xt7gth8bgm1t https://exploreuk.uky.edu/dips/xt7gth8bgm1t/data/mets.xml Marcosson, Isaac Frederick, 1876-1961. 1917 books b92-226-31183058 English J. Lane Co. ; J. Lane, : New York : London, Contact the Special Collections Research Center for information regarding rights and use of this collection. World War, 1914-1918 Economic aspects. Lloyd George, David, 1863-1945. Hughes, William Morris, 1864-1952. War after the war / by Isaac F. Marcosson. text War after the war / by Isaac F. Marcosson. 1917 2002 true xt7gth8bgm1t section xt7gth8bgm1t

THE WAR AFTER THE WAR

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THE WAR

AFTER THE WAR

ISAAC F.

MARCOSSON

CO-AUTHOR OF CHARLES FROH'MAN, MANAGER AND MAN"
AUTHOR OF "THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF A CLOWN," ETC.

NEW YORK:

JOHN LANE COMPANY

LONDON: JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD
TORONTO: S. B. GUNDY ::: MCMXVI.I

CoPYauGr, rgr6, BY TuE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPAMq
COPYRIGHT, i906, BY THY, RDGWAY COMPANY

Press of
J. J. Little & Ives Company
New York, U. S. A.

TO
LORD NORTHCLIFFE
IN GRATEFUL APPRECIATION

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FOREWORD

F OR nearly three years Europe has
been drenched with blood and rent
with bitter strife. 1\1illions of men
have been killed or maimed: billions
of dollars in property have gone up in smoke
and ruin-all part of the mighty sacrifice
laid on the Altar of the Great War.
This tragic tumult must inevitably sub-
side. The smoke of battle will clear: the
scarred fields will mantle again with spring-
time verdure: the fighting hosts will once
more find their way to peaceful pursuit.
Time the Healer will wipe out the wounds
of xvar.
The world already wearies of the Crimson
Canvas splashed with martial scene. Hero-
ism has become the most commonplace of
qualities: it takes a monster thrill to move a
civilisation sick of destruction. With eager
eye it looks forward to the era of regenera-
tion. \'Var ends some time.
Business never ceases. Under the shock
of mighty upheaval it has been dislocated
7

Foreword

by the most drastic strain ever put upon the
economic fabric. But it will march on long
after Peace will have mercifully sheathed
the Sword. Therefore the permanent world
problem is the Business problem.
This is why I made two trips to Europe:
why I submit this little book in the hope that
it may point the way to some realisation of
the immense responsibilities which will inev-
itably crowd upon the world and more espe-
cially upon the United States.
Peace will be as great a shock as War.
Hence the need of Preparedness to meet the
inevitable conflict for Universal Trade. We
-as a nation-are as unready for this emer-
gency as we are to meet the clash of actual
physical combat. Commercial Preparedness
is as vital to the national well being as the
Training for Arms.
Nor will Commerce be the only thing that
we will have to reckon with. When you
have heard the guns roar and watched hori-
zons flame with fury and seen men go to
their death smiling and unafraid; when the
pitiless panorama of carnage has passed be-
fore you in terms of terror and tragedy, you
realise that there is something human as

Foreword 9

well as economic in the relentless Thing
called War.
It means that just as there was no com-
promise with dishonour in the approach to
the Super-Struggle for which nations are
pouring out their youth and fortune, so will
there be no flinching in that coming contest
for commercial mastery-the bloodless af-
termath of History's deadliest and costliest
war.
We have reached a place in the World
Trade Sun. Unless we are ready to hold
it we will slip into the Shadow.
We must prepare.
I. F. M.

