (Methuen. 7s. 6d. net.) Musicians o SorrowandRomance. f Somehow this book reminds us. of a ribald rhyme that children used tosing of their schoolmasters, which, being adapted, would read :William of Germany’s a very good man ; €€e tries to teach us all he can, In reading, writing, arithmetic ; And he don’t forget to give us the stick. Certainly,Mr.Shaw’s friendly portraitureandgentle criticism.cannot make anythinggreater of him than this. A king who reigns “ von Gottes Gnaden” (by the grace o a philosophical f hypothesis), and, therefore, claims. theright to dictatecanons of art,systems of education, and to statethe whole duty of women,is merely a pedantic person. His objection totbeSocial Democrats is obviously only a professional ,objection to the diversion of the spirit of loyalty; and an Emperor whoiscompelled to give assurances to his Chancellor that he will not repeat his “indiscretions” is not really able to combatthat diversion of loyalty. When Mr. Shaw concludes that “with the Emperor time for fiveand-twenty years appears tohav’e stood still,” we understand the that Emperor, most like other leaders, marches in the rear of his people. There is a good deal of th,e customary drivel about Emperor the as husband and father, but, on the whole, the book is a fair statement of the life and importance o the German f Emperor. But tbe economic history of Germany is more interesting. S. Rappoport. (Stanley Paul. 16s. net.) By the very nature of its subject, this book could be no more than a compilation. The number of artists who have used models, from Apelles and Zeuxis to Gainsborough, is too large to allow of more than very cursory treatment; and cursory treatment is not really adequate tQ thesubject.True,Dr. Rappoport begins with a couple of chapters on morality and art, and thus introduces the verysense of impropriety thathe denounces; and the subsequent biographical sketches have neitherpsychologicalnor aesthletic interest. The book is simply a series of descriptions of women who Famous Artists and their Models. By Dr. Angelo By S. A. Mussabini. (Methuen. 5s. net.) Methuen’s This is a welcome addition t o Messrs. “Complete” series; for, although Mr.Mussabinisplits his i n f i n i t e s (actuallybeginshis book withone),his directions ace very clear and intelligible, and are very sound. Hehas said nothing of pole-vaulting, discus and javelin throwing, or cross-country running, for the very excellent reason that h,e has little practical expeof sprint-running, 200 and 300 ri’ence of them, But yards, 440 yards, half-mile, mile, and long-distance and Marathon (ridiculous term !) racing, he has said everything that a trainer ought to know. There are chapters on track tactics, time training methods, track and road walking, hurdles, the long jump, high jump, hop, step, and jump, putting shot, the and hammer-throwing; whilethte important subject of shoes has a chapter to itself. An’ important feature of the book is the schedule of averagetimesfloreachdistance;and th’e practical hints that Mr. Mussabini gives to t h e trainer concerning the necessity of judging a man’s track-running by his foot-prints, are invaluable. In his tbe main, chapter on genera1 health hints is valuable, but we question the value of beginning training with a course of “BlackJack.” Proper dietandexerciseshould do more to correct irregularities any than dosing; and purgingisnot half so sureandsound a method of cleaning the liver as is the Russian leg dance and other exercises prescribed by Mr. Mussabini. Leave the ‘‘ Black Jack” alone. The Complete Athletic Trainer. 737 Pastiche. I tell my novelette, As the fashion is, In verse. Well, 1 sat In the Memorial Hall, Waiting to hear Larkin Speak. One chair on the platform Was empty. Who was it for? I forgot about the chair, Thinking of Larkin, The Man of the Times. And then She came in, And leered across the platform, And took the vacant chair amidst faint applause. “ By George,’’ I said, Between my teeth, ‘‘ I might have guessed it. Here’s a NewMan Whom Everybody’s discussing. LA BELLE DAME SANS BEAUTE. Trust the old girl to turn up And get in his limelight.” Then silently I addressed Larkin. “ New Man,” I said, “ La Belle Dame sans Beaute Is at her usual games, this time with you ! I pity her ! I really do feel a spark ! ” Thenthespark died. “ Wretched hag of the nobility, Confidant of Rosebery, Hostess of Hearst, Hostess of the Fat Press,” Thus I addressed sotto voce That lovely lady, f That serpent o Old Labour, “ What the hell are you doing here? What would Fat say If Mrs. Workingman Turned up at their funerals And dropped a wet tear On their troubles? They’d search her for dynamite Or its equivalent. War’s war, old lady ! The Labour leaders You tucked in your muff, Your somewhat mothy muff, Are all dead as doornails. Now we’ve got down to rock business, Don’t you think you’d better Hook it? You’re ageneration Too old For the new spirit That loves go-betweens Like hell ! ” Thus I addressed That Bad Fairy, That sink of Many a reputation. But again, when I looked A t the New Man, I almost felt another spark ! She looked so . . there, poor old girl ! G . WHIZ. . MAMMON. Enthroned on mountainoussummits of man’s greed I sit above the world. I amhisheaven, His sun by day, his moon and stars by night. From me his fortune springs, to me returns. He is the slave within my palaces ; He lieth with his ear against my door, Haggard and fevered, thro’ long sleepless nights, Listening to catch the whisper of my breath. He serves my whim. My promise everywhere Lureth him onward. If on asuddenthought He turn him back, with glitter of savage spears I am behind to goad him to his doom. of fabulous wealth, He makes me sport. To dreams Mansions andparks, jewels andrarestfruits, Honour and longed-for service, down hard ways O’er flints he hurries with pale bleeding feet, Past fires that scorch him, barbs that tear his flesh, face, Thro’ storms of blinding dust that sting his Stumbles through quagmires, pants toward his goal, Till old and worn, with starting eyes he sees Some weakling whom he trampled in the race Inheriting his glory.Whenhe praysHe is cast down. He curses-is enthroned. He prides himself-and from desired heights To the last depths is flung. Ne whimpersthen, Cursesmy promises, forswears myways, But even while he curses and forswears His face is bowed before my throne in prayer. Most excellent sport I have of thee, 0 man ! His god am I. He maketh sacrifice. Ever before my altars, day and night, The noblest of his kind he offers up. My festivals he keeps continually, And, in a frenzy of worship, at my feet He slays his children, that their fragrant blood May steam up to my nostrils lingeringly. I smile upon him. The cup of my goodwill Feverishly drains. he His blood is seized. WiIdIy, to pleasure me, the dance of death Goes surging thro’ my tempIes. With tossed hair, Fierce lustful eyes andmaniacarms, he runs Trampling young boys and girls beneath his feet, Whose cries are music to his hymns of praise. His worship is notstinted. Million lives Yearly to my sole service he devotes. women In all his cities many thousand Pour out their love and beauty like sweet oil Before my image, faithful priestesses. He boasteth of hisgrandeur while he serves. Free is he?