When Germany conceived that the fateful moment had arrived, Germany pounced. France was friendly, but not active, Russia active and not friendly, Italy was busily occupied in Abyssinia, and nominally allied with Germany. Austria had her hands full in Macedonia, and was actually allied with Germany. Spain and Portugal did not count. Holland disappeared from the map, following the example of Denmark. The German cormorant swallowed them up, and German squadrons appropriated the harbours on the North Sea, as previously those on the Baltic. While these European changes were being effected with bewildering rapidity, our former allies, the Japanese, who had learnt naval warfare in the English school, played their own hand with notable promptitude and success. Japan had long had her eye on Australia. She wanted elbow room. She wanted to develop Asiatic power. Now was the time, when British warships were engaged in a stupendous struggle thousands of miles away. The little navy that the Australians had got together for purposes of self-defence crumpled up like paper boats under the big guns of the Yellow Fleet. Australia was lost. It made the heart ache to think of the changes wrought by the cruel hand of time--wrought in only a quarter of a century--in the pride of Britannia, in her power and her possessions. India, that once bright and splendid jewel in the British Crown, the great possession that gave the title of Empress to Queen Victoria of illustrious memory--India, as a British possession, had been sliced to less than half its size by those same Japanese, allied with pampered Hindu millions; and it was problematical whether what was left could be held much longer. The memorable alliance with Japan, running its course for several years, had worn sharp and thin towards the end. It had not been renewed. Japan never had really contemplated pulling chestnuts out of the fire for the sole benefit of Great Britain. They saved us from Russia only to help themselves; and now that Great Britain was derisively spoken of as Beggared Britain, the astute Jap, self-seeking, with limited ideas of gratitude, was England's enemy. In South Africa, alas! England had lost not only a slice, but all. The men of words had overruled the men of deeds. What had been won in many a hard-fought battle, was surrendered in the House of Commons. Patriotism had been superseded by a policy of expediency. The great Boer War had furnished a hecatomb of twenty thousand British lives. A hundred thousand mourners bowed their heads in resignation for those who died or fought and bled for England. Millions had groaned under the burden of the war tax, and then, after years, we had enabled Brother Boer to secure, by means of a ballot box, what he had lost for the world's good in the stricken field. They had talked of a union of races--a fond thing vainly invented. Oil and water never mix.