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CONTENTS

CHAPTEl PAGE
I. THE COMING WAR . . 15

II. ENGLAND AWAKE . . . . . 40
III. AMERICAN BUSINESS IN
FRANCE. . . . . . . 71
IV. THE NEW FRANCE . . . . 98

V. SAVING FOR VICTORY . . 120

VI. THE PRICE OF GLORY . . . i64
VII. THE MIAN LLOYD GEORGE . 210
VIII. FROM PEDLAR TO PREMIER. . 258

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THE WAR AFTER THE WAR

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I-The Conming War

W HILE the guns roar from the
North Sea to the Mediter-
ranean, and the greatest armed
host that history has ever known
is still locked in a life-and-death struggle
on a dozen fronts, another war, more po-
tent and permanent perhaps than the one
which now engulfs Europe, lurks beyond the
distant horizon of peace.
Its fighting line will be the boundaries of
all human needs; its dynamic purpose a
heroic rehabilitation after stupendous loss.
It will be the far-flung struggle for the rich
prize of International Trade, waiting at the
end of the Crimson Lane that sooner or later
will have a turning.
Embattled commercial groups will sup-
plant embroiled nations; boycotts, discrimi-
nations and exclusions will succeed the
strategies of line and trench; the animosities
fought out to-day with shell and steel will
have their heritage in ruthless rivalries.
How shall we fare in this tumult of tariff
I5

16 The War After the War

and treaty Where shall we stand when
the curtain of fire fades before a task of re-
generation that will spell economic rebirth
or disaster for millions Will fiscal punish-
ment be meted out to neutral and foe alike
Will reason rule or revenge dictate a costly
reprisal in this war after the war
These are the questions that rise out of
the dust and din of the colossal upheaval
which is rending half of the world. Di-
rectly or indirectly they touch the whole
American people, regardless of rank or
wealth. The tide of war has rolled us far
upon the shores of world affairs. We have
prospered in the kinship of the nations.
Will the ebb of peace leave us high and dry
amid a mighty isolation
I went to England and France to study
this problem at first hand. I interviewed
Cabinet Ministers; I talked with lawmakers,
soldiers, captains of capital, masters of in-
dustry, and plain, everyday business men.
Often the talk was disturbed by shriek of
shell or bomb of midnight Zeppelin marau-
der.
Through all the travail of debt and death
that rends the allied peoples runs the clear

The Coming War

current of determination to retrieve the im-
mense loss. Bar is waste; some one must
pay-we among the rest. Already the guns
are being trained for the inevitable com-
mercial battle, which, willingly or unwill-
ingly, will bring us under fire. Let us ex-
amine the plan of campaign.
But before going into the concrete de-
tails that mean so much to our future and
our fortune, it is important to understand
some very essential conditions.
First and foremost is the uncertainty of
the war itself. All prophecy-at best a dan-
gerous thing is purest speculation. No
one can tell how long the duel will last; how
badly the loser will be beaten; what the terms
of peace will be. Yet out of these contin-
gencies will emerge the strong hands that
will redraw the trade map of the world.
Whatever the outcome, the countries now
fighting, especially the Allies, have definitely
stated the principles that must govern-for
a long time, at least-the whole realignment
of commercial relations. Their way shall
be the universal way.
In the second place, be you Ally or Teuton
and regardless of how you may feel about

18 The War After the War

the ethics of the Great Struggle, it must be
remembered that behind the glamour as
to whether it is waged to conserve human
liberty, maintain the integrity of "scraps of
paper" or to safeguard democracy, the
larger fact remains that it is a war rooted
in commercial jealousies and fanned by com-
mercial aggressions.
Now we come to the really vital point, and
it is this: When the guns are hushed you
will find that national and industrial defence
among the warring countries will be one and
the same thing. The Allies learned to their
cost that the economic advance of Germany
was merely part of her one-time resistless
military machine. Her trade and her pre-
paredness went conqueringly hand in hand.
Henceforth that game will be played by all.
England, for instance, will manufacture dye-
stuffs not only for her textile trades, but
because coal-tar products are essential to
the making of high explosives.
Thus, Competition, which was once merely
part of the natural progress of a country,
will hereafter be a large part of the struggle
for national existence.
There is still another factor: No matter

