Eeview of Reviews, 1/3/13. 



LEADING ARTICLES. 



45 



when they spoke of their past life— before this 

 strange nig-htmare had begun, changing their 

 habits, making all the things that previously 

 mattered to them of no importance— and when 

 I found that one of these savage-looking ruffians 

 was a Professor of Literature, and another a 

 Professor of Chemistry, and a third an actor who 

 had no more use for grease paint, and a fourth 

 a poet who was learning new mysteries of life 

 and death, and so on through the whole range 

 of social life. 



It was strange to me, because I could not 

 re;ilise similar conditions in England. I could 

 not imagine John Galsworthy in a mud-stained 

 uniform in charge of a bread-waggon, or Anthony 

 Hope drinking soup out of an iron pot nea^r a 

 camp fire by a. frontier bridge, or G. K. Chester- 

 ton, with a four weeks' beard on his chin, com- 

 manding a troop of mounted infantry, or Cyril 

 Maufie up to his top-boots in mud, with one 

 shoulder to the right wheel of a gun-carriage. 



Rather effective discipline for our 

 supermen ! 



It is clear from this article how en- 

 tirely Bulgaria staked all on one throw. 

 She has no reserves to bring against the 

 swelling armies of the Sultan. 



THE CRISIS IN THE MEDI- 

 TERRANEAN. 



In the Foruui for December Roland 

 G. Usher records his belief that a great 

 crisis in international affairs is approach- 

 ing. England and her allies, among 

 whom is the United States, are facing a 

 situation as grave as when the first ships 

 of the Spanish Armada entered the 

 Channel, or when Napoleon's fleet had 

 swept the Mediterranean, eluded Nelson, 

 and landed the French army in Eg}'Dt. 



ENGLAND OUTWITTED, 



The Tripolitan war has turned out to 

 be a boomerang. It was meant to bind 

 Italy tightly to England and France by 

 allowing her to realise her cherished 

 ambit'on and take possession of the fer- 

 tile fields of the wealthiest province of 

 ancient Rome, instead of which it has 

 dri\eii Italy into the arms of German}' 

 and Austria. Italy found herself com- 

 mitted to an evpensive war, and when 

 England and France were e.xpected to 

 put diplomatic pressure on Turkey, they 

 promptly declined to do so. England 

 had become aware of a serious ferment 

 among the thronging Moslems in India, 

 and at once realised the jiaramount im- 



portance of avoiding further ill-feeling 

 by refraining at ail costa from a direct 

 attack upon the Sultan himself, the head 

 of the Mohammedan religion. So Italy 

 was left in the lurch. Under these cir- 

 cumstances, with such calamities, unex- 

 pected and such hopes unfulfilled, the 

 Italians were in a mood to listen to whis- 

 pered counsels from the Wilhelmstrasse. 

 Germany was in a position to promise 

 her not only Tripoli, but Tunis, and 

 evei more if Italy would return to the 

 old Triple Alliance. 



The Italians were quick to appreciate the 

 magnituda of the opportunity and promptly em- 

 braced it. The results have more than fulfilled 

 even the sanguine expectations of the Allies. The 

 Italian Navy bombarded a few forts and sank 

 a Tiirkish vessel or two, purely to maintain the 

 appearance of a war, and then seized island after 

 island in the .^gean-Rhodes, long considered the 

 key to the eastern Mediterranean, I^emnos, Chios, 

 and others. So confident of success were the 

 Italians that they everywhere assured the in- 

 habitants that the occupation was no mere mili- 

 ta.ry measure, but would be permanent. From 

 Crete, if it obtains the autonomy the Cretans 

 desire, the Allies will undoubtedly demand pos- 

 session of its harbours as naval bases. Their 

 development, the fortification of the Tripolitan 

 coast, and the use of both as field bases for an 

 Austro-Italian fleet operating from the Adriatic 

 will surely rob Malta of all practical importance, 

 and might even make necessary its abandon- 

 ment. The loss of Malta's strategic significance 

 robs England's defence of its keystone, and com- 

 pels a complete re-arrangement of her naval dis- 

 positions. 



WHY MORE SHIPS AKE W.4NTED. 



The English and French, alarmed beyond mea- 

 sure by this unexpected turn of affairs, have been 

 straining every nerve to meet it with prepara- 

 tions which shall be more than adequate for any- 

 emergency; but both have felt that openly to 

 avow the truth about the situation would not 

 only expose them to the danger of attack at a 

 moment when they are more likely to suffer re- 

 verses than at any time since the Franco-Prussian 

 war ended, but also would have an unfavourable 

 effect on English and French public opinion, 

 either sapping the popular confidence in the 

 national strength, or. more probably, causing a 

 demand for instant war which would be difficult 

 to resist. 



ITALY'S NAVAL STRENGTH. 



With a view to strengthening both the 

 nivy and the mercantile service, the Ras- 

 segna Nazionale pleads for a thorough 

 reform of the naval schools and insti- 

 tutes that exist in various of the Italian 

 ports, and suggests that the}' should be 

 transferred from the control of the 

 Education Department to that of the 

 Ministr}' of Marine. 



