ropriate epithets applied to the authors of them. See _White Book_,
Nos. 177 foll.

[14] Zalocostas to Legations of France, England, Italy and Russia, 28
Dec./10 Jan., 1917.

[15] See _The Times_, 20, 23, 24, 30 Jan., 1917.

{172}

CHAPTER XVI

Among the acts sanctioned by International Law, none is more worthy of
a philosopher's or a philanthropist's attention than the "pacific
blockade." The credit for the institution belongs to all the great
civilised communities, but for its pleasant designation the world is
indebted to the eminent jurist M. Hautefeuille--a countryman of the
ingenious Dr. Guillotin. It denotes "a blockade exercised by a great
Power for the purpose of bringing pressure to bear on a weaker State,
without actual war. That it is an act of violence, and therefore in
the nature of war, is undeniable";[1] but, besides its name, it
possesses certain features which distinguish it advantageously from
ordinary war.

First, instead of the barbarous effusion of blood and swift destruction
which open hostilities entail, the pacific blockade achieves its ends
by more refined and leisurely means: one is not shocked by the unseemly
sights of a battlefield, and the wielder of the weapon has time to
watch its effects as they develop: he can see the victim going through
the successive stages of misery--debility, languor, exhaustion--until
the final point is reached; and as his scientific curiosity is
gratified by the gradual manifestation of the various symptoms, so his
moral sense is fortified by the struggle between a proud spirit and an
empty stomach--than which life can offer no more ennobling spectacle.
Then, unlike crude war, the pacific blockade automatically strikes the
nation at which it is aimed on its weakest side first: instead of
having to begin with its manhood, one begins with its old men, its
women, and its infants. The merits of this form of attack are evident:
many a man who would boldly face starvation himself, may be reasonably
expected to flinch at the prospect of a starving mother, {173} wife, or
child. Lastly, whilst in war the assailant must inevitably suffer as
well as inflict losses, the pacific blockade renders him absolutely
exempt from all risk. For "it can only be employed as a measure of
coercion by maritime Powers able to bring into action such vastly
superior forces to those the resisting State can dispose of, that
resistance is out of the question." [2]

In brief