The Coining War

who wins, peace must mean prosperity for
everybody. For the victor it will take the
form of an attempted stewardship of trade
and navigation; for the vanquished it wvill
be the dedication of a terrible energy to the
twin restoration of pride and product.
Now you begin to see why it is up to the
United States to make ready for whatever
business fate awaits her beyond the uncer-
tain f rontiers of to-morrow. Nor have we
been without warning of what may be in
store for us. Prohibitive tariffs, blacklists
and boycotts, embargoes on mail and cargo,
the exclusion from England and France of
hundreds of our manufactured articles-all
show which way the international trade
winds may blow when the belligerents be-
gin to take toll of their losses. Meantime,
what are the facts
Take the case of England. Thirty years
ago she was the workshop of the world.
From the Tyne to the Thames her factories
hummed with ceaseless industry. Her goods
went wherever her ships steamed, and that
meant the globe. Supreme in her insularity
-at once her defence and her undoing-
she became infected with the virus of con-

20 The War After the War

tent. Her steel was the best steel; her wares
led all the rest. "Take it or leave it!" was
her selling maxim. When devices came
along that saved labour and increased pro-
duction she refused to scrap the old to make
way for the new. Born, too, was the evil
of restricted output. Moss began to grow
on her vaunted industrial structure. Eng-
land lagged in the trade procession.
But as she lagged the assimilative German
streamed in through her hospitable door.
He served his apprenticeship in British
mills; took home the secrets and methods
of British art and craft. He geared them
to cheap labour, harnessed product to mas-
terful distribution, and became a World
Power. Before long he had annexed the dye
trade; was competing with British steel;
was making once-cherished British goods.
What the German did in England he du-
plicated elsewhere. The world of ideas was
his field and, with insatiate hunger, he gar-
nered them in. He cunningly acquired the
sources of raw supply, especially the essen-
tials to national defence; for he overlooked
nothing. All was grist to his mills. He
pitched his tents upon debatable trade lands.

The Coming War

His rivals called it economic penetration,
because he invariably took root. For him
it was merely good business.
Then-England suddenly realised that Ger-
many had left her behind in the race for
international commerce. Indifference lay
at the root of this backsliding. It was easier
and cheaper to buy the German-made prod-
uct and reship it than to produce the same
article at home. Sloth hung like a chain
on English energy. What did it matter
No forest of bayonets hemmed her in; she
was still Mistress of the Seas.
Meantime Germany dripped with effi-
ciency and ached with expansion. Her
amazing teamwork between state and busi-
ness, stimulated by an interested finance,
drove her on to a place in the sun. The
shadows seemed far away when the great
war crashed into civilisation. Then England
woke to the folly of her blindness. The mys-
tery of coal-tar products was shut up in a
German laboratory; the secrets of tungsten,
necessary to the toughest steel, were im-
prisoned in a Teutonic mill; and so on down
a long list of products vital to industry and
defence.

22 The War After the War

Even those early and tragic reverses of
the war did not stir the stolid British bulk.
Men fought for a chance to fight; restric-
tion still oppressed factory output. Red tape
vied with tradition to block the path of mili-
tary and industrial preparation.
Then the Lion stirred; the sloth fell away;
men and munitions were enlisted; the strong
hand was put on labour tyranny; conscrip-
tion succeeded the haphazard voluntary sys-
tem. Britain got busy and she has buzzed
ever since.
When the kingdom had become a huge
arsenal; when the old sex differences van-
ished under the touchstone of a common
peril; when the first khaki host swept to its
place in the battle line, and the grey fleets
were once more queens of the seas, England
turned to the task of commercial rebuilding,
once neglected, but thenceforth to be part
and parcel of British purpose.
Animating this purpose, stirring it like a
vast emotion, was the New Battle Cry of
Empire-the kindling Creed of United Do-
minions, consecrated to the economic mas-
tery of the world.
But this revival was not an overnight per-