-His undaunted Thought outspeeds And laughs at Time. Thelast confines of Space He hathinvaded, and, victorious, hailed Truth captive, from her strongholds of the night, Beautyhath served him as an Handmaiden. He sends his heralds thto’ the Universe. The deep sea opes to him her treasuries. The farthest stars, their many coloured robes Fling at his feet, and naked blaze: before him, Their beauty firing his undazzled eyes. The rivers work hiswill. The vibrant air Shuddershis mandates o’er the seas. TheEarth To him reveals herself ; her vital heat him. Gives to his hand. The lightnings carry He is their Monarch-and the perfect slave. He serves so well that to his master’s use is h e ? Nay, but bound He binds creation. Free More surely in the chains of his desires Than are the mountains rooted to the earth. 0 perfect slave, who hath himself enslaved,, Himself his captor, prison, warder, chain! PALLISTER BARKAS. THE WORKMAN’S SATURDAY NIGHT I N GARRATT LANE, TOOTING. Come let us sing of Death, and let us make Flower-crowned altars for his royal throne. Imperial monarch, with thy dreadful sting Now transformed into arms of sleepy bliss, We hail thee, Sovereign, Lord, our Rest, our Hope, f For life hath killed the dread o thee our King. I watched the crowd, they passed ss in a dream, With blood-shortages and faces made for tears. This night a week of toil had ended, And with a beggar’s surfeit with their wealth They gorged their senses full in a mad riot With beer and shellfish, cheered by alien jokes. This, this is the summit of our lovely world ! Ah me ! How beautiful is Death the King Who folds up i n his black and sable arms f These poor creations o some lunatic; I’ll not blaspheme and call them works of God. For he in pity died an old man, blind, I n his dotage in a’ chimney corner. At least I’m told by one who came, anew To fashion and remould the human race. I’ll notblasphemeandsay that eight-pound serfs Or luckier knaves who strut in robes o State f Are quite their own or yet their brother’s keeper. These stiff-necked, mean, ignoble and low souls Who crawl from day to day with pompous pace, Move resolutions, in the iobby tramp And talk of Persia, Timbuctoo, and twine, And speak of offal to an offal crowd, Are too engaged in keeping wide the doors Of that fair mint from whence their payment flows. Away ! foul dreams of cesspool politics. If Hell were not, it would be wanted quite To cauterise this scum before theearth Would lie on those who lied above SO well. But soft I sing of Death : No sad song shall it be, Its minstrelsy Delighteth me And stabs with joy my breath. 738 No weary days of toil, No passing sighs nor tears; His soft arms fold My body cold, ,4nd Life a t last I foil. Let all the earthresound f With praise o him the King, For Life is dead, Its spirit sped, And never will be found. A n Open Letter to Dublin Employers. WILLIAM REPTON. ’TOURIST SONG. The long waves quiver with a lifting shock, Calling “Won’t you come and taste us for a day?” The slow waves shiver and the quick winds mock, “Oh, won’t you come and meet us for a day ? ” Fare thee well-fare thee wellFare thee well my fairest fay! I’m off to meet the quiver of the crinkled waves a-shiver, And I hope it’s going to last me all the day. Even leave the loominghillside in the stir of clinging ram, Booming “Don’t you be so silly, just you stay.” Evenleave therattling rillsideand theshaken leaves a-strain, “Oh, so silly, Oh, so silly, won’t you stay?” Fare thee well-fare thee wellFare thee well, my fairest fay! Don’t you stand here while it’s raining or you’ll sure get wet complaining, And I hope you’ll never keep me all the day. The black waves sizzle round the gurgle of the bow, Greedy growling “Now we’ve got you for the day.” The fiend winds whistle down the blank land’s brow, “Meet and keep him, meet and keep him for the day.” Farethee well-fare thee wellFare thee well, my fairest fay! f deeps their I’m of to net in measure from thevasty treasure, And I hope it’s going to last me all the day-AII the dayAnd I hope it’s going to last me all the day ! J. A . M. -4. SUCCESS. Evitata rotis.”-Hor., “ . . . . . . metaquefervidis Car. I, i. Beneath the canvas of the circus tent Fearfully have I watched the horses’ heels; Gone home well pleased withmyillicitfeast, As morning mouse from supper-table steals. . . . . . . . Not mine a place within the gay parterre, I never yet have learned the countersign. Not mine the glint of silver and cut glass, White napery and ruby-coloured wine. The wedding garment irks me, and my ire Flames out when the host “Friend, says, higher.” I hate the jokes, the damned omnipotence, The alcoholic breathingsand ventripotence. come up The crowd of them is one repeated grex Or swine of Gaddara that down the steep Stumbled at word of Jesus Christus Rex. Their gems are priceless but their jests are cheap. 1 have a shilling; one unbattered gate From hunger-wolf keeps castle virgin vet. “Heads,” to a beggar ; “taiis,” two daysmore . . . . . . . seige. “Heads !” Here’s a beggar, and-a landing net. CALEBPORTER. [The following letter by “A. E.” (Mr. George W. Russell) appeared last week in the “Irish Times.” We reprint it here with acknowledgments totheauthorand to the journal. J Sirs,-I address this warning to you, the aristocracy of industry in this city, because, like all aristocracies, you tend to grow blind in long authority, and to be unaware that you andyourclassand its everyaction are being considered and judged day by day by those who have the power to shakeor overturn thewhole social order and whose restlessness in poverty to-day is makingourindustrial civilisation stir like a quaking bog. You do not seem to realise that your assumption that you are answerable to yourselvesalone for youractions intheindustriesyou control is one that becomes less and lesstolerable in a world so crowded with necessitous life. Some of you have helped Irish farmers to upset a landed aristocracy in this island,an aristocracy richer and more powerful in its spherethan you arein yours, with its roots deep in history.They, too, as a class,thoughnotall of them, were scornful or neglectful of the workers in the industry by which they profited; and to many who knew them in their pride of place and thought them all-powerful they are already becoming a memory, the good disappearing togetherwith the bad. If theyhad done theirduty by those from whose labours came their wealth they might in power andprestigefor havecontinuedunquestioned centuries to come. Therelation of landlordand tenant is not an ideal one, butanyrelationsin a social order will endure if there is infused intothem some of that spirit of humansympathy which qualifies life for immortality. Despotisms endure while they are benevolent, and aristocracies while “noblesse oblige” is not a phrase to be referred to with a cynical smile. Even an oligarchy might be permanent if thespirit o human f kindness, which harmonisesall things otherwiseincompatible, is present. its You donot seem toread history so astolearn lessons. Th?t yo11 are n n uncultivated class was obvious f from recent utterances from some o you upon art. That you areincompetentmen inthespherein which you arrogateimperial powers is certain, because for many years,long before the present uprising of labour,your enterprises have been dwindling inthe regard of investors, and this while you have carried them on in the cheapestlabourmarket in theseislands,withalabour reserve always hungry and ready to accept any pittance. You are bad citizens, for we rarely, if ever, hear of the the muniwealthy among you endowing your city with ficent gifts which it is the pride of merchant princes in other cities to offer, and Irishmen not of your city who offer to supply the wants left by your lack of generosity are met with derision and abuse. Those who have economic power have civic power also, yet you