are in the middle of the struggle, and our duty is to carry it on to the end.

So far as the military situation is concerned, the disposition to-day is to regard it more hopefully. If Ladysmith can hold out for another week or ten days and Sir George White professes to feel no doubt upon this point-then we shall certainly have passed the critical stage, and General Joubert's great plan of campaign will have failed. The care taken to prevent the publication of news from the front has reduced our newspapers to mere speculations, more or less intelligent. Nobody grumbles, strange to say, at the manner in which the 'Special Correspondents' have been silenced by the Generals. There is even in the clubs a secret chuckling over the way in which this closure has been applied, and it seems to be agreed that the palmy days of the War Correspondent have passed away for ever. But without his assistance our amateur strategists at home are reduced, as I have said, to more or less idle speculation. Still, certain facts stand out clearly. The first is that General Joubert has brought into the field the full military strength of the Transvaal, and has risked the better part of his army in the attempt to rush Natal and obtain possession of Durban. If that scheme should miscarry, owing to the successful defence of Ladysmith, his first campaign will have been a failure. This will not end the war, but, unless we are still more grossly deceived as to the Boer forces than we have been as to their armaments, it will be impossible for them to raise fresh armies or to maintain the present armies in the field against the overwhelming forces now being hurried to the front. That Sir George White has received peremptory orders to remain strictly upon the defensive is universally believed. If he does so, there should be no doubt as to the result. Strange stories are told as to the relations between the War Office and that gallant officer; but they are gossip merely, and not worth repeating. For the present it is sufficient to say that whilst grave anxiety is still felt in Pall Mall, there is a confident belief that the worst is over—or will be within a week.

The political situation at home that has been created by the war has not changed so much as might have been anticipated. For the moment indeed, despite the fight maintained so stoutly by the Daily Chronicle, mere partisan controversy is suspended. The elections that have taken place during the month furnish irrefutable evidence of this fact. The nation has taken Lord Rosebery's advice, and has given its support to the man at the helm. But even this fact does not prove that the war is popular, nor does it alter the determination of the Opposition to maintain its full right to criticise the action of Ministers, not only in the negotiations which preceded the war, but in those which must attend its conclusion. If the struggle in the field is not brought to a close before next February,

the Radicals are confident that they will be able to exercise their full Parliamentary influence in the settlement of the terms of peace. But here the divided, one might say the distracted, condition of the Opposition makes itself apparent. Whilst the extreme section, who share the views attributed to Sir William Harcourt and Mr. Morley, cling to the hope that when the terrible struggle is at an end we shall go back to the state of things that existed before President Kruger issued his ultimatum, plus a Franchise Act and constitutional rights for the Uitlanders, the majority even of Radicals, and all that section of the party which looks to Lord Rosebery for inspiration, recognise the fact that the question of supremacy has been raised in earnest on both sides in South Africa, and that the arbitrament of the sword must now settle that as well as minor problems. Indeed, as I have already pointed out, there is an almost angry intolerance of the idea that when the time comes for the settlement of the future of South Africa the case of the Boers shall be treated with magnanimity. I believe that it will call for a higher and a more clearsighted statesmanship than that which has been applied to the Transvaal Question during the last four years to devise a settlement that shall combine the elements of justice and stability.

The visit of the German Emperor has been taken with a rather remarkable sang-froid, all things being considered. People have been disgusted by the blatant vulgarity of the newspaper cartoon which gave a flattering presentment of his Imperial Majesty labelled 'A Friend in Need is a Friend Indeed.' To-day our newspapers are singularly reserved in their comments on the Emperor's arrival. It would touch the national pride to the quick if it were to be suggested seriously that he had come to offer us his patronage. That would indeed be certain proof of the waning of our fortunes as a people. But everybody recognises the visit as showing that the Emperor retains his filial reverence for the Queen, and that, whether or not he is prepared to join us in any enterprise on other than a strictly business footing, he is not inclined to tolerate the fantastic suggestion of a European coalition against us. Our newspapers seem to feel, too, that some amends are due to the Emperor for the needless violence with which his action at the time of the Jameson Raid was treated by almost the entire population of these islands. If he had not been a man capable of rising above any feeling of wounded pride and any resentment for personal affronts, he would hardly have gone to Windsor Castle to-day. So we are receiving him in a spirit of quiet cordiality, without losing our heads over his visit or seeking in any way to exaggerate its political significance.

