the order of the day; whereas there has never been unrestricted competition, and the order of the day is the formation of various sorts of pools. The mine-owners themselves are always forming combines, which are complete pools; and the same process is going on in all mature and highly-developed industries, especially in the countries that are beating us. It makes for economy and efficiency and steadies the market. The German coal syndicate is a conspicuous example. Twenty-eight years ago, in 1893, Sir George Elliot, who was quite as good a business man and knew as much about coal as any living mine-owner, proposed to amalgamate all the collieries in the kingdom into one concern, with a scheme of adjusting wages and profits very similar to the present one; and his purpose was to prevent the recurrence of the great disputes of that year. The three independent business men on the Sankey Commission recommended unification of the industry. In the face of all this it is impossible to maintain that there is anything impracticable or economically ruinous in pooling or amalgamation. The immovable opposition to it, endorsed by the Government, rests on other grounds, on fear of the designs behind it; and for this fear the revolutionary element among the miners and their supporters outside are responsible. The miners, on their side, fear corresponding designs to 'smash the Federation' entertained by the Mining Association. And for this fear the militant wing of the mine-owners and their supporters outside are responsible. So it is to these pugnacious spirits on both sides, who provide each with ammunition, that we owe this stupendous piece of folly, which really is the way to 'shatter the entire fabric of British industry,' as some one in an excited moment said of the pool. If the sane and sober men, who know that they must live at peace with their neighbours or all perish together, do not assert themselves, that will be the end.

A. SHADWELL.

[Since these words were passed for press such offices as they advocate have been successfully asserted, and the coal dispute is at an end. May its severe and serious lessons not be forgotten by workmen, or employers, or the nation at large !]

Art. 12.-THE GERMANS IN BELGIUM.

1. The German Army in Belgium: The White Book of May 1915. Translated by E. N. Bennett. With a Fore word on Military Reprisals in Belgium and Ireland Swarthmore Press, 1921.

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2. Royaume de Belgique. Réponse au Livre Blanc aller Allemand. Paris: Berger-Levrault, 1916.

3. L'Armée Allemande à Louvain. Deux Mémoires publiés ear par les soins du Gouvernement Belge. Port-Villez (Seine et Oise), 1917.

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WHATEVER may be thought of the value or the desira te bility of the proceedings against individual 'war ook criminals,' there can be no doubt that, in regard to the ide German people, and even the German army, at large, onl most Englishmen are willing to let bygones be bygones. ak No good purpose is served by deliberately dragging to his the front hideous memories that are receding into the are background of our minds. We are willing to hope that, T in the school of adversity, Germans are learning to look t with critical eyes upon that 'Furor Teutonicus' in which, y at the outset of the war, they openly gloried, magnify-hes ing and inflaming it both in prose and verse.

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But Mr E. N. Bennett, the translator of 'The ur German Army in Belgium,' is not content to let bygones e be bygones. He must needs rake up the ghastly story of elg August 1914, in order to claim our approval for the p German action. His book is a complete translation of at the White Book, 'Die völkerrechtswidrige Führung des adic belgischen Volkskriegs,' published in May 1915. He lat gives us the text without a word of criticism or comment. elve His personal contribution to the volume consists of & preface of eight pages, in which he maintains that, barring 'certain instances' in which the Germans sho exercised their right of reprisal with unreasonable bat severity and without adequate discrimination,' nothing happened in Belgium that was in the least discreditable is to probably the most sternly disciplined and best ittle educated soldiers in the world.' He complains that the of a British Government ungenerously suppressed the dis culpatory evidence which he here presents to English f readers. The complaint is justified, though not precisely

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on the ground he suggests.

It is amazing that the British authorities did not publish and annihilate the Thit! White Book. The task, though tedious, would not have kben difficult, for the German defence is incredibly feeble. It has been pulverised by the Belgian Government in several publications. One of these, 'L'Armée allemande à Louvain,' apparently unknown to Mr "Bennett, translates the German evidence in full, and tears it to shreds in an absolutely masterly and conclusive fashion. But the Belgian publications were too voluminous for the general reader. It was difficult, indeed, to display very briefly the abounding inconsistencies, incredibilities, and absurdities of the White Book, especially as a large mass of collateral German evidence had also to be taken into account. Still, it would have been possible, within reasonable compass, to make the White Book look extremely foolish; and, if this had been done at the right time, it would certainly have been worth doing.

