n the following number of
_Maga_ (March 1920) says that foreign affairs are "a province far
beyond his powers or understanding." But he is talking of Mr. Lloyd
George.

Our account of mediaeval times will be brief, only so much in fact as
is needed for a comprehension of the present. In approaching our own
day, the story will become more and more detailed. If it be objected
that the details, in so far as they detract from the conduct of
Yugoslavia's neighbours, might with advantage have been painted with
the hazy, quiet colours that you give to the excursions and alarms of
long ago, one may reply that this book is intended to depict the world
in which the Yugoslavs have, after all these centuries, joined one
another and the frame of mind which consequently glows in them.

One cannot on this earth expect that a new State, however belated and
however inevitable, will be formed without a considerable amount of
friction, both external and internal. Perhaps, owing to the number of
not over-friendly States with which they are encompassed, the
Yugoslavs will manage to waive some of their internal differences, and
to show that they are capable, despite the confident assertions of
some of their neighbours and the croakings of some of themselves, of
establishing a State that will weather for many a year the storms
which even the League of Nations may not be competent to banish from
South-Eastern Europe. A certain number of people, who seem to expect
us to take them seriously, assert that an English writer is
disqualified from passing adverse comment on Italy's imperialistic
aims because the British Empire has received, as a result of the War,
some Turkish provinces and German colonies. It is said that, in view
of these notorious facts, the Italian Nationalists and their friends
cannot bear to be criticized by the pens of British authors and
journalists. The fallacy in logic known as the _argumentum ad hominem_
becomes a pale thing in comparison with this new _argumentum ad
terram_. If a passionless historian of the Eskimos had given his
attention to the Adriatic, I believe he would have come to my
conclusions. But then it might be said of him that as for half the
year his land is swathed in darkness, it would be unseemly for him to
discuss a country which is basking in the sun.

Another consummation--though this will to-day find, especially in
Serbia, a great many opponents, whose attitude, following the
deplorable events of