England (the fort set on the seas that are free), and so across to the Baltic again shall the circle be formed, of which every part is essential and irreplaceable. And like some inexhaustible regiment in reserve America watches from the west. But it is not only by land to check the soaking of the corrosive German acid eastwards, “peacefully” distilled by Jews and Turks, or to stay the march of German legions that a free and united Poland shall stand insolubly linked to anti-Teutonic forces, but by sea also that she shall hold in her hand the containing cord. As we have already noticed, the Central Empires have let slip what they really mean by the freedom of the seas, and by their gracious permission they concede to the rest of Europe undisputed passage over the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans: but they have explicitly told us that the freedom of the high seas does not extend to the narrow seas. The Black Sea therefore and the Adriatic and the Baltic must remain as they are to-day, German lakes, where perhaps ships of other nations may cruise for their own pleasure or for Germany’s profit, so long as Germany has not more serious business on hand. Then up shall go the signal “Closing Time,” and they shall be barred to us until Germany, behind fortified entrances and mined waters shall have made her naval preparations. There is no exaggeration about this: this is precisely what Germany means, and what she has said. Thus not on land alone Poland shall be significant for the freedom of Europe; she will be, with the coast of the Baltic in her hands, significant as regards the freedom of the narrow seas over which Germany claims the sole control. For not only will the loss of this coast be an open door into the sea which otherwise Germany, in her present domination of the Baltic, might close at will, but in a far larger measure than this Poland will be an essential link in the chain that by sea no less than by land will effectually bar the limitless expansion of Germany’s scheme of slavery for the world. For here will be the northern termination of the line of unbroken anti-German states that will extend in a south-easterly direction across Europe to the ports of the second of the narrow seas that to-day is German, and from Dantzig to Costanza the line of federation will be complete. There on the Black Sea to-day every port is in German control. Through Turkey’s subordination to her she has her finger on Trebizond and Batoum, and the key to the whole of that littoral, Constantinople; by her peace with the Ukraine she is port-master of the South Russian harbours. By her conquest of Rumania, Costanza is controlled from Berlin.