ed to do so. Britain, through her
maritime power and the energy of her merchants and people, had become a
great world power when Germany was still unformed. Thus, when she had
grown to her full stature, she found that the choice places of the world
and those most fitted for the spread of a transplanted European race
were already filled up. It was not a matter which we could help nor
could we alter it, since Canada, Australia, and South Africa would not,
even if we could be imagined to have wished it, be transferred to German
rule. And yet the Germans chafed, and if we can put ourselves in their
places we may admit that it was galling that the surplus of their
manhood should go to build up the strength of an alien and possibly a
rival State. So far we could see their grievance, or, rather their
misfortune, since no one was in truth to blame in the matter. Had their
needs been openly and reasonably expressed, and had the two States moved
in concord in the matter, it is difficult to think that no helpful
solution of any kind could have been found.

*As Germans See England.*

But the German method of approaching the problem has never been to ask
sympathy and co-operation, but to picture us as a degenerate race from
whom anything might be gained by playing upon our imagined weakness and
cowardice. A nation which attends quietly to its own sober business
must, according to their mediaeval notions, be a nation of decadent
poltroons. If we fight our battles by means of free volunteers instead
of enforced conscripts then the military spirit must be dead among us.
Perhaps, even in this short campaign, they have added this delusion also
to the dust-bin of their many errors. But such was their absurd
self-deception about the most virile of European races. Did we propose
disarmament, then it was not humanitarianism but cowardice that prompted
us, and their answer was to enlarge their programme. Did we suggest a
navy-building holiday, it was but a cloak for our weakness and an
incitement that they should redouble their efforts. Our decay had become
a part of their national faith. At first the wish may have been the
father to the thought, but soon under the reiterated assertions of their
crazy professors the proposition became indisputable. Bernhardi in his
book upon the next war cannot conceal the contempt in which he has
learned to hold us. Neibuhr long ago had prophesied the coming fall of
Britain, and every year was believed to