OUR LONDON LETTER

Evening Star, Issue 16092, 18 April 1916, Page 8

OUR LONDON LETTER

[By Raymond Dues.]

March 2, 1916. Match 1 and March 2 are likelv to be remembered as very significant d"ates in the Jiistory of the war, and in view of the events that have been timed to happen ou thetu it is impossible «Jiy longer to doubt that the country is at last fully .awakened to tho seriousness of the great conflict. For weeks past the posters have been asking the searching question : " Will you march, too, or will you wait till 'March 2?" and those single men who have waited are now conscripts, unless, indeed, they have succeeded in obtaining exemptions from the tribunals. Yesterday the National Gallery, the British •Museum, tho Tiite Gallry, and, in fact, nearly all the public galleries and museums in London closed their doors to the public, and the famous reading room of the British Museum itself, which in ordinary times is packed morning, noon, and ni<jht with students from all over the world, and seams nearly as full as ever even nowadays, curtailed its hours as a. threat of perhaps worse, things to come. To-day the new enactments prohibiting or restricting tho importation of certain bulky goods, to which I referred lately, come into force. Tobacco, manufactured or unmanufactured (that is to say, tobacco in any form whatever); paper and all materials for making paper; stones and slates; furniture woods, hard woods and Veneers; all periodicals exceeding 16 pages in length, imported otherwise than in single copies through the post—all these familiar commodities, with the exception of paper, are to be entirely excluded, 'and paper itself is only to he doled out to consumers to tho extent of a third of their normal requirements. And, finally, wo are told by the enemy that to-day. marks the commencement of the- latest phase of submarine warfare, .and that henceforward all British 6hip3 proved'or alleged to be carrying a gun in self-defence will be sent to the bottom without -warning ! Well, when this letter reaches New Zealand you will know just how much bite there is about the German bark in this Tespect. WJiat is most in our minds here in London ia the practical working of conscription as it affects the welfare of the individual on the ono hand and the economic welfare of the nation on the other. Day by day for moro than a week wo have watched the melancholy procession of appellants through, the tribunals; for though a large number of the excuses alleged for exemption, are plainly frivolous, thinly disguising a mere reluctance to undergo the j discomforts and perils of soldiering, there are undoubtedly many'hard cases'which appeal strongly to one's sympathy. The tribunals, pulled one way by .sentiment and the other by the urgency of the military need, are in a far from enviable position, especially since they have not as yet been provided with any* really authoritative instructions to guide them in forming their decisions. It must be of course, that the cases reported in the newspapers are ones picked out for their dramatic interest; tho ordinary cases are not, one may be sure, either so touching or so cynically diverting. Yet it does seem as though np to the present some of tho governmental pledges were being politely ignored by the tribunals. Conscientious objectors, whether one respects "them or not, were certainly promised exemption; yet I have not .'yet heard of a single case in which a conscientious objector lias completely gained hia point. Ho far most of them have been excused combatant service, but as they nearly all object on grounds of principle to having anything to do with the war whatever—even to driving a quill iri an army ,accountant's office— thev pro- j hably.feel themselves ecurvily' treated. We are, indeed, threatened with an outbreak of martyrdom, and if any conscientious objectors are put into prison for their principles (of course, there will be no shooting, though military law allows it), there is sure to bo a Terietition of suffragette tactics, with forcible feeding as their most conspicuous feature. A foolish but well intentioned lady has, in fact, just been sentenced, to six months' imprisonment in the ] hrst division for conducting a campaign against enlistment, and there is every evi- I dence that the extreme pacifists are willinoto face any. penalty that their conviction! involve.

