ferent and extraordinarily impressive experiment in Bolshevism, where an army of young enthusiasts had taken possession with the utmost confidence of this immensely wealthy district, which includes such places as Essen, Elberfeld, Solingen, and Dusseldorf, with worldwide interests, and were trying both to reorganise it on Bolshevist lines and to defend it against the Government troops. There was no brutality, no "sabotage," but much sheer fanaticism and the sad willing sacrifice that fanaticism always entails. The experiment failed, but the spirit of it was exactly that of the village priest's phrase in Poland: Beware of idealists. From this one may draw certain conclusions. Bolshevism is a far more serious enemy to organised communities than has as yet been realised, simply because it is as highly organised as organised as the communities themselves. Russians may be living on birdseed, but Bolshevism lives on ideals. Bolshevism has long ceased to be merely Russian; it is a world movement, and adapts its methods to the scene of its operations. Its hold, for example, on Germany is im mense, but it does not attempt to apply to the highly civilised population of Germany the crude methods of ascendancy which it applied in Russia. To the Russian peasant all that seemed desirable was the annihilation of the old state of affairs. The passion of the German is to regain a "place in the sun.” The Bolshevist programme shrewdly adapts itself to the ambitions and circumstances of its victim. Hence its strength. Before long I was to encounter Bolshevism at closer quarters. My next adventure, however, must be northward to the Baltic, to gain some impression of those little new countries, Lettland, Esthonia, and Lithuania, which had wrested longed-for freedom out of the turmoil of war, had fought gallantly one enemy after another, and now had gained both recognition and respect. The first stage of this adventure was a night's journey from Warsaw to the free city of Danzig. There, in the crisp bright sunshine of a Baltic autumn, I once more watched at their work the most indomitable idealists in the world-the British. I know of few spectacles more exhilarating than that of the British soldier to-day in one of the conquered or liberated countries of Central III. Europe. Whether it be a couple of spruce N.C.O.'s crossing the Cathedral Square at Cologne, a dapper sergeantclerk of one of the Missions at Berlin, or a party of merry young privates playing by the roadside with shyly delighted village children—one and all, by their smartness, their radiant cleanliness and health, their funny British elder brotherly kindliness to the people round them, are making their country immensely respected, often amid surroundings of squalor and sullen suspicion. I believe that each of these young men really does feel in the heart of him that he represents Britain in a strange place, and must do so worthily. If you want to see how smart khaki and puttees can look on a straight well-grown lad, visit Cologne under the British ! The bitterness felt between nations at war is seldom, except in action, so deeply reflected amongst individuals. The attitude of the British in Germany after the war vividly illustrated the British character. First, there was the boyish instinct to shake hands after a stiff fight in which the other fellow has been beaten; to this, not in the least understanding the point of view, the Germans responded with bad grace. Second, there was the feeling, assiduously cultivated, that the British must make clear exactly what qualities, as contrasted with those of their late adversaries, enabled them to win the war,-this was excellent thing for the adversaries concerned. Third, there intervened quaintly the ingrained British conviction that it is the destiny of the British race to look after other people for their welfare. This to be done with cheerful confidence, much common-sense, and without arrogance. Germans, inured to hereditary bureaucratic tyranny and military bullying, could not for a long time grasp this last manifestation. They looked at it all mistrustfully and askance. Bred to routine, they could not understand what appeared to be foolish or lazy British casualness of method. Gradually they are coming to realise the British spirit and informing idea. As they arrive at understanding, so they learn to respect. All this, of course, was relatively easy to achieve in Cologne and the occupied Rhine area. There the brisk friendly British régime and admirable discipline are beyond praise. I think that when the history comes to be written of the reconstruction of Europe, slow and perplexing process though it be, the work of the British in the Occupied Area and of the various British Missions in Central Europe will hold high place, and many men now profoundly authoritative and respected at the scene of their often often solitary labours will receive grateful recognition from their countrymen who now know very little about them. Bingham and Malcolm of Berlin, Arnold Robertson of Coblenz, Ryan of Cologne, Tallents of the Baltic-patient and wise administrators whose work will endure! I shall not soon forget the disarming mod- to my hotel, I saw the British esty with which young Stephen flag flying above a fine modern Tallents, British Commissioner building. The British task in for the Baltic Provinces, told remote medieval Danzig must me at Riga how on one occa- necessarily be far more difficult sion he resolved to put a stop than on the Rhine. I wondered to a bitter and devastating with what measure of success "side-war" in the great area in the great area it was being tackled. For over which he watches. Un- Danzig is one of the most accompanied he set out in his recherché of the complicated car for the theatre of war. dishes prepared by the chefs Regardless of personal danger, of the Peace Conference for he collected leaders of both a long-suffering Europe to sides, and by sheer force of assimilate. Later in this narrapersonality got them to agree tive we shall note others. In to an immediate conference. a Europe bewildered and too There, in that distant and often embittered by the