have not used the power that was yours to right what was wrong in the evil administration of this city. YOUhave allowed the poor to be herded together so that one thinks of cerof a pestilence. There are tain places in Dublin as twenty thousand rooms, in each o which live f entire families, and sometimes more, where no function of the body can be concealed, and delicacy and modesty are creatures that are stifled ere they are born. The obvious duty of you in regard to these things you might have left undone, and it be imputed to ignorance or forgetfulness : but your collective and conscious action as a class in the present labour dispute has revealed you to the world in so malign an aspect that the mirror must be held UP to pout so that you may see yourself as every humane person sees you. The conception of yourselves as altogether virtuous and wronged is, T assure you, not at all the one which onlookers hold of you. No doubt, you have rights on your side. No doubt some of you suffered without just cause. Rut nothing which has been done t o you cries aloud to Heaven for condemnation as your own actions. Let me show you how it seems to those who have followed critically the dispute, trying to weigh in a balance the rights and wrongs. You were within the rights society allows VOII when you locked out your men and insisted on the fixing of some principle to adjust your future relations with labour, when the policy of labour made it impossible for some of you to carry on your enterprise. Labour desired the fixing of some snch principle as much as von did. Rnt, having once decided on such a step,knowing how many thousands of men, women, and children, nearly one-third of the population of this city, would be 739 affected, you should not have let one day pass without unremitting endeavours to find a solution of the problem. What did you do ? The representatives of labour unions in Great Britain met you, and you made of them a preposterous, an impossible demand, and because they would not accede to it you closed the Conference; you refused to meet them further ; you assumed that no other guarantees than those you asked were possible, and you determined deliberately, in cold anger, to starve out one-third of the population of this city, to break the manhood of the men by the sight of the suffering of their wives and the hunger of their children. We lead in the Dark Ages of the rack andthe thumb-screw. Buttheseiniquities were hidden and concealed from the knowledge of men in dungeons and torture chambers. Even in the Dark Ages humanity could not endure the sight of such suffering, and it learnt of such misuse of power by slow degrees, throughrumour,and when it wascertain it razed its Bastilles to their foundations. It remained for the twentieth century and the capital city of Ireland to see an oligarchy of four hundred masters deciding openly upon starvingonehundredthousand people, andrefusing to consider any solution except that fixed by their pride. You, masters,asked men to do that which masters Gf labour in any other city in these islands had not dared to do. You insolently demanded of those men who were members of a trade union that they should resign from that union; and from those who were not members you insisted on a vow that they would never join it. Your insolence and ignorance of the rights conceded to workers universally in the modern world were incredible, as yourinhumanity. I youhad between f andasgreat you collectively aportion of human soul aslarge as a threepenny bit you would have sat night and day with the representatives of labour trying this or that solution of the trouble, mindful of the women and children, who at least were innocent of wrongagainst you. But no ! You reminded labour you could always have your three squaremealsaday while it went hungry. You went into conference againwithrepresentatives of the State, because, dull as you are, you knew public opinion would not stand your holding out. You chose as your spokesman the bitterest tongue that ever wagged in this island, and then, when an award was madebymen who have an experience in industrial matters a thousand times transcending yours, who have settled disputes in indussum of your pettyenterprises tries so greatthatthe would not equal them, you withdraw again, and will not agree to accept their solution, and fall back again on your devilish policy of starvation.Cryaloud to Heaven for new souls ! The souls you have got, cast upon the screen o publicity, f appear likehorrid writhing the and creatures enlarged from the insect world and revealed to us by the cinematograph. You may succeed in your policy and ensure your own damnation by your victory. The men whose manhood you have broken will loathe you, and will always be brooding andscheming to strike afresh blow. The children will be taughtto curse you. Theinfantbeing moulded in the womb will have -breathed into its starved body the vitality of hate. It is not they-it is you who arethe blind Samsons pulling down the pillars of the social order. You are sounding the death-knell of autocracy in industry.There was autocracy in political life, and it was superseded by democracy, So surely will democratic power wrestfrom you the control of industry. The fate of you, the aristocracy of industry, will be as the fate of the aristocracy of land if you do not now show that you have some humanity still among you. Humanity abhors, above all things, a vacuum in itself, and your class will be cut off from humanity as the surgeon cuts the cancer and alien growth from the body. Be warned ere it is too late.-Yours, etc., A. E. Dublin, October 6 , 1913. arrives at anything like fixity of belief. Did we not see him cast off Nietzsche and his own work on Indian philosophy atthe first challenge?Forthis reason we were not surprisedto find himattackingthe National Guild system within a week or two of his attempted defence of it in your pages. In another week or two, if we judge his principles correctly, he may be defending it again.But God forbid that we should hope forit. The title of his article in the “ Nineteenth Century ” is “ What the Workmen Think.” On this abstruse subject Mr. Kennedy claims to possess a more intimate knowledge than belongs to anybody now writing. We have all, it seems, been discussingLabourunrestwithout having taken into account the most essential element -namely, the workman’s point of view. But fortunately Mr. Kennedy is able to supplement our defect. ‘(I venture to say,” he remarks, ‘‘ that my experience of workmen is unusually wide, and that it enables me to judge them with fair accuracy.” Marcus Aurelius, it will be remembered, modestly recited at the opening of his “ Thoughts ” the names of his teachers as evidence that he had at least had the opportunity of learning. Would Mr. Kennedy “ venturetosay ” where and when he obtained his “ unusual ” knowledge of what the workmen think ? Forour part, we “ venture to say ’’ that what Mr. Kennedy has not picked up from THBNEWAGE: he has picked u~ in FleetStreet, for from everyother source of informationabout the proletariathehaslong been shut off. We challengehim to name an occasion a when he ever met a tradeunionleaderorattended trade union meeting or a Labour Congress, or any similar W e meeting or personage in the Labour movement. challenge him further to declare his sources of informiltion on any item of his enumeration of the thoughts of workmen. We believe, in sober fact, that not only has Mr. Kennedy never set foot more than once or twice out of London during the last six or seven