These, however, are the externals of the real problem, interesting enough from a psychological point of view, but with littla bearing on the serious aspects of conscription as it affects tho conduct of the. war. Tho number of conscientious objectors, Teal or feigned, is inconsiderable, and tho. other, single men to whom military service, for family and economic reasonsis a real hardship, are probably not very numerous either. Conscription has set out to gam a definite number of new soldiers for the Army, and the difficulty now is how to get this quantity in face of tho large number, of bachelors (some say a million) who are badged, stored, or working in reserved or, as thev are now called. certified" occupations. Tho fundamental theory is, as you know, to strike a just balance between our military and our economic needs. As we are financing our Allies, as our imports from abroad are greater than our exports, as wo have enormous war industries to be kept going—for all these reasons wo have to keep a number of men at home.. Women are being used to replace men as much as mssible! as I shall mention later, and no doubt there is a good deal of elasticity left in the national fibre yet. Tho military authorities at any rate, view with alarm tho whittling dovvn of their promised numbers by the. largo trade exemptions, and these arc going to be scarchingly revised An attempt is to be made to put married men to do the work of single men wherever tins is possible. One or two of our most fincient .prejudices have been brought glaringly. to light in the tribunals. Lloyd's -or example, claimed exemption for farg* numbers of their young men. Lloyd's (the directors metaphorically raised their hands in horror at the:thought as they said itf had never employed women! Tho tribunal, taking a common-senso view ot the. reluctance of this most conservative institution to change its ways, referred the matter to the War Office with a recommendation that Lloyd's under present conditions, might reasonably be expected to wake tip. It is clear, at any i ate, that the Government have made r.p their minlthat a certain number of men must be got That there will be hardship to individuals goes without savin*— the economic tissue will have to "be stretched till It can be stretched no longer. # . What wo are all realising to-day in that those of us who stay rt home have great obligations to discharge to the fighters. The economic difficulty, in so far as it affects the individual conscript, must bo shouldered by the stay-at-homes. By means of a moratorium we can safeguard his home while he is away, ine teeling of the country is very strong mi this :subject (as I assured you in a recent letter that it would bo), and the Government have at last reached the point Df definitely considering the question. '*** * # * *

Beneath the surface of tho party truce, which is actually as secure to-day as it has ever been, ono is beginning to discern the first stirrings of a controversy that will come to a head as soon as the war is oyer. Already tho old question of Protection or Freetrade is being politely revived. M present everybody is anxious to show that ho is willing to consider the question with an open mind, realising as a^- sensible man must do that times Have changed, and that what was anathema before the war may appear in a very different aspect after it. What is becoming obvious io all observers of politics is that freetrade as a first principle of government has died quietly as we were all thinking of other things. At the first general election .after the war-it is inconceivable that any candidate could make headway against, a rival who stood out for the protection of British industries against German competition. Leading Liberals, when they allude to the question of our trade relations after tha war, are careful not to commit themselves to any untimely championing of Freetrade, and Liberal newspapers, which can better afford, after all, to wear their hearts on their sleovos, tune their utterances on the distasteful subject in_a key of pained resignation to the inevitable. What form Protection will take ip # pf course,, a difficult, thing to foresee with any .jiccuracv. Mr Bonar Law an«.

f nounced the other day, and Mr M'Kenna | bora him out a few days later, that nego« ; tiations were on foot between the allied Governments directed to the better organi- [ sation of mutual commerce, and this ia generally taken to foreshadow She likelii hood of some sort of definite fiscal uniorI between England, Franco," Belgium, IW I si'a, Sorbia, Italy, ana Montenegro with the : Empire. Whatever may be in the air, it is certain that nothing will.bo decoded without the full approval of the Dominions, whose interests, everybody realises,- go hand in hand with our own. In the meantime the most concrete expression of view has come from ono of the largest dyeing concerns in Yorkshire, and though'the moral enunciated by the speaker (the secretary was. addressing-the shareholders l at" the annual general meeting) was meant to be .applied to even larger national interests than the welfare of trade, and actually deprecated the introduction of a tariff, his arguments will bo of great value to Protectionists when the time comes for them to raise the question. The secretary's point was that it should be an elementary principle of our statecraft in. the future to establish the British dyeing industry—that is to say,' the.manufacture of aniline colors—on a completely selfsufficing basis. The reasons he gave wore not very comforting to pacificists. ;Germany's capacity for making war, he argued, largely depended on her dye industry, for modern explosives are made in exactly the same machinery as aniline dyes aro made; therefore the country that continued to neglect its dye industry would always be at a great, initial disadvantage with a country, such as Germany, that fostered it. One could scarcely imagine a more cynical reason for fostoring a peaceful trado, and ono, moreover, so closely allied to the arts. How it could be fostered without a protective tariff, in the face of cheap dyes waiting to be dumped over the sea by Germany, it is impossible to imagine. Germany would not relinquish her lucrative market in England before she had gone to all lengths in cutting prices. If over there was a case of a new industry needing the support of a tariff wall, that case is the dye industry. It is, of course, early days to talk of post-war politics, but the signs of the times are clear to read, and deserve to be recorded. * * * # * * *

