high voltage of enthusiasm to drive it along, his scheme came to a halt. Again, without counting the cost in probable consequences, he attended a meeting of the Woman Suffragist Committee in London some time ago and delivered an impassioned speech in which he outlined a bold and vigorous policy, saying in effect: "We will immediately organise and initiate a great campaign on the public platform throughout the kingdom. Sir Edward Grey and I will lead off at the Albert Hall." Three days later the whole scheme, which had aroused such enthusiasm, was hastily dropped, he having by then realised that the initiation of his campaign would necessarily be the signal for an opposition campaign by his Cabinet colleagues who were hostile to Woman Suffrage. The passage of his Insurance Act through the House of Commons provided numberless instances of his inability to enforce his views against vested interests, e.g. the medical profession and the friendly societies—though the latter, so far as the bulk of their members were concerned, had been reckoned previously among his political supporters. The conclusions to be drawn from these instances are too obvious to need demonstration.

But the chief foundation for the popular belief in his paramount and never-failing influence over the Democracy is perhaps the apparent success which has ever attended his intervention in industrial quarrels. It must ever stand to his credit that he aimed at making the Board of Trade the great National Conciliator in labour disputes. Under his administration that department became recognised as the nation's industrial hospital. Here diseases manifesting themselves in the constitution of British trade were treated; if possible they were healed; where they were deemed incurable, anæsthetics were administered to allay the pain; when the disease was pronounced infectious, measures were taken to isolate the case and to prevent the spread of the epidemic. The value of the services thus rendered to the community, and largely due to the way in which Mr. Lloyd George personally handled the cases, can hardly be over-estimated. His savoir-faire, quick sympathy, the charm of his tongue, the sweet reasonableness of his suggestions, and the plausibility of his arguments, all conduced to success in his treatment. One may nevertheless be pardoned for inquiring as to the relative proportions of permanent cures effected in really serious cases, and of those in which temporary relief only was secured. In other words, how many of the great industrial disputes in which he intervened were permanently "settled," and how many merely "composed for the time being. This opens out a tempting field of inquiry for the student of modern political history. For the present purpose two prominent and illustrative instances which readily

suggest themselves must suffice: the great Railway Dispute of a few years ago, and the great Coal Strike of a few months since. In the first he certainly averted a then impending national danger -perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he succeeded in putting off the evil day. He certainly did not "settle" the threatened railway strike. All he did was to suppress, temporarily, the more malignant symptoms; the canker remained in the constitution; he did not even attempt to cut it out, but merely applied palliatives, the effect of which soon wore away. It is to the incident of the war rather than to the efficacy of Mr. Lloyd George's treatment, that the community is indebted for the fact that the disease he prescribed for and was supposed to have eradicated has not broken out in a more virulent form than ever. As indicated above, there are not wanting signs to show that, once the war is safely over, the malady will recrudesce and demand far more drastic treatment than it then received. In the settlement (for in this case it was a settlement, and not a mere composing of differences) of the South Wales Coal Strike, although he was conspicuously successful, he deserves even less personal credit than in connection with the Railway Strike. The whole thing was a comedy of errors which threatened to develop into a national tragedy. The trouble, which need never have arisen had a little common sense been exercised, was intensified tenfold by Mr. Lloyd George's own Munitions Act and its hastily attempted application by Mr. Runciman. When the disease developed into a virulent form, Mr. Lloyd George, as the specialist in the treatment of the disease, was called in for consultation. He personally visited the patient, and prescribed. A speedy and effective cure was widely advertised. But, owing to some error on the part of his dispenser, Mr. Runciman, possibly due to some illegibility in the prescription itself, there was an immediate recrudescence of the disease, and the specialist was again hastily summoned. This time he really effected a settlement, but only at the cost of ignoring his own Coercion Act, throwing over his colleague and successor at the Board of Trade, imposing heavy liabilities on the employers, and granting the men on strike everything they had contended for. I say nothing as to the justice of the terms of settlement. It is sufficient to point out that Mr. Lloyd George simply placated the men by granting their demands. It is beside the question to say that he was compelled by the national need to get them back to work. The essential point is that, even at the height of the national need, he only succeeded in leading the men just where they wished to go.

Mr. Lloyd George's policy since he first entered political life -as you will find in his diary, in his correspondence, and in his

public speeches-reduced to its lowest terms, may be thus expressed (indeed, he has himself so expressed it) :

Provide a cry which is, or can be made, popular.

