light-heartedly in his suburban study when he is liable to find himself at dinner with a lady on his right who shoots her own bears, and a lady on his left who flogs her own niggers. And the consequence is that romancers have been reduced to making expeditions on purpose to study their local color. The press is full of paragraphs of what is euphemistically called literary gossip, informing an astonished world how one popular novelist is in Iceland studying local color for his next Saga, while another has taken his yacht to the Mediterranean to lay in local color for his next Biblical romance. So businesslike has the practice become that an ingenious novelist lately deducted the travelling expenses incurred in procuring his local color from his income-tax assessment; and Somerset House, aghast, asked how the queen's government was to be carried on. I confess to being sceptical as to the value of the local color crammed for the occasion. I have little faith in the Zolaistic "document," nor much more in the advertised preparatory tours of our own mancers. You may pick up a few picturesque details in your fortnight in the Eternal City, or your six weeks in Syria, but that is about as much as you will get of any value.

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An amusing incident, by the way, in the career of a realist in search of local color occurred in the composition of M. Zola's "Rome." M. Zola was originally most anxious to draw his pope from the life, and for that purpose was bent upon penetrating the sacred enclosure of the Vatican. His Holiness, however, courteously but firmly declined to sit for his portrait to the French novelist. Whereupon, our archrealist discovers straightway that the limitations of this particular pontiff would only have hampered his imagination, and he is confident that he can make a better pope out of his own head. Habemus confitentem; the allegiance to the lordship of the imagination is from an unfavorable quarter, but for what it is worth it is a witness to the truth. For I take it to be an axiom of sound criticism, that the imagination is sov

ereign in all description that counts for literature. With genius and the poet's imagination a hint of Hakluyt or Humboldt will bear fruit an hundredfold; without it you may travel hundreds of miles, and fill hundreds of note-books, and for all your pains be never a whit nearer to the truth that maketh alive. It is because his imagination is torpid and mechanical, that the hack-romancer is reduced to these laborious researches after local color and reliance upon his reporter's faculty. We call it, in our solemn, modern way, sometimes, science, and sometimes art; we might with almost equal justice call it Woodenheadedness.

Given genius and the poetic imagination the true school, and, so far as I can see, the only true school for that intimate and accurate local color which the times demand is the instinctive observation of youth and adolescence, the unconscious or half unconscious absorption of impression during the early formative years. Compare, for example, the Scotch novels with "Ivanhoe" or "The Talisman;" compare George Eliot's English Midlands with the Florence of her "Romola;" compare Hawthorne's New England with the Rome of his "Transformation;" compare Mr. Kipling's India with his London. The moral is, I think, the same in each case; and it is the moral of the comparison SO unfortunately challenged by Flaubert between "Salammbô" and the Bible. If knowledge is to be fruitful, it must be the knowledge of familiarity, so thoroughly assimilated as to be subservient to the imagination.

But what criticism has chiefly to bear in mind about local color is that the phrase has been used at different times and on different lips to signify two distinct and almost opposite things. It has been used on the one hand to signify the magic of the unfamiliar, the romance of the unknown regions "over the hills and far away;" it is used, on the other hand, to signify the intimate touch of familiarity, the harvest of the quiet eye and loving spirit in their own little corner of earth.

W P. JAMES

From The Fortnightly Review. RUSSIA ON THE BOSPHORUS.

From time to time I have been privileged to draw attention to the Eastern question in the pages of the Fortnightly Review from that standpoint which it is the custom of those who are unequipped with any contrary argument to dub Little Englandism. The Little Englandism which I have persistently advocated for upwards of seventeen years (ever since the war of 1877-78) is now not only clearly within the range of practical politics, but is within measurable distance of being the only policy which this country can pursue, if it wishes to avoid some vast and irremediable blunder. It is impossible to contradict the fact that, since the days when I was generally belabored as a madman, or held up to ridicule as a naval man sufficiently unpatriotic to wish to see Russia at Constantinople, an enormous number of perfectly rational persons, in and out of Parliament and of every shade of political opinion, have come to hold the same view. It is safe to assert that these views are certainly entertained by all those who have studied the Eastern question with reference to its bearing on the responsibilities, yearly growing in immensity, with which the British Empire is burdened as apart from the lesser consideration of our supremacy in the single sea of the Mediterranean. Not, en passant, that it is admitted that our supremacy in those waters is virtually destroyed by the presence of Russia on the Bosphorus (for such is not the case), but that, conceding the greater difficulty we should have in asserting our power in those waters, the question forces itself on us that, with the rapid increase of foreign navies which is taking place all over the world, we shall have a good deal more to do outside the Mediterranean than can be managed by our existing sea strength, in the event of some powerful European coalition against us. Apart from sentiment, and that still more deadly mistake of continuing to do a thing because it has become a tradition, it is impossible to discover why

England should, after years "of having money on the wrong horse," 1 be practically bolstering up the Ottoman Empire.