years, but in all that time his conversation with workmen has been confined to a caretaker or two and the printers with whom his profession has broughthimintomutually inexplicable association. So much for Mr. Kennedy’s equipment as a reporter of “ What the Workmen Think.” We may next turn to his analysis of the existing industrial situation. It is plain to the least careful observer that the main facts of the situation are, first, that real wages arefalling, and, second, that neither trade unionactionnorpoliticalaction has succeeded in stoppingthefail.The questions that have arisen i n consequence of a generalrecognition of thesefactsamply explain the existence of “ Labour unrest,” both among the proletariat and in the Press; for the former feel the situation while the latter talk about it. With the economic causes of the fall in wages Mr. Kennedydiscreetly does not concern himself overmuch; but he adds to the fall of wages a second and, in his opinion, a “ more Important factor ” of unrest in the form of “ the gradual disappearance of a human relationship between masters andmen.” This,he contends, is the paramountcause of all the industrial trouble that exists, and on its removal depends the industrial peace of the future. ’We say nothing fy--the moment of the sky-blue idealism involved “ human relations ” can be reIn lmagining that If there were established in modern capitalistindustry. any sign that joint-stock management, company promotion, or industrial amalgamations were tendingto disappear, some reasonable hope might be entertained by ;L statesman that the pendulum would shortly swing back know, to personal relations. But Mr. Kennedy should now that we tell him, that there is no sign whatever of this ; and in consequence hismere wish that the clock should he reversed is a kind of Dolly’s day-dream. But is it thefactthatthe workmen really wish to restore thoserelations astheyexisted before ? Mr. Kennedy, from his ‘(unusual ” knowledge of workmen, assures US that they preserve the “ feudal instinct,” and mourn like dogs on thegraves of theirextinct masters. This, he says, may be seen in the fact that the working classes are still prepared to do anything for “ undoubted aristocrats ” like Lord Hugh Cecil, but nothing for men of their own or the middle classes. Well, we confess we have not seen many signs of it, and nor, we think, has Lord Hugh Cecil, who was drivento Oxford to find a seat. Mr. Kennedy’s workmen manage to dissemble their feudal instincts very well by kicking “ undoubted aristocrats downstairs. Apart, however, from this idealistic suggestion for the three cure of labour unrest, Mr. Kennedy examines remedies. The first is Socialism, of which, he says, workmen think nothing. agree We in both senses. The second is Liberalism,with which we need nottrouble LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. SYSTEM. Sir,-In the “ Nineteenth Century ” for October is an article one by of your recent contributors, Mr. J. M. Kennedy to wit. As an ex-contributor, Mr. Kennedy deserves, perhaps, some consideration from us,though not more, we think,thanhis work deserves. That Mr. Kennedy by his later articles in THENEW AGE was leading your readers to believe that he supported to the best of hisabilityourpropaganda of NationalGuilds,pour readers, w e believe, will agree. But Mr. Kennedy, being to gothrough before he young,hasmanychangesyet MR. J. M. KENNEDY ON THE NATIONAL GUILD 740 ourselves here. The third, we if have penetrated Mr. is Trade Unionism, of which the Kennedy’s meaning, Guild Socialism (‘advocated with unusualskill by the editorial writers of THE NEW AGE” is a constructive variant. Of Guild Socialism, or, as we ourselvescall it, the National Guilds system, Mr. Kennedysays, in his is one of thosebrilliantly well-known style,thatit simple plans which are only too likely to attract young workmenandunsteady intellects; it is as idealin its way as Plato’s Republic.” Fancy that, now ! The parallel with Plato’s Republic, however, would please us more if Mr. Kennedy were acquainted either with term of the comparison. Wehave never heard the idea of the Platonic Republic described before as “ brilliantly simple ” ; and it is unfortunate that Mr. Kennedy should display inthe succeeding paragraph an incapacity to grasp with so much as his finger the “brilliantly simple” notion of the National Guilds. Not toput too fine a point on his summary of our position, it is totally wrong from A to 2. Our “ unusual skill,” it seems, has failed to convey to Mr. Kennedy’smind the smallestinkling of what we have been driving- at. Indeed, we go so far as to say that, if our presentation of the case for National Guilds has resulted in nothing better in Mr. Kennedy’s mind than the idea he reports as ours, either we should cease writing or heshouldbegin to learn to read.Fortunately for our choice, however, we havetwofactsin our favour. In the ‘‘ Fortnightly Review ” of this month, Mr. Chiozza Money convicts Mr. Kennedy of having in a previous article on the Insurance Act confused the Sickness with the Unemployment Section. The den1onstr:Jtion is quite complete, and we are encouraged to find that other people besides ourselves find Mr. Kennedy a little unsteady in his intellect. Secondly, we hare evidence in the article before us that Mr. Kennedy has unmistakably misrepresented our views. His main criticism, so he says, of Guild Socialism is under that the Guild system the workmen would be theparamount political power. Well, we, who oughtto know, happentohave never a suggestion of the stated a thousand times, with contrary, that they will be nothing of the kind. The very criticisms, in k t , which Mr. Kennedy proceeds to urge against the political hegemony of the manual classes he hasderived, with everything else inhis article that is true, from the pages of THE NEW AGE. As a matter of fact, we anticipated his criticismsandapplied them to Syndicalism as against our own suggestion of the Guild system. In spite of this, however, Mr. Kennedy continuesas if we had proposed to endow industrialists as such with political power. “The working men,” he says, are not merely incapable of exercising the high political power which Guild Socialism would confer on them ; they do not wish to do so.”, Quite so, but who saici they did, and where in THE NEW AGE has it ever been suggested thatthe Guilds would be given. political power? As a matter of fact, we have as repeatedly excluded politics from thepurview of the Guilds as we have wished to exclude industryfromthe purview of politicians. Our contention has been, and is, that Parliament owes its (both corruption to admixture the of trade delegates Labour and Capitalist) with genuine representatives ; and we suggestedthe it was in full view of thisfactthat separation of the twonationalfunctions of politics and industry and the delegation of the latter to the Guilds under the immediatecontrol of theirpermanent Guild other errors of Assembly. We could point out several representation in Mr. Kennedy’s discussion of our articles ; but perhaps your readers have had enough of it. In sum, it is evident to us that Mr. Kennedy has been more eager to write an article than to write either fairly We sincerely hope, for the honour of or with sense. public controversy, that men who set out to criticise the National Guild system will at least take the trouble first to understand it. It is impossible to refute a case unless you can also state it. THE WRITERS THE ARTICLESON THE OF NATIONAL, GUILDS. (( (( Brotherhood of Syndicalists, even though you do suggest