* * * Italy has suffered very much already for this war. All her commerce with the Continent has been stopped, as well as her shipping lines trading with Constantinople and the Black Sea. The shortage of petroleum, coal and wood has hit many of her industries, and some foodstuffs have increased considerably in prices. Moreover, the annual tide of foreigners which is the principal resource of many Italian towns has not come this year, and Italy begins to realise that if she is not going to war now, she has made enormous financial sacrifices to equip her army. She will have shared all the disadvantages of the fighting countries without being able to get any of the recompense. It is now for Italy to make a great decision. If she believes in her destiny, if she feels that there are in her energies, intelligence, and possibilities of taking her real place amongst the great Powers of Europe, she has to fight. If she feels she is not equal to such a task, then she had better become at once the first of the defensive countries and renounce all her dreams of empire; she had better sell her fleet, economise on armaments, and invest the money saved in first-class hotels, casinos, and spas. She has certainly beauty and natural advantages enough to out-rival Switzerland, Spain, or Norway. But the modern Italian is rather tired of being the citizen of a country admired only for her blue skies, her Roman monuments, and her rich museums. He is more proud of her industrial enterprise, of the wide expansion, of the wonderful progress of his country in the last fifty years, than of the fair pages of her history. He will not hear about renouncing what he calls the third renaissance of Italy. That is why I believe Italy is going to fight. CHAPTER IX FRANCE _Notes taken while Motoring on the Riviera._ MENTONE. In the southern sunshine it is a strain to realise that France is at war, that, in the north, the biggest war the world has ever seen is being fought out desperately day after day. The only unusual sight is the groups of Senegalais, the French Colonial soldiers, and the blackest niggers I have ever seen, walking at leisure on the parade with a curious movement of the arms and of the whole body, which reminds one, at the same time, of a bear in his cage and the balancing efforts of a dancer on the tight-rope. They are waiting expectantly to be sent to the battlefield, and in the meantime enjoying themselves, walking about holding each other's hands, and laughing at everything with a wide, good-natured laugh. Everybody likes them and spoils them. To see the Senegalais walking amongst the palm trees under the tropical sky of Mentone, clad in dark blue with the wide scarlet belt round their waists, is really a pleasure to the eyes.