J2 
LAND & WATER 
January 23, 1917 
endorsement of the President's action, no support for the 
wider implications of the Note, not even an approval 
l)y the Senate of the mere sending of this request. 
A carefiil study of the debate shows the thoughts that 
■tre uppermost." First, if the effort to get peace did not 
•^imediately succeed, the danger of America being forced 
mto war was clearly greater at the present stage than it 
Mver had been. Senator Lewis, amongst others, gave 
this point great emphasis. Though less explicitly stated, 
another thought is throughout very clearly visible. 
However the purposes of the League to enforce peace 
are defined, it is clear that it is those purposes, and no 
others, that the Allies are now fighting to attain. In 
spite of outrageous injuries, .\mcrica, bound by tradition 
to stand ck%r of Eiu-opean entanglements, has refused 
to join this effort. How can she consistently bind 
herself to indefinite future obligations to fight, if she is 
so reluctant to fight now ? The Senate, in other words, 
refused to shut its eyes to the fact that Dr. Wilson's 
December Note offered to commit the United States to 
a policy inconsistent with their past traditions— wildly 
inconsistent with their present policy. It was for these 
reasons that the Senate deliberately dissociated itself, 
by a vote of 48 to 17, from every part of the President's 
action except the bare request that both sides should 
state their terms of peace. And it is significant that 
:^q out of 48 who constitute the majority, were Democrats, 
and that the 17 who voted against the resolution, did 
so because they thought that even this very moderate 
support of the President was more than the Senate 
ought to give. In other words, the Assembly of America's 
elder statesmen went so far as it possibly could in re- 
pudiating the President'<i action in toto 
Resolute Inaction 
If we are to understand his speech of Monday last, 
we must bear this fact in mind. It is the President's 
effort to defend andJimit his personal committal to the 
ideals of the League of Peace. His speech is not made 
in the hope that it will give a new direction to European 
policy. It is made in the effort to discover a common 
ground amongst the American parties for an American 
policy. It does not follow on any endorsement by 
congress of a plan of action in Europe proposed by the 
President. It is the necessary result of the repudiation, 
by an important part of Congress, of action actually 
taken by him. This being the situation, let us note 
certain e.Ktremely significant statements. America 
neither claims, nor expects to have, any hand whatever 
in settling the peace terms of Europe. This is surely 
fxtremely significant, for it means that except under 
the direst compulsion, America will maintain her hardly 
maintained neutrahty to- the end. Next, the President 
lias laid down the only kind of peace with which any 
American pledge to join in the future keeping of peace 
would be compatible. It is a peace that follows from 
agreement, and not from victory. Now, clearly, no man 
of sense looking at the conflict as it is in Europe to-day. 
can conceive such a peace to be possible. Writing in our 
issue of December 28th — the first that appeared after 
the pubhcation of Mr. Wilson's December Note— I 
stated that the " forces that made this war are not forces 
with which the world can compromise." It is inconceiv- 
able that the junta that has Germany in the hollow of its 
hand, can suddenly express contrition for its crimes, can 
offer to repair the evil it has done, or pledge itself never 
to offend again. 
It is just because this is inconceivable that we 
have all long since realized that the only peace which 
can be a real peace, must follow on our victory. Note 
also that the ideals set out by Dr. Wilson are in 
absolute contradiction to the whole of Germany's policy 
in declaring and carrying on the war. 
The President records that .he has received an 
explicit statement from the Allies of the kind of peace 
they want, and that the Central Powers have declined 
any similar candour. But he does not say that he 
approves the Allies^ terms. He almost cries " a 
plague on both your houses." For he rules out 
victory as a road to peace, yet he must know that with- 
out victory the Allies cannot get any tolerable terms at 
all, and that victory was Germany's only object from the 
first. So far, then, from President Wilson's speech being 
an equivalent of an American programme, it looks 
rather as if he were purposely la^-ing down as conditions 
precedent to any American action, a set of principles 
that never coulcl be realized. For, if American co- 
operation in maintaining the law of truth and justice in 
the future is dependent upon that law being voluntarily 
accepted by all Europe first, then we may be assured 
that the risk of Washington being called upon to commit 
the American people in this matter is so slender as to be 
negligible. In explaining his programme then, President 
Wilson has explained it all awUy. This being 'SO we 
need not alarm ourselves over " the freedom of the 
seas," or any other of his phrases. 
I am writing this without having seen one single word 
of comment in any American paper. But I venture to 
prophesy that this speech will be received as an anti- 
climax. So far as American policy is concerned, things 
stand therefore to-day exactly as they stood in May 
last, with this important difference : that the belligerents 
have put their cards upon the table. Germany, it is 
true, has refused to state her peace terms, but as no part 
of the world has the least doubt about her war aims, 
this is an immaterial detail. If, then, Washington has 
to face the question once again of taking any active part 
in the defence of American interests before peace arrives, 
there can be no question as to what objects she will 
indirectly assist by so doing. 
Nor can there be any doubt that Washington may 
have to choose in this matter sooner than many people 
think. The German undertaking of May last contained 
the proviso that circumstances might compel the German 
Higher Command to withdraw from it. It is as clear as 
anything can be that the time for this denunciation has 
now come. I have alluded above to the pressure now 
being brought to bear on the Berlin authorities by public 
bodies throughout Germany. This pressure will cer- 
tainly supply the excuse for a form of action for which 
the desperate case of Germany is the real cause. We 
may see the May Note denounced at any time now. 
Arthur PotLEX 
P.S. — News of the destroyer action off the Dutch 
Coast comes just as we are going to press. The enemy 
seems to have been roughly treated. If he lost, as 
some accounts say, seven boats, it is an extraordinary 
victory. It is remarkable that our only loss was a 
destroyer torpedoed. Is there another case on record ? 
It is evident that our forces were directed and led with 
great skill and dash. 
A Fine Character Study 
In Elliott Limited, by D. S. Mann (Sidgwick and Jackson. 
6s.), we have a story of an individual's progress and develop- 
ment, which whenever treated with distinction as in this 
case, arrests attention. Elliott started life as tlie son of an 
East Anglian farmer wlio had many good qualities, but 
lacKing business ability made a failure of his life. His son 
began life at fifteen, driving the plough, milking cows, etc., 
and in his spare time educating himself. From this he 
passed on to office work, and got his really first start by a 
little skilful embezzlement which, wlien times improved, 
he made good. He joined the army, fought in South .^f^ica, 
did a period of service in India, returned to South Africa, 
and finally bought himself out. Then he took to journaHsm, 
had more downs than ups, loved and was loved, finally made 
good and at last married a woman wlio provided him with 
the material comforts of life, but not with that good com- 
radesliip which a happy marriage should contain. And so 
comes tlic end — a bullet in the Great War, 
The verj' title of the book imphes that it is the record of 
limitations, and from that point of view must bo warmly 
praised. We never lose our interest in the chief figure, 
though at times feel inclined to kick him and tell him to 
liustle up and take a broader and brighter conception both 
of himself and of life generally. His abiding affection for 
his parents, through good and bad times, is the brightest 
trait, and on reading the epilogue, we can but hope that the 
wife made good the husband's fine self-sacrifice. 
.Mr. Mann has the gift of narrative ; he would do well to 
shake himself free of the Wells manner, and mannerisms, but 
the book is one very much above the ordinary and its perusal 
will well repay all those who read in order to obtain a more 
intimate knowledge of human nature. It is sincere through- 
out, and sliould prove a success, and be the prelude to o'her 
\olumcs in whicli luiman life and endeavour are dealt witl 
in a discerning and sympathetic mannc;,. 
