434 



The Review of Reviews. 



Naiional Rcviczii\ 



[China. 



' Western Civilisation ! " 



independence of the Boer Republics had never been 

 the subject of a solemn international guarantee to 

 which we were parties. The final rupture came at the 

 end of months of negotiation, and was indeed pre- 

 cipitated by a declaration of war from the other side. 

 But notwithstanding these differences in our favour 

 the Soutii African crime entailed a tremendous 

 penalty, a bitter repentance, and ample repara- 

 tion. In Tripoli the Italian Govi-nnnent suddenly 

 attacked the Turks, without even allowing the twenty- 

 four hours' notice of \\\'t ultimatum to exfiire, an 

 ultimatum in which it was frankly and cynically 

 admitted that the Turks had offered to make all the 

 economic concessions Italy asked for. 



The Italian Government was a 

 The Breach signatory of tiie Treaty of Paris, 

 Treaties. iSS^, t'V which it bound itself, in 



ca.se of any dispute arising between 

 itself and the Ottoman Empire, to allow the other 

 signatory Powers an opportunity to settle the difference 

 by -amicable medial'on. The Italian Government, 

 ignoring this obligation, whirl) has been constantly 

 enforced since the Treaty was signed, embarked 

 upon what was to all intents and purposes a 

 buccaneering expedition for the purpose of seizing 

 the Turkish provinces of 'J'ri|)oli and Cyrcnaica, 

 without affording her fellow .signatories any warning 

 as to her intentions. Upon our Foreign Otifice, at 

 least, which ajjpears to be almost as badly informed 

 as any in Europe — although that may h'i quite as 



much due to the deafness of Downing Street as to 

 the idleness or blindness of its agents abroad— the 

 Italian declaration of war fell like a bolt from the blue. 

 The aggressors imagined they would carry everything 

 by a coup ik main. They had but to make their 

 naval Jameson Raid, and in two or three days the 

 provinces would be theirs. The Italian freebooters, 

 like their South African prototypes, found the adven- 

 ture much less easy than they had anticipated. 

 Instead of it being all over in two or three days, the 

 war has been raging for a month and more, and the 

 Italians are beginning to realise that the way of the 

 transgressor is hard. It is devoutly to be hoped that 

 disaster may follow disaster, until the accumulated 

 penalty exacted by unrelenting Nemesis teaches the 

 Italians in the North of Africa as we were taught in 

 the South of the same Continent to desist from evil 

 and to learn to do well. In the schoolhouse of the 

 world the cane of the schoolmaster is replaced by the 

 scourge of military defeat and financial bankruptcy. 

 For the sake of the Italians themselves it is well that 

 retribution is following so promptly upon the steps 

 of crime. 



Lusli^e Bid/hr.] 



Cheaper Glory. 



(Berlin. T 



■J'he Ancient Romans conquered the woilil with tlic s»oiil ; 

 the modern tramjilcs on the defenceless with the boot." 