Promote a popular movement for its effective prosecution. Inspire that movement with enthusiasm by a great platform campaign.

Given the first of these, there is no man who can better provide the two remaining essentials to success. In these respects he stands unrivalled among British statesmen to-day. In justice to him it should be admitted that he also possesses the courage to run counter to the flowing tide of popular feeling when himself deeply stirred by conviction, e.g. his pacifist campaign at the time of the South African War. That, however, demonstrated that his hold upon the Democracy is largely dependent upon his ability to place before them a political menu which is, or is capable of being made, palatable to them. Furnished with the necessary ingredients, no chef in the world can send to the political table of the Democracy a meal more to its taste; and even though the ingredients themselves be unpalatable, he, better than any man, can make the dish appear appetising.

BERIAH G. EVANS.

IN NEUTRAL AMERICA.

CONDITIONS in Europe and the Near East have been brought home to Americans in America most vividly and from several different angles during the past month. A new phase of the submarine controversy with Germany, the floating of the FrancoAnglo loan, the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Armenians, and the decision of the British Prize Court which resulted in the confiscation of American meat products to the value of about three million pounds sterling, have given the American newspapers much subject-matter and the American people much to talk and think about.

The most important in public interest has been the apparent yielding of Germany to American persuasion in the matter of the submarine controversy. The German Government has apologised for the sinking of the Arabic, promised indemnity for American lives lost, and, in the words of the Note presented to Washington by the German Ambassador, orders to German submarine commanders "have been made so stringent that a recurrence of incidents similar to the Arabic case is considered out of the question."

No word has yet been received at Washington, so far as is publicly known, concerning the American demand for indemnity for lives lost on the Lusitania. The German-American situation, however, as it relates to the sinking by submarines of unarmed merchant liners carrying passengers, may be said to have again reached that point where tension is relieved, pending another 'accident" or another "violation of orders" by German submarine commanders. The reason for the second and entirely different Note to Washington on the sinking of the Arabic may be found largely in the failure of the German submarine "blockade" of England to come up to expectations through the great losses sustained by this branch of the German Navy, through the operations of the British Fleet and a changing condition of affairs in America, which makes it more desirable than ever, from a German point of view, to maintain good official relations with that country.

The destruction of many German submarines by the British Navy, of which we learn from neutral sources, notwithstanding the apparent reluctance of the British Government to have it known, has apparently convinced Berlin that to yield this point to a powerful neutral would not be such a sacrifice of advantage

as was at first supposed, and that by making the most of this concession it might be possible to secure a more favourable attitude upon other matters now and after the war. German diplomacy in this affair has been unquestionably skilful, and a successful outcome of this rather serious controversy with America is due to the efforts of Count Bernstorff, whose knowledge of America and Americans is much more in correct proportion than that of the Powers That Be in the Wilhelmstrasse.

He has evidently succeeded in convincing his Government of the correctness of his own point of view, hence the second and entirely conciliatory Note dealing with the fate of the Arabic, in sharp contrast to the first reply made by Berlin to representations from Washington. There are grave reasons why Germany now desires to remain on as good terms as possible with America. Many of these reasons did not exist, or rather were not nearly so insistent one year ago, as they are to-day. With the disappearance of Dr. Dumba, Count Bernstorff is left as the sole effective representative in America of the Central Empires. If a breach between the United States and Germany came to pass and Germany's representative were to be given his passports, there would be no official head of the great and powerful GermanAmerican influence in America. This would also mean that a score or more of German consuls stationed in large American cities, and exerting in their local spheres a most useful and practical pro-German influence, would be compelled to retire.

Within the past year America has entered the field of foreign loans. Some months ago German securities to the amount of ten million sterling were placed in the United States, and the pro-German papers are now advertising the latest German flotation. Should the United States Government cease to be neutral and openly favour the Allies, there would be no real limit to the amount of money which the Allies could borrow from the American people, for then such borrowings would have official sanction of the American Government. If five hundred million dollars can be secured in a few days, with America avowedly neutral, this amount could be multiplied several times with America openly enlisted on the side of the enemies of Germany.

In the matter of munitions of war, the productive power of. American manufacture has increased at least fourfold in the last twelve months and is still growing. It would no longer be necessary for America to keep all production at home-in fact, production and export would be so stimulated as to increase rather than decrease the resources of the Allies. As Germany is now powerless on the sea, America would have no fear of invasion, and a part at least of the American Navy-such as sub