That Russia is absolutely certain to possess Constantinople within a few years is admitted by all persons living in the Levant. Every ordinarily wellinformed person in Constantinople, Smyrna, Salonica, or even in Athens, not being in official touch with an embassy, which, of course, excludes the necessary premiss, is of that opinion. The shadow (or the light, it may be) of Russian domination in the Bosphorus is one of those clearly-foreseen events which follow anything in this world with the regularity of cause and effect. And if any one doubted this before the present Cretan trouble, a very little insight into the real workings of the childish comedy which has been going on in Constantinople under the farcial title of the action of the combined ambassadors (unparalleled in its transparent silliness, except by the somewhat analogous "joint action" of the admirals) would effectually convince him. I happen to know, on very high authority, that M. Nelidoff came very near persuading the sultan, some few weeks back, to hand over the pacification and the eventual government of Crete to Russia alone. Whilst this perfectly sensible arrangement was being negotiated M. Cambon (the strongest and ablest diplomatist in Constantinople) got wind of it. He called on M. Nelidoff and proposed a counter scheme, to wit, that if Russia were placed in this position, France should be allowed to occupy either Smyrna or Beyrout. England was left entirely out of the whole affair-out in the cold -and there is not a shadow of doubt that had not the calculations of these two strong men (Cambon and Nelidoff) been upset by the incalculabe power which lurks in stupidity and shortsight, such as that now being exhibited by King George of Greece, the arrangement would have been carried out. It was known that England would not

1 Lord Salisbury is my authority for this.

fire a shot to prevent it; and that it could be done without actual bloodshed. But as soon as the position was taken up by Greece of determining to remain in Crete at all hazards, thereby rendering active steps necessary, the affair became impracticable.

That this country would consent to fire a single shot, much less sacrifice blood and treasure, to keep the Ottoman power intact is only the dream of a few fanatics in the House of Commons, entirely without following in the country. The country would not consent to anything of the kind. Therefore it becomes a reductio ad absurdum. We bluster about the integrity of the Ottoman Empire, and yet we are not prepared to fire off a pistol to add noise to the bluster. Russia and France are perfectly aware of this, and act accordingly. Therefore it comes to the old argument, that it is wiser for England to allow Russia a free hand to the Turk than to make a show of doing what we do not intend to do. The contrary is like no ordinary common-sense proceeding in ordinary life, yet, nevertheless, it has the sanction of that obscure, mysterious, muddle-headed way of conducting business which is called diplomacy. Where does the diplomacy come in? I repeat again, and would challenge contradiction, that this country would never permit any minister, no matter how numerically great his majority in the House of Commons, and with the House of Lords under his thumb, to embark in a war, with Turkey as our ally, in order to keep Russia from the Bosphorus. It is only necessary to state the case to see the entire absurdity of it.

But with Russia given a free hand, unhampered by English interference, an entirely new order of things arises. It then becomes the paramount interest of France and Austria to see that Russian influence does not become allpowerful in the East. To France and Austria Russia on the Bosphorus means everything; to England it means very little. The whole balance of power would be shifted, and if the Triple Alliance were not to be allowed to fall to

pieces, William II. would have to do something more than sulk in his tents. England, and England alone, would be the only power which would not be affected by the pendulum swinging that way. Nay, I would go further, and myself believe that we should be immensely strengthened at sea by having our fleet to dispose of elsewhere. England's destiny is to be an oceanic power; that is, a great empire in which all our great colonies and South Africa as well as our Indian Empire, are welded into one great confederation. The pettifogging quarrels of Europe should have no interest for us, and no one realizes this so much as those who have travelled and gone abroad out of Europe. Beyond European confines England confronts the Englishman everywhere, and he comes back amazed to find that practically the whole might of this vast empire is utilized to seat or unseat this or that German princeling on some little throne where he will rule over a country half as big as Queensland. The broader views of our great empire are lost in a labyrinth of foolish squabbles amongst some half-dozen gentlemen, professional wranglers, living by that trade on the Bosphorus. For England stands in mute attention listening for the words that fall from Yildiz Kiosk with greater interest than for the great voice going up from the vast home of future millions of her sons in her South African dominions. To protect the interests of a few wealthy Jews, be it on the London Stock Exchange or the banks of the Nile, is a more sacred cause than to check the intolerable insolence of a handful of treacherous Boers. Why should these things be? Not even England is strong enough to meddle with every trumpery European quarrel that crops up, and at the same time to do her best for her distant colonies. No other nation in the world attempts it, and when, in the course of a few years, the mad competition for fleet building has levelled up the fleets of the world (as is the case with the armies) the attempt to do so will pass into the region of wanton imbecility. As has been said, England can

see a Reichstag elected which will vote a boundless increase in the fleet? Is the defensive power of Germany measured by the greater or smaller number of the ships she possesses? No. That question is only the condition which decides the limits of the fanciful conception of a 'world-wide policy' calculated to dissipate the resources of Germany and imperil the peace of Europe by transoceanic complications."

