It is refreshing to turn from the question of Conscription, befogged as it was by the stifling atmosphere of Westminster, to our army, working under the stars, rubbing shoulders with our Allies in the trenches, and, amid the bursting shells, establishing friendships and understandings that are not couched in lawyers’ language. There in Northern France a brotherhood has sprung into being which laughs at the arm-chair critics and takes no count of the blunders of politicians. But the arm-chair critic exists in France (as in England), and his garrulity in clubs and public places is by no means restrained by his lack of a real understanding of military affairs. Let us admit at once that the British Army has suffered from over prestige in the popular imagination of France; the French people thought that England’s help would be sumptuous, colossal, spontaneous and irresistible; and disappointment inevitably followed this exaggerated idea of the military assistance we should be able to give at the beginning of the war. One heard much criticism in France—indeed, one heard much the same in England: "Why did the English, for so long a time, take so small a share of the battle-line?" "Where were Kitchener’s great armies that were to join with the French to drive the Germans back to Berlin?" "Why did not the English create a diversion while the French were fighting at Verdun?" Such murmurings and complaints followed the relief and joy which welcomed the arrival of the British armies in France, and, among the uninformed portion of the population, resulted in a certain cooling off in the sentiment of friendliness. It was useless to urge that the British Expeditionary Force could not achieve the impossible; that an army cannot be built in a night; that General Joffre was responsible for the general direction of operations, and that the British could make no offensive that he did not decree. French popular opinion persisted in believing in the god their imagination had created, and bitterly proclaimed its feet to be of clay. But such is the work of the arm-chair critic all the world over. It is his business to destroy confidence, to find fault, to shake friendships; and of far more real value is the opinion of the French military command of our army in the field. Here, again, we must be prepared to hear some criticism—but considered criticism that weighs difficulties and estimates conditions. The French military observer notes an absence of good staff work on the English side, and he begins to account for it by saying that, to form a staff is a long and expensive process involving extensive scientific studies. Now it is apparent that, up to the time of the Great War, the profession of arms attracted rather the high-spirited and sporting type of man than the scientific student. In consequence, these excellent sportsmen were at a disadvantage, perfectly easy to comprehend, with the continental soldier. They had not had the same training. It was