Since the epoch, now nearly forty years past, when SMITH made his immortal discovery of the Army Exterminator, followed up so rapidly by JONES’ invention of the Fleet Annihilator, international policy has necessarily undergone a great modification. As war has become impossible as an _ultima ratio_ in any case, and the principle of Arbitration, on which such hopes were founded, has proved ineffective, in consequence of the general refusal of the working classes to permit their governments to pay the _amendes_ agreed upon by the Arbitrators, a permanent state of discord between nations seems to have become established. The dream of Free Trade having also been exploded, following the example of the American Empire, at that time a Republic, (prohibitive duties having been placed by the different States on their own exports and the imports of other countries,) commerce is undoubtedly, just now, considerably hampered. The immense facilities for travelling which we possess, thanks to the æro-magnetic propeller, have also their disadvantages, since the abandonment of extradition treaties allows the criminals of each country to take refuge immediately in the neighbouring State, when they happen to entertain any serious objection to detention in the Penal Hospitals. For all these drawbacks to our progress, however, SCIENCE will no doubt soon provide an efficient remedy. We are on the high-road, it cannot be doubted, to a period of prosperity and universal longevity (after all, the main object of all rational ambition) such as the world has not hitherto beheld.