The Coming War

formance. If you know England you also
know that it takes a colossal jolt to stir the
British mind. The war had been in full
swing for over a year and the countryside
was an armed camp before the realisation of
what might happen commercially after the
war soaked into the average islander's con-
sciousness.
Under the impassioned eloquence of Lloyd
George the munition workers had been mar-
shalled into an inspired working host;
with the magic of Kitchener's name, the
greatest of all voluntary armies came into
being. But it remained for Hughes, of Aus-
tralia, to point out the fresh path for the
feet of the race.
Who is Hughes, of Australia You need
not ask in England, for the story of his ad-
vent, the record of his astounding triumph,
the thrilling message that he left implanted
in the British breast, constitute one of the
miracles of a war that is one long succes-
sion of dramatic episodes. This Colonial
Prime Minister arrived unknown: he left a
popular hero.
Thanks to him, Australia was prepared
for war; and when the 1other Lioness sent

24 The War After the War

out the world call to her cubs beyond the
seas there was swift response from the men
of bush and range. The world knows what
the Anzacs did in the Dardanelles; how they
registered a monster heroism on the rocky
heights of Gallipoli; gave a new glory to
British arms.
England rang with their achievements.
WThat could she do to pay tribute to their
courage Hughes was their national leader
and spokesman; so the Political Powers That
Be said:
"Let us invite the Premier to sit in the
councils of the empire and advise us about
our future trade policy."
Already Hughes had declared trade war
on Germany in Australia. Under his leader-
ship every German had been banished from
commonwealth business; by a special act of
Parliament the complete and well-nigh war-
proof Teutonic control of the famous Broken
Hill metal fields had been annulled. He
stood, therefore, as a living defiance to the
renewal of all commercial relations with the
Central Powers. But he went further than
this: He decreed trade extermination of the
enemy-merciless war beyond the war.

The Coming War

With his first speech in England Hughes
created a sensation. Before he came comr-
mercial feeling against Germany ran high.
Hughes crystallised it into a definite cry.
He said what eight out of every ten men in
the street were thinking. His voice became
the Voice of E mpire. Up and down England
and before cheering crowds he preached the
doctrine of trade war to the death on Ger-
many. He denounced the laxness that had
permitted the "German taint to run like a
cancer through the fair body of English
trade"; he urged complete economic inde-
pendence of the Dominions. His persistent
plea was, "We must have the fruits of vic-
tory"; and those fruits, he declared, com-
prised all the trade that Germany had
hitherto enjoyed, and as much more as could
be lawfully gained.
He urged that the blood brotherhood of
empire, quickened by that dramatic S.O.S.
call for men across the sea and cemented
by the common trench hazard, be followed
by a union of empire after the war that
should be self-sufficient. Behind all this
eloquent talk of protection and prohibition
lay the first real menace to America's new

26 The War After the War

place as a world trade power. It was the
opening call to arms for the war after the
war.
Hughes did more than set England to
thinking in imperial terms. He upset most
of the calculations of the Powers That Be
who invited him. They expected an amiable,
able and plastic counsellor; they got an ora-
torical live wire, who would not be ruled,
and who shocked deep-rooted free-trade con-
victions to the core. He helped to launch
a whole new era of thought and action; and
the next chapter of its progress was now to
be recorded under circumstances pregnant
with meaning for the whole universe of
trade.
The second winter of war had passed, and
with it much of the dark night that en-
shrouded the Allies' arms. On land and sea
rained the first blows of the great assaults
that were to make a summer of content for
the Entente cause. Its arsenals teemed with
shells; its men were fit; victory, however dis-
tant, seemed at last assured. The time had
come to prepare a new kind of drive-the
combined attack upon enemy trade and any
other that happened to be in the way.

