the aid of the weaker, and then later the community deals with
the one who is the real aggressor. One may admit, if you will, that at
present there is no international law, and that it may not be possible
to create one. But we can at least exact that there shall be an inquiry,
a stay; and more often than not that alone would suffice to solve the
difficulty without the application of definite law.

It is just up to that point that the United States should at this stage
be ready to commit herself in the general council of conciliation,
namely, to say this: "We shall throw our weight against any power that
refuses to give civilization an opportunity at least of examining and
finding out what the facts of the dispute are. After due examination we
may reserve the right to withdraw from any further interference between
such power and its antagonist. But, at least, we pledge ourselves to
secure that by throwing the weight of such non-military influence as we
may have on to the side of the weaker." That is the point at which a new
society of nations would begin, as it is the point at which a society of
individuals has begun. And it is for the purpose of giving effect to her
undertaking in that one regard that America should become the centre of
a definite organization of that world State which has already cut
athwart all frontiers and traversed all seas.

It is not easy without apparent hyperbole to write of the service which
America would thus render to mankind. She would have discovered a new
sanction for human justice, would have made human society a reality. She
would have done something immeasurably greater, immeasurably more
beneficent than any of the conquests recorded in the long story of man's
mostly futile struggles. The democracy of America would have done
something which the despots and the conquerors of all time, from
Alexander and Caesar to Napoleon and the Kaiser, have found to be
impossible. Dangerous as I believe national vanity to be, America would,
I think, find in the pride of this achievement--this American leadership
of the human race--a glory that would not be vain, a world victory which
the world would welcome.

SIR CHRISTOPHER CRADOCK.

By JOHN E. DOLSON.

Through the fog of the fight we could dimly see,
As ever the flame from the big guns flashed,
That Cradock was doomed, yet his men and he,
With their plates shot to junk, and their turrets smashed,
Their ship hee