a duality of control of the instruments of production which Syndicalistsregardasimpracticable, impossible, and undesirable. Perhaps the following quotation from my pamphlet, “What is Syndicalism,” will support my contention that Syndicalists do not propose to vest ownership of the instruments of production in the Unions as opposed to the Community. to As the authority of the pamphlet, I would say that it has been read and passed on favourably by practically every well-known Syndicalist in this country a s well asabroad. TheSyndicalist views bothnationalisation and municipalisation of industry with more or less indifference. The essence of Syndicalism is the control by the workersthemselves, be theyintellectualormanual, of the conditions of their own work. The growth of the machine process has divorced tile worker from the control he formerly exercised by his individualownership of the tools of production. To-day the capitalist owns andcontrols the tools formerly owned by the worker, with theresultthatthe worker is practically his slave. Syndicalism proposes that this control of the technical processes now exercised by thecapitalistshall pass to variousgroups of organisedworkers of the various industries. The product which is now the property of the capitalist would become under Syndicalism the property of the community. of arranging industry Syndicalism has thought no upon the basis of each group of workers in each industry holding up the communityto the full extent of its economic power in order to extract greatest the amount of reward for its particular form of labour. The remuneration of the worker will be determined either by deeds or by needs, as may hereafter be decided, but most certainly not upon the basis of allowing him a reward according tothe importance of hisindustrial product to the community, for that would be merely of changingthepresentsystem,withitssmallnumber capitalistexploiters,to a worse system,with a myriad of exploiting workers. Both Syndicalismand Socialism look to a world-wide democratic organisation of the workers for co-operative But Socialism production and distribution.whereas looks to social organisation, proceeding from the present Capitalist State downward to the workers, the Syndicalist looks to the evolution proceeding upward from the workers to organised society. Instead of theState giving industrial controlto the theSyndicalists workers, as the Socialistsfondlyhope, look to the workers taking such control and giving it to the community. To the Syndicalist it is not so much as to what a man may thinkhe is or may call himself as it is to what he does that constitutes him a Syndicalist. For instance, the other nightatthe Syndicalistmeeting in Holborn Hall, Ben Tillett, preliminary to making a rattling good Syndicalist speech, was verycarefultoexplain that be was not a Syndicalist. And I haveheardthatLarkin, being a Syndiwhile tying up Dublin, also disclaims calist. Presumably, Larkin Tillett and would likewise disclaim beingGuildSocialists, but I imagine thatto THE NEW AGE both of them would be considered good enough Guild Socialists, just as I consider them good GAYLORD WILSHIRE. Syndicalists. enough * + + + S d SYNDICALISM. Sir,-You honour me by suggesting that I burden the pages of THENEWAGEwith an exposition of Syndicalism. I reply that the editorials of THE NEW AGE which you call Guild Socialism are good enough Syndicalism €or me with the exception of the ideal drawn of the future society, and I believe that this exception is comparatively insignificant. Your insistence upon the importance of striking, and as compared with particularly the sympathetic strike, voting, is quite enough for you to be received into the Sir,-You will be glad to know that after seven years’ democratic boycott of the name of THE NEW AGE, the “ Clarion,” that organ of the fellowship of comrades and all the rest of the sickening cant of make-believe friendliness, has referred to the National Guild System and to It is apity, however, that I the name of yourjournal. cannot add that its reference is within a thousand miles of thetruth. But i t isn’t.Thewriter is Mr. Alex. M. Thompson, who, I believe, has written a very clever and a verywittylibretto-the“Arcadians.” But this qualification is not sufficient to enable him either to state the case for the Guild system accurately or to criticise it with any intelligence. He says that THE NEW AGEin its propaganda is flying upside down like Pegoud; and the reason is that you are disappointed with the I.L.P. and with Trade Unionism. But neither of these, he says, has been givenafairtrial. Having now readyourarticles withas much care as I should devote to a subject on which my reputation depended, I am able, with your permission, to deny that THENEW AGE has done anything of the kind. Far from being ‘(disappointed”witheither “THE N E W A G E ” AND T H E PRESS. 741 the Labour Party or with Trade Unionism you have repeatedly said thzt, being on the wrong track, it is Surprising how much the Labour Party has accomplished; and as for Trade Unionism, you have said that it is the hope of the world. But Mr. Thompson, I gather, does not want to be very precise either in his criticisms or in his own counter-proposals.Hesays, to be sure, that he has studied all the alternatives to Socialism and that he still prefers Socialism ; but he does not define the Socialism he prefers nor does he give any indication of having even glanced at alternatives State the to Capitalism, namely, Syndicalism and National Guilds. It is all very well to say that we should “stand ready to use any tools that come handy, whether general strike or resolute Parliamentary action”; but tools do not drop into our hands znd it is presumably the business of Labour thinkers to forge them or, at least, to understand them. If it is true, as you say, that economic power precedes political power, thenallthe resoluteness we can command in Labour politics will be useless. The best we can do by this means is to change one set of capitalists for another. If, on the other hand, a general strike is doomed to be useless until the Unions have each a monopoly of their labour, and would then prove unnecessary, obviously the immediate is strengthen task to the Unions by every means 1x1 our power. Mr. Thompson, I conclude, is in favour of this-then what is the trouble about ? The only difference, I think, between you is that Mr. Thompson is not concerned about what will happen, whereas THE NEW AGE is. This preoccupation withplanshecalls, I presume, flying upside down. Itis so much easier to talk :lbo::t t h z French Revolution. The “Financial World,” hitherto published at threepence, announces that henceforth its price will be a penny. It refers to THE NEW A G E , and agrees with “R.H.C.” that the price of threepence is not reckoned as the half of sixpence, but as thetreble of apenny.It’s funny, but it’s true. The readers of “Forward” (October 4) had a treat last week inthe form of a longletter from Mr.Carstairs Matheson explaining his “ reasons ” for regarding THE NEWAGEas written by cads to be read by cads. None of his famous “love of comrades” appears in it, I can assure you ! He might almost be an ordinary man in a temper ! His “reasons”(let the word pass-it may soothe him) are as follows : THE NEW AGE, now nearly seven years old, has plagiarised the ideas of workingmen, of the S.L.P., of the I.U.W., of the N.B.C., and the Z . Y . X , all which bodies have been hard at work for quite five years ; and it has done so withoutacknowledging their subsequent priority. Had