itical courage of their Italian ally. Italy is not merely
fighting a first-class war in first-class fashion but she is doing
a big, dangerous, generous and far-sighted thing in fighting at all.
France and England were obliged to fight; the necessity was as plain as
daylight. The participation of Italy demanded a remoter wisdom. In the
long run she would have been swallowed up economically and politically
by Germany if she had not fought; but that was not a thing staring her
plainly in the face as the danger, insult and challenge stared France
and England in the face. What did stare her in the face was not merely a
considerable military and political risk, but the rupture of very close
financial and commercial ties. I found thoughtful men talking everywhere
I have been in Italy of two things, of the Jugo-Slav riddle and of the
question of post war finance. So far as the former matter goes, I think
the Italians are set upon the righteous solution of all such riddles,
they are possessed by an intelligent generosity. They are clearly set
upon deserving Jugo-Slav friendship; they understand the plain necessity
of open and friendly routes towards Roumania. It was an Italian who set
out to explain to me that Fiume must be at least a free port; it
would be wrong and foolish to cut the trade of Hungary off from the
Mediterranean. But the banking puzzle is a more intricate and puzzling
matter altogether than the possibility of trouble between Italian and
Jugo-Slav.

I write of these things with the simplicity of an angel, but without an
angelic detachment. Here are questions into which one does not so much
rush as get reluctantly pushed. Currency and banking are dry distasteful
questions, but it is clear that they are too much in the hands of
mystery-mongers; it is as much the duty of anyone who talks and writes
of affairs, it is as much the duty of every sane adult, to bring his
possibly poor and unsuitable wits to bear upon these things, as it is
for him to vote or enlist or pay his taxes. Behind the simple ostensible
spectacle of Italy recovering the unredeemed Italy of the Trentino
and East Venetia, goes on another drama. Has Italy been sinking into
something rather hard to define called "economic slavery"? Is she or is
she not escaping from that magical servitude? Before this question has
been under discussion for a minute comes a name--for a time I was really
quite unable to decide whether it is the name of the villain in th