estabdesperate region, in the parlour lishment of ethnological fronof a tiny cottage, Colonel tiers, Curzon lines, Polish corTallents sat with these men ridors, and many small and from nine in the evening till ambitious states; by endless three the next morning, and discussions of the self-deterfinally induced them to sign mination of races and the an armistice then and there problematical results of plebiswhich developed later into a cites; in the incubator-bred useful peace! Not to many artificial Europe called into men is it given, as to Stephen being by pundits who knew Tallents, to be able to say, at not Teschen, Danzig has bethirty-six, that practically come a free city once more. single-handed they have de- Proudly pedestalled on selflimited two national frontiers! determination and Mr Wilson's Points, that strange document, the Versailles Treaty, ordains the return of Central Europe to the era of small states and little independent units. The instinctive development of humanity had long since shown that the day of the small state was done, and that of the consolidated empire or federation had come. Germany and Italy had proved it almost within the pundits' own generation; Mr Wilson might well have learned the same lesson from his own great country. Too This is precisely the spirit of confidence and commonsense that a handful of young Britons apply to the administration of vast Sudan provinces. But the war has added to it a deeper knowledge of human nature and a broader and yet more generous outlook. Moreover, these European problems amidst mortified, turbulent, crushed, or timid peoples are infinitely complicated. Walking that sunny morning from Danzig railway station VOL. CCIX.-NO. MCCLXIII. F weak either for attack or defence, too small in resources to claim either much capital or credit, is it possible that under the economic conditions of the modern world the numerous little independent states called peremptorily into exist ence by the Versailles Treaty can survive? a nondescript and very dis- Nor is the ethnographical frontier more than a pleasant fiction of the academic brain. So mixed are races in Central and Eastern Europe that it is impossible to delimit frontiers without injuring-sometimes and speed Germany is pulling very considerable-minorities herself together. Against such and running up against count- forces they very pertinently less religious prejudices and inquire, how will Danzig be social jealousies. Even in little able to defend herself? Lettland on the Baltic, probably the most satisfactory instance of the lot, there are towns in which the majority of the population are Jews. Poor puzzled frontier-makers! Often has the wish been expressed to me on my wanderings that the Big Three could have been haled from Paris and plumped down somewhere in this chaotic area, that they might learn that frontiers cannot be laid down by academic formulæ, percentages, plebiscites, or foot-rules! The British soldier does not worry his head about these things, but it did not take me long to discover that the influence of the British régime was just as bracing and vigorous here on the Baltic as in Cologne. The contrast between Danzig and slack, shabby Warsaw was electric. Danzig hums with health and activity; its streets are crowded, its shops and markets well stocked, its municipal gardens and buildings well looked after, its tramway service admirable. The old sturdy burgher life of the great Baltic seaport has been roused to new vigour. Wider commerce, I learned, is beginning, although the port is still empty and desolate. An evening stroll through the superb old streets of Danzig, one of the most perfectly preserved medieval cities of Europe, is sheer delight to to the lover frank British way, in quiet of humanity; and in the squares where old brick genial depths of the Rathskeller, where hang from the ceiling the models of stately ships, one may once more eat steaks of Vistula salmon as only Danzig cooks can cook them. At the corner of the street of the Holy Ghost and that of the Goldsmiths in the great Hansa days, doubtless British sailor apprentices met the blond Danzig beauties, and made love to them in their churches are, or before all the world in the thronged street of Fair Ladies, where each house has its terrace whence stately merchants and their households greeted the passers-by. I think the British soldiers in Danzig to-day enjoy to the full the renascence of this jolly city life. Everybody respects them, and their pleasant straightforward bearing is helping to remove a thousand prejudices. The little old woman had stood just in front of me for a weary hour in the " queue that waited for visas in the German passport office at Danzig. She was very old, and her hair was silvery. In her eyes there lay the dumb and pathetic patience of the peasant and the Slav. Of all European races the Slav has endured most, and beneath oppression has been the most helpless. Whether bowing to the bluff tyranny of the soldier, or to the worse, because more cynical, bullying of the bureaucrat, you will see to this day in the bearing of the Slav peasantry a humble and bewildered endurance, neither stolid nor sullen, that is an age-long inheritance, and infinitely sad. At last the interminable succession of cringing Jew merchants, voluble commercial travellers of a score of eastern IV. European nationalities, slowthinking peasant youths wandering vaguely through a turbulent Europe in search of work, haggard refugees struggling homewards in tragic groups, had pushed out of the arid and stuffy room. The little old woman's turn had come. She had to tell her tale to a thin pasty-faced Prussian official, snappy and supercilious. Typical of his race, with high cheek-bones, coarse lips, thick neck, and flat-backed head, he clearly exulted in his petty authority. He kept her waiting whilst he wrote, so that he might duly impress her with his importance, and her patient pleading eyes sought in vain for a hint of friendliness. Her little story, I think, might well have won sympathy. She and her daughter lived in a tiny village a few kilometres from Danzig, but within the |