abolish existing legislation) in aid of the farmer (for which sin I have absolved the Congress), the most serious sins of omission in the late session were two. One is in the highest degree disgraceful; namely, the failure of the House to reapportion the House seats to accord with the 1920 census. The letter of paragraph 3, section 2, Article I, of the Constitution will not have been violated if reapportionment is made at any time prior to the end of 1930; but it is clearly the intention of that paragraph that lack of correspondence between the populations of the several states and their voting strength respectively in the House and the Electoral College should be corrected as soon as possible after completion of each census, and in postponing reapportionment the House has impudently flouted the spirit of one of the most important provisions of the Constitution. No language of reprobation is adequate to characterize the action of the House in that connection.

The other great omission was the failure to ratify the Turkish Treaty. The Treaty would put us on the same footing as Allied nationals in Turkey the usual footing of aliens in a country recognized as civilized and fully sovereign. We may, of course, have our mental reservations on the question of Turkish civility; but one can't do business with the Turk except on the basis of such recognition, and surely we want to do business with him. Indeed, candor must allow the Turk the right to question the perfection of our civility; the which, as a matter of fact, he does.

We handsomely maintain our position as the criminal nation par excellence. It is pleasant to note that a National Crime Commission, directed by terrific bigwigs, is making a sweeping survey of crime in this country. It is proper to assume that those

gentlemen regard their function as that of art critics and historians, who would discover the origins, trace the development, and set forth the beauty and majesty of our national art. One pants to know what share of the credit for the magnificent development of recent years they will assign to the movies.

Automobile accidents in the past twelvemonth were more numerous by six per cent than those of the previous twelvemonth, happily supplementing Malthusian arrangements by ridding us of the aged and unfit and weeding out the unalert children. Our annual automobile bill now tops fourteen billions.

The two most striking achievements of the twelvemonth by Americans were the discovery by Dr. B. S. Hopkins, Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Illinois, of a new chemical element to which he has given the name 'illinium,' and Commander Byrd's flight to the Pole. Illinium is the first chemical element to be discovered by an American, and Dr. Hopkins's exploit came in good time for our national self-esteem, as there now remain but two elements in Moseley's series of atomic species yet to be discovered. Not impossibly the discovery will in the end bring to the University of Illinois a glory equal to that bestowed by Red Grange.

Commander Byrd was, to be sure, greatly favored by Fortune, but no man has better deserved that lady's favors. There was no flukiness about his performance, which was based on the most elaborate scientific study and experiment. Science, plus a stout heart, plus good luck; result, immortal fame.

The most lamentable and discouraging episode of the twelvemonth was the demonstration upon the occasion of the laying-out in state of Valentino, the movie actor. But one's disgust

should be tempered by reflection, how brief is the interval since man transcended the pack.

The day that Valentino (a capable artist in his way) died, there died a really great man, Charles Eliot; one of those men who indicate the possibilities of the race. Will those possibilities ever be approximately realized? Only by the right sort of education; the sort of education Dr. Eliot did as much as any American has done to promote. 'Quick about it,' friends!

II

I'm afraid we shall have to say that in regard of the coal-mining problem Mr. Baldwin has just muddled along. One may not deny him impartiality, good will, magnanimity; but one does not discover in his conduct of that business the required imagination, large address, masterfulness.

Apparently Mr. Baldwin has failed to recognize that the coal-mining industry is the central industry to which all other British industries refer themselves; that it is a transcendently national interest to which private interests should be postponed; and that in dealing therewith, though nationalization is not the answer, the principle of laissez faire should go by the board. Reverence for the principle of property should not be carried to the fanatical degree of allowing Economic Bourbonism - whereof the majority of the coal owners are the outstanding champions

drastic economic surgery and physic. Had the main recommendations of the report been implemented at once by vigorous legislation, compulsory at least as to organization, along with discreetly generous financial aid, by way of subsidy over a reasonable period followed by a loan, it is possible that there would have been no strike and fairly certain that a strike would not have lasted long. But economic statesmanship was lacking to the Government, and the chiefs of miners and owners have fiercely contested for the superiority in stupidity and intransigence; in which contest the owners have won by a hair. As I write, it seems probable that the strike will soon end in complete victory for the owners. But, belike, a Pyrrhic victory, my masters! I note astonishing Laborite successes in recent municipal elections. Meantime the industry, not having received the treatment prescribed, continues sick.