The Coming War

Thus it came about that on a brilliant sun-
lit day last June twoscore men sat round a
long table in a stately room of a palace that
overlooked the Seine, in Paris. Eminent
lawmakers-Hughes, of Australia, among
them-were there aplenty; but few practical
business men.
On the walls hung the trade maps of the
world; spread before them were the red-
dotted diagrams that showed the water high-
ways where traffic flowted in happier and
serener days. For coming generations of
business everywhere it was a fateful meet-
ing because the now famous Economic Con-
ference of the Allies was about to reshape
those maps and change the channels of com-
merce.
All the while, and less than a hundred
miles away, Verdun seethed with death; still
nearer brewed the storm of the Somme.
These men were assembled to fix the price
of all this blood and sacrifice, and they did.
In what has come to be known as the Paris
Pact they bound themselves together by eco-
nomic ties and pledged themselves to present
a united economic front. They unfurled
the banner of aggressive reprisal with the

28 The War After the War

sole object of crushing the one-time busi-
ness supremacy of their foes.
The chief recommendations were: To
meet, by tariff discrimination, boycott or
otherwise, any individual or organised trade
advance of the Central Powers-already
Germany, Austria, Turkey and Bulgaria
have reached a commercial understanding;
to forego any "favoured-nation" relation
with the enemy for an indefinite period; to
conserve for themselves, "before all others,"
their natural resources during the period of
reconstruction; to make themselves inde-
pendent of enemy countries in the raw ma-
terials and manufactured products essential
to their economic well-being; and to facili-
tate this exchange by preferential trade
among themselves, and by special and state
subsidies to shipping, railroads and tele-
graphs. Another important decree prohibits
the enemy from engaging in certain indus-
tries and professions, such as dyestuffs, in
allied countries when these industries relate
to national defence or economic indepen-
dence.
In short, self-sufficiency became the aim
of the whole allied group, to be achieved

The Coming War

without the aid or consent of any other na-
tion or group of nations, be they friends or
foes.
Here, then, is the strategy that will rule
after the war. A huge allied monopoly is
projected-a sort of monster militant trust,
with cabinets of ministers for directorates,
armies and navies as trade scouts, and whole
roused citizenships for salesmen.
Throughout this new Bill of World Trade
Rights there is scant mention of neutrals-
no reference at all to the greatest of non-
belligerent nations. Yet the document is
packed with interest, fraught even with
highest concern, for us. Upon the ability
to be translated into offensive and defensive
reality will depend a large part of our fu-
ture international commercial relations.
Is the Paris Pact practical Will it with-
stand the logical pressure of business de-
mand and supply when the war is ended
How will it affect American trade
To try to get the answer I talked with
many men in England and France who were
intimately concerned. Some had sat in the
conference; others had helped to shape its
approach; still others were dedicated to its

30 The War After the War

far-spreading purpose. I found an astonish-
ing conflict of opinion. Even those who
had attended this most momentous of all
economic conferences were sceptical about
complete results. Yet no one questioned the
intent to smash enemy trade. Will our in-
terests be pinched at the same time
Regardless of what any European states-
man may say to the contrary, one deduction
of supreme significance to us arises out of
the whole proposition. Summed up, it is
this:
Mutual preference by or for the members
of either of the great European alliances
automatically creates a discrimination
against those outside! Whether we face the
Teuton or the Allies' group-or both-in
the grand economic line-up, we shall have
to fight for commercial privileges that once
knew no ban.
There are two well-defined beliefs about
the practical working out of the pact as a
pact. Let us take the objections first. They
find expression in a strong body of opinion
that the whole procedure is both unhuman
and uneconomic-a campaign document, as
it were, conceived in the heat and passion of

The Comning War

a great war, projected for political effect in
cementing the allied lines. In short, it is
what business men would call a glorified and
stimulated "selling talk," framed to sell good
will between the nations that now propose
to carry war to shop and mill and mine.
"But," as a celebrated British economist
said to me in London, "while all this talk
of Economic Alliance sounds well and is
serving its purpose, the fact must not be
overlooked that, though war ends, business
keeps right on. Self-interest will dictate the
policy that pays the best." This is a typical
comment.
Now we get to the meat of the matter:
By the terms of the pact half a dozen im-
portant nations-to say nothing of the
smaller fry-are bound to a hard-and-fast
trade aoreement. Business, in brief, is pro-
jected in terms of nations.
Go behind this new battle front and you
will find that it conflicts with an uncompro-
mising commercial rule. Why Simply be-
cause, so far as business is concerned, na-
tions may propose, but human beings dis-
pose. Individuals, not countries, do busi-
ness! Being human, these individuals are