Wherever one goes in London now one sees women engaged in work which before, tiie war was thougnt to be the exclusive prerogative of man. Women cleaning windows, women, collecting fares on buses, women on the elevators in business offices and shops, women driving motor cars and motor delivery vans, women delivering bread in the morning, bringing the letters, bending their heads under the greenshaded lamps in the great banks and insurance offices of Lombard street—-women, in fact, doing almost everything. Not so long ago (I mention it not because it had importance, but merely for its value a,s a symbol of change) we had a London theatre entirely run by women both behind and in front of the curtain. Now a great campaign is on foot to bring women back to the land, in order that the able-bodied m-en who are engaged in agriculture may be freed for service in; the Army. What is to happen after the "war, when the men come back and want their jobs again, nobody seems to have time to think. Mr Walter Long, in a recent interview with an American journalist, spoke vaguely of the immense fields of new activity that would bo waiting'for us after the war, and, indeed, it seems probable that there will be work for all. It is not so probablo, however, that women will relinquish, or even that they will be allowed to relinquish, the occupations for which they havo so signally proved their fitness. ISot, I imagine, that many women will care to work on the land after the war. The hardships are too great and the monotony of the life too irksome for the endurance of the modern woman, who, however much she may have proved her capacity to do as well as the meny must admit as tho fruits of her new experience of the work of the world a craving for freedom and variety of living. The modem working woman wants her evenings to herself, and the farmer woman will be too tired in tho evening to wish to do anything but sleep. What England is learning now about her women France knew always. Woman has always had her valued place as a director of French business, and those who think that women are going to stop short at the clerk's desk are likely to be rudely awakened in the next few years. There may be work for all, but it will be strange "if the women do not keep their jobs after the war; more probably it will be tho men who will go out seeking tho new ones. **** * * ■ #

I should like to be able to tell yon something more about the great economy campaign, but in the absence of any news as to the probable character of the new Budget a. summary of the proposals set forth bythe War Savings' Committee will not, I fear, greatly impress you. The terms of reference under which the committee _ worked expressly excluded any kind of economy that really deserves consideration. As a result, we are urged not to drive motor cars for pleasure, " to cut down our expenditure" in every possible way, to do, in fact, what the Government might do for ns so much easily by taxation. _ For tho great majority of people "cutting down expenditure" has reached the point of a fine art, faced as we are with a steady and continuous rise in the general cost of living. The committee's proposals, where they are definite, are of that pettifogging kind that led a month ago to the closing of tho public libraries, galleries, and museums. Old age penscioners who have been putting in a few hours' work each clay making munitions are to be penalised for their patriotism by having the amount of their wages deducted from their pensions—such, at least is the idiotio suggestion. Tho ago of compulsory school attendance is to be raised. In effect, by splitting a few more hairs', we are to save tho lordly sum of three million pounds! In the meantime, one of the most obvious means of procuring money for tho war is seemingly neglected. By tho excess profits tax 50 per cent, of war profits above a certain figure passes to tho State. Six million pounds per annum \vas the estimated yield of this tax, and it is now expected to yield 16 Considering that all excess profits are made_ at tho expense of the consumer—that is to say, of the country—there 33 "no evident reason why the tax should stop at 60 per cent. It ought to be nearer 100 per cent.