228 TRANSACTIONS OP SECTION E. 



order to prevent the pooling of resources by Russia and Germany it is im- 

 portant that the reconstituted States of Eastern Europe should form a complete 

 intercept. Hence the importance of securing the continuity of Rumania and 

 Poland by the restoration of Eastern Galicia to the latter State. The recon- 

 stituted Sbates ojf Eastern Europe -will fiorm a continuous territory with 

 population and resources equal to those of a Great Power. We shall have 

 naval access to Jugo-Slavia by Adriatic ports, and to Rumania by the newly- 

 opened Black Sea. Holsteiu' and Southern Schleswig being retained ^by 

 Germany, that State will have opportunities for military control of the Kiel 

 Canal in the event of war, thus jeopardising our naval communications with 

 Poland. 



Such are the outstanding facts in the defensive geography of the British 

 Empire as now constituted ; but if, as has been proposed, the Government of 

 Great Britain and Ireland be separate instead of united as at present, a vital 

 change in the conditions would result. The real vulnerability of Great Britain 

 is not to invasion but starvation by blockade. The area fer cajiita is less 

 than half that of France, which country has only just enough land to feed 

 its people. No system of farming at present generally practised will make 

 Great Britain independent of foreign food. This conies across the North 

 Atlantic and Bay of Biscay, since Western Europe has little to spare. Even 

 if there were through railway communication by a Channel tunnel, supplies by 

 this route would be dependent on the grace of foreign Powers. Thus if Ireland 

 be governed separately from Great Britain the subsistence of the population 

 of the latter would be dependent on the controllers of the Western Island, 

 which flanks the routes from the ocean, and is at present the naval outpost 

 of the United Kingdom. The passages past the Irish coasts are also the 

 routes by which reinforcements and munitions must De sent to the dominions 

 and territories beyond the ocean from Great Britain, the main recruiting and 

 munition base of the Empire. Thus if Ireland and Great Britain were 

 politically separated neither Great Britain mor the outlying dominions and 

 territories would be strategically secure. 



THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 11. 



1. Discussion on Geographical Aspects of Evolution, opened by the 



following Paper: — ■ 



Some Geographicali Aspects of Devolution in England. 

 By 0. B. Fawcett.i 



The prominence of ' Devolution ' during this time of reconstruction may be 

 ascribed"to three principal cause«s, namefy : — 



1. The strength and urgency of the Irish demand for some form of home rule, 

 and the existence and growing strength of similar demands in Scotland and 

 Wales. . 4^m 



2. The congestion of busine-ss in Parliament and the fact that the present 

 Parliament is obviously unable to cope with all the tasks which fall to it. 



3. The increasing realisation that our counties and county boroughs are too 

 small, in area and in the authority of their councils, to deal adequately with 

 many problems of local government. 



The realisation of these facts has led to many references, in the Press and 

 from i>ublic platforms, to a ' federal solution.' This is usually understood as 

 involving the erection of four national Pariiaments — in England, Scotland, 

 Ireland, and Wales — to deal with the internal affairs of each country. 



The fatal weakness of this solution, as it is thus stated, is that one of the 

 four partners possesses more than three times as much population and wealth as 

 the other three together. The German Empire was the one prominent example 

 of a federal State in which one partner was dominant — and Prussia was less 



^ See C. B. Fawcett, Provinces of EnqJand (London : Williams & Norgate, 

 1919). 