32 The War After the War

apt to follow the line of least resistance.
Hence, the best-laid plans for imposing in-
ternational industrial teamwork are likely
to founder on those weaknesses of human
nature that begin and end in the pocket-
book.
After the Franco-Prussian War of 1870-
7I, and while the Peace of Versailles was
being negotiated, commercial travellers of
each nation, laden with samples, filled the
border villages, ready to dash across the
frontier and open accounts. Of course no
one dreams that such history will repeat it-
self after the present war; but there are
many persons in England and France to-day
who contend that the business needs of peace
will be stronger than the costly hang-over of
wartime passions.
Trade, after all, is a Colossus that rests
with one foot upon Necessity and the other
foot upon Convenience.
Wrill the Allies be such valued commercial
helpmates to each other Perhaps not.
When this war is over the fighting countries
will be impoverished by years of drain and
waste. As a result, they will be poorer cus-
tomers for each other, but very sharp com-

The Coming War

petitors. International trade is merely an
exchange of goods for goods. You cannot
sell without buying, and vice versa. No
groups of nations can live by taking in each
other's washing. Trhey are bound to get
outside linen. When peace comes we shall
have the lending and purchasing power of
the world. Can anybody afford to shut us
out
Again: Can the Allies present a united
front or carry on a uniform line of conduct
Will not their interests overlap and cause
an inevitable conflict, even when intentions
are of the very best
France, for example, competes with Eng-
land in chemicals, surgical instruments, high-
speed tools, scores of things; Russia's com-
petitors in wheat are not Germany, but Can-
ada, India and Australia; Italy and France
are rivals for the same wine markets. Rus-
sia for years has kept down the high cost
of her living by buying cheap German goods
at her front door and having her projects
financed by German capital. Will she face
bankruptcy by going hundreds-even thou-
sands-of miles out of her way and paying
more for products England for years has

34 The War After the War

made huge profits out of the re-export of
Teutonic articles, thanks to the grace of free
trade and huge carrying power. Is she
likely to forego all this
In the last analysis Propinquity and the
Purse are the Mothers of Trade Alliance.
Finally, will not any organised exclusion
of German products, coupled with a definite
and organised campaign to throttle German
trade the world over, throw the business of
the Kaiser's country smack into the lap of
the United States Sober reflection over
these possibilities may stay economic re-
prisal.
On the other hand, there are many ways
by which even a near translation of the eco-
nomic pact into actuality may work hardship
-even disaster-to American commercial
interests. No matter which way we turn
when peace comes we shall face the prover-
bial millstones in the shape of two great al-
liances. One is the Allied Group, jealous of
our new wealth and world power, bitter with
the belief that we have coined gold out of
agony; the other is the Teutonic Union,
smarting because of our aid to its enemies,

The Coming War

stinging under reverses, mad with a desire
to recuperate.
Examine our trade relations with warring
Europe and you see how hazardous a shift
in old-time relations would be. To the fight-
ing peoples and their colonies in normal
times we send nearly seventy-eight per cent
of our exports, and from them we derive
seventy per cent of our exports. The Al-
lies alone, principally England and her col-
onies, get sixty-three per cent of these ex-
ports and send us fifty-four per cent of all
we get from foreign lands.
As the National Foreign-Trade Council
of the United States points out: "Any
sweeping change of tariff, navigation or
financial policy on the part of either group
of the Allies, and particularly on the part
of the Entente Allies, may seriously affect
the domestic prosperity of the United States,
in which foreign trade is a vital element."
Why is this foreign trade so vital Be-
cause, during these last two years of world
upheaval we have rolled up the immense
favourable trade balance of over three bil-
lion dollars. In peace time this would be
paid for in merchandise. But fighting

