NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LI, Issue 15747, 23 October 1914, Page 4

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

GERMAN SHIPS IN AMERICA

Ameiucax shipping experts declare most emphatically that the informal notice from England, France, and Russia protesting against the proposal by Americans to buy German ships in Now York and other home ports has given its death blow to the shipping scheme, which was never popular

in tho United States, and wliich from the

momont of its inception was bitterly opposed by all American shipowners and shipbuilders. Everybody desired to take advantage of the present war to rehabilitate) America's mercantile marine, but the closer study of the problems involved convinces Americans that tho Government

ownership of the few German liners now safo in American harbours would not be a stop in the right direction, and would fail miserably, first, because such ships so acquired would be liable to seizure at the hands of belligerents; and, secondly, because they would provo unprofitable from the commercial standpoint. There are a sufficient number of neutral ships to transport American products, agricultural and manufactured, to South America, whew the Government is seeking now fields for trade. In point of fact, there is absolutely no. reason why Washington should desire to buy either German or neutral ships, because there arc quite a number of American-owned vessels seeking employment, and there is more than sufficient British craft able .mid willing to transport American merchandise at the most ceo-

nomical rates, and with the maximum of speed. Meantime, the lot of the splendid Gorman liners now marooned in New York and other American ports is; most pitiable. Since the war their agents have not been able to maintain communication with Germany, with the result that the North German-Lloyd and HamburgAmerican representatives in New York are reaching the climax of despair. They will shortly be without money and without credit. Their last hope has been shattered, because of the. protest by the allies against the proposed purchase by the American Government. Piteous appeals for funds to headquarters in Germany have been made'-by.circuitous routes, but so far no funds have arrived. Actions have been commenced by creditors, and the Vaterland, the world's biggest ship, and therprido'of every. Teutonic heartit has a life-sized' oil painting of the Kaiser at the head of the main stairway, inscribed with the words: "Germany's future is upon the sea ! v —is also menaced by bailiffs. 'Hie big office staffs of the German lines in New York have been reduced to skeleton dimensions, and agencies throughout the country and Canada are closing. It is estimated that thcro are about thirty German vessels in American ports, including some of the biggest liners, which were intended for merchant cruisers in time of war. THE RUSSIAN CAPITAL.

By Imperial order, the City of St. Petersburg will henceforth be known as Petrograd, the Russian version of the old Teutonic designation This decree is the sequence, in far more drastic form, of tho German action in renaming, in the language of the Fatherland, every place, thing, or idea, that had either a Russian, French, or English appellation. St. Petersburg, or the town of St. Peter, has been the name of tho capital of Russia ever since 1705, when Peter the Great, having beaten tho Swedes on the banks of tho Neva, laid on the swamp-land tho foundation of the cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul. His next step was to begin the erection of a fort, which he called Petersburg. The orthodox Russian, belonging to the Greek Church, looking on Peter the Great as his " little father" and patron saint, persists in calling the whole city Petersburg, without the prolix that the devout founder gave to it.

THE " SCRAP OF PAPER." "That scrap of paper," fays the New York World, "was the treaty guaranteeing tho neutrality of Belgium. The whole historv of human liberty is written on just such scraps of paper. Magna Chart a was a scrap of paper. The Bill of Rights was a scrap of paper. The Declaration of Independence was a scrap of paper. Respects for these scraps of paper measures a nation's honour no less than its freedom. Democracy itself is only a scrap of paper, but it looses forces that no autocracy can stay. The German Army is the most wonderful military machine over constructed by tho hand and brain of man. but in the final reckoning of history 'a scrap of paper" will prove more powerful than all tho Kaiser's legions." AMBASSADOR IN DISGRACE. It. is reported that the German newspapers have been full of the disgrace of Prince Lichnowsky, the German Ambassador to Britain, who is said to have misled the Kaiser about the certainty of civil war in Ireland and the mutiny of the officers in the British Army, and also to have informed his Sovereign that England would never declare war on Germany. Tho Kaiser has rofused to sop him since his return, and his career is safe by tho German papers to bo "closed." OSTEND IN HISTORY, Exactly 250 years ago Englishmen were in a state of'panic with regard to Ostend. It was the ' time of the war with the Dutch, and various disquieting rumours were wafted across the North Sea. Pepys notes,in his diary for August 27, 1664 :— "All the news of the clay is that the Dutch are, with 22 sail of ships of war. crewsing UP' and down about. Ostend, at which we are alarmed." A year later ho hears a rumour to the effect " that Ostend is ill our present possession." It was in June, 1666, that the great fight of the English and Dutch navies was fought between Ostend and Dunkirk, and the anxieties of Mr. Pepys were finally allayed.