Two pages of Mr Bennett's 'Foreword' are devoted to extracts from Belgian (and Dutch ?) papers, supposed to prove the reality of the alleged franc-tireur attacks. These quotations were among the prize exhibits of German propaganda. They prove that, during the first our days of the stupendous calamity which had befallen he nation (the latest extract is dated Aug. 8), some Belgians were willing to believe, and some newspapers o print, the wild rumours which filled the air. It is atural that the Germans should make capital of them as ndications of a state of mind; but the specific incidents elated are demonstrably lies, and the Germans themelves make no effort to substantiate them. For instance, paper of Aug. 6 stated that the population of Visé offered a vigorous resistance' to the advancing Germans, vho completely destroyed the town.' Now it is true hat, in a drunken frenzy, they completely destroyed the down-but not till ten days later. When they entered Visé they met with practically no resistance and did ittle or no damage. A paper of Aug. 8 relates a story of a German officer assembling the inhabitants around im and addressing to them a pacific oration, at the close of which a shot suddenly fired at him caused him to fall lead to the ground.' This story went the round of the

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German press, generally located, not at Visé, but t some unnamed village, and with the addition that populace were surrounded by a hollow square of Germ hav

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soldiers. Does it not strike Mr Bennett as remarkab that the White Book should make no allusion to an incident like this, for which, had it ever occurred, & crowd of witnesses could have been cited? The smallest pe failu investigation of these extracts from the Belgian press would have shown him that they were merely speci thic mens of the lies which (in the absence of authentic news) filled all the papers of the world during those ofe

four days of consternation and bewilderment. If he thought them worth citing, he ought in common fairness to have cited as well the instant and energetic steps taken by the Belgian Government to forbid civilian participation in the fighting, and to secure the surrender of firearms.

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Mr Bennett's careful abstention from any critical examination of the German evidence is proved by the fact that he has not even followed it on the map. He 'The White Book does not cover more than the says: incidents which occurred at Dinant, Aerschot, Andenne, Louvain, and the neighbourhood of Visé.' This remark he somewhat amends by heading the first section of the book (Appendices 2-66), 'Down the Eastern Frontier.' As a matter of plain fact, these Appendices refer neither to the neighbourhood of Visé in particular nor to the eastern frontier, but to villages and small towns all over the country-for instance, to villages around Namur, to Lessines (thirty miles west of Brussels), and to Deynze, Staden, and Roulers, within a few miles of the North Sea.

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In his attempt to discredit the evidence presented to ith the Bryce Committee, Mr Bennett emphasizes the fact that it was not given upon oath. He seems to imagine that the White Book contains nothing but sworn testimony; but this is far from being the case. In the section relating to the villages, for example, 103 witnesses in all are produced, and of these only 43 are sworn. Something like the same proportion probably obtains throughout the book. A great part of the unsworn evidence consists of mere extracts from regimental re

ports, in which the writers may occasionally speak as d

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ye-witnesses, but are as a rule merely retailing the alleged experiences of others. Not one witness seems to have been subjected to any cross-examination; whereas he witnesses who appeared before the Bryce Committee vere cross-examined by experienced lawyers. Even a uperficial reader, in fact, must be struck by the constant Failure in the White Book to distinguish between firsthand and hearsay evidence, as well as by the way in vhich the Zusammenfassender Bericht' prefixed to each ection misquotes and misrepresents the statements it rofesses to summarise. But Mr Bennett is blind to all hortcomings. In his eyes everything that the (German) oldier says is evidence.

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It is manifestly impossible within the limits of a ingle article to examine minutely even a tithe of the tatements put forth in some 300 closely printed pages; but it is possible to make some general observations vhich seem to have escaped Mr Bennett. The typical Picture presented by the German story is that of great odies of men advancing in column of route, and fiercely ssailed, in every second village they passed through, by Tharpshooters concealed in the houses that lined the oadway. If these accounts were true, the expression Belgian Folk-War' employed on the cover of the White Book would not be at all exaggerated. But the first hing that strikes the attentive reader is that this is in almost bloodless war on the German side; it is the Lavage Belgians, not the 'defenceless' and 'unsuspectag' Germans, who are massacred. The first section of the White Book deals with events in 51 villages. We are onstantly told that the advancing columns are received with lively fire,' 'violent fire,' 'particularly violent fire,' fire from all sides,' 'a general fusillade,' 'murderous re,' 'a raging rifle-fire,' and so forth; but it is by the arest exception that any one is injured. The total asualty-list for these 51 villages is 14 killed, 29 wounded, nd three missing. To these must be added three cases f indeterminate loss: we had killed and wounded,' we lost several men, including officers,' 'a considerable umber were wounded.' The disparity between cause nd effect sometimes strikes the Germans themselves, ho explain that the Belgians were fortunately poor

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