you merely anticipated these alphabetical entities, Mr. Matheson might conceivably have forgiven you ; but you confused their subsequent doctrines and added nothingthem the to save whole organic conception of National Guilds-a mere piece of “swank.” Further than this, the style in which you present these ideas is that like of an Oxford don unbending to children ; in other words, you irritate Mr. Matheson. Your “chatty, chirruping familiarity” makes fair his blood boil : it do indeed.Thenagain,youcriticise the Labour Party. So does Mr. Matheson, and in such language, he tells us, that ladies not may be present when heisinfulllung. But your criticismhesimply cannot tolerate-not merely women andchildrenleave the room, but Mr. Matheson has to be carried out screaming! And why? Because your writers, he says, ! That Mr. are working not men, only but outsiders I think, Matheson is a workingmanhisletterproves, conclusively, for quotes he Greek-a well-known PRESS-CUTTER. language at Labour conferences. armed originated force the evils from which your belief of “righteous” wars are togivedeliverance.The nations or of governments i n war brought about,, in the first instance, the enslavement or the attack. If critics of Mr. Norman Angell’s views would only read his book, “The Great Illusion,” before attacking what they think are his theories, they would be saved from many an error. F. SEYMOUR COCKS. * * * A SUFFRAGETTE LIE. Sir,-In the latest issue of “Votes for Women,” which is little if any better than the “Suffragette,” anindividual calling herself, “ ,4n Old Liberal,” repeats a particularly malevolent falsehood in regard to the case of a man named Edward Cargill, who was released by the Home Secretary for ill-health. It is stated that this person was ‘‘convicted of assaults on little children.” The fact is that the man was indicted for an offence against the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1885, a Feminist measure, in regard to two hulking overgrown wenches of 15, and convicted in regard to one of them. He was released because suffering from aneurism of the aorta, he might otherwise have died in gaol as Albert Davis died. Mrs. Castle and Mrs. Cameron were similarly released for ill-health. ARCH.GIBBs. * * * Sir,-It is interesting amusing and t o witness the efforts of ourlegislators,layand clerical, to amendour morals. Interesting because it proves how futileallthe civilising influences of the passing years have been when they oppose such a mighty power as the sexual instinct. It is true that we have progressed i n refinement, and are generallyable to conceal our“sin” under the cloak of respectability, but that the instinct is rampant in us, the crowds of boys and girls who throng our streets nightly, f recent fashions in women’s dress, thz taint o the modern novel, the living statues of the music-hall, the Russian ballet and the Salome dance of the theatre, all these go t o prove it. The amusing part of it all is that these moral of all. Can law-givers of oursarethegreatestsinners f one be surprised at the failure o the Christian Church to cope with “sin” when the oldest of its sects h a s such a priesthood as is depicted by Mr. Hall Caine in his recent work. Even in the Church morals have not improved since thedays of MartinLuther.Theynever will be. These laws of ours will never alternature’s laws. They will but force people to live a lie.Immorality is not So deadly to the nation a s this great lie me are being forced ‘‘ TRUTH.” to live. THEWHITESLAVETRAFFIC ACT. * * * * * * Sir,-One o yourcontributorsrepresents f Mr. Norman Angell as being opposed to war on “vulgar and ignoble grounds”--on thegrounds,infact,“that war does not pay. ” I am sure you would not wish to misrepresent Mr. Angell’s views-even though you may be opposed to them. Mr. Norman Angell’s argument is not merely that lvaldoes ?lot pay in the material sense, but that it does not pay In any Sense at all-that war as between civilised nations in the modern world does not a,nd cannot achieve any object of eithermoral or materialworth. Reference is made to “the exaltation of a people” as the effect of “a righteouswar onbehalf of liberation or cf defence.’’ This remark appears to be the result of a very common error of reasoning, i . e . , the failure to see the two A war of liberation elements in a duplex fact. implies that someone has been enslaved; a war of defence , implies that someone has been attacked. The nse of “THE GREAT ‘ILLUSION.” sir,-I think that Miss Cicely Hamilton deserves first mention among the week’s stupid women. “ Formerly,” she wrote in the (‘Daily Mail,” “ we were penned in the drawing-roorn untilsuchtimeasthe men wanted US.” We allknow that woman is woman’s worst C o m p a n y but what a revelation of the mutual bore women are for angel one anot11er-our sisters, wives, and mothers ‘‘ penned ” together for an hour or two ! So the women’s movement was a desperate bid for freedom from each other’sdegrading society. Of course ! The scientific fact is that females’energiesnaturallydestroyoneanother, as they destroy the male, while male energies build each women come totalk of being other up. That is how ‘‘ penned ” together, while men heartily seek men’s society. Mrs. Dora Montefiore has a crazy suggestion for spending money bytransportingIrishchildrentoEngland. The cost of transportation of children and nurses would certainly keep the children fed for weeks in Dublin. Heaps of the children mould be sick passage, on and arriveto be sentto who knows what fool would who almost certainly overfeed themandset up indigestion. Many children would be utterly miserable among strange persons and surroundings, the and only certain beueficiaries would be the railway companies. The cost of fare and of keep in England would go far inIreland itself. The fare alone from Liverpool to London and back (and is a pound. the Countess of WarwicksuggestsEssex) Mrs. Gow, of the National Union ofWomen Workers, confirms the chargeagainst women of a preference for inflicting the lash. She was cheered tothe echo, we are told, when proposing a resolution to oppose the abolition of the floggingclause in the White Slave Act. She has “abundant evidence that flogging has proved a deterrent:’ Not a single to white-slavers. Where isthatevidence? case of genuine white slavery has come before the country. WOMENINPUBLIC. 742 A few ignoramuses of the lowest labouringclasshave been flogged for living with prostitutes. That is ail. But we had “ abundant evidence ” to pass the Bill-hadwe not ? Meanwhile Mrs. Gow finds still occasion tosay “ f o ” aloud. lg I notice that men seem to like the word less than ever. Someone writesreminding me that that champion of the miners, MIS. MaryFitzgerald,actuallyreturnedto the JohannesburgTrades’Federationmeeting afterher first polite dismissal, declaring that ‘‘ Loranorder ” was on her side; had she consultedlawyer. a I suppose, above all its enemies, the proletariat loves alawyer! A correspondent in the “ New Statesman,” who reads like a woman, deplores the destruction of nestingbirds to decorate human females. Thelettersuggests everything except the common-sense remedy-to prosecute the lady wearers of aigrettes and other maternal indications of birds. In America the Customs officers now ripout o immigrant women’s hats these “ badges of cruelty.” f EDWARD STAFFORD. (I) Two smallish beasts belonging to a naval commander on the reserve : I have never once seen the dogs off the chain; garden devoted to pergolas and sweetpassers-by to peas ; romantic notice on thegatewarns “ Beware ! Thesedogs arekept for protection.”They often howl for hours a t a time. (2) Beautifullittle white-hairedterrier that for weeks and weeks cried all day. Recently been much beaten forbarking, owing complaints to laid. Woman admits tohatingthe dog, which she is keeping for someone. The couple go out,butrarely, if ever, takethe dog“ she such is a nuisance.” Practically always on the : dog chain, and literally bursting with apparent energy well fed. (3) Farm-dog. A mongrel, and apparently untrainduring the able. Is often kept on chainforeighthours day, and squeaks incessantly with misery and boredom. (4) Laundress’s dog : a black white big and somef It’s one consolathing; never been seen o f thechain. tion,thesight of its owners inthe kitchen, recently f cut of by a fence.Howls in spurts of threeindignant barks and a long-drawn yell. ( 5 ) Big retriever, guardian of a family. Occasionally from Saturdaynightto Monday out fpr a run.Barks morning. (6) A splendid collie, enormouscreature,friendly. :ts apup. Used to howl the whole nightthrough, owing toperpetual confinement on a veryshortchain(about a yardlong) beside a kennel. People, notintentionally cruel, were persuadedtogive the dog a fewgood runs during the day.Barkingalmost wholly ceased, the do? being well bred. (7) Very old dog, chained day, all never out, but taken indoors at night. Relieves its feeling by perfectly awful shrieks, sometimes for hourstogether. (8) Dog I haveneverseen,alwayschained behind a cottage. (9) Big black dog, guardian of a wood-shed ; occasion ally off cham; but something is wrong with it, since its bass note may be heard all night long. Thisby no means exhauststhelist of dogs within containing, perhaps, less than half a mile’s radius, twenty houses ; buttheotherseitherare well treated do not (thereare five or six smallpetdogs)orthey I have mentioned maketheir misery heard. dogs The get no fun whatsoever, andthat is probably thetruth about more than half of the dogs inthis hypocritical country of “sane and healthy dog-lovers.” The owner of a dog thatbarks muchought to be prosecuted for neglect;the dog’s voice is itself evidence of crueltyin most cases ; in any case, it is evidence that the owner knows nothing about dogs and ought not to have charge of one. The “ saneandhealthy,”etc., inthisdistrict are mostly either common cowards who feel safe behind the bark of their friend and victim, or persons who have become possessed of a dog somehow and don’t know quite of it. The lawfordogsmust be in a how togetrid rotten state when these animals can be treated so as to makea whole countrysidehear of their misfortune. F. J. WILSON. * * * Sir,-Mr. Stafford has evidently learned that Mrs. Fitzgerald, like Jenny Geddes and Louise Michel, ‘‘ has a way wid her.” She stands committed for trial on a charge of “ seditious conspiracy.” Had miners their and leaders on the Rand rendered themselves 2s doughtily ten years ago, there had been no need for recent happenings. Probably the miners whom Mr. Stafford mentions will breathe freely (according to the lung power left) when Mrs. Fitzgerald is under lock and key, and will be able to shout for British intervention, Chinese labour or its repatriation, or for Labour candidates without the taint of Socialism. Mary Fitzgerald, being illogical an woman, cries, in Season and out, “ Down with Capitalism !” SPALL HAMMER. * * * T H E PLAGUE OF ADVERTISEMENTS. Sir,-I see that the promoters of the Rill to regulate advertisements are coming forward again. Now while, as a patriot, I applaud their efforts, as a selfish individual, I really am greatly beholden to those same vile advatisements. I live somewhere (no particulars shall escape me) which is kept practically traffic free (I am as sure of the following as onemay well be from inquiries and long observation) because of the slum-like appearance created by advertisements at the entrance to the place. A firstclass motor road passes through m d a large in2 was built in expectation of custom. Thank goodness, the greedy brewers hoisted an enormous staringadvertisement on destroying rural all charm. Besides the green utterly this, a lovely little old red cottage opposite has suffered the addition of theugliest grocery shop aDd post-office ever committed by iniquity incarnate.Theshop which is indescribably sordid and repulsive beside the cottage, sticks outso as to obscure not onlythe cottage, but a grove o trees‘ and gardens, and is literally plastered with soap f a wire-fenced and pills and otheradvertisements,while plot of grass contains special enormities of the mechanical sort and two rusty-looking slot machines. You might fancy you were passing by a section of a London slum ; and the aforesaid brewers, with an utterly neglected pub on theirhands(thepresentinnkeeperisgivingupin despair) have just made another splash on the green with a staring red board affixed to the old-fashioned I s i p ! Why on earththeysparetheruralinn-post, cannot imagine-it takes up as much room as a spanking fine modern board, with nice n-ew plain letters everyscarcely amotor one could see ! I profit by all this, as There is ever sets down here. The place looks sordid. no other word for it, So ten miles of country is left practicallyunravagedby the beastlytripper.Whyare trippers always beastly? Why do they always leave marks of their passage? They do ! Could not the schools’ curriculum, now so futile, be made to includemanners? It explains why our trippers are beastly that a proposal to teach manners as a necessity would be taken a s absurd ! However, I wander from mysubject. My feelings a s apatriot compel me toplay, if ever SO little,intothehands of the promoters of the Bill, but I trust MY place may be the last to be noticed by the PARADISE. abolitionists. advertisement 0 ’* * THE DOG IN CIVILISATION. Sir,-On the subject of the crass cruelty of dogI relate the present keepers towards their animals, may I take circumstances in the village where I reside? nine houses where ten dogsare kept in a state of perpetual happiness. I have lived in this place for two years. Sir,-I have read withmuch interestthethoughtful article, “ Relativity in Continuity,” which “ M.B.Oxon.” contributes to your issue of September 25. As the author rightly remarks : “ Psychical Research is a double-edged sword.” This is so because people havenotyet recognised that with the human mind all sorts of results can be obtained; whereas what is really desirable is that results should be obtained through the action of Divine Mind, God-the Principle of good. One accomplishes this, not by thinking of persons, circumstances, etc., but by turning in thought to reality-heaven brought down contributor likes, but by no means to earth, if your “ dragged in the mud.” This important subject is ably “ Life Underdealtwithin arecentlypublishedwork, stood,” by E;. I,. Rawson, a well-known engineer and man of science (Crystal Press, Ltd., 34;39, Maiden Lane, W.C.). Apropos of “ M.B.Oxon.’s pertinent remark that, in his opinion, Sir Oliver Lodge “ gave his ‘ d ~ s covery ’ to the world prematurely, as has happened with other discoveries, and usually with similar results,” the followingpassage from “ Life Understood ” will be of interest :“ -4 friend of mine, one of the leading chemical authorities in England,” the author writes, “ confidentially gave just medetails of . . . chemical experimentswhichhad been carried out, under test conditions, before a selected body of leading scientific men, and had been pronounced by them as wholly inconsistent with any conceivable RELATIVITY Y * * IN CONTINUITY. 