146 



NATURE 



[October 16, 1919 



"sea." The Regulations of Mainz gave each riparian 

 State full sovereignty over its own part of the river, 

 and limited the right of pilotage to the subjects of 

 riparian States; and in 1868 the Regulations of Mann- 

 heim further whittled down the old liberal principles 

 of France — to the disadvantage of non-riparians, 

 although they were admitted to rights of navigation. 

 The revised Rhine Navigation Treaty of that year 

 was still in force in 1913, administered by the six 

 riparian States — Holland, Prussia, Hesse, Baden, 

 Bavaria, and Germany (as owning Alsace). Even 

 since 1871 Prussia, as the strongest Power, has ham- 

 pered the development of non-Prussian ports, using 

 even the most childish tricks with pontoon bridges, 

 choice of wharves, accessibility to rail, etc., against 

 other German States. 



Since 1871, too, the Rhine has illustrated another 

 important point — namely, that the traffic on an inland 

 waterway depends largely, perhaps vitally, on the 

 extent to which railways are willing or forced to co- 

 operate ; and this has a present importance even from 

 a purely international point of view. One of the 

 results of the Franco-Prussian War was that Prussia 

 bought up a number of private railways in the Rhine 

 vallev, and eventually used the profits of the trans- 

 action to make a secret fund for aggressive purposes. 

 Now, if properK administered as an international 

 waterway, the Rhine will be perfectly free except for 

 trifling dues on boat or cargo for the expenses of 

 upkeep ; and it will compete so favourably with the 

 Prussian railways that their rates will have to be 

 reduced to a minimum. This will cut hard at such 

 differential treatment as has handicapped British 

 trade in the last twenty years, and it will leave no 

 surplus with which the unscrupulous can juggle. ^ 



Of course, the Rhine is essentially linked with^he 

 Meuse and the .Scheldt — politically, economically, his- 

 torically ; and the Powers have long been too lenient 

 or too timid with Holland, possibly because her purely 

 legal position appeals to lawyer politicians. The 

 Dutch base their claims to monopolise the estuary 

 of the Scheldt on the Treaty of Munster (1648), but 

 have greatlv strengthened their legal position in recent 

 years. The marriage of the Dutch Queen to a 

 German princelot was followed immediately by the 

 intrigue that ended in Belgium definitely granting to 

 Holland in i8q2 special rights on the Scheldt in time 

 of war, and Germanv strongly supported IloUand in 

 getting these rights extended between^ igo5 and iqo8. 

 But the Scheldt is merely an international rlvef; it 

 is navigable into France, and it was only by France 

 waiving her claims in tS-^q, and proposing a dual 

 control bv Belgium and Holland — like that of the 

 Rhine bv France and Germany at the beginning of 

 last century, and that of the Niger by France and 

 ourselves now — that Holland ever obtained the power 

 which she has abused. When Napoleon annexed 

 Antwerp, he declared the Scheldt free ; and the Rhine 

 Regulations, when extended to the Scheldt, were 

 interoreted as meaning " free for all flags out onto the 

 sea." Even so, the Dutch raised every possible diffi- 

 cultv, and navigation had no fair chance until the 

 railwav from Cologne to .Antwerp brought in the onlv 

 kind of influence which the Dutch seem to under- 

 stand. 



We have, therefore, full knowledge of all the 

 essential conditions necessary to ensure the proper 

 administration of international rivers, and shall have 

 no kind of excuse if we are caught napping or misled 

 by plausible and "interested" tricksters. .\mongst 

 their last tricks is "the great difficulty of policing 

 such a river, where a German boat may be stopped 

 by a French official." That is not more terrible than 

 a' Rumanian boat being stopped by an .\ustrian 

 official ; and the experience on the Danube shows that 

 NO. 2607, VOL. 104] 



there is really no difficulty at all — for the simple 

 reason that offenders are always dealt with, naturally 

 and reasonably, by oflicials of their own nation, just 

 as the various European Powers have the right of 

 jurisdiction over their own subjects in the Belgian 

 Congo. In Article 25 the effete and pharisaical Berlin 

 .'\ct of 1884-85 provided that its regulations for the 

 Congo "shall remain in force in time of war." To- 

 day we are less ambitious, and desire only to further 

 safe, easy, honourable intercourse, in tinie of peace, 

 between nations that are unequal in size and popula- 

 tion, wealth and power, situation and relation to 

 navigation facilities. We have seen that one small 

 nation may ill-treat another small nation from 

 stupidity almost as easily and as grossly as a large 

 nation may ill-treat a small nation from tyranny. In 

 the circumstances it seems necessary to remove from 

 both the stupid and the tyrannical the opportunities 

 for misusing such facilities ; and the obvious way of 

 doing this is to make international rivers international 

 in use and in government. Commerce is alreadv a 

 prime factor in the evolution of human brotherhood. 

 Progress towards that ideal may be gauged as well 

 by the price of a banana or a piece of chocolate as 

 by the number of sermons preached on the subiec; ; 

 the sea is already free, made so mainly by British 

 perseverance in clearing it of pirates ; it only remains 

 to make navigable rivers equally free, and the op- 

 position comes mainly from those who have talked 

 most loudly about "the freedom of the seas." But 

 "the freedom of the seas " does not means that war 

 isi to be removed only from that element on which 

 land-power is weak, while the land-power mav still 

 block access to the free sea by the natural avenue — 

 the navigable river. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



Cambridge. — On October 10 Mr. A. J. Balfour was 

 dulv elected to the office of Chancellor of the Uni- 

 versity in succession to the late Lord Rayleigh. 



Dr. Robert J. T. Bell, of the University of Glas- 

 gow, has been appointed to the chair of pure and 

 applied mathematics in the University of Otago. 



The National Union of Scientific Workers is hold- 

 ing a social evening at 52 St. Martin's Lane, W.C.2, 

 on Thursday, October 30, at 7.30, to inaugurate a 

 London branch of the Union. The meeting will be 

 open to all scientific workers. 



The Lord Strathoona legacy to Yale University, 

 which amounts to about 120,000/., will, Science an- 

 nounces, be used as follows : Two professorships in the 

 graduate school will be established, and several fellow- 

 ships founded, and a memorial building, costing about 

 50,000/., will be built. 



Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, cele- 

 brated the centenary of its foundation (1818) on 

 September 11, 12, and 13. Representatives were 

 present from a large number of universities and 

 learned bodies. On September 11, in the Macdonald 

 Memorial Library Hall, President A. S. MacKenzie 

 conferred the degree of LL.D. honoris causa on the 

 following gentlemen, those marked with an asterisk 

 being in absentia : — David .Allison, ex-President of the 

 Universitv of Mount .Mlison ; R. B. Bennett, Calgary; 

 the Right Hon. Sir Robert L. Borden, Prime Minister 

 of Canada*; the Hon. W. J. Bowser, Victoria, B.C., 

 ex-Premier of British Columbia * ; G. S. Campbell, 

 Halifax, chairman of the Board of Governors, Dal- 

 housie University; C. H. Cahan, Montreal; T. Cant- 