But no doubt, the strike over, the coal-mining industry will muddle on, more Britannico, sullenly and slowly reforming itself as, willy-nilly, it must do to carry on in face of the fact that the foreign market for British coal will never again be what it was; will, indeed, in all probability, practically fade away done to death by oil, white coal, and larger and cheaper output by competitors. And the industries so hard hit by the strike-iron and steel worst of all; almost, indeed, to the point of complete cessation of output

will pick up and recover a degree of prosperity, even in face of the keener competition threatened by reason of the new West European Steel Trust.

How much greater, however, would be that prosperity were cheap coal available! But it will be! Again Heaven has shown peculiar kindness to Britain. Rich new seams have been discovered in Robin Hood's country.

The Bourbons of the old Mining Association, deaf to the incursions of reason, blind to the Spirit of the Age, selfish and arrogant, must heed this Nature's handwriting on the wall. Humorous Nature has solved the problem, the while the Conservatives, by weakly yielding to the Economic Bourbons, by subordinating the interests of the commonweal to a grotesque conception of the principle of property, have muffed a magnificent opportunity; whence the very strong likelihood that, unless they redeem themselves by salutary belated legislation, they will be constrained to yield the power to a much-chastened Labor. For one happy result of the strike year is the recovery of control in the trades-unions and in political Labor by the moderate leaders. Should the British people become convinced that their leadership is securely established, another Labor Government would be on the cards. It is deserving of remark that from the younger members of the Conservative Party a note of revolt against Economic Bourbonism, clear and formidable, is heard.

So one great lesson of the strike year is that Economic Bourbonism is not the ticket. I have dwelt on that lesson at such length because it has not received sufficient attention. Obviously, another great lesson is that extreme radicalism is equally not the ticket. The two lessons combined, the grand truth, declared by Philosophy since its Ionian dawn, emerges, that in generous compromise, which looks before and after and is thoroughly informed by the Spirit of the Age, lies the true solution of all great problems. The ignominious fate of the General Strike demonstrated that extreme radicalism is 'no go' in Britain. It opened the eyes of organized Labor to the fact that the middle classes, hitherto regarded by them as incapable of effective coöperation, as

'submerged,' so to speak, are really the great power in the nation; courageous, resourceful, dead-set for constitutional as against revolutionary action. Incidentally, the General Strike exhibited the general temper of the nation in a most pleasing, a most reassuring, light; so sportsmanlike, so humorous, so goodnatured. Really, you see the makings of a new 'Merrie England,' once the present discontents are past. That popular fallacy, the General Strike, has been exploded; that Grand Sham has been relegated to the Limbo of the Fatuous; that absurd, though horrific, Djinni has been put back in his bottle.

But to return for a moment to Economic Bourbonism. Speaking generally, that great bane of Britain is being fast eliminated from the industrial structure; the which fact increases our astonishment at the excess of tenderness shown by the Government for the coal owners. The first effect from conning the reports of the Board of Trade is of consternation at the fallingoff of foreign trade shown; but analysis substitutes amazement that, all considerations weighed, the showing should not be a vast deal worse. The explanation is that 'silently, invisibly,' British industry is adapting itself to a quite new face of the world. Probably the heavy industries will never quite recover their old position; but other industries are growing up answerable to fire-new opportunities; new markets, especially those provided by imperial development. Most significantly, the automotive industry has of late taken great strides, though still only a lusty infant. Why? It is developing to meet the growing requirements of the outlying parts of the Empire.

So, then, in this so dismal strike year the coup de grâce has been given to extreme radicalism and Economic Bourbonism, and thereby the ground has been cleared for a phase of

prosperity for Britain and the Empire compared with which the Victorian period will seem pelting and drab. Let me list what my prophetic vision presents to me as the chief elements of the development which is to have so glorious a result.

1. Reorganization of the coal industry so as to put it on a handsomely self-supporting basis and so as to provide, through low-temperature carbonization of crude coal (or kindred process), for the necessities of the realm in respect of fuel oil, motor spirit, lubricating oils, Diesel engine oil, gas and sulphate of ammonia, the 70 per cent residue after distillation being a smokeless fuel of calorific value equal to that of the best raw coal and capable of far more economical use.

2. General reorganization and reconstruction of industries and transport on the basis of electricity and oil, provision being made for distribution of electric power cheaply throughout the realm.

3. Adaptation to British industry and trade of what is best (and only what is best) in American methods, whereof the British have been making an intensive and very intelligent study; a new psychology to be induced by stimulation from the contacts with America.

4. The relations between Capital and Labor to be immensely improved; another leaf out of our American book. 5. Institution of a thorough general anti-waste programme.

