Produced by Irma Spehar, Markus Brenner and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) ARE WE RUINED BY THE GERMANS? BY HAROLD COX, FORMERLY SCHOLAR OF JESUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE. _Republished from the “Daily Graphic” for the Cobden Club._ [Illustration] CASSELL and COMPANY, LIMITED: _LONDON, PARIS & MELBOURNE._ PREFACE. The greater part of the contents of this little volume appeared originally in the _Daily Graphic_, in the form of a series of six articles written in criticism of Mr. Ernest Williams’s “Made in Germany.” To these articles Mr. Williams replied in two letters, and to that reply I made a final rejoinder. In the present reproduction this sequence has been abandoned. For the convenience of readers, and for the economy of space, I have anticipated in the text all of Mr. Williams’s objections which appeared to me to have any substance, and, in addition, I have modified or omitted phrases, in themselves trivial, upon which he had fastened to build elaborate but unsubstantial retorts. By doing this I have been able to preserve the continuity of my argument and at the same time to cut down a somewhat lengthy rejoinder into a brief concluding chapter. Incidentally a few new points and some further figures have been added to the articles. This arrangement, unfortunately, deprives Mr. Williams’s reply of most of its original piquancy; but, in order that my readers may have an opportunity of seeing what the author of “Made in Germany” was able to say for himself, his letters are reprinted _verbatim_ in an Appendix. I am indebted to the proprietors of the _Daily Graphic_ for their courteous permission to republish the articles, and to the Committee of the Cobden Club for undertaking the republication. I have only to add that the opinions expressed throughout are my own, and that the Cobden Club does not necessarily endorse every one of them. H. C. GRAY’S INN, _December, 1896._ CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGE I.—OUR EXPANDING TRADE 1 II.—GERMANY: ONE OF OUR BEST CUSTOMERS 8 III.—PICTURESQUE EXAGGERATIONS 14 IV.—MORE MISREPRESENTATIONS 21 V.—OUR GROWING PROSPERITY 33 VI.—LET WELL ALONE 43 VII.—CONCLUSION 54 APPENDIX 57 ARE WE RUINED BY THE GERMANS? CHAPTER I. OUR EXPANDING TRADE.