As “Patriot”--“Nederlander,” etc., he _may_ write ferocious epistles to the papers demanding a firm stand by his country on the side of right. But the compression of his left optic belies the supposition. Mynheer’s “neutrality” has very comfortably lined his own nest and his own inside. And yet he knows--none better that, should the tiger take it into his head, he would be gobbled up at a mouthful. Knows moreover that, if by any fatal chance the tiger won the game, he would inevitably be the next morsel to be gobbled. When Germany is at last on the run, the ferocious bellicose party will probably come in on the side of the winners. It is not a lofty game. But it probably pays. JOHN OXENHAM [Illustration: ONE OF THE FEROCIOUS BELLICOSE PARTY There existed a considerable party in Holland who were held up to derision for wishing their country to come into the war.] Holland and Militarism Louis Raemakers knows his own countrymen better than we can, and this satire at the expense of the peace at any price brigade is doubtless well deserved. The attitude might have been pardoned two years ago, but it is merely insane to-day. And none knows that fact better than Holland. Like America, she is taking care of herself; indeed, no nation has better reason to do so with a neighbour at her elbow unamenable to reason and uncontrolled by conscience. Historians to come, however, will argue that our blindness was unpardonable, and our surprise and unpreparedness before the advent of war must cast a heavy slur on the future credit of our past diplomacy. For what could be clearer than Germany’s attitude or brighter than the beacons which had directed and were still directing her course? Bernhardi tells us all there is to know; Frederick the Great established the Prussian tradition on a basis of fraud and force; Bismarck sustained it and William II. has striven to reap the harvest of their sowing. It has needed the united might of Europe to prevent him from doing so. But to cry out against Teutonic principle and practice, as though it were a thing of yesterday sprung upon us in these wars, is absurd. Every politician worthy the name had the pages of history open for his perusal. Frederick pointed out that alliances in which each contracting party has different interests must never hold good under all conditions, or represent a permanent political system. He declared that no alliance or agreement in the world can be effective after the bond of common and reciprocal interest is broken. Why then marvel at the Belgian “Scrap of paper,” or any number of them? It was a political commonplace with the German Chancellor and his Master that oaths should be broken at the moment it became inconvenient to keep them. Bernhardi himself says that political agreements must always be concluded with a tacit reservation and can only hold as long as the interests of both contracting parties are satisfied.