36 The War After the War

Europe's industries, with the exception of a
part of England's, are mobilised for muni-
tions. Therefore, these goods have been
paid for largely in gold.
This gold is now part of our basis of
credit. When the war ends Europe will
make every effort that ingenuity, backed up
by trade resource, can devise to get that gold
back. One way is through loans from us;
the other is by exports to us. Now you see
why we must maintain our foreign com-
merce.
Our huge gold reserve hides another men-
ace: The war demands for our commodi-
ties, paid for with the yellow metal, have
increased the cost of production; and it will
stay up. This will lead to an unequal com-
petition with the cheap labour markets of
Europe when the war is over. Both groups
of Allies will be able to undersell us.
Turn to the raw materials and you en-
counter a further danger in the economic
pact. If the Allies develop their own
sources, it will cut down our export of
cotton, copper and oil. If they cannot de-
velop sufficient sources for self-supply they
may, through co-operative buying outside

The Comning War

their dominions, satisfy their needs. In
the third place, they may stimulate, through
tariff or shipping concessions, or by subsi-
dies-which are much talked of in Europe
to-day-a preference for their own manu-
factures over American products in both
allied and neutral markets.
Take navigation: England controls an
immense shipping. As a matter of fact, out-
side the three-mile limit, she practically owns
the waters of the world. If she makes lower
rates for her allies, or others to whom she
gives preference, where shall we be in our
chronic and unpardonable dependence upon
foreign bottoms Here is where we shall
pay the price for neglecting our merchant
marine.
Still another menace to our trade lies in
preferential alliances between MNother Coun-
tries and their colonies, which is part of the
projected programme. Our next-door neigh-
bour, Canada, has just given an illuminating
instance of what may be in store for us.
A Co-operative Export Association has been
formed in the Dominion to get business
throughout the British Empire and the other
allied nations. In the circular announcing

38 The War After the War

its organisation it declares that "the prod-
ucts of Canada will be preferred against the
products of her great neutral competitor, the
United States, who has stayed outside of
the war and has borne no sacrifice of life
and money made by the allied countries."
Return to the economic pact again and you
find that it continues to bristle with danger-
ous possibilities for us. You will recall that
one of the clauses forbids the resumption
of a favoured-nation arrangement with
enemy countries for a period "to be fixed
by mutual agreement." This may be for
an indefinite time.
Now the danger here lies in the European
interpretation of the favoured-nation idea.
To quote an authority: "Most of these
countries have treaties under which each
must grant most-favoured-nation treatment
to the other; and this means that a reduc-
tion in duties granted to one country is auto-
matically extended to all other countries with
whom such treaties exist. The result is
that the lowest rate in any treaty becomes,
with exception, the rate extended to all cotin-
tries."
We have the favoured-nation relation with

The Coming War 39.

many European countries, and herein lies
the possible danger: The war automatically
annulled all treaties between belligerents.
When the day of treaty making comes again
shall we suffer for the sins of friend and
foe in the rearrangement of international
trade and lose some precious commercial
privileges It is worth thinking about.

II-England Awake

M AEANTIMIE, regardless of how
the economic pact works out,
England's policy is "Deeds, not
Words," as she prepares for the
time when normal life and business succeed
the strain and frenzy of fighting days.
No man can range up and down the Brit-
ish Isles to-day without catching the thrill
of a galvanic awakening, or feeling an im-
perial heartbeat that proclaims a people
roused and alive to what the future holds and
means. The kingdom is a mighty crucible
out of which will emerge a new England
determined to come back to her old indus-
trial authority. It is with England that our
commerce must reckon; it is English compe-
tition that will grapple with Yankee enter-
prise wherever the trade winds blow.
There are many reasons why. "For Eng-
l