after the examination at
the frontier, being sent on by another train. In addition to the French
and Italian secret-service officials, there are now on duty at the
various frontier stations, and likewise in Athens, Naples, and Rome,
keen-eyed young officers of the "Hush-Hush Brigade," as the British
Intelligence Department is disrespectfully called, whose business it is
to scrutinize the thousands of British subjects--officers returning
from India, Egypt, or Salonika, or from service with the Mediterranean
fleet, King's messengers, diplomatic couriers--who are constantly
crossing Italy on their way to or from England.

That the arm of the enemy is very long, and that it is able to strike
at astounding distances and in the most unexpected places, is brought
sharply home to one as the train pulls out of the Genoa station. From
Genoa to Pisa, a distance of a hundred miles, the railway closely hugs
the Mediterranean shore. At night all the curtains on that side of the
train must be kept closely drawn and, as an additional precaution,
the white electric-light bulbs in the corridors and compartments have
been replaced by violet ones. If you ask the reason for this you are
usually met with evasions. But, if you persist, you learn that it is
done to avoid the danger of the trains being shelled by Austrian
submarines! (Imagine, if you please, the passengers on the New
York-Boston trains being ordered to keep their windows darkened
because enemy submarines have been reported off the coast.) In this
war remoteness from the firing-line does not assure safety. Spezia,
for example, which is a naval base of the first importance, is
separated from the firing-line by the width of the Italian peninsula.
Until a few months ago its inhabitants felt as snug and safe as though
they lived in Spain. Then, one night, an Austrian airman crossed the
Alps, winged his way above the Lombard plain, and let loose on Spezia
a rain of bombs which caused many deaths and did enormous damage.

Even the casual traveller in Italy to-day cannot fail to be struck by
the prosperity which the war has brought to the great manufacturing
cities of the north as contrasted with the commercial stagnation which
prevails in the southern provinces of the kingdom. In the munition
plants, most of which are in the north, are employed upward of half a
million workers, of whom 75,000 are women. Genoa, Milan, and Turin are
a-boom with industry. The great automobile factories