to settle what a word means or ought to mean. But it is
necessary in every argument to settle what we propose to mean by the
word. So long as our opponent understands what is the thing of which we
are talking, it does not matter to the argument whether the word is or
is not the one he would have chosen. A soldier does not say, "We were
ordered to go to Mechlin, but I would rather go to Malines." He may
discuss the etymology and archaeology of the difference on the march,
but the point is that he knows where to go. So long as we know what a
given word is to mean in a given discussion, it does not even matter if
it means something else in some other and quite distinct discussion. We
have a perfect right to say that the width of a window comes to four
feet, even if we instantly and cheerfully change the subject to the
larger mammals and say that an elephant has four feet. The identity of
the words does not matter, because there is no doubt at all about the
meanings, because nobody is likely to think of an elephant as four feet
long, or of a window as having tusks and a curly trunk.

*Two Meanings of "Barbarian."*

It is essential to emphasize this consciousness of the thing under
discussion in connection with two or three words that are, as it were,
the keywords of this war. One of them is the word "barbarian." The
Prussians apply it to the Russians, the Russians apply it to the
Prussians. Both, I think, really mean something that really exists, name
or no name. Both mean different things. And if we ask what these
different things are we shall understand why England and France prefer
Russia, and consider Prussia the really dangerous barbarian of the two.

To begin with, it goes so much deeper even than atrocities; of which, in
the past, at least, all the three empires of Central Europe have
partaken pretty equally; as they partook of Poland. An English writer,
seeking to avert the war by warnings against Russian influence, said
that the flogged backs of Polish women stood between us and the
Alliance. But not long before the flogging of women by an Austrian
General led to that officer being thrashed in the streets of London by
Barclay and Perkins draymen. And as for the third power, the Prussians,
it seems clear that they have treated Belgian women in a style compared
with which flogging might be called an official formality.

But, as I say, something much deeper than any such recrimination lies
behind the use of the