CONFIDENCE IN BRITAIN

Southland Times, Issue 17490, 20 April 1915, Page 7

CONFIDENCE IN BRITAIN

FOE'S 1 6TRENTII REALISED. Will Irwin. Urn ucll-known Anna-jean journalist, uho lately returned if* Europe on FTialf of the San Francisco Chronicle*. sent front London the following account of the manner in which Englishmen are taking llio war. It is dated February m—• Shrove Tuesday—a Alardi Gras without merriment in all Europe. To-mor-row will b“ Ash Wednesday, and Thursday is the I Mil —the day s- t for the great blockade, or the paper blockade, whichever you may wish to call it —the day when Germany proposes to make Lent begin indeed for litis island people. 1 cannot say that London seems especially disturbed, indeed, the city seemed much more disturbed when the talk of the Zeppelin menace was at its height. This. 1 think, is only human. Tho Zeppelin is a new ghostly terror; a thing whose laws no layman understands; a tiling which drops death and destruction our ot* ihe fog from the unexplored regions of the upper air. There i* a touch, of tho supernatural u'nout that. Von shudder over it as over a pixy. But a terror from the sea—-England has been dealing with Unit ever since tho first bare-legged Saxon scraped his keel against the sands of England. ISOLATION IS NOT FEARED. “It’s serious, yes.” says the average informed Knglishman. “Ves. "We tuny los*' a groat many ships first and last. But as for culling off commerce enlircly or starving us out- —that’s rubbish,” 1 have met no one. high, or low. who appears lo fear isolation or starvation. The neutral observers, while they take much the same view, arc taking no chances of getting cut off by sea. Yesterday the steamers from Holland cam" in crowded to the rails. To-morrow the Ghanne’ steamers to France will be jammed with Americans who have business on tie* Continent. and win* prefer to sail while ihe seas remain safe.

• Wh'-ther tho Gorman talk of Zvppolin attack and of .vubmarino and mint* blockade sincere, or a bluff to inspire terror. I must say Unit tlo-y have dranmUmtl their cnnipai?u well. The Z*-ppvlin mdug a horror, Umy sc'. no tixcd I tin-" tor Hi-' aerial attack. They suri minded it wit.ii an atmosphere of mys-t.-ry. It might come at any time to-day. ; to-morrow. next -week. Tho\ harped open tins string until all Kngland grew T'h i losnpiiteah Now they switch their . tactics. This lime they set a. day—‘the 1 day'—for Holland, and hid the British 1 populace watch the dock, crawling inexorably toward the hour of doom. We ; wait here with some artistic interest to ' whether th»*v will begin promptly on ' That sday. Jf tlicy are as good drumatisf.~ e;‘ frier as they seem to be they a ill -fr; it Off With a rush, giving the impfe>sioii that Germany keeps her : (iri.rrsev Am* l ira will know before : a'->'U’*‘ reads t!;ese lines in America. A 1.1, TALK OK S L LIMA 111 XITS. ' and List there is a good deal of A rie;M i s tra\d hack and forth between Kngkmd and Germany thesis days. Scarcely a day passes but that, one of our flhcv-oaint i ymui who has been into Germany <•-> nnsin'-ss drops into that sab-on lounge where Americans most rcs-Tt. Ti’e recent eomers give tlio same «dd piriiire «>f dm (hTinan people a natbui muted in a kind of tierce fanaticism of patriotism; a nation a little mad in.-, with wishes whb hj are father to the thought. Last autumn. according to these messengers from the hostile country. all the Germans wer** talking Zeppelins. The Zeppelins were going to destroy London by dynamite and tire. German friends begged t horn not to go back to lliai doomed city, which might any day vanish from the face of Uio earth, with all the people in it. Now these American travellers say they hear little about Zapped ins. All the talk is about submarines. Kngland’s merchant shipping in a few months will be under i water, and Kngland. starved, will be I suing for peace at any price. And the ! Germans are begging liicir American | friends not to g'* borne in Knglish ships. because every British U ,,0 1 which ven- | turns into either channel is doomed. ; KKALISK GKK-MAX STUKXGTIE, That fervour of German patriotism | has readied lie* Knglish consciousness j at last. One hears no more belittling i <,f ihe enemy. The newspapers admit it. The Times is printing the observations of a neutral who passed six weeks in Germany and really studied lii*' stiua- ; tinn. He makes no bones of idling the Knglish people that the Germans arc nor • breaking under the strain; that Un- food i supple, for all the solicitude expressed ■ bv the German authorities, may well last • over until the next harvest; and that the ; domestic supply of copper will lake can.- ■ of militarv needs. And the Knglish. confident fatalists that they are, face this also, perfectly sure that the Allies will win in the end. but sure also that it I is going to be a man’s job. Wirn iht.- Urst crop of American correspondents came scurrying back to America with their copy, everyone asked : ;h>■ ns. “How long is it going to lust?’’ ; Tadr friends kept repealing that ques- » tion until tho correspondents grew tired 1 *.f declaring that they wore not prophets. I ht re, it is still Urn question of the hour. 1 <>n!v, if America asks this question with I anxious solicitude, imagine how solidI inusiv limy ask it here! four son. your ! brother, your husband, a dozen t riends : ;ind ;m*u ua inlames arc out there in the j mi.ist Of a war. Kvery day subtracted I naans a b.'iter chance for their lives; i ru-r. day added, a worse one. Ppou the I answer may depend all your happiness j :m ,i your worldly prosperity. All talk ! here drifts inevitably ami in spite of | your will, toward the war; and ail war ; talk drifts towards this question: j HOW LONG WILL IT I.AST? ! Tie- "cafe strategists." now that the I lin'-s have become locked, no longer pore ! over maps mid explain the real moaning j of tho latest communique from Paris, j They argue now over the relative im- ; portunee of offence and defence, over the Hermann- influence in the Court at Petrograd. over the food supply of Herman.'. - , aver tiie possibility that Italy, Itoumania. or even Holland will enter the fight—and all to prove that it will be a long war or a short war. In a question so immeasurably coin- - nlicated, and so affected by an uncar-

tain future, the guess of these cafe strategists is perhaps as good as that of the wisest statesman who walks; yet I will quote a few sincere opinions, if only to show the diversity of opinion. “It will end sooner than most people think: and as suddenly as it began,” says one of the most able statesman of Britain. “Some time before next autumn,* says a great soldier. "August or thereabouts." says a military expert. "Two of three years.” says an American Journalist, whose position keeps him in broad touch with all Hurope. “Two years.” says one of the most astute Journalists in all Knropo. On one point, however, there is no question whatever. in a fortnight, 1 have heard no Knglishman. he he wise or ignorant. express the slightest shade of a doubt that the Allies will win.