one of the main causes why, in spite of deficient home production of necessaries, we have been able to stand the economic strain of the War. Striking off the fetters that it has been found necessary to impose--sometimes with undue strictness and pedantic minuteness--on British commerce and industry will be one of the first things to be hoped for from peace. It is impossible to give detailed examples here. Ask any merchant, he will give you specific instances of the need for a recovered freedom. Questions are so closely involved with each other that we may seem to be mixing up national trade interests with the ideal striving for peace and goodwill. Yet, after all, self-interest rightly understood and regard for the interests of others, with an honest wish for their welfare, are not feelings mutually exclusive. There is high authority for saying that "serving the Lord" is not incompatible with "diligence in business." It is quite possible to lay too much stress on the necessity for definite and formal sanctions to enforce agreements. There are cases in which the enforcement of a definite penalty for a wrongful act or for breach of an agreement is very difficult, but in which the "sense of moral obligation," "respect for public opinion," and "reliance on principles of mutual consent" do regularly operate so strongly that the rules of conduct laid down are in fact observed. On the Manchester Exchange thousands of agreements involving millions of money are made, the breach of which could not be made the ground of a successful action at law. The number of cases of repudiation of such agreements is almost negligible. To plead the Statute of Frauds in an action for non-delivery or non-acceptance of goods under such informal agreements might be a defence in the law courts, but would not save the defendant from the indeterminate but effective penalties due to the feeling of his fellows that he was acting dishonourably. It is instructive to notice that in dealing with the question of industrial disputes, which are in many ways analogous to international, at least where they arise between organised bodies of employers and of workpeople, the Whitley Committee, in a supplemental report issued in January, 1918, expressed the opinion: (1) that no attempt should be made to establish compulsory arbitration or compulsory legislation to prevent strikes and lock-outs; (2) that there should be standing arbitration councils or panels of arbitrators to whom disputes arising could be voluntarily referred; (3) that provision should be made for independent inquiry and report as to the merits of trade disputes; (4) that legal penalties for breach of an award or of an agreement made to settle a trade dispute should not be imposed; (5) that the decisions of industrial tribunals and arbitrators should be co-ordinated as far as possible, and that there should be opportunity for interchange of opinion between the arbitrators whose awards should be circulated.