59^ 



The Review of Reviews. 



question of the Mediterranean, indifference 

 on all army questions, and a tendency to let 

 things drift too much. Pending a solution 

 of the question, we would remind our readers 

 that while an alliance may prove fatal to 

 maintenance of our independent position in 

 the Mediterranean, the raising of our fleet 

 there to proper strength cannot but make 

 alliance more easy or oilentc more stable. 

 The Prince of Wales's visit to the French 

 fleet has been excellent ; his descent into 

 the depths 'in a French submarine has shown 

 the progress made by these new engines of 

 destruction. The time is not long past 

 when there would have been nobody 

 courageous enough to suggest that the 

 King should go down in a British sub- 

 marine and his son in a French one. Sub- 

 marines and aeroplanes — what will these 

 not do to revolutionise the possibilities of 

 warfare ? France is convinced that her 

 future flies in the air, and has almost come 

 to believe that she originated the, aeroplane. 

 But in Dayton, Ohio, there has died the man 

 who was the first to fly ])ractically, and the 

 first to convince the world that flying was 

 possible. France should erect a splendid 

 monument to Wilbur Wright, that original 

 and earnest genius, who, caring little for 

 money and less for glory, flew and forced 

 the world to admit that it can fly. To us 

 in this country Wilbur Wright may have 

 brought a com|)lete and definite ending to 

 insularity. The other day an aer()])lane, 

 leaving Belgium, flew over to Dover, circled 

 round, and without descending flew back 

 to Belgium. And Dover is a naval harbour. 

 The recent visit of a com- 

 Tlje mittec of eminent I'^rench- 



New France. men U) America to give 

 to the American nation a 

 wonderful presentment of France by the 

 greatest of French sculptors — Rodin — 



affords its an appropriate opportunity to 

 survey the coming of the New France. 

 The work of Rodin is destined to ornament 

 the monument to Champlain, that French- 

 man who dreamed of and worked towards 

 a New France across the Atlantic. Although 

 Champlain's ideal was not realised, there is 

 no doubt that the New France of to-day 

 has gained much and owes much to the 

 great Republic which now exists where 

 Champlain lived and died. The American 

 Republic has been an inspiration to the 

 French Republic, thus rendering back to- 

 day the assistance of former years. The 

 two nations are to-day bound by a friendship 

 "founded on a more enduring basis than 

 the friendship of any two sovereigns could 

 possibly be, because the two peoples have 

 similar ideas of government." Few more 

 surprising changes have taken place in a 

 nation than has been the case recently in 

 France. It would seem as if a wind had 

 blown on the dry bones, and they had 

 become alive. There is no comparison 

 possible between France of two years, or 

 even of one year ago, and the France of 

 to-day. There is no lassitude, no indiffer- 

 ence apparent now — rather an mtense, 

 enthusiastic belief in herself, and a determi- 

 nation to justify this confidence to all the 

 world. It would seem as if the coming of 

 the aeroplane had marked a new era in 

 France. It certainly proved again that in 

 new invention France can lead the world ; 

 just as the forerunners of the British Dread- 

 noughts of to-day were modelled on J'rench 

 men-of-war. so to-day aeroplanes in all 

 countries are closely unitatuig I'^rench 

 motlels. A possible war will show France 

 with some thousand aeroplanes and a corps 

 of airmen unrivalled in anv country. All 

 this gives confidence, as does the friendship 

 with l',n2,laiHl : the oi/ciitf conlidlc has been 



