LAND AND NATIONAL SAFETY. 233 



sibility to be met, something approaching in 

 term and in conditions the great struggles of the 

 Napoleonic era. The mere fact that the Com- 

 mission took into consideration the question of 

 the supply of food and raw material is sufficient 

 to prove that. I do not suppose that a sensible 

 Commission with the same task of inquiry to-day 

 would give a moment's thought to the question 

 of the uninterrupted entry of raw materials to 

 England in time of a European war. With the 

 possible exception of iron ore, we have normally 

 over three months ' supply in local hands of all the 

 raw materials we need for our manufactures. 

 And the great war, when it comes, is not going 

 to last three months under conditions making it 

 a matter of any real importance whether there 

 is raw cotton, raw wool, and iron ore coming 

 freely into our ports. It will be a war not of 

 armies and navies, but of nations ; and, while 

 it lasts, no nation involved in it will have much 

 energy for cotton spinning, cloth weaving, and 

 the ordinary processes of industry. The position 

 will be that of a ship at sea in the old days when 

 the command went out " All hands to the 

 pump ! " A close, hard, bitter, desperate struggle 



