INCREASING CURSE OF EUROPEAN MILITANCY. 521 



(attachment transferred to less inaccessible objects), and sometimes in 

 religious fervor — yearning for a home which even an impecunious 

 traveler may hope to reach. Pliny marvels " how greatly disappointed 

 love inspires to deeds heroic " ; yet heroism, in the ancient active sense, 

 self-devotion to hard work and rough-and-tumble campaigns, is, in 

 truth, the best cure for the ailments of sentimental sorrow. The 

 mountain-mania of worn-out brain-workers, their passionate longing 

 for the occupations of their nature-abiding ancestors — hunting, camp- 

 ing, and horticulture — are inspired by the instinctive desire to re-estab- 

 lish the structure of their organism on the basis of its original founda- 

 tions, and recover, as an uprooted tree might revive in the mold of its 

 native soil. 



The purpose of such intuitions has rarely been fully recognized, and 

 there is no doubt that the most useful contribution to the medical lit- 

 erature of this century would be a popular treatise on the Revelations 

 of Instinct. The didactic significance of those revelations may even 

 be destined to become the basis of a special science. That science 

 would help the votaries of reform to atone for the grievous heresies of 

 the past. It would make the healing art an ally of Nature : it would 

 preserve us from manifold social and educational errors, by guiding 

 progress along the lines of natural ordination. A science of instinct 

 would be the commentary of a gospel which, in the language of man, 

 has almost ceased to be its own interpreter. 



THE INCREASING CURSE OF EUROPEAN 

 MILITANCY.* 



Br A. E. WALLACE. 



SINCE the year 1870, but more especially since 1874, the general 

 war expenditure of Europe has increased enormously. This is 

 partly a consequence of the Franco-German War which so greatly en- 

 hanced the military power of united Germany and led other nations 

 to aim at a corresponding increase in their forces, and in part to the 

 enormously increased cost of iron-clad ships, monster guns, torpedoes, 

 and all the scientific appliances of modern warfare. 



Up to the year 1875 our own army and navy had increased but 

 little for many years, the total expenditure in 1874 being £24,664,000, 

 which was somewhat less than that of 1864. But since the former 

 date our outlay on the two services has risen greatly, and now amounts 

 to £28,964,000, an increase of more than four millions. The number 

 of men has increased from 189,000 in 1874 to 197,000 in 1884, exclusive 

 of the Indian army. 

 * Chapter V of " Bad Times," by Alfred Eussel Wallace, LL. D. Macmillan & Co., 1835. 



