THE SEA FREE.

Colonist, Volume LVII, Issue 13729, 18 March 1915, Page 2

THE SEA FREE.

"For the first time in history England can say 'the sea is free,' " declared the First Lord of the Admiralty, in an interview with M. Hughes Leroux, editor of the "Matin." "In the days when you and we fought each other," he. continued, "our most important victories never brought us security comparable with that which we enjoy to-day. Even after Trafalgar we knew nothing like- it. "Supposing Germany has friendships and relationships in South America, how can help reach her from them

now?"

"There remains the United States. Public opinion there hesitates^ perhaps, in bestowing its sympathies, but at the present moment it is fully unified. Wo shall arrtinge to take precautions fully compatible with the rights of belligerents and the respect due to neutrals.

"Our adversary, perhaps, can obtain a few supplies from Turkey and Asia Minor. I cherish no illusions, for as long as there are neutrals, a complete blockade must be a chimera. Germany will continue to receive a small quantity of that whereof she has considerable, but meanwhile you and we breathe freely, thanks to the sea we have kept and can keep open.

"Germany is like a man throttled with a heavy gag. Yon know the effect of such a ,-gag when action is necessary. The effort wears out the heart, and Germany knows it. /This pressure shall not be relaxed until she gives in unconditionally, for even if you of France, and. if pur ally Russia, should decide to withdraw from the struggle, which -is inconceivable, we English would carry on the war to the bitter end. :

"The action of a navy necessarily is slow, but the pressure it exercises on an adversary is unrelenting. Com-

pare it to the forces of Nature, to the inexorable grip of winter, and remember that it is a stress nothing can resist."