tered a long
hall with a stage and scenery at the end. All the tables were full of a
very quiet crowd drinking most harmless red wine. I sat near Landauer.
He is a very nervous, keen, eager young fellow, with the thin,
well-marked eyebrows in a curve which perhaps show the revolutionary or
at the least the man in revolt. But his general aspect and that of his
immediate friends and colleagues is extremely gentle and mild; this no
one can help marking.

The proceedings began with a long speech by Werner and were continued by
a Dutch journalist, who took the contrary side but was listened to with
exemplary patience. He was controverted by Domela Niewenhuis, the leader
of the Dutch, who looks a mediaeval saint but speaks with great vigour
and some humour.

The most noticeable feature of this revolutionary meeting was its
extreme peace and the great firmness with which every attempt at noise
or interruption was put down. The only really violent speech made during
the evening was by a fair Italian, who called the German Parliamentary
Socialist "Borghesi" and recommended their immediate extinction by all
means within the power of those who objected to their methods. Landauer,
their revolutionary leader, spoke after him, and though greatly excited
was not particularly violent. I talked with him the morning after and
endeavoured to explain to him why the English workers were more
conservative and more ready to trust to constitutional methods of
enforcing their views. For it is the triple combination of long hours,
low wages and militarism that makes the German violent and impatient of
the slow order of change recommended by the Parliamentarians, who, so
far, have done nothing.

AT LAS PALMAS

On a map the Canary Islands look like seven irregular fish scales, and
of these Grand Canary is a cycloid scale. For it is round and has deep
folds or barrancas in it, running from its highest point in the middle.
Like all the other islands it is a volcanic ash pile, or fire and cinder
heap, cut and scarped by its rain storms of winter till all valleys seem
to run to the centre. With a shovel of ashes and a watering-pot one
could easily make a copy in miniature of the island, and at the first
blush it seems when one lands at Las Palmas that one has come to the
cinder and sand dumping ground of all the world, an enlarged edition of
Mr Boffin's dust heaps, a kind of gigantic and glorified Harmony Jail.
There is no more disillusio