The voice of Lord Roberts sounded harshly on the ears of sensitive English officialdom. Lord Haldane, to emphasize his attitude, disbanded 80,000 British troops at the very moment when England should have enlisted and begun to train 800,000. Also, he threatened to abolish Lord Roberts' pension if he did not keep quiet. The grand old soldier was spared by a kind Providence to stand on the firing-line when the great war came which he had foreseen, and there he saw thousands of his country's dead who had fallen from failure to regard his timely warning. We have a Lord Roberts, too. There is a grand old American soldier who for years has appealed to us to fly to arms with all speed in preparation against war. He has even greater reason than Lord Roberts had, because our danger is many times greater than was England's danger. We are practically defenseless, while England was not. I quote the following from the American Lord Roberts, General Leonard Wood: * * * * * "_... We have neither guns nor ammunition sufficient to give any general commanding an army in the field any assurance of success if attacked by an army of equal size which is supplied with its proper quota of field-artillery._ "_The fire of modern field-artillery is so deadly that troops cannot advance over terrain swept by these guns without prohibitive losses. It is therefore necessary to neutralize the fire of hostile guns before our troops can advance, and the only way to neutralize the fire of this hostile field-artillery is by field-artillery guns, for troops armed with the small arms are as effectual against this fire until they arrive at about 2,000 yards from it as though they were armed with knives. This field-artillery material and ammunition cannot be quickly obtained. In fact, the Chief of Ordnance estimates that almost one year would be required to supply the field-artillery guns needed with one field army of a little less than 70,000 men. No war within the past 45 years has lasted for one year, so that after war is declared it would probably be over before we could manufacture an appreciable number of guns; and the same applies to ammunition._ "_The Ordnance Department states that by running night and day with three shifts Frankford Arsenal could turn out about 1,600 rounds of ammunition per day, and that if private manufacturers were given orders to run under war conditions they could begin deliveries of ammunition in from three to four months, and after getting under way could turn out about 100,000 or 200,000 rounds per month for two or three months, and after a total time of six months the production would perhaps equal 250,000 rounds per month. The best estimates indicate that at the end of the first six months not to exceed 350,000 rounds could be procured from all sources, including the Government plant. After this six months there would be no particular difficulty in securing ammunition as rapidly as might be needed._