er War; we had not thought that so many men could be so
quickly killed, so many millions of money whittled away. But even the
South African War never remotely seemed to threaten the security of
our own islands. For the most part, the policeman has been enough. A
light bolt and a key guard us against petty burglars; we walk abroad
unarmed--at the worst, we comment on the fact that it is well to carry
a stick if we walk alone in Epping Forest. We have abolished duelling.
We have forbidden prize-fights. Even the horse-whip has ceased to be
the patrician's mode of redressing wrong. For assault, libel, slander,
we have a remedy in the law courts. Even in our punishment of
criminals, if occasionally we have to put a man out of the way by
discreetly hanging him, we never subject him to the degradation of a
whipping. Youthful barbarians at public schools still roll about and
pummel one another, but the organised, stand-up fight, such as was
fought in Tom Brown's schooldays, is discouraged; public opinion is
against it. From infancy we are taught to be peaceful, law-abiding
citizens.

Most of us, then, know very little about physical violence. The
shedding of blood is an unfamiliar spectacle. If a man is knocked
down by a motor-bus, we may or we may not feel human sympathy, but
certainly we are physically shocked by the gruesome sight. We send men
to the gallows, but we no longer watch their agony on Tyburn Hill. We
despatch men to a frontier war, but we know little about their wounds.
And yet, as of old, our martial ardour is aroused and we glow with
patriotic pride when a regiment of soldiers marches past to the sound
of music. As of old, the thought of any great European war excites us,
even fascinates us. We know enough, indeed, to assure ourselves that a
great war would mean economic ruin, that even a distant war between
two foreign countries, such as Turkey and Italy, or Turkey and
Bulgaria, will probably react unfavourably on our own trade. Yet the
thought of a great war still profoundly interests the mass of
Englishmen; they are fascinated; they almost long for news of the
great, decisive, bloody battle which means a sensation, a spectacle,
an acquaintance with something doing, a something strange, gruesome,
violent, and vast.

I am not saying that the people of this country approved of the war
which Italy thought good to wage against Turkey, or were pleased at
the horrible slaughter in the Balkans. It is obvious, on t