The Evening Star THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1915.

Evening Star, Issue 15910, 16 September 1915, Page 6

The Evening Star THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1915.

The words are those of His Majesty th© King, and they apThcso Anxious propriately occur in Times.” the course of a brief

message sent to the Emperor of Russia in response to one intimating that tho Tsar had assumed tho leadership of his armies. The times are indeed anxious, and it is both a good and a comforting sign that these august representatives of their respective Empires, unlike so many of their own people, ore fully alive to the real nature of th© crisis through which England and Russia, in common with the greater part of the civilised world, are now passing. We commend the simple, modest phraseology of these two communications, and the tone of quiet confidence of ultimate victory that runs through each of them, to the attention, of those who follow with intelligent sympathy the daily progress of the great conflict ;n which we also are engaged, and contrast them with the arrogantly boastful and wholly savage tone of a message telegraphed by the Kaiser in the last days of July to the Queen of Greece—a lady who, whatever her own feelings may be, has the misfortune and oishonor of being his sister. The message .was as follows: My destractiV© sword has crushed the Russians, They will need six months to recover. In a, short while I will announce new victories won by my brave soldiers, who have shown themselves invincible in battle against nearly the whole world. The war drama is now coming to its dose. My kindest regards to Tino (the King of the Hellenes). —(Signed) William. The world, we rejoice to know, is in a position at this hour to estimate the value of these Imperial and criminal mouthings and boastings. As a prophet the Kaiser is no greater success than he is as an authority on humanity md morals. Never has there been a rqler, since tho people for their sins were given rulers, whose estimates of probabilities -and of international possibilities have been made appear so tragically ludicrous, by subsequent events. Russia is not only not crashed, but she cannot be crushed. Six weeks, not months, have barely passed since this poor, pitiful stuff was published to the world, and already the victories of “my invincible soldiers” have given place to quite other stories, in which Germany victory has no share. Nor is the war drama drawing to a close. This, happily for mankind, does not rest with Germany to decide. Germany can only close the war drama by a series of improbable victories, or wholesale submission. Germany is rot winning; she is merely staving off the day of judgment. Nothing, it is now admitted, but cur own follies, crimes, and blunders, with which the me a of the Army and Navy have nothing to do, can give German militarism and all that it connotes victory in the appalling catastrophe which thirteen months and more ago was deliberately inflicted -upon mankind.

This, then, at least is clear: Victory will bo with tine Allien provided the .Allies, and more especially the men of Britain, are prepa-rdd to comply with the absolutely indispensable conditions precedent. This Empire is not going to crush the hydra-headed monster against which it is waging deadly war in all parts of the habitable globe unless it determines at once and for ever that there shah be no repetition of those scandalous and humiliating incidents that hay© too frequently disgraced us before the world, it is, w© venture to think, not the “ destructive sword” of the Kaiser nor the “ new victories ” of which he prematurely and characteristically boast® that either the King or the Tsar had in mind when they referred to “the serious time” and the "anxious times” through which Russia and England aro passing. Our “ anxious times,” at least, a® may be gathered from well-nigh ©very public utter, anc© made by those who speak with authority, are not provoked by worry over tbs chances- of battle on sea and land so much as by doubt as to the actions of large numbers of those who stay at home, and fear as to what they will do next. Meantime the Imperial Parliament has reassembled, • and Mr Asquith and Lwd ■ Kitchener hay© mad© important announce- 1 mente that, apart from the terrible rat© i at which the cost of the war is mounting up, are of a satisfactory nature. It would b© quit© ©asy to wax sarcastic over the; utility of Parliaments at this hour. Certainly the Imperial Parliament, as such, can do little, and what little it does, either in the way of work or supplying information, is of doubtful value. The House of Commons, said * restless member, prior to its adjournment on July 28, according to the Prime Minister, ought to sit in silence; and for practical purposes the member was, and, we presume, will continue to be, quite correct. Whenever disagreeable questions are asked; when, any "nuisance” wants to know why the Prime Minister says one thing at on© place and Rond .Kitchener or M? Lloyd George something directly contradictory somewhere else, he is severely told, amid a perfect chorus of approving cheers and of an applauding Press the next day, that . he is asking for information that it is not desirable in the public interests to give. Therefore Parliament, save as a convenient platform whence to make public as much information as it js desirable to make, has no very weltdefined function or purpose at this time. Which, perhaps, is just as well. Dulses Parliaments can act 09 a sort,of central bureau for the guidance, education, and reflection of that which is bast and worthiest among the people, and facilitate tho putting into practice of those means—social, political, material, and moral—by which alone victory is possible, then they fail to justify their existence. The 3Umd<m ‘ Times.’ ji( says that on the British Parliament ggd

what, it docs within,the next few, weeks will depend .the fortunes of the war apd tho future of the civilised world. Wo do not interpret this to mean that the policy of the Empire is to be mad© the subject of a free and easy debate, and a -final decision reached by way of the division lobby, As tho House of Commons is now constituted,, whatever policy the Government submit (provided, as there is no reason to doubt ‘it will be, that it is a united Government) will bo approved by Parliament. We cannot conceive, at this hour in. the nation’s fate, that such a "question as compulsory military service will he wrangled over in the Commons and approved or denounced on the hustings. 'There Is a time for everything, and the time for political agitation is not now. If th© Government decide that such training is Imperative, then all loyal citizens will support the Government. But, to use Lord Haldane’s words: “We want “the Government, not the Press, to say “it.”