In coming back to London I find that the admirable statue of Cromwell which the country owes to Lord Rosebery has been unveiled on the site allotted to it by the late Government. No statue in London has been more happily placed from the purely

artistic point of view. Westminster Hall makes a noble background, and throws into high relief the artistic merits of Mr. Thorneycroft's striking work. It is well, too, that the figure of the great prince whose name is associated with so much of which Englishmen have reason to be proud should stand between the historical buildings of the Hall and the Abbey. The speech in which its donor may be said to have dedicated the statue to the nation, and which has met with universal praise, did not put the claims of Cromwell too high. It certainly did not ignore his faults, but it supplied ample reasons for the belated honour now done to his memory.

Tuesday, the 21st of November. From all parties and all classes there has come to-day a warm outburst of sympathy with the Prime Minister in his sore bereavement. Lord Salisbury has been more successful than most men in his great position in maintaining the privacy of his own home and of his domestic life. The intimates of the Hatfield household are but few in number. Mr. Gladstone in his last days was wont to complain that he had been forced to live in a glass-house for many years. Lord Salisbury has been fortunate in being able to evade this distasteful necessity. There is hardly any house in England where the privacy of domestic life is more strictly respected than at Hatfield. But from those who are familiar with it only one testimony has been heard, and it is a testimony that enables the outer world to realise the bitterness of the grief that has now fallen upon the Prime Minister. That the blow should have been dealt at a moment when public affairs are in so serious a state adds to its gravity. But Lord Salisbury is of the tough fibre of his race, and his moral courage, combined with his high sense of public duty and his strong Christian faith, will, it is to be hoped, enable him to bear this greatest of all earthly afflictions. It is pleasing to note that the first public expression of the national sympathy with him emanated from a Liberal meeting in London last night.

Wednesday, the 22nd of November.-The speeches of Lord Ripon and Mr. Bryce last night indicate the desire of the Liberal leaders to prepare the way for that settlement of the terms of peace which is still alas! in the dim and distant future. The principle enunciated by both speakers, that the sentiments of our fellowsubjects, English and Africander, in South Africa must be taken into account, is that which not only Liberals, but all sensible persons, will agree to. But that a settlement on anything like the lines of the Majuba Hill peace is impossible is now more than ever evident. The statement of Lord Kimberley on the historical aspect of that settlement, which the London papers curiously failed to notice when he made his speech, has at last attracted the attention of the Times, and its real meaning is pressed home with vigour this morning. Truly there can be no repetition of the Majuba Hill policy.

The splendour of yesterday's scene at Windsor Castle is the theme upon which those who were present at the banquet have been dilating to-day. That no other Court in Europe can rise to the height of magnificent display which our ordinarily sober Court attains on special occasions has long been known to the initiated. Yesterday Windsor seems to have surpassed itself, and though there be no special political importance in the fact, no one will maintain that it is wholly devoid of significance. By a curious accident the names of the members of the late Ministry who were invited were omitted from the list of guests in many of this morning's papers, whilst Sir Henry Fowler's name was omitted in all. As a matter of fact, the company was representative of both political parties, as well as of all the public services.

The way in which the red-hot reviewing now fashionable in our daily newspapers is carried on must be rather disconcerting at times to authors. The only implement of the reviewer seems to be a pair of scissors by means of which he guts' unmercifully the volume with which he happens to be dealing, snipping out any story that attracts his attention, and thus compiling a column of nuggets, no doubt to the delight of his reader, though hardly to that of the author who is reviewed in this summary fashion. Still some knowledge should be displayed even in wielding the scissors. In the review of Sir Algernon West's Reminiscences in to-day's Daily News, it is assumed that the story of Mr. Forster's offer to return to Dublin at the time of the murder of Lord Frederick Cavendish is now given to the world for the first time. As it happens, it was duly set forth in the Life of Mr. Forster published in 1888. As for the joke repeated by Sir Algernon, and quoted by the Daily News, about the ice being the only dish at a certain bad dinner that was not cold, it is almost as ancient as Joe Miller. Evidently the red-hot review has its disadvantages even from the reader's point of view.

WEMYSS REID.

The Editor of THE NINETEENTH CENTURY cannot undertake to return unaccepted MSS.

INDEX TO VOL. XLVI

The titles of articles are printed in italics

Armies of Russia, The Excessive, 173- CABINETS and Parties in Japan,