J. W. GAMBIER, CAPT., R. N.

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HERR RICHTER'S GREAT SPEECH. Considerations of space prevented me from telegraphing any detailed account of the speeches delivered yesterday in the Imperial Diet on the emergency bill introduced and carried by an overwhelming majority as a reply to the action of the Prussian ministry in laying before the Chamber a reactionary measure dealing with the right of public meeting and of association. One of these speeches, however, deserves further notice, both because of its outspokenness and because of the demonstrations by which it was companied and followed. While Herr Richter was speaking yesterday his sentences were punctuated with loud and continued cheering from the whole House except the benches of the Conservative minority of 53, and when he sat down a crowd of deputies from all parties save the Right surrounded him, shaking hands with him and congratulating him on his bold appeal to the rights and liberties of the nation, the Conservatives meanwhile maintaining an ominous silence. The following were the most important passages in the Radical leader's stirring peroration. He said:

"What are the reasons of state for the course followed by the Prussian

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Referring to the danger that the legal weapons which the ministry demanded would be wielded by dangerous successors, he proceeded:"Where is the array of new ministers who are to succeed those now in office? Wherever you look there are only pliant and puny courtiers, who adopt every view recommended from higher quarters. Promoted bureaucrats or 'smart' Hussar politiciansthat is all the material you can get to carry out a policy of this kind-mere tools, in the ordinary sense of the word. We are living to-day in a federated state and no longer merely in the realm of Prussia. Let us also bear in mind that the German Empire as such, has no native dynasty, and that the imperial dignity itself is in Germany no older than the Reichstag." Here there was an extraordinary demonstration, accompanied by clapping of hands both in the House and among the strangers, so that the president had to interpose and threaten to clear the galleries.

At an earlier stage of the debate the Conservative Herr von Kardorff had declared with sorrow that "since the death of the Emperor Frederick there had been a grave diminution of the fund of loyalty in the country," which he attributed "not only to the repeal of the Socialist law, but also to the dangerous policy which had injured the agricultural interest, and to other matters to which" (in a low tone) "I will not here refer." Herr Richter endorsed this statement, and concluded his speech in the following terms:"I am no republican, nor do I cherish political illusions. I am of opinion

that the monarchical system has the prospect of a longer existence in Germany than in any other European land, because the monarchy here is closely connected with the development and growth of the state, because the glory of monarchs of real importance and merit is reflected upon the!r posterity at the present day. The greater is my regret that Herr Kardorff is right in asserting that monarchical feeling has not increased in the last ten years, but that the capital stock of this sentiment is being consumed away in a manner which I should not have considered possible ten years ago. This is not a conse

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quence of the growth of the social democracy. It is a result of occurrences which cannot be mentioned in parliamentary debate, occurrences which provoke criticism not only among plain citizens, but far into the ranks of the bureaucracy and of the officers of the army. Germany is a land of constitutional monarchy. But as for the programme Sic volo sie jubeo and Regis voluntas suprema lex, it may still be possible for a time to govern in accordance with it in Russia. The German nation cannot be permanently governed on such principles."— Berlin Correspondence of the London Times, May 13.

Queen Victoria's Veterans.-One of the most interesting incidents which will take place in this year of jubilee will be the inspection of veterans representing every battle fought during her Majesty's sixty years of soverreignty. This unique event will take place at the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, on July 5, when the Prince of Wales, accompanied by the princess, will inspect the rapidly dwindling remnant of the men who in many lands bore the British flag to victory. The idea owes its origin to Colonel Gildea, chairman and treasurer of the Soldiers' and Sailors' Families Association.

A sketch of the lives of these old warriors would almost be an epitome of British history during the most glorious reign in the annals of England. Ghuzni, Maharajapore, Aliwal, Sobranje, the Crimean battles, the Mutiny, the two China wars, the Maori war, the various South African campaigns, the rebellion in Canada, Afghanistan, Ashantee, and the Indian frontier campaigns all will be represented. Some of the old heroes have passed by two decades the allotted span of human life, but they are now nearly as full of ardor as they were

sixty years ago when they first wore the queen's uniform. It will come as a surprise to most people to learn that there are yet on the active strength of the army, if one may apply that adjective in this regard, two veterans who enlisted, one in 1837 and the other in 1838. One of them fills the erstwhile gruesome office of queen's executioner at the Tower. Fortunately for this old hero, who fought at Gujerat, in the Indian frontier war, all through the Central Indian campaign, and the Indian mutiny, the office of yeoman jailer entails no lethal function. and his headsman's axe rests idle by his side. His brother veteran fills a nominally more grateful office, and he still moves about hale and brisk, sporting the ribbon of the recruiting-sergeant in the queen's good town of Woolwich. Of the first war of the reign, the Ghuzni war of 1838-39, only one man survives to bear its medals. He fought in that campaign. and also at Maharajapore in 1843. At Aliwal three years later he was wounded severely, and proudly wears the medal with the Sobranje clasp.London Daily Telegraph.