July 10, 1915. 
LAND AND W.ATER. 
erroneous notions too prevalent to-day — such, for 
example, as that Roumania's position is virtually identi- 
cal with that of Italy, and that the Allied Powers have 
been chary of inducements, offering her far less than she 
could have reasonably expected. 
Between Roumania and Italy there is no parity. 
The former State constitutes an ethnic island, sur- 
rounded by foreign and not always neighbourly peoples. 
Descended from a Latin strain, the population contains 
an admixture of Slav blood which is estimated — like the 
Slav words in their tongue — at 33 per cent. From a 
Danubian principality, it has slowly risen to be a Balkan 
I^ngdom, whence cohesive force was vainly expected to 
issue, and keep the original Ballcan peoples from being 
loosed into mutually warring elements. Ringed round 
by a wall built up by history and religion which the 
subtler voices of refined humanity may one day pierce, 
all these nations may justly demur to having their 
conduct gauged by Western standards. For in these 
interesting clefts of international life, where even the 
noblest spirits are cramped and narrow, and the stars 
are seen twinkling at noonday, public opinion, in the 
Italian sense, is lacking. The benighted masses, listless 
and inert, are hypnotised and mummified rather than 
led. For a whole generation the foreign business of 
Roumania was transacted by the late King without 
check or control. At his death this unconstitutional, 
but unquestioned, prerogative passed to the privileged 
classes, who already had in their hands the internal 
governance of the realm. And at present these classes 
have at their head a politician who is certainly the most 
extraordinary and typical, if not the greatest, character 
sprung from a spiritual soil where the highest needs 
of the people, and the capacities of its leaders to meet 
them, are what they are in Roumania. 
John Bratiano was born under a lucky star. From 
nature he received physical health and considerable 
abilities. From his illustrious father, who was gifted 
with political vision, moral courage, and a marvellous 
capacity for work, he inherited, besides name and 
prestige, the leadership of the strongest Parliamentary 
party in the country. Finding everything that ambition 
could strive for ready to his hand without the need 
for personal exertion, he has never made any. Before 
he had an opportimity to merit the honours of a hero 
he became an idol, and, content with the dignity, has 
acted the part. And now if he but threatens to descend 
from his shrine, the nation is moved to its depths as 
by some imminent national disaster. He governs in 
conformity with what his political followers deem the 
constituents of Roumanian progress, and forbears from 
attempting to make any fresh contribution to its slender 
stock of ethico-political ideas. 
Hence his policy, conducive enough to the attain- 
ment of party objects, is not weighted with the solid 
aims of national statesmanship, or the higher purpose 
of wise, progressive government. During his tenure 
of office and the vicissitudes of the present struggle, 
his Cabinet has given no proof that the landmarks 
of European civilisation mean anything to Roumania. 
His great opponent, and Roumania's one statesman, 
Take Jonescu, and also the ex-Minister Filippescu, 
have continuously striven to raise the political standard 
by leavening its gross elements with the higher con- 
ceptions of international solidarity and duty. And 
there are some signs that their endeavours may finally 
prove successful. If Roumania resembled Italy hi 
possessing powerful currents of national thought and 
feelings, the present crisis would compel M. Bratiano 
as it compelled Giolitti, who was also the absolute 
ruler of the two Houses of Parliament and the bureau- 
cracy, to bring his policy into harmony with the 
aspirations of tlie people or else to disappear. But 
the leader of the Liberal Party is the ruler of the 
realm, from whose fiat there is no appeal. Between 
the cases of Roumania and Italy, therefore, tliere is 
no real resemblance. 
Neither can one account for the bewildering course 
of Roumania's policy by the disproportion between the 
demands she has put forward and the offers made by 
Russia. At the extent of the national claims one need 
affect no surprise. The formula is simple and com- 
prehensive : all the Austro-Hungarian provinces in- 
habited by Roumanians are to be united to the 
kingdom after the war. This, being a corollary of 
the principle of nationality, is acceptable to all the 
Powers of the Quadruple Alliance. It is only when 
one proceeds to localise tlie provinces and districts 
that a divergence of views is noticeable. And the 
difference turns upon the partition of the province 
known as the Banat of Temesvar and on the future 
frontiers of Bukovina. As part of the former territory 
is inhabited by Roumanians, Bratiano asks that a 
further portion, which is not Roumanian, and reaches 
as far as the River Tisza, shall also be incorporated 
in the extended kingdom. Now to this there are 
objections of several kinds, deriving from the principle 
of nationality, from common equity which would 
allot the zone in question to Serbia, and from con- 
siderations of military strategy which point in the 
same direction. For if Roumania's claim were allowed, 
she would annex a stretch of territory occupied by 
foreign nationalities. 
It is enough to consult Roumanian statistics on the 
subject to see that in the contentious part of the Banat 
the Roumanian elements amount only to three per 
cent, of the population, the Germans contributing 
twenty-seven and the Serbs thirty-two per cent., while 
the remainder consists of an admixture of Magyars, 
gipsies, and Slovachs. Lastly, it should not be. for- 
gotten that if the strip in dispute were allotted to 
Roumania, the Serbian capital, which it borders, 
would be indefensible. 
The partition of Bukovina is also beset with diffi- 
culties, but they are of a lesser order. Duly boiled 
down, they shrink to the allotment of the capital city, 
Czernowitz, which Roumania demands. If it be taken 
over byRoumania, so, too, must the districts to the south 
and west of it, and these are populated by Ruthenians 
or Russians whom the Tsardom is loth to abandon to 
any foreign vState. On the other hand, Czernowitz is 
unquestionably a Roumanian centre, the seat of a 
Roumanian Metropolitan See and of a university, and 
it belonged of old to Moldavia, which waS undoubtedly 
Roumanian. Those are the main arguments. But the 
heat with which they are maintained is attributable to 
an unavowed motive analogous to that which fired tlie 
Greek and Bulgarian plenipotentiaries at Bucharest in 
their battle for the possession of Kavalla, the richest 
tobacco district in the Ottoman Empire. In Czernowitz 
there is a bishopric endowed with a yearly revenue of 
twenty million francs, to which the Austrian Govern- 
ment and also certain princes of the House of Haps- 
burg were wont to have recourse for the payment of 
various pensions and other expenses. But I have little 
doubt that, in view of the vast interests involved in 
the higher question of Roumania's belligerency, all 
these considerations will soon be viewed in correct 
perspective and dealt with in a business-like way. 
As for the international demands which M. Bratiano 
has put forward, such as a satisfactory arrangement 
respecting the freedom of the Straits and the naviga- 
tion of the Danube, the circumstance that they are 
international renders their settlement by any two States 
at this juncture inconceivable; and that they should 
have been formulated at all is construed in Petrograd 
as a circuitous way chosen by the Bucharest Cabinet 
to put off taking a decision. 
The military objection to immediate intervention 
has also been interpreted as a pretext, although it has 
a little more substance. Russia's defeat in Bukovina 
has, it must be admitted, deprived the Roumanian 
Army of what would have been one of its wings. 
And that is a consideration, for M. Bratiano would like 
to arrange intervention of the kind which his predeces- 
sor, Maiorescu, found so cheap and lucrative two years 
ago. 
(To be conlinued.) 
13* 