6. Elimination of smoke and grime, through use of smokeless fuel, whence a neater, sweeter Britain and happiest physiological, psychological, and æsthetic results.

7. An immense development of the sparsely populated territory of the Empire (which totals ten million square miles, a very large part immensely rich in sources of wealth, agricultural and

mineral, waiting to be tapped), chiefly through use on the grand scale of roadless motor vehicles, all-tracked or half-tracked. The problem of imperial development is mainly one of transportation, and here is the solution. The possibilities thus opened up stagger the imagination.

No, no Leo Britannicus has had many hard knocks in recent years, but the reports that he is in a mortal decline are greatly exaggerative. No, he's tough and hale and 'a good enough man.' If we gaze low, the prospect seems bleak. But up eyes!

Look, the morn, in russet mantle clad, Walks o'er the dew of yon high eastward hill.

As I write, the Imperial Conference of Premiers, which opened in London on October 19, is about to close. As our information of its proceedings is meagre, the more delicate discussions being secret, I may be excused for brevity in dealing with a business so important. The considerations that enter into the grand problem of imperial federation are about equally economic and political. I doubt we shall find that the conferees have given a clear answer to the question: Is the Empire to be henceforth a self-sufficing, closely interdependent federation, or not? Before that question can be answered, the following subsidiary question must be cleanly answered: How is the demand of the Dominions for extension of operation of the principle of Imperial Preference to be acquiesced in without fatally prejudicing the foreign trade of the British realm? I venture the opinion that we shall find that the conferees have softpedaled on the main issues of the constitutional relations of the Empire and imperial economic policy. These issues relate themselves intimately to the project of European federation (to include all the non-Soviet States of Continental Europe) and to the coming

International Economic Conference under League auspices. Would realization of 'Pan-Europe' promote solidarity of the British Empire and aloofness of Britain from Continental Europe? Or would the effects be quite the opposite? It is significant that the conferees devoted perhaps their main attention to imperial aeronautical development. It may be that hereafter as hitherto, though in a new sense, the Empire is to be held together mostly by aerial bonds.

Exigencies of space forbid my discoursing, as I should like to do, of intra-imperial developments and foreign policy. Britain has remarkably solidified her position in the Near and Middle East, and her relations with Egypt, thanks to the firm wisdom of Lord Lloyd, have been considerably improved. Apparently, also, the situation in India is developing happily both from the standpoint of the British Raj and from that of the Indian people. Especially notable is the Canadian wave of prosperity. No praise could be excessive for the magnanimity of the British Government and Parliament in procuring a settlement of the Irish boundary question by forgiving the Free State's considerable share of the debt of the United Kingdom and of war pensions.

III

After painful study of the matter, I find it improper greatly to blame the French (Government, Parliament — least of all, of course, the great body of the nation) for the unfortunate fiscal developments from the outbreak of the war until the demonstration of the failure of the Ruhr experiment. I do not blame them for their long subjection to the illusion that the greater part of the costs of the war and of reconstruction would be recovered from Germany. Man is preeminently a gullible animal, and, especially where Patria or Helen is

concerned, believes (your hard-headed Poincaré being no exception) what he passionately wishes to believe. Le fantôme des Réparations! It may not be doubted that the phantom was honestly believed to be the real Helen until, with the failure of the Ruhr experiment, eyes were unsealed. With eyes on the lovely phantom, France was treading the primrose path of the borrower toward the bonfire of the franc. Yet, in a manner of speaking, the illusion was a blessing. Under its spell the worst of the ruin in the devastated area was repaired. Had disenchantment come quickly, that work might have lagged disastrously.

Up to that point of the unsealing of the eyes, then, the French authorities were more to be pitied than censured. But the behavior of Parliament thence, until the supercrisis of July this year, deserves censure more than sympathy. The eyes unsealed, the necessary programme of rehabilitation was clearly indicated; to include (a) a supereffort of retrenchment and reorganization; (b) genuine balancing of the budget, without the slightest soupçon of camouflage, however cruelly burdensome might be the additional taxation involved; (c) debt agreements with Britain and the United States, preconditioning stabilization of the franc, as opening the door to foreign credits and loans without which stabilization could not be consummated; (d) finally, revalorization of the franc at a low par, knelling ad Avernum the hopes of the rentiers. Instant action was called for.

But two and one half years went by and you noted, not, on the whole, progress toward realization of the indicated programme; rather, on the whole, regression. And the reasons? Some, to be sure, of honorable import, but the chief, sans doubt, selfish, vicious politics; all the vices of the French political system (not less numerous or vicious