743 theory of matter. These experiments were shown to them to establish priority of date for the discoverer, who untilhehad found the did not care to publishthem reason for the results.” With regardtoyourcontributor’s hint as to the probable differentiation between ‘‘ matter ” and “ substance,” I may, perhaps, be permitted to quote a further passage from “ Life Understood ” that may be information to some of your readers :“ It was only seven years ago that Professor Osborne Reynolds, F.R.S., LL.D., M.Inst .C.E., Professor of Engineering at Owen’s College, Manchester, one of the ablest mathematicians of the day, gave the world the result of twenty years’ hard work, showing in the‘Rede Lecture’ [for 1902, p. 291 that he had proved mathematically that matter was 0 non-reality.” The italics are mine. “ I have never heard,” comments F. I,. Rawson, ‘ I even a suggestion thathe has made a mistake in hismathematical proof .” 0. by it that he hzd renounced the magazine for ever and deprived the house of Blackwood of twelve half-crowns a year. I have often wondered who that old gentleman was, and in what hot-house he had nurtured his tender innocence ofmind’.Now, at last, I know. The old gentleman was your reviewer, and the hot-house was the office of THE NEW AGE. Z t is impossible that there should be, in f the diversity o the world, two men so identical in: fatuity and spite. To be chargedpubliclywith“filthiness” would be n serious matter if the charge were made in 2 paper whose character for honesty in criticism was unblemished; but THE NEW AGEis not such a paper. It took on the colour o blackmail when, Arnold Bennett having ceased to conf tribute his weekly article to it, his next novel was made It is still the subject of a frothy and maliciousattack. dishonest when it permits a reviewer to brand my book as “filthy” without having read it. For he has not read i t ; he has glanced at the first story, been content to slander it crudely, and to write of the book as though it were a novel and not a collection o tales. If, in spite of everything, he f would stillmaintainthathedidhisdutybylooking throughthe book before he bespattered it, there is the f case of an earlier book o mine, which he credited in his review with containing anecdotes, one in particular, which it does not contain. Perhaps, however, he did not review f that book, and falsehoods o this kind are common to a11 NEWAGE reviewers. You will observe that I do not complain of your reviewer’s ineptitude, but only o his and your dishonesty. f I find it natural that experiments in the short-story form should fail to interest you; you are pre-occupied with of art and letters which those extremes and perversions mayserve to mark a commonplace intelligencewitha seeming of singularity. your But need to attitudinise for a livingcannot excuse the application o the word f “filthy” to z Jook which is, in no sense and under no construction, filthy a t all. So to characterise it is to makea ruffianly use of words, to deceive thoseeager readers of yours who might buy my book in the hope of finding thefilth you promise them, and to darkenthe already sufficiently questionable character of T H E NEW AGE. PERCEVAL GIBBON. [Mr. Gibbon’s letter calls for no reply from our reviewer. We say, may however, that his amiable Fleet Street assumption of a causal relation between Mr. Bennett’s ceasing to write for THE NEW AGE and our reviews o Mr. f untrue. Mr. Bennett, of Bennett’s work is grotesquely course,knows this as well as we do.-€b. N.A.1 + * + Sir,-Your reviewer, in noticing my little book of LyricsandOther Verses,” exhibits some curiosity as to ‘‘ how long a poem may be according to Poe and Mr. Malloch.” May I say that I cannotspeak for Poe : but for myself I should say that “ The Excursion ” was “ a long ’W piece of verse : or “ Paradise Lost,” or “ Childe Harold.” A few hundred lines I do not call “ long ”--I havewrittenmany pieces of that length, and would be glad to see some of them printed in THE NEW AGE. So many people have found fault with this deliberately restricted book of lyrics because it does not contain “long” poems ! It is really exactly what it was intended to be. Perhapsmynext volume, should I ever find a publisher for it, will convince your reviewer that I am capable o longer flights. Meantime it may be interesting f to recall that what Poe said was that every so-called long poem consisted of a series of passages of such beauty that they stood outas poems by themselves, connected by more or less wearisome bitsthatmight almost as well have been in prose as in verse. The pleasure we get out of the reading is the pleasure we derive from those beautia second reading ful passages, a pleasure heightened on by anticipation of the purple ahead as we wade dutifully through the heavy intervening lines. That or something like it was what Poe meant, and many readers of poetry MALLOCH. will agree GEORGE with him. RESTON I‘ T H E LENGTH O F POEMS. * * * Sir,-As few of your readers canbe blessed with Turkish servants who burn the back numbers of “HI; NEW AGE, it will be possible for most o them to refer to July 17, f which contains Mr. Randall’s famous and infamous article called “The Economics of Jesus.’’ I ask them to do this, and if any one of them will write to you or to me declaring that he has found the slightest trace of the dual Jesus expoundedby“National Guildsman,” I will-give all I have to the poor ! Mr. Randall’s apologetic commentator is no doubt saying what the great Rabbinical exegete ought to have said, criticism impossible. I f buthe is makinghistoryand every person of antiquity is to split into two-the historical Jesus and this Jesus, the historical Julius Caesar and this Caesar-the same bifurcation may overtake the moderns, and I shallnot know which Mr. Randall I am dealing with-the realoriginalRabbi of July 17 ortheduplex gentleman represented so ably by “National Guildsman.” I like the old one better, and shall keep m y teeth in him. I fear i t seems too much like ‘‘scoring points,”--which the great men o THE NEWAGE never do-but I must tell f “NationalGuildsman” that Mr. Randall declared his inof “treating of the economics of Jesus, tention on July 17 as revealed in the Englishtranslation of the Gospels.” Furthermore, i n Mr. Randall’s goose-song of October 2, he never mentions the duplex theory of which, a week later, he was to be saved. I, therefore, issue the formal challenge to “National Guildsman’’ to defend with a single word the Randallian theses (I) “that the Kingdom of God and the Wage System were synonymous terms” when used by €he original historical Jesus; ( 2 ) “that Christ regarded himself as the founder o capitalism.” f WILLIAM L. HARE. Y * * “THE ECONOMICS OFJESUS.” BOOK BARGAINS. PUBLISHERS’ REMAINDERS(New Book offered at discounts of from 5 0 ~ to~So0/, off the published price / Write for GLAISHER’S (136 page) CATALOGUE of WILLIAM GLAISHER, LIMITED. 265, HIGH HOLBORN, LONDON, W.C. & r4, GEORGE ST.,CROYDON CARICATURES “ TOMT” ‘I o f “The New BY Age” The New Age” Volumes. 5/- Net. New Age Press, 38,Cursitor Street, E C .. Uniform with Price (Jan Junoza de Rosciszewski). miscellaneous advertisements “THE SECOND-CLASS PASSENGER.” . Sir,--X7our reviewer, passing judgment upon my volume of short stories, “The Second-Class Passenger,” writes : “It is simplyfilthy.” Long ago, when thestorythus referred to appeared in :‘Blackwood’s Magazine,” the late old gentleman, rl. William Blackwood told that me an subscriber of many years standing, had been SO affected 744 MR. JAMES GLOVER.