142 



NATURE 



[October i6, 1919 



a land problem, conceals — especially from the Swiss 

 point of view — a problem of access to the sea ; and 

 the problems of Poland, of Italy, of Jugo-Slavia, are 

 obviously sea problems, or sea problems very slightly 

 disguised. 



It is a truism that the ocean attracts rivers and 

 their trade and their riverine population. Industry, 

 commerce, even culture, have been starved and stunted 

 in various parts of the world by lack of easy access 

 to the sea. Even your League of Nations idea has 

 more than once approximated to a substantial fact— 

 round the Mediterranean and round the Baltic, facili- 

 tated bv inter-national or inter-racial rivers. The 

 Hanseatic League was essentially based on the rela- 

 tion of a number of more or less navigable river& to 

 an inland sea, and that was why it came to include 

 such distant "inland" members as Broslau and 

 Cracow. 



Accessibility is now more than ever before a 

 supreme factor in all cultural and economic develop- 

 ment, and rivers are still the chief natural inter- 

 mediaries between land and sea. The first leal inter- 

 national attempt to solve the problem of international 

 rivers followed the victorv of sea-power over the 

 France of Napoleon the Great; the second has fol- 

 lowed the victory of sea-power over this would-be 

 ■' Napoleon " of Prussia. 



Now, I submit that to many of us the mere word 

 "river" by itself suggests, at once and primarily ,_ a 

 physical unitv— no doubt, with some variety of relief 

 and climate-^and that on this physical unity we are 

 prepared to sanction some social and economic, and 

 even political, unitv. But directly you add the 

 qualifviiig "international," the suggestion changes; 

 the adjective raises a picture not of local features, 

 but of regional relations. . 



In recent vears I have pleaded for the use of rivers 

 as political ' boundaries- on the ground that they 

 clearly separate lands without at all separating 

 peoples except in time of war; we want to preserve 

 the valuable variety of political and cultural units, 

 but to draw the various units together. Our object 

 is unity, not uniformitv. The proposal has been 

 objected to — even bv some who are not at heart hos- 

 tile to the idea of fostering all possible aids to the 

 easy, honourable, friendlv intercourse of peoples— on 

 the ground that rivers shift their courses. Thev do, 

 and trouble has come of this in the past, political 

 trouble as well as economic. The Missouri was a 

 fertile source of inter-State squabbles. But no normal 

 person would choose a mud-carrier, like the Missouri, 

 as a political boundary unless there was marked differ- 

 ence of racial type or nationality running approxi- 

 matelv along the line of the river. In fact, I would 

 suggest that the troubles along the Upper Missouri 

 were really due to the fact that the river was nowhere 

 an inter-State boundary, and therefore each State 

 claimed the right to monopolise it in the particular 

 section. If it had been an inter-State boundary from 

 the first, such a claim would have been obviously 

 absurd. ' -And it was the iniquity of the claim to 

 monopoly that forced the United States, as similar 

 conditions forced the Australian Commonwealth, to 

 take over the control of the inter-State rivers. 



The principles behind the control are significant. 

 Thus the Murrumbidgee is entirely within New South 

 Wales, as the Goulburn is entirely within Victoria; 

 but the Murray is an inter-State river— in a double 

 sense, acting as the boundary between New South 

 Wales and Victoria, and emptying through South 

 \ustralia. New South Wales has entire use of the 

 Murrumbidgee, and Victoria of the Goulburn, but the 

 whole volume of the Murray up to normal low-water 

 level is left to South Australia. In Europe navigation 

 is usually far more important^ than irrigation. Why 

 NO. 2607, VOL. 104] 



should not Europe exercise similar control over the 

 navigable rivers of Europe? 



For, geographically, great navigable rivers are 

 essentially a continental feature, i.e. really a world 

 feature, for all major continental features must be 

 included in a survey of world features, even if they 

 are minor world features ; and the world can recog- 

 nise no right of a political unit to regional monopoly 

 of the commercial advantages of such a feature to the 

 disadvantage of other political units — least of all, 

 others in the same region. As with the irrigation, 

 when a river is obviously and entirely within an area 

 where identity of culture and sentiment proclaims a 

 natural or national unit, then that unit has a claim — 

 even if it should prove impolitic toi press it — to some 

 monopoly of the facilities afforded by that river. But 

 when the river runs through or between two or more 

 such natural or national units, i.e. is really inter- 

 national, one of the units has no claim to any mono- 

 poly against the other or others. 



It was reasonable that expanding Prussia should 

 get to the mouth of the Elbe, and it was certain that 

 Holstein had been both a fief of the Holy Roman 

 Empire and in the German Confederation of iSi^ 

 and that succession in Holstein could no\. go in the 

 female line. It was equally certain that Schleswig 

 had never been in either the Holy Roman Empire tr 

 the German Confederation, and that succession in 

 Schleswig coiiZi go in the female line. The reason- 

 able sequel in 1864 would have been for Prussia to 

 purchase Holstein from Denmark, and share the 

 facilities of the international river. 



One would not expect such a view to be taken by 

 a Prussian, but that was the actual principle laid 

 down by France nearly one hundred years earlier. 

 The farnous Decree of " November t6, 1792. asserted 

 that: — "No nation can, without injustice, claim the 

 right to occupy exclusively a river-channel, and to 

 prevent the riparian States from enjoying the same 

 advantages. Such an attitude is a relic of feudal 

 slavery, or at any rate an odious monopoly imposed 

 by force." This was not mere talk. It was fol- 

 lowed in 1793 by the complete freeing of the Scheldt 

 and the Meuse to all riparians— France herself being 

 a riparian in each case, for the Scheldt was naturally 

 navigable up to Valenciennes. Somewhat similar 

 rights were extended in 179S to all riparians on the 



Rhine France herself, of course, being again a 



riparian; and in 1797 the freedom was extended, so 

 far as France was concerned, to the ships of foreign 

 nations, though Holland was able to make the privi- 

 lege valueless. 



The original Decree had not pressed the precise 

 question of internationalitv. But if the general prin- 

 ciple holds— that a great navigable river cannot_ be 

 monopolised bv a single political unit asainst 

 riparians, even if thev are its subjects and of alien 

 " race " still more must it hold when the river in 

 question is fully international, flowing through or 

 between two or more States. Of course, the Rhine, 

 Danube, and Vistula do both. . - , . 



As a matter of fact, in Europe this principle has 

 been generally accepted for the last centurv except 

 bv Holland. Prussia and Saxony agreed about the 

 Elbe in 181.:;, and the agreement was extended to 

 \ustria, Hanover, and Denmark in 1821. Prussia, 

 Hanover, and Bremen '"ade a similar agreemen 

 about the Weser in 1823: and Soa.n and Portusal 

 made similar agreements about the Tagus and the 

 Douro in ,829 and 1835- Holland, however, has a 

 tarnished record. 



One has not an atom of sympathy 



with the 



arrogant German demand that " small nations rnust 

 not be allowed to interfere with the development of 



