iendship." The
Italian Government, however, had now got almost their whole country
behind them, and in the months after the War so many Italians had become
warlike that they were enchanted with the picture drawn by Gabriele
d'Annunzio: "And what peace will in the end be imposed on us, poor
little ones of Christ? A Gallic peace? A British peace? A star-spangled
peace? Then, no! Enough! Victorious Italy--the most victorious of all
the nations--victorious over herself and over the enemy--will have on
the Alps and over her sea the _Pax Romana_, the sole peace that is
fitting. If necessary we will meet the new plot in the fashion of the
Arditi [units of volunteers employed on specially dangerous
enterprises], a grenade in each hand and a knife between our teeth." It
is true that the other poor little ones of Christ, the Franciscans, who
are greatly beloved by the people of Dalmatia, from whom they are
sprung, have hitherto preached a different _Pax Romana_. The Dalmatian
clergy, who are patriotic, have been rather a stumbling-block in the
way of the Italians. A very small percentage of them--about six in a
thousand--have been anti-national and opportunist. At one place a priest
whom his bishop had some years ago had occasion to expel, returned with
the Italian army in November 1918 and informed the bishop that he had a
letter from the Pope which reinstated him, but he refused to show this
letter. He was anxious to preach on the following Sunday; the bishop
declined to allow him. Then came unto the bishop the chief of the
Italian soldiery and he said unto him: "Either thou shalt permit this
man to preach or I will cause thine office to be taken from thee."
Unfortunately the bishop yielded, and the sermon, as one would imagine,
was devoted to the greater glory of the Italians. Sometimes the
Italians, since their occupation, have made a more humorous if not more
successful use of the Church. On Palm Sunday, after the service a number
of peasants, in their best clothes, were walking through a village
holding the usual palm leaves in their hands. They were photographed,
and a popular Italian newspaper printed this as a full-page coloured
illustration. It was entitled: "Dalmatian Peasants on their way to pay
Homage to Admiral Millo."

This policy of a grenade in each hand and a knife between the teeth
makes a powerful appeal to the munition firms. And others who feed the
flame of Italo-Slav hatred are, as Gaetano Salvemini, the
a